EREMIAH: 
 
 HIS LIFE & TIMES 
 
 BY 
 
 REV, CANON T, K, CHEYNE, M.A., D,D
 
 JEREMIAH
 
 JEREMIAH: 
 
 HIS LIFE AND TIMES. ^ 
 
 - 5lfC 
 
 REV. T. K. CHEYNE, M.A., D.D. 
 
 ORIEL PROFESSOR OF THE INTERPRETATION OF HOLY SCRIPTURE AT OXFORD, 
 CANON OF ROCHESTER. 
 
 JAMES NISBET AND CO., 
 21, BERNERS STREET, W.
 
 TO 
 
 PROF. EBERHARD SCHRADER, 
 Autljov of 
 
 "THE CUNEIFORM INSCRIPTIONS AND THE OLD TESTAMENT," 
 
 A FOREMOST PUPIL OF EWAI.D 
 AND PIONEER OK ASSYRIOI.OOY, 
 
 AS A MEMORIAL 
 
 OF PLEASANT PERSONAL INTERCOURSE 
 IN FORMER DAYS.
 
 C'est pour nous tons un devoir de rompre lecercle magique dans 
 lequcl nous rcstons volontairement enferm^s ; sachons nous con- 
 cilier le grand public par une bonne et scientifique vulgarisation de 
 nos travaux, et ne nous contentons pas de dix lectenrs erudits, 
 quand nous pouvous reunir dans notre auditoire tons ceux que 
 le pass<5 de I'csprit humain cliarme et attire. 
 
 M. BARBIER DE MEYNARD.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 JKREMIAH is one of the central figures of an exciting period 
 which has to be reconstructed by a combined effort of criticism 
 and imagination. It is nearly twenty years since I first began 
 to prepare for a commentary on Jeremiah, and since then the 
 book and its author have retained an interest for me. The ex- 
 position in the " Pulpit Commentary " (1883-1885) is a most 
 fragmentary realization of my original plan, and I was glad to 
 take up the pen once more. In the summer of 1887 I preached 
 a course of sermons on Jeremiah in Rochester Cathedral, simi- 
 lar to a course which I have printed on Elijah. 1 These sermons 
 are the germ of the present volume. 
 
 In these two biographies I have entered on a field which is 
 new to me the literary and yet critical treatment of those Old 
 Testament narratives which from my childhood I have loved. 
 With faltering steps I have sought to follow Arthur Stanley, 
 who regarded it as his mission "so to delineate the outward 
 events of the Old and New Testament, as that they should 
 come home with a new power to those who by long familiarity 
 have almost ceased to regard them as historical at all." It is 
 hoped that this volume may be an appropriate companion to 
 Dr. Driver's critical and yet both reverent and popular study 
 on the Life and Times of Isaiah. 
 
 I regret that, since Deuteronomy had to be brought in at all 
 hazards, it was impossible to discuss the question of the text 
 of Jeremiah, that of the arrangement of the prophecies, or that 
 of the origin of Jer. x. 1-16, and (see p. 168) 1., li. I should 
 now probably modify what I have written on these subjects in 
 
 1 " The Hallowing of Criticism " (Hodder and Stoughton, 1888).
 
 Vlll PREFACE. 
 
 the '' Encyclopaedia Britannica " (art. "Jeremiah "), and in the 
 " Pulpit Commentary," and should have to discuss them in 
 connexion with the larger question of the method of the editor 
 of Jeremiah, who, I suspect, dealt more freely with his material 
 (yet not so as to injure its true prophetic inspiration) than some 
 of the other editors of the prophecies. I have thought it best 
 on this occasion not to assume more than the most assured 
 results of criticism. The reader must make allowance for the 
 narrow limits prescribed to the volumes of this series. The 
 Book of Jeremiah itself is full of exegetical interest ; the character 
 of Jeremiah is a fascinating psychological problem ; the times 
 of Jeremiah are among the most important in Old Testament 
 history. On each of these subjects I have tried to throw some 
 light from various sources, and at the same time to kindle in 
 the reader that same reverential sympathy which I hope I feel 
 myself for this great prophet. 
 Sept. 1 8, 1888.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 JU DAM'S TRAGEDY DOWN TO THR DEATH OF JOS f AH. 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 (Ion COMMANDS TO TAKK THE TRUMPET i 
 
 The narrative of Jeremiah's call ; its biographical and spiritual 
 
 value. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 FKIKNDS IN COUNCIL 13 
 
 Jeremiah and his friends Reformers before the Reformation. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 Hol'l - \M> FEAKS QflCKI.Y REALIZED 21 
 
 Jeremiah's early discourses, and the historical inferences war- 
 ranted by them The quiescence of the reforming party The 
 sign granted at length The threatened Scythian invasion. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 MuKMNG-CLOUD GOODNESb 37 
 
 The crisis and its effects Religious reaction. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 ' Hi; THAT SEEKRTH, FIXDKTII " 48 
 
 The finding of the book of Divine instruction The national 
 covenant Jeremiah, a preacher of Deuteronomy.
 
 x CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 I' AGE 
 
 THE ANCIENT LAW TRANSFORMED 60 
 
 The publication of the first Scripture, its significance The lead- 
 ing ideas of Deuteronomy- -The effects of the recognition of 
 the Lawbook. 
 
 CHAPTER VI f. 
 
 FRAUD OR NEEDFUL ILLUSION? 69 
 
 Criticism of the narrative in 2 Kings xxii. The Mosaic author- 
 ship of the Lawbook, not tenable Reasons for this Notes on 
 the allusions to Egypt in Deuteronomy, and on the finding of 
 the Lawbook. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 "His REMEMBRANCE is LIKE Music" (ECCLUS. XLIX. i) . .87 
 
 David's "last words" fulfilled in Josiah His thirteen golden 
 years after the great covenant Jeremiah's comparative happi- 
 ness His friends among the wise men Pharaoh Neco profits 
 by the weakness of Assyria Josiah 's defeat at Megiddo ; his 
 death The national mourning The tragedy of his life, and of 
 Israel's history. 
 
 PART II. 
 
 THE CLOSE OF JUDAH S TRAGEDY. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE CLOUDS RETURN AFTER THE RAIN 102 
 
 Consequences of Josiah's death Jeremiah's changed attitude 
 towards Deuteronomy His visit to Anathoth. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ON THE VERGE OF MARTYRDOM 114 
 
 Jeremiah's sermon in the Temple The fate of Shiloh The 
 prophet's trial and acquittal The martyrdom of Uriah. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 KEEP THE MUNITION, WATCH THE WAY ! 125 
 
 Progress of Neco Accession of Jehoahaz, and soon after of 
 Jelioiakim Fall of Nineveh Neco's defeat by Nebuchadrezzar 
 Dread of Babylon at Jerusalem Jeremiah's new peace of 
 mind His prophecy on Egypt, &c
 
 CONTENTS. XI 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 TAGS 
 
 THERE BE GODS MANY, LORDS 'MANY 139 
 
 Jeremiah's verdict upon the later kings Nebuchadrezzar 
 crosses the border Duel between Jeremiah and Jehoiakim. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 BKIGHT VISIONS IN THE DEATH-CHAMI:EK 148 
 
 Jeremiah's Wartburg period and its results The drought The 
 problem of Israel's spiritual condition The new covenant - 
 Jehoiakim's rebellion The Rechabites Two symbolic actions 
 Jehoiachin's captivity His character and Nebuchadrezzar's. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 1 1 THOU HADST KNOWN, EVEN THOU! 165 
 
 Xedekiah ; his accession and character Kzekiel, the prophet of 
 the exiles The lower prophets at home and in Babylonia Zede- 
 kiah's revolt First siege of Jerusalem Imprisonment of Jere- 
 miah His purchase of family-property He is again in danger 
 of his life Cast into the cistern Ebedmelceh's help Fall of 
 Jerusalem Book of Lamentation. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 A PASTOR'S STRANGE FAREWELL 182 
 
 Gedaliah becomes viceroy The prophet stays with him at Miz- 
 pah IshmaePs outrages Flight from Mizpah Migration into 
 Egypt The heathen festival The stormy colloquy. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 PER CHUCEM AD LUCEM 200 
 
 Legendary accounts of Jeremiah's death His sufferings and 
 compensations Jeremiah compared with Milton and Savonarola 
 The spring foreseen by the Israelite and the Italian still future.
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE 
 
 (Supplementary to Table in Driver's "Isaiah" in this series} 
 
 B.C. 
 
 685-641 Reign of Manasseh. 
 
 640-639 Amon. 
 
 638-608 Josiah. 
 
 608 Jehoahaz. 
 
 607-597 .. Jehoiakim. 
 
 en* ,, Jehoiachin. 
 
 596-586 Zedekiah. 
 
 ** These dates are taken from Kamphausen's "Die Chronologic 
 der hebraischen Konige '' (Bonn, 1883).
 
 PART I. 
 
 JUDA1VS TRAGEDY DOWN TO THE DEATH OF 
 JOSIAII. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 GOD COMMANDS TO TAKE THE TRUMPET. 
 
 The narrative of Jeremiah's call ; its biographical and spiritual value. 
 
 THE peculiar importance of Jeremiah, both as a man and as an 
 actor in an unique tragedy, is too visible upon every page of his 
 wrilings to need explanation at the outset. His life resembles 
 no other life ; his character and his experiences are full of 
 surprises which stimulate thought on great moral and religious 
 problems. The introductory paragraph (i. i), due perhaps to 
 his faithful secretary Baruch, is of itself of a somewhat startling 
 nature. Is it not strange that the herald of the Church of the 
 New Covenant should have been a hereditary member of the 
 sacerdotal order ? There is nothing however to indicate that 
 he ever performed priestly functions. Ezekiel very possibly 
 did ; he was not called so young as Jeremiah, and was evidently 
 well acquainted with and keenly interested in the traditions of 
 the priesthood. Still, Jeremiah had a true priestly heart in the 
 deepest sense of the word. By intense sympathy, he so iden- 
 tified himself with his people as to feel their sins and sufferings 
 his own, and bear them on his heart before his God. He was 
 a priest, not merely by birth, but by the grace of God ; and his 
 life, as a critical view of the Psalter proves, was a fertile seed 
 of similar Christ-like self-forgetfulness. 
 
 It was not all at once, indeed, that Jeremiah attained the 
 heights of saintly heroism. There was a time when no more 
 than Moses (Exod. iv. 13) could he deny that he had sought to 
 evade a pastor's grave responsibilities (comp. xvii. 16), when he 
 agonized, as in a Gethsemane, confessing the divinity of the 
 
 2
 
 2 JEREMIAH. 
 
 impulse which stirred him, but painfully conscious of his own 
 natural infirmity. He tells us so himself in his book, parts of 
 which might fitly be called " The Confessions of Jeremiah ; " 
 for, admitting that later experiences may have coloured the form 
 of the introductory narrative, a solid substratum of fact must, 
 even on psychological grounds, be assumed. It was the 
 thirteenth year of King Josiah when three distinct heavenly 
 voices reached the youthful Jeremiah reached him, that is, 
 not from a God without, but from the God within him ; or, in 
 Western language, he passed through three separate, though 
 connected, phases of consciousness, which he could not but 
 ascribe to a direct Divine influence. I cannot say more about 
 this belief of Jeremiah's in this place ; those who will, may 
 accuse what I have said of vagueness ; the phenomena of 
 Biblical religion cannot be brought under the clear, cold defi- 
 nitions of Western orthodoxy. A fresh and openminded 
 re-examination of the religion of the Old Testament is urgently 
 called for, and a sketch of the life and times of a single prophet 
 is not the place to insert one of the chapters in such an 
 exposition. Suffice it to say that Jeremiah must have had 
 inner experiences at a still earlier age, which made these 
 phases of consciousness in a psychological sense possible. A 
 veil may conceal them from view, but of what prophetic 
 experiences (in the wider sense) must not the same confession, 
 to some extent at least, be made ? We may at least be sure 
 that, as with St. Paul, so with Jeremiah, there was a "gracious 
 proportion between the revelation vouchsafed and the mental 
 state of the person receiving it." In both cases there is some 
 material for conjecture, but I doubt if the main object of this 
 book will be served by an attempt which might reasonably 
 enough be made in a critical survey of Old Testament prophecy. 
 I prefer therefore to confine myself now to the distinct state- 
 ments of the Biblical record. 
 
 The first Divine truth of which Jeremiah became conscious 
 may be summed up thus Jehovah hath foreordained thee to 
 be a prophet x (Jer. i. 5). To understand this we must read the 
 
 1 Observe to be a prophet not a Nazirite as well (Plumptre). The two 
 classes are evidently distinguished (Amos ii. u, 12). Jeremiah's sorrowful 
 experiences may have made him an ascetic, but such an one needed no 
 outward rules. Nor, probably, was his life, even after his call, one of 
 unmixed gloom.
 
 GOD COMMANDS TO TAKE THE TRUMPET. 3 
 
 1 39th Psalm. Every man's career is written in the book of 
 God ; but, if possible, there are some careers more legibly 
 written than others. To some it is only given to see God's 
 "purpose" (Ixxiii. 24) concerning them at the end of life; 
 while others, like Abraham (Gen. xviii. 19), Cyrus (Isa. xlv. 4), 
 and Jeremiah, are assured from the very first that the personal 
 God has distinguished and selected them (I knew thee, means 
 all this) to perform a special work for Him. It inspires them 
 with double energy and enthusiasm, and is a part of the secret 
 of their success. The belief in predestination, as Ewald truly 
 observes, was a " powerful lever in Hebrew prophecy 1 ; " and 
 though "prophet,'' "religious reformer," and (much less) 
 " saint," are not absolutely synonymous terms, we may well 
 appropriate the lesson that (in the words of Milman) "he who 
 is not predestined, who does not declare, who does not believe 
 himself predestinated as the author of a great religious move- 
 ment, he in whom God is not manifestly, sensibly, avowedly 
 working out his pre-established designs, will never be saint or 
 reformer." 2 This did not, however, become Jeremiah's con- 
 viction without an attempt at resistance. 
 
 And I said, A fas, O Lord Jehovah ! behold, I cannot speak; 
 for I am (still) young (like a young man); i. 6. It is a cry of 
 pain. Jeremiah is too warmhearted to regard with any com- 
 placence the office of a censor ; it hurts him to say that which 
 will give pain to others. He would fain live at peace with all 
 men, and one of his saddest complaints in later life is this 
 Woe is me, my mother, that thou hast borne me, with whom all 
 the world has strife and contention (xv. 10). It is also a cry of 
 alarm. How can one who is not yet of mature age in Oriental 
 society a young man has no role to play expect to be listened 
 to, especially by those who have been already fascinated by 
 more flattering orators? And even if his credentials were 
 accepted and his prophetic message received, is it not too 
 likely that, through the malice of those whom he provokes, his 
 career will be cut short when it has scarcely begun ? 
 
 And so a man uniquely qualified to promote it was well nigh 
 lost to the cause of spiritual religion. There were hundreds of 
 
 1 " Die Lehre der Bibel von Gott," ii. 208. 
 
 2 " History of Latin Christianity,'' i. 112. Perhaps some may wish the 
 word " saint " away from this fine passage ; for are not all Christians called 
 to be (not, to become) saints (icX;roi rYyioi)?
 
 4 JEREMIAH. 
 
 stationary and unprogressive religionists who exercised the 
 sacred office of prophet ; there were few indeed to be compared 
 with Jeremiah. There were Zephaniah and Habakkuk, and we 
 shall be indebted to these prophets later on for illustrations ; 
 but, if we may judge from Jeremiah's account, the main drift 
 of prophetic influence was downwards and not upwards. The 
 young man is only too conscious of this, and in his pain and 
 alarm almost makes the "great refusal" to apply once more 
 the phrase (Dante, " Inf." iii. 60) which has been so variously 
 interpreted. His first impulse was insufficient to carry him 
 away, and so the God of revelation caused a second, which, 
 translated into words, could be expressed thus 
 
 Say not, I am (still) young; for to whomsoever I send thee, 
 thou must go, and whatsoever I command thce, thou must speak. 
 Be not afraid because of them; for I am with thee to deliver 
 thec, saith Jehovah (i. 7, 8). 
 
 God had his own method for overcoming Jeremiah's hesi- 
 tancy. First, he heightened the young man's consciousness of 
 a Divine call. He made him feel that the work to which he 
 was summoned was not his own but God's that the youth 
 would be lost in his message. How could he be disobedient 
 to the voice which came indeed from above, but which he 
 heard within himself? The lion roareth who will not fear ? 
 tJic Lord JcJiovah hath spoken,who can but prophesy I (Amos iii. 
 8 ; cf. Hos. xi. 10). The path of duty was the path of safety 
 above all for one called to be a prophet. As another propheti- 
 cally-minded writer says in lyric verse 
 
 I have set Jehovah before me continually ; 
 
 With him at my riyht hand, I cannot be moved (Psa. xvi. 8). 
 
 Did Jeremiah think of God's early promise of deliverance, as 
 he went through his last brief agony ? Did his heart tell him 
 that God could be better than his promise, and even in death 
 could "deliver" him from the songless, praiseless world of the 
 shades? But we must not anticipate too much, though here as 
 elsewhere it is true that "coming events cast their shadow 
 before." 
 
 While Jeremiah is pondering, a third voice reaches him, 
 Behold I put (or, I have put) my words in thy mouth (i. 9) : 
 that is, whenever the occasion to prophesy arises, Jehovah will 
 supply the fitting words, just as Jesus Christ said to His dis-
 
 GOD COMMANDS TO TAKE THE TRUMPET. 5 
 
 ciples, When they deliver you iip, be not diet-careful, for it is 
 not ye tJiat speak, but Hie Spirit of your Father ii'/io speaketk 
 in you (Matt. x. 20). But how is this? Docs the Biblical 
 record sanction the later Hellenistic view of inspiration, which 
 impressed itself so firmly on traditional theology, that, as 
 Hooker says, " so oft as God employed them (the prophets) in 
 this heavenly work, they neither spake nor wrote any word of 
 their own, but uttered syllable by syllable as the Spirit put it 
 into their mouths, no otherwise than the harp or the lute doth 
 give a sound according to the discretion of his hands that 
 holdeth and striketh it with skill" 1 ? No; this would be to 
 degrade Jeremiah to the level of a /uJt'rif or a Trpo^j/rj/e (Plato, 
 "Timaeus," 72 B), or since we are speaking of a Semitic and 
 not an Aryan religion of an Arabian kdhin whose personality 
 is entirely absorbed in that of the genius or divinity who speaks 
 through him. 2 Jeremiah's book is too full of human nature to 
 allow us to imagine this for a moment. / have put my words 
 in thy mouth, cannot, of course, mean anything poor or 
 commonplace. But who can say that such a paraphrase as 
 this gives an unworthy or inadequate meaning " I promise 
 never to leave thee in uncertainty as to thy message ; I will 
 guide and overrule the natural promptings of thy heart and 
 intellect as that thou shalt convey the only true conception of 
 my will which the language can express or the people of Israel 
 comprehend." 
 
 But this is not all. The voice adds 
 
 See, I set thec in charge this day over tJie nations and over 
 the kingdoms, to pluck up and to break down, to destroy and to 
 overthrow, to build and to plant* (i. 10). 
 
 It may seem strange that Jeremiah could thus early realize 
 
 1 " Works,"ed. Kcble, iii. 662 ; comp. I'hilo, II. 417, and other passages 
 
 Lee's " Inspiration,' 1 ist ed. pp. 54-57. Hooker, however, does not, like 
 Philo, represent unconsciousness as an essential condition of the prophetic 
 inspiration. According to him, the prophet? both sympathize with and 
 understand the words committed to them; according to I'hilo, "the 
 understanding goes away from home" (t^otKt^trcti o voi'c). 
 
 3 See Wellhausen, "Skizzen und Vorarbeiten," Heft 3, p. 133. 
 
 3 Sirach quotes this passage in his eulogy of great men, but apparently 
 explains it, in the sense suggested by Jer. xxxi. 28, of the pulling down 
 and building up of Israel. In the original context, it applies at least as 
 much to the non-Israelitiih world as to Israel.
 
 6 JEREMIAH. 
 
 the wide range appointed for his ministry, and some will 
 suspect that, writing perhaps twenty-three years afterwards, he 
 may have transferred his later conviction to those early days 
 when the state of his own country must have been the absorb- 
 ing theme of his meditation. Modern parallels to such a case 
 will at once suggest themselves how constantly for instance 
 Goethe violated strict historical truth in re-editing and re- 
 arranging his various works ! But why need we go beyond the 
 king of the Hebrew prophets? If at the opening of his 
 ministry Isaiah had really become certain (see Isa. vi. 9, 10) 
 that his preaching would only confirm his people in its blind 
 obstinacy, could he have had courage to work as cheerfully and 
 as sympathetically as he did? Must not his later experience 
 have cast a deep shadow over his recollections of the past ? 
 Psychologically, this is quite conceivable ; and it is certain that 
 the prophets were in no hurry to express their burning thoughts 
 and words in literary style. At any rate, it seems more than 
 probable that the phraseology of Jer. i. 10, 12 is modelled upon 
 a passage in one of Jeremiah's subsequent prophecies (xxxi. 
 28), and these verses cannot be taken alone the whole context 
 must equally have been affected by the prophet's later ex- 
 perience. 1 And yet may not the tntths which underlie tliis 
 verse have been already present to the mind of Jeremiah, 
 though he may have not fully realized their application to 
 his own case ? For what do the solemn words, / set thee in 
 charge over the nations, mean ? Surely this that it is not the 
 necessary result of certain physical laws when an institution, or 
 a dynasty, or a people, is overthrown and perishes. The forces 
 of nature are, according to this passage, but ministers of 
 Jehovah, " fulfilling His word." The one absolute Power in 
 the universe is God's " wisdom," or thought, or purpose, or 
 word a Power which, both in the sphere of creation and in 
 that of government, has two aspects a destructive and a con- 
 structive, so that the world is a mysterious scene of blended 
 production and destruction. Between this great Power and 
 ordinary mankind the prophet is the link ; he has in a certain 
 sense to co-operate with God by pronouncing words which are 
 in a secondary sense forces. 
 
 1 Possibly, too, w. 18, 19 may be a development of xv. 20, 21, though 
 Ewald regards the latter verses as a (shortened) " repetition " of i. 18, 19.
 
 GOD COMMANDS TO TAKE THE TRUMPET. 7 
 
 " Tis not in me to give or take away, 
 
 But He who guides the thunder-peals on high, 
 He tunes my voice, the tones of His deep sway 
 
 Faintly to echo in the nether sky. 
 Therefore I bid earth's glories set or shine, 
 And it is so ; my words are sacraments divine." 1 
 
 If Jeremiah had already grasped the truth that Jehovah was 
 the God of the whole earth and is there any reason to doubt 
 this ? why should he not have had at least a presentiment (i) 
 that to the world at large, as well as to Israel, he had a pro- 
 phetic mission ; and (2) that if he was called to destroy and to 
 overthrow, this was only that he might, as a fellow-worker with 
 God, plant and build up ? The former conviction without the 
 latter would have been a source of deepest anguish. One who, 
 as a prophet, was set in charge even over a single nation needed 
 all the strength and comfort which could be conveyed to him. 
 Why should not He, " by whose holy inspiration we think those 
 things that be good," have suggested to Jeremiah's mind a 
 bright though as yet vague vision, not of Israel alone, but also 
 of the other nations, emerging regenerate from the temporary 
 chaos of political ruin. At a later time the vision reappeared 
 (xxxi. 28), and became the subject of earnest meditation, though 
 doubtless it is for God's " first-born son," Israel, that Jeremiah 
 is chiefly concerned. 
 
 I have spoken of this experience of the young prophet as an 
 inward experience. So it mainly was. But it was accom- 
 panied with imaginations which were as real to him as if they 
 had been visible to the outward eye. They partook of the 
 nature of visions, but, unlike many recorded visions, were un- 
 accompanied, as we must infer, with morbid, moral, or physical 
 phenomena. I mention this to distinguish them from the vision 
 which attended the only inward experience analogous to our 
 prophet's with which extra-Biblical history acquaints us the 
 vision of Mohammed on Mount Hira. From a historical point 
 of view, Mohammed must be called the Prophet of Islam, and 
 his prophetic career was introduced by a vision which is alluded 
 to in the opening lines of the 96th Sura of the Koran. But the 
 mingled character of Mohammed's prophetic ministry is fore- 
 shadowed by the morbid elements in the phenomena of his 
 call. " From youth upwards," says the late Professor Palmer, 
 
 1 Lyra Afioslolicii, cxxiv., "Jeremiah" (by Keble).
 
 8 JEREMIAH. 
 
 " [Mohammed] had suffered from a nervous disorder which 
 tradition calls epilepsy, but the symptoms of which more closely 
 resembled certain hysterical phenomena well known and 
 diagnosed in the present time, and which are almost always 
 accompanied with hallucinations, abnormal exercise of the 
 mental functions, and not unfrequently with a certain amount 
 of deception, both voluntary and otherwise." ' One cannot, 
 however, be sure that we have the visions of the prophets 
 exactly as they were experienced, if they were written down a 
 long time afterwards, and the plays upon words which occur in 
 Jeremiah's account of his own visions, 2 warn us not to build too 
 much on the literal historical accuracy of the narrative. It will 
 be pardonable if some reader should doubt whether Jeremiah 
 meant us to believe that he had really had any vision at all 
 whether he does not presume that his readers will take these 
 so-called visions as pure literary fictions, such as have been 
 recognized in all great literary periods. The decision depends 
 on the range which each person allows to the quality of reve- 
 rence. For my part, I prefer to believe that one who is so 
 candid as Jeremiah in his descriptions of himself really did 
 experience a vision at this crisis of his inner life, like Isaiah 
 before him ; but I lay no stress upon this, because the opposite 
 view is possible, and Jeremiah's principal object in writing 
 verses 11-16 of chap. i. is to bring strikingly before us 
 the grand though not the only themes of his prophetic 
 discourses. 
 
 The first visionary experience of Jeremiah is described in the 
 words, And Jehovah put forth his hand and touched my nioiitJi 
 (i. 9). Just as God so often employs the letter of Scripture as 
 the channel of spiritual illumination, so here He repeated 
 a scene in the grand inaugural vision of Isaiah, because His 
 servant, by frequent study of that revealed vision, was prepared 
 to understand a similar experience. Jeremiah's inner eyes 
 were opened (2 Kings vi. 17), and he saw a Form, which he 
 does not attempt to describe, approach him and touch his lips. 
 What this meant could only become clear by the Divine 
 guidance of the prophet's reasoning powers. Isaiah had been 
 led to interpret a similar action, performed by one of the sera- 
 
 1 "The Qur'an" (Oxford, 1880), Part i., Introd., p. xx. 
 3 These plays upon words remind us of Amos viii. 2, which was probably 
 Jeremiah's model.
 
 GOD COMMANDS TO TAKE THE TRUMPET. 9 
 
 phim, of the purification of his "unclean lips" (Isa. vi. 9); 
 Jeremiah, however, understands the Divine touch to mean the 
 revelation of a truth the communication of a message from 
 Jehovah to Israel. No longer could he complain, like Moses, 
 of inability to speak ; He who gave the theme would so lift up 
 his whole being that the most appropriate words would rise 
 unsought for to his lips. 
 
 Two more visions are recorded in the same chapter, which 
 the prophet, with intuitive certainty, interprets that is, with 
 which he connects a truth impressed upon his mind with Divine 
 power. The first is of the rod of an almond tree (i. 1 1). The 
 Israelites, with the unconscious natural poetry of primitive times, 
 called it shaqed, or the "wakeful" tree, because it blossoms 
 in Palestine as early as January, when all the rest of the plant- 
 world seems asleep. So, thought Jeremiah (it was God who 
 suggested the thought), Jehovah will be wakeful over his word; 
 that is, will break through the winter of man's careless sleep by 
 a sudden but not premature fulfilment of the purpose which His 
 prophets have announced (comp. xxxi. 28 ; xliv. 27). The 
 second is a seething cauldron with its front turned from ///< 
 north (i. 13). The fire of war is a frequent image in Arabic 
 literal me. Thus one poet says 
 
 " Their sternness remains unflagging, though they be rcastcd, 
 Again and agnin in War's most flaming furnace ; " ' 
 
 and another, speaking of fierce warriors, long used to the 
 helmet 
 
 " White are our foreheads and worn ; for ever our cauldrons boil ; " 2 
 
 in commenting on which the scholiast quotes a verse from 
 another poem in which, still more distinctly, the boiling caul- 
 dron seems to mean the desolation caused by war. In Isaiah, 
 too, fire is an image for war, but of war regarded as a judgment 
 sent from Jehovah (Isa. ix. 19; x. 17, 18). The cauldron in 
 Jeremiah's vision is on the point of boiling over, and the seer's 
 intuitive interpretation (intuitive, and therefore Divinely sanc- 
 
 1 I.yall, "Ancient Arabian Poetry, 1 ' p. 8; " Ham Asa," ed. Freytag, 
 p. 13, 1. 4. 
 
 2 Lyall, p. 18 ; "Ilamasa," p. 47, 1. 7.
 
 10 JEREMIAH. 
 
 tioned) ' is, Out of the north shall the evil seethe (i.e., come 
 seething), over all the inhabitants of the land (i. 14). "The 
 evil " means that which Jeremiah has already learned to 
 expect, as a thinker trained in the school of Amos and Isaiah 
 "the evil" which sin, when it is mature, necessarily produces, 
 by a law of God's moral government. And why "out of the 
 north " ? Does it mean that the threatened invaders will be a 
 northern people (comp. v. 15 with Ezek. xxxix. 2), or simply 
 that the road which they will take will lead them through the 
 north of Palestine ? We must leave this question until Jere- 
 miah's own prophecies supply us with the means of answering 
 it. 
 
 It is needless to say much more on this opening chapter, the 
 remainder of which is of little biographical use for this, the 
 earliest stage of Jeremiah's ministry. It contains three ideas, 
 (i) That Jeremiah is to say out frankly and fearlessly whatever 
 message may be given him ; (2) That he will encounter great 
 opposition ; and (3) That Jehovah's protection will render His 
 prophet invincible. Two of these ideas are repeated from the 
 first part of the chapter ; the third is one which can hardly 
 have been realized by Jeremiah as fully as the words would 
 imply. I think we shall gain something if now and then we 
 read the first fourteen verses by themselves. They give us a 
 striking picture of what Jeremiah was by nature, and what 
 Jehovah would have him become, and will, I hope, prepossess 
 us in favour of the prophet and the book which he and his dis- 
 ciples have left us. Shall we not let this favourable bias have 
 full play, and allow Jeremiah some influence in forming our 
 character, remembering that " whoso receiveth a prophet in the 
 name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward." Prophets 
 are few and far between, even if the term be stretched to in- 
 clude all great moral and religious teachers ; but of those who 
 "receive a prophet," in the highest sense of the phrase, by em- 
 bodying the truths which he teaches in their life and character, 
 there may and should be many. We cannot all be Shake- 
 speares, but we can all take up some part of Shakespeare into 
 
 1 Does not this parenthesis justify the self-confidence of prophets like 
 Hananiah (ch. xxviii.) ? It explains it, I would rather say. As a prophet's 
 God, so his prophetic intuitions. A false or at least inaccurate conception 
 of God was as virtually powerful for the lower prophets as a true conception 
 was for the higher prophets like Jeremiah.
 
 GOD COMMANDS TO TAKE THE TRUMPET. II 
 
 ourselves. We cannot all be prophets, but we can all be dis- 
 ciples of the prophets, and receive a prophet's reward. 
 
 As the earnest of such a reward, may we seek to have the 
 inner experiences which Jeremiah had in his early manhood ! 
 May we open our ears to the still small voice of God's Spirit ! 
 May we never thrust ourselves into any post without the sense 
 that we are providentially called to it ! On the other hand, 
 may we never reject a true call from any earthly consideration ! 
 A call to a position of comparative poverty may be just as truly 
 Divine as a call to riches and prosperity. Who so happy as he 
 who deliberately sacrifices a brilliant prospect for the sake of 
 his conscience ? May we learn to submit our personal wishes 
 and aspirations to that supreme authority whose oracle is 
 within us, and whose living voice is known to the obedient 
 disciple as the shepherd's voice is known to the sheep ! When 
 langour or depression creeps over us, may the thought of duty 
 revive us, and be to us an inspiration ! In circumstances of 
 danger, may God's Spirit teach us how to speak and how to 
 act ! May our natural graces be transformed into supernatural, 
 and even our natural disqualifications be overruled to the profit 
 of ourselves and our work ! And may we learn something even 
 from that part of Jeremiah's " vision " which speaks of " destroy- 
 ing" and "building up" learn, that is, to trust God more 
 boldly, not only for ourselves, not only for society, but also for 
 the Church, remembering that Christ's religion is not bound up 
 with this or that form or system, is not indeed properly a form 
 nor a system, but a spirit and a life, and that the gospel lives 
 and thrives upon honest inquiry, and delightedly assimilates 
 fresh truth. Christ is the great Reconciler both in the spiritual 
 and in the intellectual sphere, both in the individual soul and in 
 society at large, and all outward changes and painful revolu- 
 tions are but the disguised ministers of His all-reconciling 
 Love. 
 
 Need I offer an excuse for this appeal addressed to myself as 
 much as to my readers. If so, why, let me ask, should books on 
 the Scriptures be written solely in the academical or historical 
 style? Is there not a human nature common alike to the 
 historical critic and to the ordinary reader of the Bible ? Why 
 is it that the patristic commentators still possess an attractive- 
 ness for many students? They are deficient in that self- 
 projection into a different order of ideas which is necessary for
 
 12 JEREMIAH. 
 
 the historical realization of distant times, but they see the per- 
 manent elements in Scripture- teaching, even if they exaggerate 
 them. " Their whole soul is stirred and penetrated with words 
 which to them are manifestly full of the words and Spirit of 
 God ; their reading leaves them aflame with the enthusiasm of 
 admiration, delight, awe, hope'"' (Dean Church). Is it impos- 
 sible that, among the many new developments of the Christian 
 life for which Providence is preparing us, this may be one 
 the union of the critical with the devotional and with the social 
 spirit ? Are there not even now some examples of this union, 
 like the first ripe fruit in prophetic imagery, " wise master- 
 builders " (i Cor. iii. 10) of the Church of the future ?
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 FRIENDS IN. COUNCIL. 
 Jeremiah and his friends Reformers before the Reformation. 
 
 THE conflict between Jeremiah and the constituted authorities 
 referred to at the end of Chapter I. belongs properly to the 
 time of Jehoiakim and his successors ; but surely not less 
 important is the earlier period during which his character was 
 formed, and his hold upon fundamental truths became assured. 
 However scanty then may be the records concerning it, we 
 must make the most of them, and not refuse the help of 
 imaginative inference or conjecture. The dangers of an 
 undisciplined imagination are undeniable ; in the regions of 
 science and in those of history beacon-lights enough have risen 
 to view within the recollection of our generation, and far be it 
 from me to encourage the intrusion of a sensational element 
 into the hallowed study of the records of revelation. But the 
 fact that the imagination is a bad master does not nullify 
 its usefulness as a servant say rather, as God's appointed 
 minister for enabling us to realize the significance and the 
 beauty of His words and works in the past. A biography with 
 an element admitted to be imaginative may have less of 
 photographic accuracy than one based entirely on so-called 
 fact, but more of essential fidelity, both to the ideals and to 
 the achievements of a life. One is often tempted to ask, What 
 have we gained by the biographies of the present day, which 
 give us countless details but without a breath of realizing 
 imagination. Useless indeed would a " Life of Jeremiah" be, 
 if no attempt were made in it to reconstruct what may, or must
 
 14 JEREMIAH. 
 
 have been, the course of the prophet's development, by the 
 help of the imagination. 
 
 The only facts that we know as yet are that Jeremiah was 
 called to be a prophet in the thirteenth year of the reign of 
 Josiah (say, B.C. 618, or 617), that he was then under the age 
 at which it was usual for men to venture an opinion in public, 1 
 and that he at first timidly drew back from so weighty an 
 office, but gave way to Jehovah's repeated injunctions, which 
 were coupled with promises of protection and visionary dis- 
 closures of the appointed subject-matter of his prophecies. 
 But how had Jeremiah been prepared to be thus distinguished ? 
 What had been his education? Who had been his friends? 
 If we dip into his book we are at once struck, first, by the 
 warmth of his sympathies, and next by the isolation in which 
 he would seem to have lived. His tender heart overflowed 
 with sympathy. To apply the words of psalms wlrch may, 
 perhaps, present an idealized view of Jeremiah s " when others 
 were sick, he clothed himself with sackcloth," 2 and yet '* when 
 he looked for sympathy himself, there was none," 3 so that he 
 felt in his loneliness as if the patriarch Jacob's lot were his 
 as if " bereavement had come upon his soul. 1 ' 4 He had, in fact, 
 felt the truth of those warnings of Jehovah. The whole land, 
 kings, princes, priests, and people, shall fight against thce ; ^even 
 thy brethren and the house of thy father, even they have dealt 
 treacherously with thee. 6 Take ye heed every one of his friend, 
 and trust ye not in any brother. 1 Nor had he that soothing 
 compensation which many a persecuted Christian has found 
 in family joys ; for he had received this express injunction : 
 Thou shalt not take thee a wife, neither shalt thou have sons 
 or daughters in this place* What, then> became of that 
 sympathy in which Jeremiah's nature was so rich ? Did its 
 precious waters run wholly to waste, like the neglected over- 
 flow of some Eastern river which once irrigated a smiling 
 country, and now stagnates in pestilential marshes ? The 
 psalmist, indeed, who gives us, as some think, Jeremiah 
 idealized, craves from his God that recompense of love which 
 
 1 Recalls himself "a boy "' (i. 7), somewhat as Solomon calls himself 
 "a young boy " (i Kings iii. 6, comp. xi. 4), though probably as much as 
 twenty years old. 
 
 3 Psa. xxxv. 13. 3 Psa. Ixix. 20. < Psa. xxxv. 12. 
 
 5 Jer. i. 19 (comp. 18). 6 Jer. xii. 6. i Jer. ix. \. 8 Jer. xvi. a.
 
 FRIENDS IN COUNCIL. 1$ 
 
 was denied him by men let my prayer (for them) return (i.e., 
 be recompensed) into mine own bosom. 1 But must we can 
 we believe that Jeremiah was so utterly without responsive 
 human love? That his own strong sympathy with his people 
 only served to call forth its opposite hate ? Can human 
 nature in the land of Judah have been so base as this ? Must 
 we take Jeremiah at his word ? 
 
 In reply it may be said that none of the prophets are artists 
 in moral portraiture ; they do not, like even the saddest of our 
 recent novelists, express the lights as carefully as the shades 
 of the social picture; and Jeremiah most of all was liable to 
 exaggeration through the very intensity of his character. He 
 has left us some inestimable pages of confessions, supplemented 
 by notes of important episodes in his career, but not a com- 
 plete autobiography. It is allowable therefore to hold that he 
 did, at some period in his life, enjoy the privilege, as successively 
 disciple and teacher, of communion with other minds, and 
 that we should have found some allusion to this in his works, 
 if twenty-three years had not elapsed before his first public 
 addresses received a permanent form ? I am the more inclined 
 to this view because it appears certain that Jeremiah often 
 somewhat exaggerates the spiritual insensibility of his people 
 he himself even now and then confesses that it is composed 
 of two very different elements (see xv. 19, xxiv. 5-7). Surely 
 some like-minded men must have gravitated towards Jeremiah ; 
 presently, the names of a few such may occur to us. 
 
 This conjecture will gain much in plausibility if we fix this 
 fact in our minds that the new movement of religious reform 
 probably began earlier than is sometimes supposed. If so, 
 Jeremiah must have had friends, for he too (I will justify the 
 phrase presently) early became a religious reformer. But did 
 the new reform-movement begin before the eighteenth year of 
 the reign of Josiah ? Certainly ; and one may add that it must 
 have begun earlier. Just consider the state of things when the 
 young king came to the throne. We know but little of the 
 long reign of Manasseh (a good critical view of it will be 
 found in Ewald 2 ), but we do know what Manasseh's next 
 
 1 Psa. xxxv. 13. 
 
 " History of Israel,'' iv. 206-213. Perhaps, however, this great critic 
 (whom an American writer has strangely mis-named "the great denier") 
 may have erred in some of his details ; e.g., he may have placed the Book 
 of Job a little too early. But we will return to this later. Ewald's
 
 1 6 JEREMIAH. 
 
 successor but one found. He found the friends of a comparatively 
 pure religion deprived of many of their natural leaders, in- 
 cluding, as legend asserts, the aged Isaiah, by the persecution 
 of Manasseh ; and, as we shall see, the venerated sanctuary 
 at Jerusalem polluted by a number of imported heathenish 
 rites. But he did not find pure religion friendless, indeed, 
 among its friends, as the event proved, were many of the 
 princes and even of the priests of Jerusalem, and some of these 
 would seem to have obtained the guardianship of the eight- 
 years-old * prince Josiah on the death of his father (himself 
 but a young man), Amon, son of Manasseh. This was of the 
 greatest importance to the plans of the as yet quiescent re- 
 forming party. Manasseh had ascended the throne when 
 on the verge of manhood, and fell at once into the hands of 
 reactionary advisers ; Joash, on the other hand, who became 
 king at seven, was (in spite of a too probably polytheistic 
 queen-mother) completely under sacerdotal influence, and, 
 accordingly, " did that which was right in the eyes of Jehovah, 
 all his days wherein Jehoiada the priest directed him" (2 Kings 
 xii. 2). It is most unfortunate that our sources of information 
 are so silent as to the period of Josiah's minority ; but none, 
 I hope, will object to the "imaginative inferences'' which I 
 venture to draw from the facts which have reached us. 
 
 But where shall we find even a scanty basis of fact ? The 
 earlier and more documentary of our two narrative-books 
 merely says that in the eighteenth year of Josiah's reign he 
 began a course of reforming measures which, by their drastic 
 nature, threw those of Hezekiah completely into the shade. 
 The second book of Chronicles indeed states 2 that the yourg 
 
 account of Manasseh may be compared with the modest and instructive, 
 though not too critical, sketch in Edersheim's " History of Israel and 
 Judah," vii. 169-177. 
 
 1 Provisionally, I follow the ordinary view that the unidiomatic expression, 
 " eight year" instead of "eight years" in 2 Kings xxii. i, (Hebrew text) 
 is an unimportant accident (2 Chron, xxxiv. i, has "eight years"). 
 Klostermann, however, thinks that the original document used by the 
 compiler had "eighteen year"; this would be idiomatic, but would 
 involve a revision of the chronology of the kings. In Arabia it was a local 
 principle that no minor could be elected caliph. 
 
 2 2 Chron. xxxiv. 3. It is doubted by conservative scholars whether 
 vv. 4-7 describe what Josiah did (or at least began to do) in his twelfth 
 year, or whether they are an awkward anticipation of facts to be told 
 more fully later.
 
 FRIENbS IN COUNCIL. 17 
 
 king began his reformation, not in the eighteenth year of his 
 reign but in the twelfth, and as early as the eighth began to 
 seek after the God of David his father. But can we altogether 
 trust this assertion, considering the late period of the 
 Chronicler, and his evident determination to judge the kings of 
 Judah by the orthodox standard of his own times ? This 
 would be too bold ; and yet I think there is something to learn 
 from the Chronicler. He perhaps reconstructs history on the 
 basis of inference : "we may follow him in his inferences, 
 though we may be vaguer and less dogmatic in our historical 
 reconstruction. Certainly it is difficult to conceive that 
 Josiah's adoption of reforming principles was really so sudden 
 as it is represented in the Second Book of Kings. An ob- 
 servation of God's ways both in nature and in the soul of man 
 justifies the conclusion that events which we call sudden have 
 been long since prepared by unobserved agencies. The call 
 of Jeremiah, for instance, must, psychologically speaking, have 
 been preceded by inward experiences, the nature of which we 
 can only conjecture. And so it is but reasonable to suppose 
 that Josiah had not indeed all at once shocked his people by 
 what would seem to their unprepared minds arbitrary icono- 
 clasm, but nevertheless given early and serious consideration 
 to the lessons of the past and the needs of the future. The 
 premature death of his idolatrous father Amon may well have 
 appeared to him in the light of a judgment, and the reforming 
 zeal of Hezekiah may have fired him with a noble emulation. 
 Nor can he have been unacquainted with those bold prophecies 
 of Isaiah which supplied a Divine sanction to the not very 
 successful attempt of his great ancestor ; of Isaiah, not less 
 than of Jeremiah, may it be said, that by their pen they 
 accomplished more than by their speech. And yet, if we may 
 venture to carry on the method of inference reading and medi- 
 tation cannot have satisfied a mind of so practical a bent. 
 Josiah would naturally seek for living teachers and congenial 
 religious friends. Isolation is as unfavourable to practical 
 ability as to personal religion. The ideas of Isaiah needed 
 to be developed and supplemented before they could be 
 applied to present circumstances. And even if none of Josiah's 
 contemporaries was ready as yet to show how this could be 
 done, yet it would be no slight gain if Josiah and some like- 
 minded friends could ponder the lessons of history together, 
 
 3
 
 1 8 JEREMIAH. 
 
 and build each other up in the truths of prophetic religion. 
 He had, no doubt, his " tutors and governors," but he must also, 
 unless human nature has changed since his time, have needed 
 youthful associates. Among such would naturally be Jeremiah 
 and others of the same generation. What happy days the 
 destined prophet must have had at this period, for what friend- 
 ship so delightful as that which is cemented by common 
 principles and a common object of ambition ? I could 
 willingly believe that it is Jeremiah who takes that melancholy 
 retrospect (almost the sweetest-saddest passage of the Psalter), 
 in which those touching words occur 
 
 " But it was even tlioti, mine equal, 
 
 My companion, and my familiar friend ; 
 We took sweet counsel together, 
 
 And walked to the house of God as friends " PSA. Iv. 14, 
 
 Alas ! this was not " the friend that sticketh closer than a 
 brother." Worse than Demas, who forsook Paul out of mere 
 worldliness, this bosom-friend became an apostate first and a 
 personal enemy of his old associate afterwards. 
 
 Shall I startle the critical, nineteenth-century reader if I 
 remark that Jeremiah is already revealed in these circum- 
 stances as a true though incomplete type of Him to whom 
 all prophecy points? Let me assure such an one that the 
 theory which underlies this remark involves no unfaithfulness 
 to a strict historical method. It is simply a corollary from 
 the fundamental Christian doctrine of Providence. No doubt 
 the theory may be pressed too far. " Types " which satis- 
 fied, and were personally intended by the guiding Spirit to 
 satisfy, earlier ages do not and cannot satisfy our own. But 
 as long as the belief in Providence and a sense of biographic 
 analogies last, there will be many who are not afraid to recog- 
 nize "adumbrations " (a synonym of which Mr. Max Miiller 
 has lately reminded us) of Jesus Christ in the great men of 
 ancient Israel. There will even be some who, with a personage 
 in "John Inglesant," can go further, and maintain that, " as the 
 innocent and heroic life of Socrates, commended and admired 
 by Christians as well as heathens, together with his august 
 death, may be thought, in some measure, to have borne the 
 image of Christ ; and, indeed, not without some mystery of 
 purpose, and preparation of men for Christianity, has been so
 
 FRIENDS IN COUNCIL. 19 
 
 magnified among men " (vol. i. p. 36). I have said elsewhere 1 
 that I belong to this class of religious thinkers, and that I 
 account Jeremiah a striking historic type of that Servant of 
 Jehovah, who is himself a grand poetical type of the Saviour 
 of Israel and the world. Certainly Jeremiah " knew the 
 fellowship of Christ's sufferings," and it is pleasant to hope 
 that his Christlike sympathy with his people was accompanied 
 by some Christlike friendships in which he, not less than 
 more commonplace persons, began to practise on a small 
 scale the Divine virtue of love. "It is enough for the 
 disciple," says Jesus, "that he be as his Master" (Matt. x. 24), 
 and we are sure that the Master formed some close human ties 
 in the course of His ministry, and that only one of His twelve 
 associates proved a traitor. Would that we knew something 
 more definite about Jeremiah's friendships ! But we can at 
 least fill up our mental image of them by conjecture ; and if 
 we not only venerate but are interested in this great prophet, 
 how can we refrain from doing so? It seems to me, then, not 
 out of place to recollect here the words of Roger Ascham in 
 "The Scholemaster," respecting our own boy-king. "Ifkyng 
 Edward," he says, "had lined a litle longer, his onely example 
 had breed soch a rase of worthie learned ientlemen, as this 
 Realme neuer yet did affburde." Surely it is probable enough 
 that the person of the Jewish boy-king formed in like manner 
 the centre of a little society of kindred spirits, for we know that 
 Jewish kings were not idolized as divine like the Egyptian 
 Pharaohs a society of which Jeremiah was a youthful member, 
 and the two Hilkiahs 2 (one the High Priest, the other also a 
 priest, and the father of Jeremiah) were among the recognized 
 leaders. The probability amounts almost to certainty in the 
 
 1 "The Prophecies of Isaiah," 3rd ed. ii. 195 (comp. p. 26). 
 
 2 It has been conjectured that Hilkiah, the father of Jeremiah, is 
 identical with "Hilkiah the priest," in 2 Kings xxii. (e.g., by Clement of 
 Alexandria, "Strom."' i. p. 328, comp. Jerome, "Quaestt. Hebr. ad i Chron. 
 ix. 15," and by Joseph Kimchi). This is not indeed impossible. It is true 
 that " Hilkiah the priest " belonged to the line of Eleazar (i Chron. vi. 13), 
 whereas Abiathar, who as we have seen, had " fields " at Anathoth, was 
 of that of Ithamar. It is a very fantastic criticism which can build any 
 argument at all on this harmless statement ; why should not the high 
 priest Hilkiah have had landed property at Anathoth ? But I will not on 
 this account be tempted by the conjecture. Hilkiah was not an un- 
 common name.
 
 20 JEREMIAH. 
 
 case of the High Priest, for it was he who, later on, brought 
 the Book of Law to the notice of the king; it is something less 
 than this in the case of Jeremiah's father, and yet, considering 
 the conditions of education at this period, it is scarcely credible 
 that the religious ideas of the son should not have been largely 
 derived from the father. The name of the latter be it re- 
 marked means "Jehovah is my portion"- a phrase which 
 was at once a deep confession of faith in the true God, and a 
 silent protest against the heathenish name and character of the 
 late king Amon. He who could utter this phrase in the sense 
 which it bears in Psa. xvi. 5 (comp. Jer. x. 16, li. 19), cannot 
 have been ill-qualified for leadership in the noble army of 
 religious reformers. 
 
 But would Jeremiah himself, previously to the eighteenth year 
 of Josiah, have called himself a reformer ? I do not see why 
 he should not have done so. It is possible indeed that he only 
 aspired to carry out the plans of his leaders in a modest, unob- 
 trusive way ; but if even the pots in Jerusalem and Juclah 
 might, by a consistent religious thinker, be called holy to 
 Jehovah (Zech. xiv. 20, 21), much more might a humble-minded 
 young priest be called I need not say a reformer but, in 
 Biblical language, an amencler of the ways of Israel. At any rate, 
 the inner experiences related in chap. i. are not psychologically 
 intelligible, if he had not brooded deeply over the defects of the 
 national religion, and longed to be made use of in removing 
 them. That no action was taken for several years of Josiah's 
 reign, proves how carefully the friends of reform considered the 
 position of affairs, and how anxiously they waited for some 
 indication of the Divine will. The seniors would naturally be 
 the most averse to a hasty movement. They would caution the 
 juniors against compromising Jehovah's cause by a " zeal not 
 according unto knowledge." They would point out how few 
 and at present inactive were the higher as compared with the 
 lower prophets, and how the princes, or elders of the people, 
 who had a constitutional share in the government, were still 
 attached to the fascinating local superstitions. Nothing, they 
 would in effect say, but a visible sign of the Divine displeasure 
 will break up this unnatural calm, and at once add a new 
 practicalness to the preaching of the higher prophets, and pre- 
 dispose both princes and people to listen to it.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 HOPES AND FEARS QUICKLY REALIZED. 
 
 Jeremiah's early discourses, and the historical inferences warranted by 
 them The quiescence of the reforming party The sign granted at 
 length The threatened Scythian invasion. 
 
 WK have seen that after a spiritual training, which, though but 
 dimly discernible, is none the less certain, Jeremiah was called 
 to be a prophet in the thirteenth year of King Josiah. By 
 birth, as the heading tells us (i. i), he was connected with 
 Anathoth in Benjamin. 1 Dreary enough the place ('Anata) 
 looks now a wretched little village, which forces from us, in a 
 slightly different sense, the old prophet's exclamation, O thou 
 poor Anathoth (Isa. x. 30, R.V.). Anciently, no doubt, it was a 
 fortified town, and some of the stones built into one and another 
 of its few poor houses present the appearance of great age. It 
 stood, in fact, on the great northern road, as Isaiah intimates in 
 the passage from which I have quoted. One great advantage 
 it had for Jeremiah's training it was not far from Jerusalem, 
 which he could easily reach in a little more than an hour's 
 walk. But in itself it was not adapted to form a cheerful or 
 a poetic mind. Cut off from the thrilling sight (to a devout 
 beholder) of the Holy City, its inhabitants look down eastward 
 and south-eastward on the Dead Sea and the Lower Jordan 
 striking elements in a landscape, no doubt, but requiring to be 
 
 1 I cannot here enter into the question of the antiquity of the arrange- 
 ment of the Levitical cities, the list of which in Josh. xxi. (see v. 18) includes 
 Anathoth.
 
 22 JEREMIAH. 
 
 varied, and deficient in happy associations. There, however, 
 Jeremiah was tied, by inheriting a piece of land (comp. xxxii. 
 6-12, xxxvii. 12) a point in which he reminds us of Abiathar, 
 the well-known high priest of David, who lost his office on the 
 accession of Solomon and retired to " his own fields " at Ana- 
 thoth (i Kings ii. 26). Since Jeremiah's call to be a prophet, 
 however, he naturally resided chiefly at Jerusalem, though there 
 is a striking episode in his career of which Anathoth is the 
 scene. The capital was the true home of prophecy the valley 
 of vision, as Isaiah calls it (Isa. xxii. 5, if Delitzsch be right). 
 Would that we could have heard the young and once timid 
 prophet after the great transformation wrought within him by 
 his call ! But alas ! neither of his first discourse nor of any 
 succeeding one have we an exact report ; and it is only with 
 much qualification that one can assent to JSwald, who regards 
 chap. ii. as Jeremiah's earliest public address. No doubt the 
 opening words, Go and cry thus in the ears of Jerusalem (ii. i), 
 may seem to indicate that all the following words were actually 
 spoken not long after the prophet's call, but when we observe 
 the generality of much of the contents, and the strong appear- 
 ance of condensation, we see that Jeremiah must have composed 
 chap. ii. some time after he began his ministry on the basis of 
 notes or general recollections of a number of discourses. It is 
 therefore not so much a discourse as the quintessence of several 
 discourses. Four leading considerations are developed in it : 
 I. Israel's infidelity contrasted with the fidelity of Jehovah to 
 Israel and of the other nations to their gods (vv. 4-13). II. 
 Israel's punishment and its cause (vv. 14-19). III. Israel's 
 inveterate and unblushing idolatry, and its practical inutility 
 (vv. 20-28). IV. Israel's sole guiltiness (Jehovah having per- 
 formed His own part of the covenant) and its magnitude. 
 
 There is much that is striking in the chapter, from Jehovah's 
 loving address with which it opens, to the mixture of earnestness 
 and irony in the concluding description of Israel's guilt. There 
 is also much that might well startle us. Take verse I, for in- 
 stance I venture to quote it in Reuss's version, which is at 
 once graceful and scholarly 
 
 Je te garde le souvenir de la iendresse de ton jtime age, de 
 V amour de ton temps de fiancee, quand tu me suivais a t ravers 
 le desert, par une terre sans culture. 
 
 It is quite certain that the words here ascribed to Jehovah
 
 HOPES AND FEARS QUICKLY REALIZED. 23 
 
 (with intuitive certitude on the part of the prophet) give an 
 idealizing view of the Israel of antiquity, and that the popular 
 religion of Israel, even after Moses had spoken, was very dif- 
 ferent from that spiritual religion to serve which Jeremiah con- 
 secrated his life. 
 
 Then take verse 13, doubly beautiful to those who can realize 
 the preciousness of water in the East 
 
 For two evils hath my people committed; me have they 
 forsaken, the fountain of living water, to hew out for themselves 
 cisterns, broken cisterns, that hold no water. 
 
 It is not less certain that the contemporaries of Jeremiah 
 were not conscious of having forsaken Jehovah, though, as we 
 shall see, their Jehovah was very different from the Jehovah 
 of the prophet. In proof of this, see i>. 23 of this very chapter, 
 where the Israelites are represented as meeting the charge of 
 going over to Baal-worship by a direct denial of the offence. 
 A fair-minded student is bound to say that Jeremiah and his 
 opponents were both right. Jeremiah was right, in that the 
 moral and spiritual elements of early Israelitish religion had 
 been nearly extinguished through the influence of the impure 
 religions of Israel's neighbours ; his opponents were right, in 
 that Israel in its worst days never ceased to worship Jehovah 
 as the national God. The Baalim of the different cities and 
 villages to which Jeremiah seems to refer in ii. 28 (=xi. 31) 
 were not necessarily, in the mind of the worshippers, " other 
 gods beside Jehovah," and even when they were, their worship 
 did not exclude that of Jehovah. 
 
 The fault of the Jews was not, strictly speaking, in throwing 
 off the service of Jehovah, or, as Jeremiah says, changing their 
 gods, but in refusing to rise, at the call of the nobler prophets, 
 to a higher stage of religion, in not even standing still, but 
 sinking to a lower level. 
 
 Again, take v. 18 
 
 Well then, what hast thou to do with a journey to Egypt 
 to drink the water of the Nile ? or what with a journey to 
 Assyria to drink tiie water of the Euphrates? 
 
 To this the Jews might very well have replied, that their 
 experienced politicians did but adapt themselves to circum- 
 stances ; that Israel's imperial position under David and 
 Solomon was due to the temporary depression of both Assyria 
 and Egypt, between which its territory was situated; that, even
 
 24 JEREMIAH. 
 
 were Israel to be reunited, its only chance for safety would lie in 
 attaching itself to the stronger of those two powers ; that a 
 policy of isolation would be fatal at once to the little country 
 of Judah, and that the only question could be whether a philo- 
 Assyrian or a philo-Egyptian policy were the more expedient. 
 The right rejoinder, in the spirit though not in the words of 
 Jeremiah, would be this that God had committed to Israel the 
 deposit, not indeed of a perfect religion, but of one which, by 
 wonderfully varied means of the Divine selection, both could 
 and would be developed into a religion adapted for all nations ; 
 that, as long as political independence was necessary for this 
 object, Jehovah would preserve His people without its having to 
 condescend to statecraft (" perverseness and crookedness," as it 
 is called in Isa. xxx. 12 *), and that when it ceased to be required, 
 God would still preserve the moral and spiritual independence 
 of Israel as He preserved its forefathers in Egypt, and conse 
 quently that Israel's true interest lay in dutifully co-operating 
 with its Divine Guide. 
 
 The rejoinder would be, I repeat, a true one ; and yet we 
 must not be unjust to the politicians, who thoroughly acted out 
 their own idea of patriotism, and who were in their own sense 
 religious men. Was not Hezekiah himself at one time tempted 
 to rely too much on a human alliance (Isa. xxxix.), and was not 
 a king (Azariah or Uzziah), who is only less commended by the 
 historian than Hezekiah, the prime mover in a Syrian coalition 
 against Tiglath-Pileser II. ? a Certainly the temptation to rely 
 on the arts of the politician was not less at this part of Josiah's 
 reign than under his great ancestors. Decay had begun in the 
 blood-cemented empire of Assyria even before the death of 
 Assurbanipal, and this cannot have been unknown to the " in- 
 telligence department" of the Jewish court. It was owing to 
 this that, as the second chapter of Jeremiah shows us, the 
 philo-Egyptian party (com p. Isa. xxx. 2, xxxi. i) had supplanted 
 the philo-Assyrian one in the councils of the sovereign. We see 
 from this that, whatever the personal inclinations of Josiah and 
 his nearest friends might be, he was not as yet sufficiently inde- 
 pendent to strike out a line for himself ; and we may observe 
 
 1 See the "Variorum Bible" on the passage. 
 
 2 This is at any rate accepted by Schrader, and regarded as probable by 
 the cautious Tiele in his " Babylonisch-Assyrische Geschichte," part i, 
 (Qotha, 1886), pp, 230, 231,
 
 HOPES AND FEARS QUICKLY REALIZED. 25 
 
 in this connection that already in the narrative of his call 
 Jeremiah speaks of the kings of Judah (i. 18), i.e. perhaps the 
 large and influential royal family which seems to have shared 
 the important governmental function of judgment with the 
 reigning king (xvii. 20, comp. xxi. 11, 12. 
 
 Thus the facts implied in Jeremiah's second chapter cast a 
 bright light on the quiescent attitude of the reforming party at 
 this period. It is evident that the " sign," for which, as we saw 
 in chap, ii., the reformers must have been looking, had not yet 
 been given, and that people were generally prosperous, and 
 went on with their quaint medley of religious rites, trusting 
 that Jehovah, at any rate, had no longer any complaint against 
 them. As Jeremiah puts it 
 
 Thou saidst, I am innocent ; surely his anger hath turned 
 from me (ii. 35). 
 
 Some, I am aware, have found a precisely opposite statement 
 in vv. 14-17, where the past tenses retained in the Revised Ver- 
 sion are no doubt substantially correct. But though these verses 
 may be a later interpolation, as Ewald holds, due, perhaps, to a 
 disciple of the prophet's, it seems to me perfectly possible to 
 explain them as a vivid, dramatic description of the almost 
 inevitable calamity which hung over Judah. " Prophetic per- 
 fects " (see Driver, "Hebrew Tenses," pp. 21-25) are common 
 enough, and passages like iv. 14, vi. 8, warn the reader not to 
 take the description too prosaically (for chaps, iv.-vi. form a 
 group of prophecies). 
 
 I will not linger further on this chapter, and only remark that 
 it opens a welcome view of the Biblical training of the youthful 
 Jeremiah. The great prophets of the eighth and following 
 centuries were no "untaught geniuses." Hence, Jeremiah, like 
 his fellows, is fond of borrowing ideas and phrases from older 
 writers ; this very chapter presents numerous points of contact 
 with that fine song (Deut. xxxii.) of unknown authorship, 
 enshrined, by a singular good fortune, in the Book of Deute- 
 ronomy. It formed no part of that Book of the Law which 
 one of the Ililkiahs, as we shall sec, brought to light, but is an 
 independent Scripture, though for centuries covered over, as it 
 were, by Deuteronomy, very much as that book itself is said to 
 have been found by Hilkiah covered over in a corner of the 
 temple. I think, however, that Jeremiah is, in one respect, the 
 superior of his nameless predecessor ; he treats his countrymen
 
 26 JEREMIAH. 
 
 more tenderly, more sympathetically. Not tenderly enough, 
 perhaps, as we should think, and yet with a wonderful amount 
 of sympathy, if we compare his first prophecy (if chap. ii. may 
 be called such) with the Song attached to Deuteronomy, and 
 indeed with the works of any of the prophets who went before 
 him, except Hosea. It was the gospel which opened wide the 
 floodgates of truly humane sympathy ; but Jeremiah, in spite 
 of the relics of antique sternness which still cling to him, has a 
 tender fellow-feeling with his people, which may be compared to 
 the first delicate streaks of advancing dawn. Surely God chose 
 him out precisely because he was cast in this softer mould, even 
 as He chose out Hosea to be the prophet of the decline and 
 fall of the kingdom of Israel. And why? Because there is no 
 chance of an audience for the prophet of woe, if no sound of a 
 stifled sob strikes the ear ; would our own Carlyle have in- 
 fluenced the last generation as he did, if men had not felt that 
 underneath that rough exterior there beat the warmest and most 
 sympathetic of hearts ? 
 
 That Jeremiah was fond of Hosea's book is certain ; the 
 touching words which open chap. ii. are closely parallel to 
 a passage in Hosea (ii. 15). A happy instinct guided him ; 
 he felt himself allied in genius to the elder prophet ; and he 
 must have noticed how similar his own circumstances were 
 to those of Hosea. I will not, however, exaggerate this simi- 
 larity. Jeremiah had a harder fate than Hosea in this respect, 
 that whereas Hosea was always able to look with some degree 
 of hope to Judah, in Jeremiah's days the last remnant of Jeho- 
 vah's people seemed swiftly nearing destruction. 1 
 
 It is true that Providence still has an eye upon Judah ; 
 both the guilty sisters shall yet dwell together as favoured 
 children of Jehovah (iii. 18); but we maybe sure that to the 
 increased severity of the judgment upon Judah, there corre- 
 sponds a deeper gloom in the mind of its prophet ; Hosea 
 was not tried as severely as Jeremiah. 
 
 Altogether this third chapter deserves an attentive and sym- 
 pathetic study. There seems to me no reason why criticalness 
 and sympathy should not be combined in the same reader. 
 Let me then point out some phenomena which might escape an 
 uncritical reader. The chapter begins (as the margin of the 
 Revised Version rightly states) with the word saying evidently 
 
 1 Esvald, " The Prophets of the Old Testament," iii. 68.
 
 HOPES AND FEARS QUICKLY REALIZED. 27 
 
 a mere fragment of a superscription. Those who know any- 
 thing about manuscripts (and even the unlearned can easily 
 imagine what I am describing) are aware how apt words, and 
 even sentences, are to get dropped out of the text in the process 
 of transcription ; sometimes, too, words and phrases will 
 become illegible, and the scribe who makes his copy from such 
 a manuscript will forget to indicate that there is a gap in his 
 text. Sometimes, moreover, words will get copied into the 
 wrong line, and this seems to have been the case here, the 
 first part of the heading of v. I having been transposed to v. 6. 
 Let us then read v. i thus, 
 
 And the word of Jehovah came tin to me in the days ofjosiah 
 the king, saying, &c. 
 
 To those who read their Bible as attentively as their 
 Shakespeare or their Virgil, this critical remark will not, I 
 hope, seem trifling. It requires however to be supple- 
 mented. Is it possible that verses 4 and 5 were meant to close 
 a section of this, in general, well-arranged group of prophecies ? 
 This is how they run in Reuss's version, from which I again 
 quote because of its simple dignity and essential fidelity 
 
 Maintenant, n'est-ce pas ? tu me cries; Moti pert / tot, le 
 fiance de ma jcunesse ! s'en souviendra-t-il done toujours? me 
 gardtra-t-il rancune ajainaisf Voila comme tu paries, tout en 
 faisant le mal, et en y persisfant. 
 
 I am only considering the passage now in its literary as- 
 pect ; the facts of history which explain it will come before 
 us later. Notice then from this point of view that such 
 deeply-felt expressions can hardly stand at the end of a 
 prophecy. The divine speaker is wrought to a high pitch 
 of feeling ; he is touched by the tender expressions of the 
 personified people of Judah, which indeed correspond to the 
 sweet appeal of Jehovah (quoted, from Reuss's version, in 
 page 22), but knows only too well that they are but unmeaning 
 sounds. And so he begins to expostulate in the style of Isaiah 
 (i. 12), "Why spread out your hands before me. I hate such 
 prayers when coupled with evil practices. With unchanged 
 minds you return home and calmly repeat all the old abomina- 
 tions." Some further development of these ideas is clearly 
 wanted ; Jeremiah is not without the instincts of an artist, and 
 does not leave his finest motifs only half worked out. What 
 we seem to want here is a contrasted picture of Jehovah's
 
 28 JEREMIAH. 
 
 lovirgkimlness to Judah ; then, a renewed expression of horror 
 at Judah's infidelity ; and then, a picture either of the almost 
 inevitable judgment, or (for Jeremiah has in him a strong dash 
 of the emotionalism of Hosea) of the final conversion of heart 
 which God's people must and will in His own good time 
 experience. This is the close which verses like iii. 1-5 lead 
 us to expect, and there actually is a passage which exactly 
 meets our requirements ; only it is separated from verses 1-5 
 by another passage which the editor (a disciple of Jeremiah's ?) 
 seems to have inserted here to illustrate the hopes held out in 
 verses 21 and 22, and so give a more complete answer to the 
 question, Will he keep (anger) for ever (v. 5) ?' 
 
 Observe first of all the contrast, 
 
 Moi,favais dit : Comme je te mettrai par mi mcs enfant s ! Je 
 te donncrai tin pays de delices, un patrimoine magnifique, le 
 plus excellent qifait tin peuple ! Je disais : Vous iriappcllerez 
 pere, et vous ne vous detournerez pas de mot (iii. 19). 
 
 Next, the horror at Judah's surprising infidelity (does not 
 house of Israel here include Judah ? comp. ii. 4, 26) 
 
 Eh oui ! Comme unefemme devient infidele a son amant, ainsi 
 vous favez tit a mot, maison d 1 Israel, parole de FEtcrnel 
 (iii. 20). 
 
 See how deeply the Divine speaker has been hurt ! He refuses 
 the word used by Judah in v. 4 (comp. Prov. ii. 17), which ex- 
 presses the intimate friendship between husband and wife, and 
 substitutes another, already used by Hosea (iii. i), and indeed 
 by himself in verse i, to describe a superficial and illegitimate 
 attachment. Of course house of Israel in this verse must be 
 taken to include Judah. 
 
 Lastly, the graphic description of the genuine heart-con- 
 version in the days to come, which reminds us of the pictu- 
 resque tableau in chap. xxxi. Here, however, I must desert 
 Reuss's version, and venture on an English rendering 
 
 Hark ! there is a sound tipon the heights, tears and entreaties 
 of the children of Israel, because they have perverted their 
 way, have forgotten Jehovah their God. " Return, backsliding 
 children; I will heal your backslidings." "Behold, we are 
 come unto t/ice ; for thou art Jehovah our God" (iii. 21, 22). 
 
 1 In tliis view I mainly follow Stade, "Zeitschrift fiir die alttestamentliche 
 Wissenschaft," 1884, p. 151, &c.
 
 HOPES AND FEARS QUICKLY REALIZED. 2y 
 
 But gloomy indeed did the immediate prospect of Judah 
 appear to the young prophet so much so that in the prophecy 
 which extends from iii. 6 to iii. 18 he announces on the part of 
 Jehovah 
 
 Hacks/iiling Israel hath shewn herself more righteous than 
 treacherous Judah (iii. 11), 
 
 and, more astonishingly still, invites the backslider to return 
 with the tender assurance 
 
 I will not knit my brow at you, for I am full of lovingkind- 
 ness, sail/i Jehovah, I will not keep (anger} for ever .... 
 Return, backsliding children, saith Jehovah, for I am a husband 
 unto you : and I will take you one of a city and two of a family 
 and will bring you to Zion 1 (iii. 12, 14). 
 
 As I have already said, I regard the prophecy from which 
 these quotations are taken as distinct from iii. 1-5 and 19- 
 25. It may have been written at the same period as the 
 latter, but it has some noteworthy differences, e.g., that the 
 future is described in still more attractive terms, and with a 
 singular spirituality ; also that the phrase backsliding children^ 
 which in verse 22 refers to Judah (v. 21 compared with 
 v. 2 proves this note the phrase the heights in both), in 
 verse 14 evidently refers to the northern Israel. We must 
 remember that "backsliding" (both adjective and substan- 
 tive) is a favourite word of Jeremiah's (see ii. 19 ; iii. 6, 8, 
 II, 12, 14, 22; v. 6; viii. 5; xiv. 7; xxxi. 22; xlix. 4) 
 the different use of such a phrase need not therefore surprise 
 us. I may remark too that the word forms another link 
 between Jeremiah and Hosea. And so we get an answer to a 
 question which may have troubled some readers, viz., Had 
 Jeremiah really such grave cause for complaint against Judah ? 
 I mean that the idea of "backsliding" occurred naturally to 
 idealistic teachers like the prophets to Hosea not less than 
 Jeremiah, and to Jeremiah before as well as after the year of 
 the great reformation. I think, however, that both the pro- 
 phecies which together make up chap. iii. received a heightened 
 colouring, if indeed they were not altogether put into shape, 
 
 1 For " knit my brow " the Hebrew has "cause my countenance to fall " 
 if we cannot translate a figure, we must substitute a corresponding one 
 for it. " Kind " is, more fully, " rich in lovingkindness " (k/tdsed the bond 
 of the covenant-relation between Jehovah and Israel).
 
 30 JEREMIAH. 
 
 subsequently to the eighteenth year of Josiah, though based on 
 Jeremiah's notes or recollections of his pre-reformation activity. 
 I must now pass on to another portion of the first great group 
 of prophecies, viz., chapters iv. and vi., from which we may, I 
 think, infer that the looked-for " sign " from heaven came at 
 last, encouraging the reformers to take up their task in earnest. 
 Who has not heard of Attila and the Huns, and the horror excited 
 by these fierce barbarians among the civilized peoples of the 
 Roman Empire ? ' A close parallel to this is furnished by the 
 Scythian invasion of Assyria and Babylonia, not to add Pales- 
 tine, in the early part of the reign of Josiah. Who the Scythians 
 were, what was the order of their desolating inroads and how 
 far they extended, belongs rather to the historian of the ancient 
 East than to the biographer of Jeremiah to discuss. Our 
 knowledge of these subjects depends primarily on the narrative 
 of Herodotus (i. 74, 103-106, iv. i), the Hebrew historical 
 records being here, as so often, imperfect, and the cuneiform 
 tablets being as yet not fully transcribed and not in all respects 
 satisfactorily explained. That the Scythians, like the Cim- 
 merians, whom, according to Herodotus, they displaced, were 
 originally nomads, is clear ; but it is possible that, after having 
 passed the Caucasus, they settled themselves permanently in 
 a province of northern Armenia called Sacasene (from Sacce 
 the Persian name of the Scythians, Herod, vii. 64), and made 
 this their headquarters during their later ravages. Gugu, a 
 chief of " the land of Sauj," captured by Assurbanipal, 2 may, as 
 some think, have been a Scythian prince ; and it is an attractive 
 view which connects Gog, the prince of Magog (Ezek. xxxviii. 
 2, 3) with this Gugu. At any rate, there is no doubt as to the 
 vast and general subversion which they produced. The power- 
 ful kingdom of Urartu (comp. Ararat) henceforth disappeared 
 from history. The Moschi and the Tabali, Assyria's gallant 
 foes, were reduced to a small remnant which took refuge on the 
 mountains by the Euxine Sea, 3 and it is of this apparently that 
 Ezekiel speaks in the following graphic passage, so important 
 for the delineation of the popular view of the underworld 
 
 1 See Gibbon, "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," chap, xxxiv., 
 and notice his parallel of the Mongols. 
 
 2 "Annals of Assurbanipal, " cyl. B., " Records of the past," ix. 46. 
 
 3 See Lenorrnant, " Les origines de 1'histoire," ii. i, pp. 458-461 ; cf. 
 Schrader, " Keilinschriften und Geschichtsforschung," p. 159.
 
 HOPES AND FEARS QUICKLY REALIZED. 31 
 
 There is Meshech, Tubal, and all its multitude round about its 
 grave ; all of them unclad, slain by the sword, who caused 
 terror in the land of the living. And they lie not with heroes, 
 giants of the olden time, who went down to Sheol in full 
 armour, with their swords fait under their heads, and their 
 shields upon their bones, for there was terror at their prowess 
 while they lived (Ezek. xxxii. 26, 27).' 
 
 Province after province of the civilized and semi-civilized 
 East was visited by this crashing storm (Ezek. xxxviii. 9). 
 The incredibly fertile plains of Mesopotamia were laid 
 waste. Towns and villages which had not the protection 
 of walls were pillaged and destroyed (comp. Ezek. xxxviii. 
 n) ; only well-defended cities could defy the attacks of the 
 bold Scythian archers (Ezek. xxxviii. 15, comp. Herod, iv. 
 46). The wave of ruin swept along Palestine by the coast- 
 road to the borders of Egypt. That most ancient temple 
 of Aphrodite at Ashkelon, of which the lately-discovered 
 temple at Cythera was a copy, was plundered (Herod, i. 105). 
 Psamitik (Psammetichus) only averted an invasion of Egypt by 
 "gifts and prayers." Did the little country of Judah remain 
 unscathed? If Hitzig and Ewald arc right in finding allusions 
 to the Scythians in the Psalter (the former refers Psalms xiv. 
 and Iv., the latter Psa. lix., to this period), we must answer in 
 the negative. This view, however, is not a good specimen of 
 the critical tact of these eminent scholars, and Knobel has 
 very naturally included this in a too bitter indictment of this 
 faulty though never-to-be-forgotten leader of thought (See 
 Expositor, 3rd series, vol. iv., p. 263). The obvious inference 
 from the narrative of Herodotus is that Judah was in the main 
 exempt from injury. The highlands of Judah were protected 
 by nature, besides which the Scythians knew well enough where 
 to make the most productive conquests. It is probable how- 
 ever that straggling parties turned aside inland. The fertile 
 plain of Sharon, studded with villages on their little tels or 
 eminences, must surely have suffered, especially as the road 
 swerved from the coast-line at some distance to the north of 
 Joppa. Here the straight way was barred by a thick forest 
 called Assur, 2 well known as late as crusading times, for it was 
 
 1 I follow Cornill's corrected text. 
 
 3 See Maspero in the "Album "of Egyptological papers published in 
 honour of Dr. Leemans.
 
 32 JEREMIAH. 
 
 at this point that Cceur-de-Lion overcame Salaclin in a great 
 battle on Sept. 7, 1191, under the walls of Arsuf, the ancient 
 Apollonia. Some (after Pliny and Syncellus) have found a 
 trace of their presence in the name Scythopolis (= Beth-shean, 
 a finely-situated town, now Beisan, on the edge of the cliffs 
 which descend from the Wady Jalud to the Ghor). Even if 
 this be not a corruption of Sikytopolis (city of Siccuth), \ve 
 surely cannot venture to connect it with these Scythians. 1 
 
 One thing at least is more than probable that two faithful 
 servants of the true Jehovah were called to be prophets when 
 the danger from the Scythians began to loom in the horizon. 
 One was Zephaniah, whose short book seems based on the 
 prophet's notes of his discourses during the terrible crisis. We 
 cannot help turning over its pages, for they illustrate passages 
 of Jeremiah ; for us at least, Zephaniah is not a " minor 
 prophet." This, then, is what he says, Be still, for the judg- 
 ment is irrevocably fixed ; yea, Jehovah hath already prepared 
 the sacrifice, hath consecrated his invited ones (Zeph. i. 7 ; comp. 
 Isa. xiii. 3 ; Jer. li. 27, 28, where prepared in the Revised 
 Version should be consecrated, as in Isa. I.e. ; see also Isa. 
 xxxiv. 6, Jer. xlvi. 10). The great day of Jehovah, he adds, is 
 near; it is near and hasteth greatly (Zeph. i. 14) a passage 
 which to us has a special interest, because this and the following 
 verse partly suggested the famous hymn of Thomas of Celano, 
 beginning Dies irce, dies ilia. There are those in Judah, our 
 prophet tells us, who have hitherto known neither shame nor 
 fear ; surely these cannot but tremble now at the imminent 
 recompence of their heathen wickedness. False Israelites ! 
 No better are they than their neighbours ; nay, their obduracy 
 makes them still more deserving of punishment. On the other 
 hand, true seekers after Jehovah should go quietly on in the 
 path of obedience, if perhaps ye may hide yourselves in the day 
 of Jehovah's anger. For Gaza, he continues, shall become a 
 desert tract, and Ashkelon a desolation; they shall drive out 
 Ashdod at noonday, and Ekron shall be rooted out (Zeph. ii. 3, 4). 
 Such was the prophet's anticipation, when the Scythians began 
 their southward march. All the peoples with which they came 
 into contact should have to rue their wickedness ; the barbarian 
 
 1 Its population was predominantly a non-Jewish one (2 Mace. xii. 30 ; 
 Jos. " De Bello Jud.," ii. 18, and "Vit."6). " Scythian " may mean "bar- 
 barian" (comp. 3 Mace. vii. 5 ; Col. iii. ii).
 
 HOPES AND FEARS QUICKLY REALIZED. 33 
 
 horde was, like Altila, the '' Scourge of God." That the pro- 
 phecy, thus explained, was not fulfilled to the very letter, is no 
 argument against this view ; the Book of Jonah is a warning 
 to us not to be surprised if God's dealings with man are gentler 
 sometimes than His threatenings. 
 
 Let us notice, before we pass on, Zephaniah's unusually clear 
 perception of the greatness of God's world ; in his judicial 
 survey of the peoples known to him, the space allotted to Judah 
 is not more than agrees with its real position among the nations. 
 Also that no measures of reform had as yet been introduced no 
 plan of action had as yet commended itself to that little band of 
 friends which included (probably) Josiah, the two Hilkiahs, 
 Jeremiah, and to which we may now add the name of Zephaniah. 
 But each member of this upward and forward looking company 
 was being gradually ripened for his own share in the work. 
 Zephaniah's own importance would be doubtless enhanced, if 
 he belonged to one of the branches of the royal family. Is there 
 any ground for such a supposition ? Ibn Ezra thinks that there 
 is, and the reader will perhaps agree with him, on looking at 
 the first verse of the Book, in which, contrary to the usual prac- 
 tice, the genealogy is carried up to the fourth generation, and if he 
 observes the name last mentioned Hizkiah, or, as the Revised 
 Version more consistently gives it, Hezekiah. Truly, tlic wind 
 blowetli where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but 
 canst not tell whence it comcth nor whither it gocth. The Spirit 
 of revelation chooses the most unlikely instruments, calls Elisha 
 from the plough, Amos from the herd, Zephaniah (it may be) 
 from the steps of the throne. 
 
 And who was the second of the prophets called forth by the 
 danger from the Scythians ? The reader will have guessed his 
 name already ; it was Jeremiah. Among the minor motives 
 which overcame this prophet's hesitation, one must have been 
 his people's urgent need of an interpreter of the signs of the 
 times. In Judah, as in England now, people were only too ready 
 for external and non-moral views of political questions ; this 
 was the constant trouble of Isaiah, it became that of Jeremiah. 
 Against the " opportunism " of the statesmen he directs the 
 weapons of his sarcasm. Why gaddest thou about so much, he 
 says, to cJiange thy way (thy policy, as we should say)? Thou 
 shalt be ashamed of Egypt also, as t/iou wast asliained of Assyria 
 (Jer ii. 36). Not from Egypt, not from Assyria, unable soon to 
 
 4
 
 34 JEREMIAH. 
 
 help themselves shall the great wind come which shall smite 
 the four corners of the house, so that it falls 1 (Job. i. 19). From 
 another and a more energetic race, ever replenished (in Jere- 
 miah' language see v. 15) from a secret store of vitality, the new 
 dangers will arise. Like some mighty perennial stream, or (to 
 quote again from the opening vision) like the contents of a caldron 
 (Jer. i. 14), will "the evil" come. For lo, I will call all the families 
 of the kingdoms of the north, said Jehovah, and they shall come 
 (Jer. i. 14, 15 ; comp. iv. 6, vi. i). We see, however dimly, 
 that, as the punishment of accumulated sins, some new and 
 more awful enemies are threatened, and when we consult the 
 pages of history, we cannot doubt that these are, first the 
 Scythians, and next the Chaldasans. The phrase (if I am not 
 mistaken) was selected after the course of history had sharpened 
 the prophet's eye to understand his remembered vision better 
 selected in order to include both the Scythians and the Chal- 
 dasans. "The north" had long since been marked out as the 
 great arsenal from which God drew forth first one weapon of ven- 
 geance and then another. To Isaiah it suggested the Assyrians 
 (Isa. xiv. 31) ; to Jeremiah the not less destructive nations who 
 continued their work. 2 First, however, the Scythians. Surely 
 it is of these dread ministers of judgment that our prophet 
 speaks with emotional exaggeration in language such as the 
 last man might employ, on the morning of the great doomday, 
 " / saw the earth it was a waste Chaos j and heavenwards 
 the light thereof was gone ; I saw the mountains they trembled, 
 and all the hills moved to and fro; I saw mankind had dis- 
 appeared, and all the birds of the heaven had flown. I saw 
 the garden-land (had become) desert, all the cities thereof had 
 been broken down, 3 because of Jehovah, because of his hot anger. 
 
 1 That Job is a "parable" was early seen (see "Job and Solomon," 
 p. 61). The great sufferer may be poetically individual! zed, but he is more 
 than a common man he is a symbol, not merely of afflicted humanity, 
 but of Israel. 
 
 2 How elastic the symbol was, appears from Jer. xlvii. i, where a clause 
 inserted by the editor (before Pharaoh smote Gaza) suggests that he under- 
 stood the waters from the north (v. 2) to mean the army of Neco on its 
 southward journey to Egypt. 
 
 3 I do not say that this feature of the description applies to the Scythians. 
 Jeremiah adapted his prophesies respecting the Scythians to the later 
 Chaldaean crisis, just as he adapted to it the older prophecy against Moab, 
 preserved in Isa. xv., xvi., and the old poem in Num. xxi. 27-30 (see 
 Jer. xlviii.) See pp. 40, 41.
 
 HOPES AND FEARS QUICKLY REALIZED. 35 
 
 . . . At the noise of horsemen and bowmen the whole land flceth ; 
 they go into thickets, and climb up upon rocks ; every city is 
 forsaken, and not a man dwelleth therein (Jer. iv. 23-26, 29). 
 
 But I must not linger on this interesting theme. Suffice it 
 to add here a sentence which has struck me in reading (since 
 the above was written) the posthumous revised edition of vol. 
 iv. of Lenormant's " Histoire de 1'Orient," published in 1885 with 
 the friendly aid of a disciple of the lamented Assyriologist 
 (M. Babelon), 
 
 " Quand on lit, dans les premiers chapitres de Jdrdmie, une 
 description de ces hordes de barbares qui se ru^rent sur la 
 Palestine comme sur la Mesopotamie, on croirait assister a une 
 invasion des soldats de Gengis ou de Tamerlan, dont les 
 Cimmeriens sont d'ailleurs les ancetres " (p. 379). 
 
 There is nothing arbitrary, then, in what the preceding 
 pages have offered as a reconstruction of a half-forgotten 
 chapter in the history of Judah. From every point of view, it 
 is clear that we have arrived at a new epoch, and if Zephaniah 
 can claim the distinction of being its earliest prophet, Jeremiah 
 has still the superiority in the richness and variety of his 
 subject-matter. The transformation of the timid, sensitive 
 Jeremiah evidently began at once. A marvellous maturity 
 strikes us even in the opening chapters of his book, and though 
 these, in their present form, may reflect a later stage of his ex- 
 perience, yet the maturity visible may in part be attributed to 
 his Spirit-led meditations before his call came. Jeremiah, 
 then, was a reformer even before Josiah's great reformation. 
 
 What a hope it gives us both for ourselves and others when 
 we see how much the Spirit of revelation made of Jeremiah ! 
 I spoke of some of the unlikely agents of that Spirit among the 
 prophets who preceded him. But who can have seemed more 
 unlikely than Jeremiah ? Who of Josiah's little band could 
 have expected to see his timid friend occupying any prominent 
 position ? He at least, it might have been said, was of too soft 
 a nature to lead, and too sympathetic by far to endure the strain 
 of prophesying in an age which was growing tired of prophets. 
 He was perhaps too soft to take the lead in action, and per- 
 haps without the example of Zephaniah that sensitive shrinking 
 from the acknowledged call of duty might have even more 
 resembled the agony of Gethsemane. Mysterious are the ways 
 of the Spirit ; an electric spark often seems to pass from one
 
 36 JEREMIAH. 
 
 to another in a company of young men, and so perhaps it was 
 with Zephaniah and Jeremiah. And there appeared unto thetn 
 tongues parting asunder, like as of fire; and it sat upon each of 
 them (Acts ii. 2). 
 
 To those who have followed me thus far, the form and bearing 
 of the man underneath the prophet's mantle have, I hope, 
 become somewhat more real than before. He has none of the 
 so-called apathy of the Stoic ; he may use bold words at the 
 risk of life, but he does so with quivering lips. Even in the 
 solemn hour of his consecration, he has had sore misgivings, 
 and would gladly have made way for a stronger man. But one 
 of his chief qualifications is precisely his sense of weakness ; he 
 needs no thorn in the flesh to make him pray to be clothed upon 
 with Divine strength. He is not a hero by nature, but by grace ; 
 and in his sometimes strange confessions we clearly read that 
 grace never expelled nature. His life is at once the most natural 
 and the most supernatural in the Old Testament. Let us then 
 be patient even with ourselves ; God is better than our fears, 
 and more generous than our highest hopes, if in base cowardice 
 we do not shrink back from His call.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 MORNING-CLOUD GOODNESS. 
 The crisis and its effects Religious reaction. 
 
 WE have seen in the preceding chapter that in the early part of 
 the reign of Josiah a great migration of peoples took place ; 
 first of all the Cimmerians, and then the Scythians (who in the 
 Babylonian inscriptions are called Gimirrai r a name more 
 properly belonging to the Cimmerians) spread ruin and desola- 
 tion through the fairest countries of Asia. The latter of these two 
 barbarian hordes even violated the sacred land of Jehovah. Can 
 we doubt that the prophets on their watch-towers were keenly 
 alive to the danger? Nothing but a dread of admitting unful- 
 filled predictions can have prevented some critics of the last 
 and the present generation from recognizing the light which 
 these facts of history throw upon the language of the two con- 
 temporary prophets Zephaniah and Jeremiah. The limits of 
 this volume prevent me from entering into the question of the 
 relation of prediction to fulfilment. Again and again, however, 
 the expositor is obliged by the force of truth to state facts which 
 conclusively demonstrate that " it is not fate that presides ovei 
 prophecy, nor does fatality follow it." 2 Prophecy is simply 
 the declaration and illustration of the principles of the divine 
 government sometimes in the past, sometimes in the present, 
 sometimes in the future. The illustrations, however, are always 
 inferior in strict accuracy to the principles, and among the 
 
 1 Schracler, " Kcilinschriften und Gcschichtsforschung,'' p. 150; Lenor- 
 inant, " Les origines de 1'histoire," ii. i, p. 547. 
 
 a Kdershcim, "Prophecy and History in Relation to the Messiah,'' 
 P- 153-
 
 38 JEREMIAH. 
 
 illustrations those which have to do with the circumstances of 
 the hour are more implicitly to be trusted than those which 
 have to do with the past and with the future. Zephaniah and 
 Jeremiah were prophets in the sense which I have described, 
 and their expositor is not to be tied down by the mistaken 
 theories of dull and unsympathetic theologians. 
 
 So far, then, as we know for certain, the only one of the 
 nations of Palestine upon which the threats of Zephaniah were 
 at all fulfilled was Philistia (Herod, i. 105) ; and it is but a 
 probable guess that Judah, so earnestly warned both by 
 Zephaniah and by Jeremiah, suffered somewhat from the re- 
 turning Scythians. God, who had stretched out His hand over 
 His guilty land as if to annihilate it, withdrew it, as it seems, 
 after (at most) a very mild chastisement. That Zephaniah and 
 Jeremiah did not foresee this, does not detract from their 
 prophetic character. God meant them to make the utmost use 
 of a very real danger to Judah in teaching and admonishing 
 their people. It was certain to both that the national sins must 
 be followed by an awful national judgment, and Jeremiah 
 especially went on, like Evangelist in the " Pilgrim's Progress," 
 urging his countrymen to flee from the wrath to come. Like 
 the wise men to whom we owe the canonical proverbs, like 
 the Rabbis their successors, and above all like "the Master" 
 Himself, he did not disdain the homeliest illustrations. It is a 
 condensed parable, borrowed from his favourite Hosea (Hos. x. 
 12), with which he begins the prophecy of the northern invasion 
 in chap, iv. 1 , 
 
 For thus saith Jehovah to the men of Judah and to Jerusalem, 
 PlougJi for yourselves fallow ground, and sow not among thorns. 
 
 It is needless to explain this illustration ; one might take it 
 for a scene from our Lord's Parable of the Sower. Doubtless 
 it is but a condensed note of a more elaborate and pointed dis- 
 course, like that with which Isaiah concludes one of his great 
 warning prophecies (Isa. xxviii. 23-29). Both regard agricul- 
 ture, in the spirit of primitive times, as derived from the mani- 
 fold wisdom of God, who doth instruct him (the husbandman) 
 aright, and doth teach him (Isa. xxviii. 26 R.V.). Sow not 
 among the thorns, says the prophet, implying that his hearers 
 
 1 This chapter ought to begin at verse 3 ; verses i and 2 belong to the 
 preceding prophecy.
 
 MORNING-CLOUD GOODNESS. 39 
 
 were doing so at the time. He had at length joi 
 in announcing the approach of the instrument of God's wrath 
 The preaching based on the terrors of judgment seems to have 
 produced some result. In iii. 4 (see p. 27) Judah personified 
 is represented as from this time addressing Jehovah by the 
 most endearing of titles. We may be sure that the little band 
 of highminded and likeminded friends to which Jeremiah him- 
 self belonged had tried, each in his own circle, to call forth a 
 fitting spirit of contrition and amendment. Could the efforts 
 of these good men be absolutely and entirely resultless ? Con- 
 sider for a moment the great spiritual forces laid up at the 
 outset in the people of Israel, to which, through Jehovah's 
 lovingkindness, was due a long succession of inspired men 
 taken from the ranks of the people. Could these forces be 
 entirely spent ? No ; the good spiritual elements inherited 
 from far-off ancestors had doubtless been impaired by the 
 adverse influences of Canaan, Assyria, and Egypt endangered, 
 but not entirely destroyed. And so a certain amount of moral 
 reformation must have been produced, and, we infer from Jere- 
 miah, was actually produced through the efforts of God's 
 servants at this period. But it was too much like the reforma- 
 tion of which Hosea speaks in northern Israel, your goodness 
 is as a morning cloud, and as the dew that goeth early away 
 (Hos. vi. 4). 
 
 Upon shallow and superficial natures, already " choked " 
 with the "thorns" of noxious habits, the most diligent cul- 
 tivation was thrown away. So Jeremiah came to think; and 
 yet may not the scantiness of the result have been partly due 
 to the style of the prophet's teaching? He had not entirely 
 got beyond the imperfect moral conceptions of Isaiah, who says 
 in effect in his opening discourse (Isa. i. 15-17), "Wash you, 
 make you clean, and then God will hearken to your prayers," 
 implying that the sinner himself can nip his evil inclinations in 
 the bud can, by his native strength, " cease to do evil " and 
 "learn to do well." Jeremiah in iv. 3, 4 speaks like Isaiah. In 
 other passages indeed he approaches the point of view of the 
 Fifty-first Psalm. In ii. 22 he says, Though thou wash thce 
 with lye, and take thee much soap, yet thine iniquity is marked 
 (i.e., deeply ingrained) before me, saith the Lord Jehovah; and 
 in xiii. 23, Can the Ethiopian change his skin, and the leopard 
 his spots ? then may ye also do good, that are trained to do evil,
 
 40 JEREMIAH. 
 
 But he dqps not get so far as Purge me with hyssop, and 1 shall 
 be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow (Psa. li. 7) ; 
 he even says, not as it would seem ironically, in iv. 14, O Jeru- 
 salem, wash thine Jieart from wickedness, that thou mayest be 
 saved (compare the striking language of iv. 4).' The reason of 
 this inconsistency is that he has no knowledge as yet of the in- 
 dwelling of the Spirit of God, which is surely the second half of 
 the Gospel, and which is almost revealed in one of the pro- 
 phecies attached to the original Book of Isaiah (Isa. Ixiii. u) 
 and in the Fifty-first Psalm (v. n), both written, as I at least 
 must believe, later than the time of Jeremiah. 
 
 The results, then, of this earnest but onesided preaching were 
 a bitter disappointment to the prophet. What indeed was the 
 good of a few isolated good actions, as long as the moral bent 
 remained unchanged ? Or, to speak parabolically with Jeremiah, 
 How could even a single sheaf of ripe wheat be harvested in a 
 field choked by thorns ? And so the prophet, in reproducing the 
 discourses of this period, gives but one verse to (I suppose) the 
 exhortations of many days, and at once passes on to give a most 
 graphic and deeply felt description of the advance of the swarm- 
 ing barbarians, reminding us of a similar picture of the expected 
 advance of the Assyrians in Isa. x. It is possible that at a 
 later stage the prophet of woe became the bearer of the glad 
 tidings of deliverance. To Jeremiah's deeply religious mind, 
 the retirement of the Scythians would appear Jehovah's merci- 
 ful recognition that there were at least " ten righteous " in the 
 city (Gen. xviii. 32) for whose sakes a brief space was granted 
 for a fuller repentance. Not having a complete collection of 
 Jeremiah's discourses, we are at liberty to guess this. But cer- 
 tain it is, that in finally editing the prophecies which make up 
 chaps, iv. and vi., Jeremiah introduced some new features, and 
 otherwise heightened the colouring of some descriptions, to make 
 them suit later and in reality more dreadful foes the Chaldrcans 
 (see p. 34, note 3). This is in harmony with the manner 
 
 * Circumcise yourselves to Jehovah, &c. Is this phrase (with which 
 comp. vi. 10) suggested by Deut. x. 16? If so, we must, it would seem, in- 
 clude it among the features (see below) added by the prophet to his earliest 
 discourse some years afterwards. That Jeremiah should adopt the less 
 advanced expression (as compared with the language of Deut. xxx. 6), 
 would be in harmony with the acknowledged result of criticism that Deut. 
 xxx. is one of the later additions to the original Deuteronomy.
 
 MORNING-CLOUD GOODNESS. 41^ 
 
 of the prophets, and indeed of the Jewish writers in general. 
 Jeremiah deals with his own earlier predictions as the authors 
 of the ancient versions, to whom the Bible, as Geiger says, was 
 "no dead book," deal with the Scriptures in general ; he works 
 them up anew, or rather " works over " them, to adapt them to 
 later circumstances. That difficulties might arise to readers in 
 remote centuries, did not of course occur to him ; Providence 
 has given to each fragment from the pen of prophets and 
 apostles an importance which the writers could not have antici- 
 pated. But let us not interpret these in many respects peculiar 
 works as if they were indited yesterday, and as if we had them 
 in their first draft. Let us frankly recognize that they may be 
 susceptible of two interpretations with equal claims on our at- 
 tention. They are in fact a fusion of kindred historical scenes, 
 to some extent analogous to the fusion of details from two 
 national catastrophes in Psa. Ixxix. 
 
 It will perhaps make it easier to understand this fusion of 
 prophecies if we remember that, however sharp the agony of 
 this crisis may have been, it cannot have lasted long. The 
 whole period of the Scythian successes must have been much 
 shorter than is stated by Herodotus, if he is right in dating it 
 from the defeat of Cyaxares. 1 At any rate there can have been 
 but a brief interval between Jeremiah's first gloomy forebodings 
 and the withdrawal of Jehovah's chastening hand. It is surely 
 not a misplaced comment that God is at once more loving and 
 more just than finite mortals can be. He " seeth not as man 
 seeth" (Job x. 4), and recognized elements of good which Jere- 
 miah, with his tear-bedimmed eyes, could scarcely notice. He 
 was ready to make allowances (tiriEiKfe, 2 as the Septuagint of 
 Psa. Ixxxvi. 5 has it) for shallow and superficial natures and 
 for inconsistent characters, for the plants which " forthwith 
 sprung up," but " had no root," or (to quote a feature more 
 parallel to Jeremiah's own words in iv. 3) to those which were 
 "choked" by "the thorns" (Matt. xiii. 5-7). In His loving- 
 kindness He spared Judah and Jerusalem for this time ; but in 
 His justice He made use of the Scythians to prepare the chosen 
 instrument for carrying out that bitter purpose of which He 
 
 1 Comp. Meyer, "Geschichte des Alterthums," i. 557; Maspero, " His- 
 toire ancienne des peuples de 1'Orient," ed. 4, p. 514. 
 
 * Finely adapted to the lin-aZ Xtyo/utiw sallakh (A.V. and R.V. 
 " ready to forgive ").
 
 42 JEREMIAH. 
 
 had said, I have not repented, neillter will I turn back from it 
 (iv. 28) 
 
 Assyria and Chaldcea, those two great peoples of the basin of 
 the Euphrates and the Tigris, had long since filled a large place 
 in the minds of the Jews. The former looked upon herself as 
 the queen of nations, but her power had been seriously impaired 
 by her ceaseless wars ; the energetic warrior caste, to which its 
 conquests were due, not being replenished (as was the case in 
 Turkey formerly) from outside, declined more and more, and 
 even in Judah her fall had long since been foreseen by the 
 illuminated eye of the prophet Nahum. With no acquired moral 
 justification, and no principle of cohesiveness, the great Assyrian 
 empire could not but fall, not gradually like that of Rome, but 
 with a sudden and terrific crash. To her at least might be 
 applied the prophetic words first uttered at this crisis respecting 
 Jerusalem, Evil impends from the north and a great ruin 
 (iv. I). 
 
 But all this is still in the future. At present, to quote an 
 earlier prophet, behold, joy and gladness, slaying oxen and 
 killing sheep, eating flesh and drinking ivine (Isa. xxii. 13), in 
 the exuberant festivity, not (as in Isaiah's prophecy) of de- 
 spairing sensualists, but of a people "rejoicing before Jehovah" 
 for all the benefits that He had done unto them. Earnest no 
 doubt were the thanksgivings offered both in the temple at 
 Jerusalem and at the various local sanctuaries. Yes, at the 
 "high places" as well as at the house where Jehovah was 
 " enthroned upon the cherubim" ; for in all good faith the Jews 
 must have believed that their moral and religious practices had 
 just received a Divine sanction of the most positive kind. As 
 long as the Scythians were near, the Jews would seem to have 
 listened to Jeremiah, and prompted by alarm to have made 
 certain promises of amendment. Truly from this time, says 
 the Divine oracle, than criest unto me, My father, (and,) Thou 
 art the bridegroom of my youth (Jer. iii. 4). Then in terrified 
 accents the Jews inquire, Will he retain anger for ever? will 
 he keep it perpetually? Verily, the prophet adds from his 
 experience of what actually took place, when the danger was 
 removed, thou hast spoken (such things), but hast done those evil 
 tJiings effectually (Jer. iii. 4). 
 
 That Jeremiah, in spite of his proneness to take dark views, 
 was disappointed at the heathenish reaction which now set in
 
 MORNING-CLOUD COODNESS. 43 
 
 may be inferred from the extreme bitterness, the s<zva inaigna- 
 tio,of the opening words of chap, v., Roam ye through the streets 
 of Jerusalem; look welt, take notice, and seek in the broad places 
 thereof, if ye can Jijid a man, if there be any that doeth justice, 
 that seeketh faithfulness; and I will pardon lier (Jer. v. i). 
 May we not safely regard this as one of those exaggerations to 
 which from his temperament this prophet was peculiarly liable? 
 for surely, if the prophets really warned the Jews of the ap- 
 proach of a judgment, it follows from the withdrawal of the 
 "outstretched hand" that there must have been a few righteous 
 men within the city. God knew better than His servant, and 
 in the course of His providence contradicted the extreme ex- 
 pressions of that passage, which may be compared to the 
 overstatements of Elijah in the wilds of Arabia, and those of 
 the Florentine Elijah Savonarola, in the earliest period of his 
 reforming activity. Still, we need not hesitate to accept Jere- 
 miah's authority for the less favourable aspect which the popu- 
 lar religion once more assumed. This is how the prophet 
 continues to unburden his mind in chap. v. The first passage 
 testifies to a loosening of the moral bands of society ; the 
 second, to the increased opposition offered to the nobler class of 
 prophets. Jehovah, do not tJiine eyes look for faithfulness ? if 
 thou smitest them, they feel nothing; if thou consumest them, 
 they will not receive correction; they make their face harder than 
 rock, they will not (urn (v. 3). 
 
 They have denied Jehovah, and said, " Not he '/ upon us shall 
 no calamity come, sword and famine we shall not see "; and 
 " Those prophets shall become wind; speaker, there is none in 
 them ; it shall be done thus unto themselves'''' (v. 12). 
 
 In fact, it is from this point that we may date the beginning 
 of Jeremiah's long martyrdom. Priests and prophets were 
 now to a great extent united against him and his friends, and my 
 -people, he sadly says, assuming the person of Jehovah, love to 
 have it so (v. 31). The king, however, is not mentioned in 
 this dark chapter, some of the details in which we hesitate to 
 take too literally, although to resolve them into mere allegories 
 
 1 The speakers mean to deny, not the metaphysical existence of Jehovah, 
 but rather His moral government of the world, like the ungodly described 
 in Psa. xiv. and similar passages. A'of he means " Not he is the true lord 
 of the world," " Not he is the avenger of the innocent " (cf. the commenta- 
 tors on Psa. x. ii, 13, xii. 5, xiv. i).
 
 44 JEREMIAH. 
 
 would destroy half their force. 1 All classes except the highest 
 being described and condemned, one naturally asks, What was 
 Josiah doing? What were his feelings, and what his course 
 of action, on this large accession of strength to the heathenish 
 party ? 
 
 Surely we cannot doubt that Josiah would gladly have inter- 
 posed, had he been able, and that his feelings were those of 
 alarm and shame. It is true that he had hitherto deliberately 
 tolerated the old religious customs (" high places " and all that 
 they involved), which, in so far as they merely indicated 
 deficient religious insight, may not have seemed to him as 
 unmitigatedly evil as they did to the later historian. Let us 
 remember that to the student of religions the customs which 
 would be odiously repulsive if reintroduced become full of 
 meaning, and therefore relatively excusable in the light of 
 antiquity. Josiah was not a critical student, but he may well have 
 understood the traditions of his people better than the vehement 
 Jeremiah, and have known or believed that certain of them 
 were still to some extent the manifestations of a naive and 
 sincere piety. On the other hand, there were other customs 
 which must have appeared to him as pernicious morally as they 
 did to Jeremiah, especially those which, like the custom of 
 child-sacrifice, had but recently been introduced into the popular 
 religion. This expression may perhaps be criticised. Readers 
 of Dr. Kuenen's " Religion of Israel" must well remember the 
 powerful passage in which he sums up the evidence for the 
 survival of human sacrifices among the Israelites (vol. i., p. 237). 
 But the utmost that this great critic can prove is the possibility 
 that sporadic cases of human sacrifice occurred in early times. 
 In the same connexion he quotes Mic. vi. 7, 
 
 Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, 
 Tlie fruit of my body for my personal sin f 
 
 The author of Mic. vi., vii., however, is, regarded from a 
 religious point of view, one of the precursors of Deuteronomy 
 (comp. Mic. vi. 8 with Deut. x. 12), and, from a historical one, 
 
 1 It is certain that the customs which were bound up with the reactionary 
 Baal-worship were profoundly immoral (see my notes on Hos. iv. 11-14 in 
 the "Cambridge Bible"). Butz/. 7, according to the best reading, runs . . . 
 though I made them to swear (allegiance to me), yet they committed adultery, 
 (comp. Psa. Ixxiii. 27), which favours at least a partial reference to a relapse 
 into heathenish religion.
 
 MORNING-CLOUD GOODNESS. 45 
 
 contemporary with an influx of idolatry and a bitter persecution 
 such as only occurred in the reign of Manasseh (see my " Micah," 
 p. 14). Child-sacrifice was, as I have said, a recent importation, 
 and surely it is even more shocking to natural feelings of 
 humanity than the hewing of Agag in pieces before Jehovah 
 which was permitted in the rude age of Samuel. Is there any 
 evidence that child-sacrifice was ever a distinctively Israelitish 
 practice? Phoenician, Arabian, and Babylonian, it undoubtedly 
 was ; ' but we must not too hastily assume that it was known 
 to all the Semitic tribes before their separation. The influence 
 of Babylonia and Assyria upon the Semitic East was vast long 
 after that prehistoric event. As the Babylonians borrowed this 
 cruel rite from the " Accadians," so did the Phoenicians and (if 
 I am not mistaken) the Arabians from the Babylonians. Re- 
 member too that I am now speaking of the comparatively pure 
 religion brought by the tribes of Israel from the desert of the 
 wanderings ; what their more distant ancestors may conceivably 
 have practised is not germane to my subject. It is with good 
 reason that a late chronicler says of Ahaz that he made his son 
 (or, as the Septuagint in Lucian's recension gives, his sons, TOVQ 
 vioi-Q ai'Tuv, comp. 2 Chron. xxviii. 3) pass tkrottgh the fire, 
 according to the abominations of the nations whom Jehovah had 
 expelled before the children of Israel 2 (2 Kings xvi. 3). That 
 
 1 Saycc, " Hibbert Lectures" (1887), p. 78 ; Wellhausen, "Skizzen und 
 Vorarbeiten," Heft iii. (1887), pp. 112, 113; Baudissin, art. " Moloch," in 
 Herzog's " Encyclopadie/' ed. 2, x. 174, 175. Notice the doubtless 
 synonymous Phoenician names, Respuyathon and Malikyathon, in which 
 Resper is the name of the heavenly Fire-god and Malik= Moloch, i.e., 
 "king of heaven." It may be observed in passing that it is doubtful 
 whether Malik, Melech, Molech, or Moloch (we may adopt which form we 
 please) can strictly be called a proper name of the great heaven-god. For 
 the horror at child-sacrifices felt in a humane age, see the end of Plutarch's 
 treatise on Superstition. 
 
 2 Baudissin, in the article already referred to, thinks that the custom of 
 appeasing the god Molech (Sept., Moloch) by sacrifices of children pro- 
 bably began before Ahaz, though from some unknown cause the cult of 
 Moloch became specially prevalent in and after the time of that king. 
 This view he supports by the virtual identification of Molech or Moloch with 
 Baal in Jer. xix. 5, xxxii. 35. He rightly denies that the phrase "to cause 
 to pass through the fire " can be used of mere fiery lustrations. Doubtless, 
 however, the children were slain before the fire-rite was performed upon 
 them (see Ezek. xvi, 20, 21, xxiii. 39, and comp. Isa, Ivii, 5, Psa. cvi. 
 37- 38)-
 
 46 JEREMIAH. 
 
 very narrative and that very law to which reference has been 
 made conclusively show that when they were written, or rather 
 when the traditional story in the one and the custom which lies 
 at the root of the other became current (this takes us back to 
 a still earlier period), these horrible child-sacrifices were not 
 approved by the general consciousness of Israel ; the ram in 
 Gen. xxii. is a substittite for Isaac, and the firstborn of man in 
 a well-known law (Ex. xiii. 13) was to be redeemed. In contra- 
 distinction to Ahaz, it is recorded of Josiah that he walked in 
 all the way of David his father (2 Kings xxii. 2), and the primi- 
 tive simplicity of David's religion (see i and 2 Samuel) must not 
 blind us to its comparative refinement. 1 I think, then, that I 
 have not claimed too much for Josiah. If his friend Jeremiah 
 has a " fear and love of God's holy name " which contrasts so 
 "amazingly" with the low type of religion prevalent in Israel, 
 and by this contrast, as Colenso has said, 2 convince us of his 
 inspiration, can we doubt that Josiah, true son of David as he 
 was, and even in youth a " seeker after the God of David " 
 (2 Chron. xxxiv. 3), felt as truly, though not quite as warmly, as 
 Jeremiah, and that he cast many a look of horror on what the 
 prophet calls the way of Israel in the valley (Jer. viii. 23) ? If 
 even for us the picturesque scenery of the glen of Hinnom 
 ("moaning " is a suggestive even if not an undoubtedly correct 
 rendering) is spoiled by the awful memories of Moloch's 
 religion, how much keener must have been the feelings of one 
 who lived in the midst of the still uncertain struggle against its 
 abominations ! I admit the difficulty which arises. If these 
 were really Josiah's sentiments, why did he lose a moment in 
 extinguishing the horrid rites of " the Topheth " ? 3 So we may 
 naturally ask, but, as I suggested above, it is doubtful whether 
 he had the power to do so. If the present ruler of Egypt could 
 
 1 Can we fairly say, with Kuenen, that " David, at the instigation of the 
 Gibeonites, seeks to avert Yahveh's anger by the death of seven of Saul's 
 progeny " (" Religion of Israel," i. 237) ? Doubtless he is not shocked by 
 the impalement of Saul's descendants as we should have been ; but, 
 believing that the guilt of bloodshed lay upon his people, could he have 
 acted otherwise than he did ? It was not a sacrifice but an act of vengeance 
 which the Gibeonites performed. 
 
 2 Colenso, "On the Pentateuch," part v., p. 300. 
 
 3 See Jer. xix. 13, the place of the Topheth (i.e., according to a common 
 but doubtful etymology, " the abomination," lit., " the object of spitting," 
 comp. Job xvii. 6).
 
 MORNING-CLOUD GOODNESS. 47 
 
 with difficulty be persuaded that it was safe to venture on a 
 somewhat similar step, 1 how can a king of Judah, who was by 
 no means an absolute sovereign, be blamed for his backward- 
 ness ? 
 
 So much, at least, is certain, that Josiah and his friends must 
 have had a sad life. Disappointed once already, they had 
 nothing to expect from the future but still more bitter dis- 
 appointments, if they attempted the smallest reform in their 
 own strength. Meantime the good old Israclitish character 
 was in danger of a sad transformation. Must not the frenzy of 
 nature-worship in course of time intoxicate the unhappy 
 devotees, and assimilate them to the impure and cruel character 
 of their Phoenician neighbours ? Yes, it must do so ; Judah 
 has sinned worse than Israel (Jer. iii.), and must be punished, 
 both inwardly and outwardly inwardly, by being given over to 
 moral degeneracy, and outwardly by being cast off from the 
 land which she has defiled. But in a strange and unlocked for 
 way one more chance is to be offered her ; for the sake of 
 "ten righteous men" the city is to be spared for a while, if so 
 be the covenant between Jehovah and Israel can on man's side 
 be renewed. 
 
 1 The abolition of the d6seh, or trampling upon a human causeway, 
 which Tewfik always abhorred as "an inhuman rite" (see Butler, "Court 
 Life in Egypt"). Comp. Miss Edwards, "A Thousand Miles up the 
 Nile," p. 707, and (for the same usage at Beirut) Thomson, "The Land 
 and the Book," p. 156.
 
 CHAPTER V, 
 "HE THAT SEEKETII, FINDETH." 
 
 The finding of the book of Divine instruction The national covenant 
 Jeremiah, a preacher of Deuteronomy. 
 
 LET us now transport ourselves in imagination to the year 622 
 (or 621) B.C. the eighteenth year of the reign of Josiah, and 
 try to realize the religious condition of the people of Judah. 
 Beyond question, they were " servants of Jehovah," but their 
 Jehovah (I speak of the mass of the people) was simply the 
 supreme deity in a Pantheon, and had insensibly adopted the 
 characteristics of the Canaanitish Baal. All through these 
 eighteen years no forward movement had been made, in spite 
 of the genial atmosphere of peace which, since the retreat of 
 the Scythians, seemed to invite a closer attention to religious 
 culture. How much there was that needed reform ! The most 
 honoured sanctuary of Jehovah was still polluted by idolatrous 
 polytheistic emblems. Altars still smoked both to Him and to 
 other divinities " under every green tree and upon every high 
 hill." Children were still sacrificed to the cruel Fire-god in the 
 torrent-valleys like that of Hinnom " under the clefts of the 
 rocks." Worship was still offered to the host of heaven upon 
 the housetops, while at every street-corner in the larger towns 
 there were shrines of Jehovah or Baal or the " queen of heaven."' 
 
 1 See Jer. ii. 20, 28, iii. 6, 13, vii. 17, 18, xi. 13, xix. 13, and comp. 
 2 Kings xxiii. 4-15. For the child-sacrifices, see Jer. ii. 23, vii. 31, xix 
 5, xxxii. 35, and comp. Isa. Ivii. 5. Of the prophecy to which the latter 
 passage belongs, Ewald very justifiably asserts that it (like Mic. vi., vii.) 
 transports us into the times of Manasseh, or those immediately following his 
 death, and adds that the piece bears the closest resemblance to the earlier 
 pieces of Jeremiah (" Prophets of the Old Testament,'' iv. 321).
 
 "HE THAT SEEKETH, FINDETH." 49 
 
 Josiah and those who sympathized with him had still to endure 
 these painful sights and sounds, for no plan of reform had, 
 according to our chronological notices, as yet commended itself 
 to the practical mind of the king. Such was the state of affairs, 
 when a lightning-flash all at once illuminated the scene. A 
 messenger had been sent by Josiah to the temple on business 
 connected with the repairs of the building. Nearly two and a 
 half centuries ago the sacred building had been efficiently 
 restored by Joash, the account of whose work is placed in 
 designed parallelism (compare the two descriptions') to that of 
 Josiah. We are not told what the circumstances were which 
 led to the new restoration ; but we must conjecture that they 
 bore a close relation to the gradually progressing though not 
 publicly recognized reform-movement. The messenger himself 
 was Shaphan, the scribe or chancellor, also known as the father 
 of Jeremiah's patron Gemariah (Jer. xxxiv. 10, 19, 25), and 
 grandfather of the equally friendly Micaiah (Jer. xxxvi. 11-13). 
 We shall have to refer to him again ; he was evidently one of 
 the adherents of a progressive or spiritual religion. At present 
 we must accompany him to his royal master, and watch the 
 effect of the tidings which he bears from the temple, where a 
 discovery has just been made by Hilkiah the priest. It is a 
 book which has been found, containing directions on religious 
 and moral points which cut at the root of many popular customs 
 and practices. The name which Hilkiah gives to it is "the 
 book of torali " (i.e., of Divine direction or instruction) ; the 
 narrator himself calls it "the covenant book" (2 Kings xxiii. 2). 
 The Chronicler, however, gives it a fuller title " the book of 
 Jehovah's torah given by Moses" (2 Chron. xxxiv. 14), which 
 probably expresses the meaning of the earlier narrator. For 
 certainly it was as a Mosaic production that " the book of 
 torah " effected such a rapid success, though not (even accord- 
 ing to the compiler of Kings) the whole of what is now called 
 the Pentateuch. There can be no longer any doubt that the 
 book found in the temple was substantially the same as our 
 Book of Deuteronomy. Does the narrative in Kings describe 
 the book as " the book of torah " and its stipulations collec- 
 tively as " the covenant " (2 Kings xxii. 8, xxiii. 3) ? These 
 are also phrases of the expanded Book of Deuteronomy (Deut. 
 xxix. r, 21, xxx. 10, xxxi. 26, &c.). Do the king and the 
 
 1 Comp. a Kings xii. 4-16, xxii. 3-7. 
 
 5
 
 50 JEREMIAH. 
 
 people pledge themselves to walk after Jehovah, and to keep 
 his commandments and Ids precepts and Jiis statutes with all 
 their heart and with all their soul, performing the words of this 
 covenant that are written in this book (2 Kings xxiii. 3) ? The 
 same phrases occur over and over again in Deuteronomy 
 (see Deut. viii. 6, n, vi. 5, x. 12, 13, iv. 13, xxix. 9). Does 
 Josiah devote himself to the suppression of the local sanc- 
 tuaries and the centralization of worship ? This is also one 
 of the principal aims of the Book of Deuteronomy. 
 
 Whenever, therefore, the Old Testament is rearranged for 
 English Bible-students, we may expect that the chapter on the 
 Reformation of Josiah will contain something like the following 
 section : 
 
 And Hilkiah the high priest said to Shaphan the chancellor, 
 I have found the lawbook in tJie house of Jehovah. And Hil- 
 kiah gave the book to Shaphan, and he read it, and came to the 
 king, and told him, Plilkiah the priest hath given me a book. 
 And Shaphan read it before the king. And among the com- 
 mandments of the lawbook that Shaphan read before the king 
 were found these words : Hear, O Israel : Jehovah is our God, 
 Jehovah is one j and thou shalt love Jehovah thy God with all 
 thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. Ye 
 shall destroy all the places, wherein the nations which ye dis- 
 possess served their gods, upon the high mountains, and upon 
 the hills, and under every green tree; and ye shall tear down 
 their altars, and dash in pieces their standing stones, and burn 
 their Asherahs ( or emblems of AshtraJi) with fire ; and the 
 graven images of their gods ye shall break down, and shall de- 
 stroy their name out of that place. Not thus shall ye worship 
 Jehovah your God. But unto the place which Jehovah your 
 God chooseth out of your tribes to put his name there to inhabit 
 it, shall ye seek, and thither shalt thou come; and ye shall bring 
 thither your burnt-offerings and your sacrifices. Thou shalt not 
 plant an emblem of A sht'rah, of any kind of tree, beside the altar 
 of Jehovah thy God which thou shalt make thee. Neither shalt 
 thou set thee up a pillar which Jehovah thy God hateth. 
 
 When thou art come into the land which Jehovah thy God 
 giveth thee, thou shalt not learn to do after the abominations of 
 the nations which were before thee. There shalt not be found in 
 thee any that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through 
 the fire, any thai useth divination, or an enchanter, or a sorcerer,
 
 "HE THAT SEEKETH, FINDETH." $t 
 
 or a charmer. For these nations which thou dispossessest do 
 hearken unto sorcerers ; but for thee Jehovah hath not so 
 ordained. Jehovah thy God shall (continually) raise up for tlicc 
 a prophet from tJie midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me ; 
 unto him shall ye hearken. 1 
 
 I pause here for a moment in the interests of my reader. 
 The future (" shall Jehovah raise ") has here a frequentative 
 sense, as in Isa. x. 5, Against an impious nation am I wont to 
 send him (not, " will I send him," as A.V. and R.V.). It means 
 " shall from time to time raise," and the verse contains a promise 
 that a prophet in the highest sense (as opposed to the sooth- 
 sayers just before mentioned) shall never be wanting, and a 
 direction to pay unconditional obedience to such a prophet. It 
 is therefore a grand glorification of the inspired Hebrew (or, 
 shall I say? Mosaic) prophethood which we have before us ; not 
 a Messianic prediction, except so far as it indicates that a vic- 
 torious king was not adequate to God's gracious purposes for 
 Israel and the world, that not only a " Messiah" was requisite 
 but a prophetic mediator to interpret the Divine counsel to man. 
 (It is no objection to this view that xxxiv. 10-12 denies that a 
 prophet ever arose " like unto Moses " ; for this passage is not 
 the work of the author of Deuteronomy (see chapter vii.). 
 
 And if thou wilt hearken unto the voice of Jehovah thy God, 
 he will set thce on high above all the nations of the earth ; but 
 if thou wilt not hearken, then will all these curses come upon 
 thee and overtake thce, until Jehovah have consumed thee from 
 off tlie land, whither thou goest in to possess it. And when the 
 king heard the words of the laivbook, he rent his clothes." 2 
 
 Such is the only setting in which a Biblical scholar, who, if I 
 may model my phrase en that of Dante, 3 
 
 . . . 'twixt reverent and free, 
 I know not which is more . . . 
 
 1 This rearrangement has been judiciously made already for American 
 readers. The title of the book is, "Scriptures Hebrew and Christian, 
 Arranged and Edited for Young Readers as an Introduction to the Study 
 of the Bible." By E. T. Bartlett, A.M., Dean of the Protestant Episcopal 
 Divinity School in Philadephia, and Ja. P. Peters, Ph.D., Professor of the 
 Old Test. Languages and Literature in the same school. Vol. i. London, 
 James Clarke & Co., 1886. 
 
 2 2 Kings xxii. 8-10 ; Deut. vi. 4, 5, xii. 2-6, xvi. 21, 22, xviii. 9-15, 
 xxviii. 15-21. 3 " Purgatorio," xxiv. 13, 14 Longfellow).
 
 52 JEREMIAH. 
 
 is permitted to place the kernel at least of Deuteronomy (if this 
 somewhat misleading name is still to be used 1 ), but not more 
 than this, for the fifth of the so-called " Books of Moses " has 
 most certainly grown like the other four. It is too soon to 
 inquire what this " kernel " was ; too soon to set forth the pro- 
 bable origin of this earliest part of the book. To our regret, 
 though not to our surprise, the narrator is silent on much which 
 we modern students would like to know. Conversations on 
 this mysterious lawbook must have taken place between the 
 king and his friend the high priest, but they have found no 
 record in history. The narrator only mentions the profound 
 impression which the book at once made upon the king. Was 
 the latter afraid of the curses pronounced upon a persistently 
 disobedient people? So the narrator appears to think. I 
 would rather suppose that a spirit of great hopefulness came 
 upon him, now that the wished-for "sign" from heaven had 
 come, and that his only remaining desire was to ascertain, not 
 whether the pen of Moses wrote, but whether the successors of 
 Moses in the prophetic office guaranteed it to be according to 
 the will of God. He sent therefore to one of those who were 
 specially called to "interpret" that will (Isa. xliii. 27, R.V.). 
 The circumstances of the visit are noteworthy. When a pro- 
 phecy of woe has to be delivered to Hezekiah, it is Isaiah who 
 visits the king (Isa. xxxix. 3) ; prophetism and royalty are still 
 almost equal powers in the state. But since Isaiah's death the 
 relation of these two powers has changed. In the present 
 instance, it is a prophetic personage to whom the king sends 
 his ambassadors. It is an interesting but not very important 
 fact 2 that this personage is a woman. Possibly she was 
 selected as being at once of advanced age and high in repute 
 as well with the king as with the people (this qualification 
 would exclude Jeremiah). There were doubtless, as in Ezekiel's 
 time (Ezek. xiii. 17-23), many prophetesses, but not many 
 
 1 The name means "repetition of the law" ; it is founded on a philo- 
 logical mistake, and assumes a critical view which very many believe to be 
 equally erroneous. The philological mistake referred to is the rendering of 
 Deut. xvii. 18, where the Septuagint has "this deuteronomy " (instead of 
 " a copy of this law "). The doubtful critical view is that " Deuteronomy " 
 is later than the rest of the legislation in the Pentateuch. 
 
 2 The later Jews judged otherwise, however, if we may argue from the 
 so- called Tomb of Hulclah on Mount Olivet.
 
 "HE THAT SEEKETH, F1NDETH." 53 
 
 Huldahs ; the rarity of them would with some add to her 
 personal reputation. The prophecy ascribed to Huldah 1 by the 
 later compiler has, for different reasons, been a stumbling- 
 block to students. The moderns have remarked that Josiah 
 went through life in perfect unconsciousness of any dark fate 
 brooding over his people, and that the phraseology is that of 
 later prophecy ; the ancients were more puzzled by the state- 
 ment that Josiah should die in peace (some copies of the 
 Septuagint gave in Jerusalem in Salem). The king's next 
 step suggests that he really wished the reforms called for by the 
 lawbook to be the result of a national movement (comp. Isa. 
 xxvii. 9, xxx. 22). The wish was too languid, to judge from the 
 king's subsequent methods, but may he not really have wished 
 to see Isaiah's prophecy fulfilled? At any rate, he summoned an 
 assembly in which the whole nation was duly and fully repre- 
 sented, and which accepted the newly " found " lawbook, as 
 soon as it was read to them, in a form probably shorter than 
 that in which we have received it. Finally all present joined 
 the king in a solemn "covenant," binding themselves to carry 
 out faithfully " the words of this book." The narrative runs 
 thus : 
 
 And the king sent, and there ^vere gathered unto him all the 
 elders of Judah and of Jerusalem. And the king went up to the 
 house of Jehovah, and all tJie men of Judali and all tJie inJiabi- 
 tants of Jerusalem with him, and tli e priests, and the prophets, 3 
 and all the people, both small and great ; and he read in their 
 ears all the words of tJie book of covenant 3 which was found 
 in the house of Jehovah. And tlie king stood on the platform? 
 And he made tlie covenant before Jehovah, to walk after Jeho- 
 vah [i.e., to serve no other god], and to keep his commandments 
 and his testimonies and his statutes, with all his heart and all 
 
 1 There are coins with the name of Huldah, a Nabatrean queen, tlie con- 
 sort of King Aretas Philodemos, a contemporary of Pompeius (" Zeitschr. 
 der d. morgenland. Gesellschaft," xiv. 370, &c. ) 
 
 2 Jeremiah, therefore, was present, as we may presume. 
 
 3 That " the book of covenant " is different from that mentioned in Exod. 
 xxiv. 7, needs no showing. Observe that Deuteronomy is entirely silent 
 respecting that covenant-book and its acceptance. 
 
 * So K.V. margin rightly. Some conspicuous place, specially reserved 
 for the king, seems to be meant (comp. 2 Kings xi. 14). The Hebrew 
 \i in in ml means anything which stands firmly usually (but not neces- 
 sarily) a pillar. Josephus has, <m<c tjri rai< /3>//<ro<;,
 
 54 JEREMIAH. 
 
 liis so:il, to perform the icords of t]iis covenant that are written 
 in Hi is book. And all the people entered into the covenant. 
 And the king commanded all the people, saying, Keep the pass- 
 over unto Jehovah your God, as it is written in this book oj 
 covenant 1 (2 Kings xxiii. 1-3,21). 
 
 But what is meant, the reader will ask, by this word "cove- 
 nant" (beritJi) ? It would take too long to discuss it philologi- 
 cally and exegetically. It means, however, when used in con- 
 nexion with God, a law to the observance of which certain 
 promises are attached. Looking at the history of Israel from 
 the vantage-ground of Christianity, we may say that it is a 
 history of " covenants." From time to time God has revealed 
 His will to chosen persons, telling them how He would be 
 worshipped, how men should behave themselves to be like their 
 God, and how He would reward them for their faithful obedi- 
 ence. Such a revelation is, in Hebrew phrase, a "covenant." 
 There was a "covenant" with Abraham, with Moses, and, we 
 might analogically say, with each of those prophets who had 
 something really new to declare, such as Hoseaand Isaiah and 
 Jeremiah. And now the religious stagnation or retrogression 
 which has prevailed since the time of Micah is all at once 
 interrupted by the ratification of a fresh covenant. Not that 
 either " new " or " fresh " is to be taken literally ; there is but 
 one "covenant" between Jehovah and Israel that of Sinai, 
 and all other covenants are but developments of its meaning. 
 In other words, that "prophet like unto Moses" and his faith- 
 ful priestly coadjutor of whom I have spoken were favoured 
 with a fuller intuition of that which was involved in the old 
 Mosaic covenant. They were not great men ; they could not 
 take the intellectual initiative like Hosea and Jeremiah ; but the 
 peculiar combination of prophecy and law whirh they pro- 
 duced was something which had not yet been seen, and from 
 which even the Christian student need not disdain to learn. It 
 was a "covenant" that is, God vouchsafed to make Himself 
 authoritatively known to the Jews in the way best suited to 
 their actual stage of development. And (if I may glide from 
 an academic into a popular religious phraseology) just as we 
 through our parents at the font thankfully accepted God's cove- 
 nant iu Christ, and responded to it by a promise before God 
 
 1 Klostermann has pointed out that 2 Kings xxiii. 21 must originally 
 have stood after v. 3.
 
 "HE THAT SEEKETH, FINDETH." 55 
 
 and the Church to make His commandments, promises, and 
 threatenings the rule of our lives, so did the men of Judah 
 through their representatives at this memorable assembly. 
 
 This in itself is a sufficiently unexpected result. Could we 
 have believed that those who till now had not only exercised 
 boundless freedom in the choice of a sanctuary, but associated 
 Jehovah with a number of other " divinities," including even 
 the cruel Moloch, 1 would at the call of Josiah and on the reading 
 of a hitherto unknown book permit their moral and religious 
 life to be revolutionized ? It is a riddle which at first sight 
 baffles our comprehension. For an Israelitish king was not an 
 absolute sovereign, and could not (like German princes in the 
 i6th century) convert his people by force, nor had Josiah the 
 assistance of a prophet with that wonderworking power and 
 unique popular authority which according to tradition belonged 
 to Elijah. 
 
 Let me now quote a portion ofthe nth chapter of Jeremiah's 
 book. It will perhaps assist us in solving this psychological 
 problem, and suggest the reflexion that, if Josiah had no 
 Elijah to help him, he had a friend and fellow-worker who was 
 better adapted to the altered times. 
 
 The word which came to Jeremiah from Jehovah, as 
 follows : 
 
 . . . And thou shalt speak" unto the men of Judah and unto 
 the inhabitants of Jerusalem in these terms, Thus said JeJiovah, 
 the God of Israel, Cursed be the man that heareth not the 
 words of tliis covenant, which I commanded yotir fathers when 
 1 broitght them out of the land of Egypt the iron furnace, 
 saying, Hearken to my voice, and carry them out {i.e., these 
 words] in the fullest measure, so shall ye become to me a people 
 and I shall become to you a God, that 1 may maintain the oath 
 which I swore unto your fathers that I would give a land 
 
 1 I retain the received way of denominating the heavenly Fire-god. 
 But, as I have already pointed out, it is at least very doubtful 
 whether Malik = Moloch ("king") ought to be regarded as a proper name. 
 
 2 I follow the Septuagint in reading the and person singular. The 
 received Hebrew text has the 2nd pers. plur., and prefixes, Hear ye the 
 ivords of this covenant. This is evidently wrong. The original reading 
 may have been, Publish than the -words, &c. ; or else the whole of the 
 opening clause may have become illegible in the standard manuscript upon 
 which our text ultimately depends, and the words which now supply its 
 place may have been inserted by guess from verse 6.
 
 56 JEREMIAH. 
 
 f owing with milk and honey, as it is this day. And 1 
 answered and said, A men, Jehovah. 
 
 TJius spake Jehovah unto me, Recite all these words in the 
 cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, saying, If ear ye 
 the words of this covenant, and carry them out. For solemnly 
 have I warned your fathers, when I brought them up out of the 
 land of Egypt (and) unto this day, from earliest dawn, Obey my 
 voice. But they have not obeyed, nor bent their ear, but have 
 walked every one in the stubbornness of his evil heart, so I 
 brought upon them all the words of this covenant which I com- 
 manded them to carry out, but they carried not out (Jer. xi. 
 1-8). 
 
 I do not know how to understand this prophecy (the impor- 
 tance of which is shown by the double form in which it has 
 been handed down, 1 and which is clearly isolated from the 
 context), except by supposing that Jeremiah undertook an 
 itinerating mission to the people of Judah, beginning with the 
 capital, in order to set forth the main objects of Deuteronomy, 
 and to persuade men to live in accordance with its precepts. 2 
 The ideas and phraseology of the section are in some respects 
 so akin to those of the kernel of Deuteronomy, 3 and the refer- 
 ence to the curses threatened for disobedience reminds us so 
 strongly of Josiah's reference (2 Kings xxii. 13) to the wrath 
 that is kindled against us, because our fathers have not 
 hearkened unto the words of this book,'' that the supposition 
 
 1 Verses 2-5 give one form of it, and verses 6-8 another. R.V. has 
 rightly altered A. Vs., " Then the LORD said" (v. 6) into " And the LORD 
 said." 
 
 2 It is now seventeen years' since I consulted Dahler's French work on 
 Jeremiah (2 vols., 1825, 1830), but I well remember the forcible way in 
 which the above hypothesis is presented. 
 
 3 By the word "kernel" I mean the earliest and most original part of 
 the Book of Deuteronomy. Comp. Jer. xi. 3 with Deut. xxviii. 15-19 ; 
 ver. 4 with Deut. iv. 20 (" iron furnace"), xxvi. 17, 18, xxvii. 9, xxix. 12 
 (Israel a people to Jehovah, and Jehovah a God to Israel) ; ver. 5 with 
 Deut. vi. 3 (" a land flowing," &c.) ; ver. 8 with Deut. xxviii. 15 (" words," 
 in "all the words,"=" things spoken of," i.e., in this context, curses such 
 as those in Deut. xxviii. 16-68 ; see 2 Chron. xxxiv. 24, "all the curses "). 
 Comp. also Jer. vii. 23-26. 
 
 * I am well aware of the critical uncertainty of this part of the narrative 
 in Kings. But it does not seem to me sufficient to compel me to pass 
 over this very obvious comparison. Kuenen and Dillmann, at any rate, 
 accept Deut. xxviii., which contains the blessings and curses, as the work
 
 "HE THAT SEEKETH, FINDETH." 57 
 
 cannot be evaded or dispensed with. It is just possible that 
 there is a faint recollection of this mission of Jeremiah in the 
 not very accurate account of the reign of Jehoshaphat pre- 
 served in that recast of historical traditions and pious fancies 
 made, long after the return from the Captivity, in what we call 
 the Books of Chronicles. There we read what is entirely op- 
 posed to the earlier account in Kings that Jehoshaphat took 
 away the " high places," and sent nine Levites and two priests 
 throughout all the cities of Judah to teach " the book of 
 Jehovah's torah " (2 Chron. xvii. 6-9). It is possible that the 
 compiler of Chronicles (a man of fervent piety from whom we 
 have much to learn, but most inaccurate as a historian) ante- 
 dated the mission of the preachers of the law, just as he 
 antedated the full development of the musical service in the 
 temple. At any rate, if Jeremiah's words mean anything at 
 all, they cannot mean less than this that he went about in 
 Jerusalem and the provincial cities (possibly as far as Shiloh, 
 vii. 12) explaining a book which closely resembled our 
 Deuteronomy, and persuading the Jews to live according to it. 
 Put this fact side by side with that of the great national 
 assembly which seems to have passed off so smoothly, although 
 the object to be obtained was so contrary to the wishes of the 
 majority of the Jews. Does not the one fact illustrate the 
 other? Jeremiah, I know, is reluctant to admit that his preach- 
 ing met with the least success ; but that is because he put his 
 notes and impressions into shape at so late a period in his 
 ministry. That which he knew had been all along his great 
 object, he did fail for the most part to obtain. But this is quite 
 consistent with his having had those temporary successes which 
 still relieve the gloom of ministerial disappointment. One such 
 he probably had, as we have seen, on the first news of the 
 approach of the Scythians ; may he not have had another when, 
 in the enthiibiubin of youth and the strength of a Divine 
 call, he carried with him as the textbook of his missionary 
 addresses the first complete account of Israel's holy religion ? 
 The reader will recall that, according to the view which I 
 endeavoured to make plausible, Jeremiah was a reformer in 
 
 of tlic Dcnteronomist, and if it be such, I have a right, on the authority 
 of 2 Kings xxii. 13 (comp. v. ti) to assume that Josiah read it and was 
 much affected by it.
 
 5-S JEREMIAH. 
 
 spirit before he was called to be a prophet, and belonged to a 
 band of religious friends who clustered around the pious boy- 
 king Josiah. He will remember how long the friends waited in 
 suspense for some sign from heaven or some practical scheme 
 of reform. The sign from heaven had come, and both Zepha- 
 niah and Jeremiah had sought in vain to get the people to see its 
 meaning. The Jews did indeed see their danger, and, asakind 
 of life-insurance, made some hasty promises of amendment, but 
 no radical change followed (Jer. iii. 4, 5). And now, full of 
 renewed zeal, Jeremiah goes forth with a practical scheme of 
 reform, of which he may or may not know the authors, but 
 which he has recognized as an inspired interpretation of the 
 fundamental ideas of the covenant of Sinai. He has felt its full 
 power himself, and has from the heart said ' Amen ' to its varied 
 contents. But the principle to which, as it would seem, he 
 makes his first appeal in addressing his countrymen is that of 
 fear. He doubtless knew the coarseness of their moral fibre, 
 and hoped against hope that those who began with fear would 
 end with love, and that the promises would seem all the sweeter 
 when the threatenings had been realized in their awful serious- 
 ness. It is not Christ's way ; but then Christ addressed a 
 prepared people, and without concealing the dark side of 
 heavenly truth, He trusted far more to the attractive power of 
 the promises than to the deterrent efficacy of the threatenings 
 of the Gospel. Jeremiah tried the opposite plan and failed. In 
 the world of grace as well as in that of nature, it sometimes 
 seems as if God made experiments, before the best and final 
 plan were adopted. Not that God is finite, but that in this as in 
 other respects His works are adapted to the faculties of those 
 who are to study them. Nature without evolution, and revelation 
 without historical progress, would both of them lose half their 
 charms. 
 
 Jeremiah is not as yet to any great extent a type of Christ ; 
 he will become more so later on, when his personal training is 
 more complete, and he has received the crowning revelation of 
 his life. At present he is but continuing the work of Elijah on 
 Mount Carmel ; or rather, the second Elijah is the iconoclast 
 Josiah, and Jeremiah in his missionary circuit prepares the way 
 for that series of violent measures which is described in 2 Kings 
 xxiii. I cannot see that the part played by Josiah was as noble 
 as that of Jeremiah ; in the roll of honour the royal iconoclast
 
 "HE THAT SEEKETII, FINDETH." 59 
 
 must stand below the preacher. It was a confession of weak- 
 ness, however, that both Hilkiah and Jeremiah allowed Josiah 
 (who would surely have respected their opposition) to commit 
 these arbitrary and in some cases cruel acts. At any rate, if 
 the latter trusted the results of his mission, why did he not bid 
 Josiah wait for a spontaneous iconoclastic movement of his 
 (Jeremiah's) converts (comp. Isa. xxx. 22) ? Or why did he not 
 throw himself at the king's feet, and beg and implore what he 
 might not venture, like Elijah, to command ? Had even he 
 learned no lesson from the transitoriness 1 of Hezekiah's violent 
 reforms? Yes; but not all that he might have learned. He 
 knew that nothing but a fresh revelation could induce the people 
 either to initiate or to accept at the king's hand the much needed 
 reforms, but he did not yet see that without a true spiritual 
 motive, without conversion of heart, the moral standard and the 
 ideal of life must remain low, and the new law of worship 
 simply issue in a fresh idolatry. This was the reason why both 
 he and Hilkiah stood by while Josiah executed judgment on the 
 outward forms of superstition. King, prophet, and priest were 
 alike victims of the delusion that, when the storm of revolution 
 had raged itself out, the Divine law would become the national 
 rule of life, and so a claim would be established to the blessings 
 promised by Jehovah to the righteous nation. 
 
 I am not blaming, however much I may pity, these great 
 men ; we can but dimly imagine the debasing influence of the 
 worships which Jeremiah preached against and Josiah violently 
 put down ; and if the prophet's hearers were not to be trusted 
 to rise of their own accord against these abominations, this does 
 but increase our surprise at the ultimate results of the divine 
 education of this very people. Nowhere is the fact of a Divine 
 Providence so powerfully attested to the religious mind as in the 
 later history of the people of Israel. 
 
 1 It has been suggested that the account of Hezekiah's reforming measures 
 in 2 Kings, xviii. 4 contains anachronisms, the writer not being willing to 
 suppose that so pious a king would have loft the " high places " untouched. 
 Certainly the Chronicler commits just such an anachronism in his account 
 of Jehoshaph.it (2 Chron. xvii. 6). Hut is it likely that any of the writers 
 concerned in the narrative now before us were quite so devoid of historical 
 sense? This demands a further examination.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE ANCIENT LAW TRANSFORMED. 
 
 The publication of the first Scripture, its significance The leading ideas of 
 Deuteronomy The effects of the recognition of the Lavvbook. 
 
 IT is not my design in the present chapter to discuss the 
 details of the historical passage which describes the reforma- 
 tion of Josiah, Beyond question, it was a rough and vigorous 
 reformation, which could never have been effected but for the 
 " Mosaic " lawbook, and very different from the compromising 
 measures of the newly established Church in the country districts 
 of the Roman empire. 1 Both in the capital and in the provinces, 
 as far even as Bethel and the cities of Samaria (where a new 
 heathenism had joined itself to the old heretical worship, 2 Kings 
 xvii. 29-31), a work of purification by destruction was carried 
 out which is quite unique in the earlier chapters of the ancient 
 history of religion. Where in fact can we find a parallel to the 
 zeal of Josiah in the Semitic East till we come to Mohammed ? a 
 and if the non-appearance of dolmens and the like in Western 
 Palestine be due (as Conder plausibly holds 3 ) to the reformations 
 
 1 See Albert Marignan, " Le Triomphe de lEglise au quatrieme siecle" 
 (Paris, 1887). 
 
 3 The heretical Egyptian king Khuenaten (Amenhotep iv.) did but erase 
 the name of the old Theban deity whose worship he superseded by that of 
 the solar disk. And in spite of Mohammed's zeal against idols, he left not 
 only the ''black stone " at Mecca, but numerous dolmens all over Arabia 
 the atifdb or sacrificial stones (lit. "standing stones " = Heb. ma^cboth, 
 " pillars," Deut. xii. 3. &c.), against which, however, he warns his followers 
 (" Koran," v. 92). 
 
 3 " Syrian Stone-Lore," p. 126 ; comp. " Hetli and Moab," pp. 264-5, 
 Stanley, "Jewish Church," i. 59. Mr. Oliphant found four huge prostrate
 
 THE ANCIENT LAW TRANSFORMED. 6 1 
 
 of Hezekiah (?) and Josiah, these kings of Juclah effected a more 
 complete abolition of idols than even Mohammed. Of idols, 
 but not of idolatry. The altar-stones and pillars might be 
 broken, and the chapels destroyed, but the old sanctity still 
 clung to the sites, as Jeremiah found later on to his cost. Did 
 the prophet co-operate with Josiah in his iconoclastic work? So 
 far as the temple was concerned, it is possible enough that he 
 did, but I prefer to think of him, not so much as the iconoclast, 
 but as the persuasive preacher. And what if he did represent 
 Deuteronomy to be the work of Moses ? Did not the illusion 
 cover an important truth ? Did not the authors of the new law- 
 book enable men to see into the heart of the Mosaic covenant, 
 by speaking to them as Moses would have spoken had he come 
 to life again as a prophet and a reformer ? Other writers had 
 made the same attempt in a more mechanical way ; their 
 work had failed however to produce any considerable effect. 
 Collections of primitive laws had been made, based perhaps on 
 Mosaic or early post-Mosaic material (comp. Hos. viii. 12 '), 
 among which we may safely include the Decalogue (Exod. xx. 
 1-17, comp. Deut. v. 6-21), the greater Book of the Covenant 
 (Exod. xx. 22-xxiii.), and the lesser Book of the Covenant (Exod. 
 xxxiv. 11-26), which, as many critics consider, ought properly 
 to be arranged as a second Decalogue. 2 But there is no proof 
 that those collections enjoyed any public, that is, national recog- 
 nition, and their circulation was probably limited to the priests 
 (if the collection was a ritualistic one), and to the few edu- 
 cated people among the laity (if the collection related to social 
 duties). It is worth noticing that the Deuteronomist (even if 
 two authors are concerned, we may sometimes for variety or 
 convenience use the singular) represents Moses as sending the 
 individual Israelite to "the priests the Levites " ( = " the Levitical 
 priests") for an authoritative "direction" (to nth). He doubt- 
 less reflects the customs of his time, and we may assume (a 
 good commentary on Leviticus would amply justify the assump- 
 
 slabs of stone which, he says, had evidently once formed a dolmen, near the 
 secluded village of Mugheir in the northern Samaritan hill-country ("Haifa," 
 
 P- 337)- 
 
 1 Render, " I am wont to write unto him, c., but they are counted as a 
 strange thing." Comp. Smend, " Moses aptid Prophetas " (1875), p. 15. 
 
 2 Comp. Briggs, "Old Testament Student "(Chicago), vol. ii. (1882- 
 1883), pp. 264-272.
 
 62 JEREMIAH. 
 
 tion) that there were various collections of legal traditions (at 
 first unwritten, and then written) in the possession of priestly 
 families on the basis of which the priests ("those that handle 
 the iorah" Jer. ii. 8, comp. Dent, xxxiii. 10) gave, orally, their 
 tdrCih or " directions." 
 
 Still, though many may have carried their perplexities to the 
 priests, some that is, of course, the more educated would 
 sometimes at least, avail themselves of such written records as 
 were extant. For these, and for the priests themselves, and 
 above all, for the general life of the nation, it was of the utmost 
 importance that the legal traditions of Israel should be re- 
 vised, harmonized, corrected, reorganized. For it is more 
 than doubtful whether all the pre-Deuteronomic collections of 
 laws subserved the interests of a truly progressive and in some 
 measure spiritual religion. There are indications enough that 
 the religious literature of the Israelites was not entirely con- 
 fined to those whom we look up to as the inspired writers, and 
 it appears from a passage in Jeremiah that the formalist priests 
 and lying prophets employed the pen to give greater currency 
 to their teaching. How do ye say (the question is addressed to 
 the laity), We are wise, and the law of the LORD [Jehovah] is 
 with us ? But, behold (this is the prophet's answer), the false 
 pen of the scribes hath wrought falsely (marg., hath wade of it 
 falsehood) Jer. viii. 8, R.V. The prophet cannot refer here 
 to Deuteronomy ; he can only mean something analogous to 
 the heretical Gospels of early Christian times something 
 which, though it pretended to a divine sanction, was really 
 subservient to false religious principles. 
 
 It was a truly memorable event this publication of the first 
 Scripture, for henceforth it became possible for the religion of 
 an insignificant Asiatic people to survive a national catastrophe 
 and become. the faith of the human race. A poor Bible, some 
 one may say. Yes ; but it was a Bible admirably adapted to 
 those times. And does not the distinctive quality of our Bible 
 consist partly in this that it contains the comparatively poor 
 religious standards of past ages ? Just consider what a 
 difference this makes between a Christian and a Mohammedan 
 Reformation. Moslems, not less than Jews and Christians, are 
 a " people of the Book " ' ; but their Book only belongs to a 
 
 1 Mohammed uses this phrase of Jews and Christians in " Koran," 
 ii. 56, &c.
 
 THE ANCIENT LAW TRANSFORMED. 63 
 
 single period and comes from a single man. To reform 
 Mohammedanism is therefore to go back twelve hundred years 
 and believe as Mohammed believed. But a Christian Reformer 
 is not thus rigidly confined to the standards of a single age or 
 person. 1 By comparing Scripture with Scripture in a critical but 
 religiously sympathetic spirit, 2 he discovers which are really 
 the essential doctrines and the fundamental facts, and exercises 
 the right of restating them to his own generation, just as 
 prophets and reformers did of old to theirs. That inspired 
 prophet and priest (so great in their self-effacing humility) who 
 composed the main part of the Book of Deuteronomy, re- 
 created Moses for their own age. They adapted older laws 
 with the utmost freedom, but in the spirit of Moses and his 
 equally inspired successors, " bringing forth out of their 
 treasury things new and old." And whenever the same need is 
 felt, it should be the Christian's happy faith that the right man 
 will be sent for the task. 
 
 Deuteronomy may be a poor Bible, from a modern point of 
 view ; but it is rich in significance, if judged by a historic 
 standard. It sought to place the whole moral and spiritual life 
 of Israel upon a new basis. It condenses the essence of the 
 past, and anticipates the future developments of Judaism (in 
 Ezra's form of it) and Christianity. And upon the whole in 
 how effective a style ! As Ewald has well said, " A work 
 which transformed the ancient law with such creative power, so 
 emphatically threatened all those who despised it with the 
 severest Divine penalties, and, on the other hand, spoke with 
 such tenderness and human feeling about its observance, was 
 in every respect adapted to make a profound impression on its 
 readers, and to produce the effect for which it was designed." 3 
 It could not have been composed by a mere priest. The 
 Deuteronomic torah is in fact the joint work of at least two of 
 
 1 The Christian religion of the nineteenth century cannot be the same as 
 that of the second or the fourth ; it need not be opposed to it, but it 
 cannot be identical with it. Dr. Bigg, in his " Bampton Lectures" (1886), 
 has made a similar remark of the Christianity of the fourth century as com- 
 pared with that of the second. 
 
 2 Some readers will mentally make the comment that this union is 
 inconceis'able. But are there then no living persons in whom this union is 
 an accomplished fact ? The infinite variety possible in the Christian life is 
 only now beginning to be realized. 
 
 J " History of Israel," iv. 227.
 
 64 JEREMIAH. 
 
 the noblest members of the prophetic and the priestly orders, 
 each caring for that particular jewel which God in His provi- 
 dence had deposited with him. From the prophetic writer comes 
 the width of view so conspicuous, for example, in x. 12-22, and 
 which contrasts strangely with the exclusiveness imposed by 
 tradition upon his priestly companion (see xxiii. 3-8 ; xxv. 17-19 ; 
 xx. 17). To the priest is due the general conception of a 
 religious organization of the national life, as well as the arrange- 
 ments of its details. He too is animated, within the sphere of 
 Israelitish interests, by a fine spirit of humanity, which some- 
 times even leads him to make impracticable requirements (see 
 e.g. xx. 1-9). A poor Bible? Nay; such a combination of 
 priestly energy and policy with the idealizing prophetic spirit 
 was the greatest work which the Divine Spirit acting upon the 
 human had yet produced. 
 
 Of this remarkable book the following are the four chief 
 ideas, i. Jehovah is the one God worthy of the name Elohim 
 " the Elohim," as he is called both by the Deuteronomist and 
 by the disciple who added to his work (iv. 35, 39, vii. 9). It 
 was enough to assert the comparative inability of other gods 
 to help see iii. 24, iv. 7, and comp. "the God of the gods 
 (Elohim) and the Lord of the lords, the great, strong, and 
 fearful God (El.)," x. 17. So in vi. 4 we read, Hear, O Israel ^ 
 Jehovah our God is one Jehovah (i.e., Jehovah is unique in kind 
 and in nature). We need not be surprised, however, that in 
 some of their moods the writers regard the other gods as 
 mere wood and stone iv. 28, xxviii. 36, 64, xxix. 17 ; comp. 
 Jer. ii. 27. 2. The life of the community in all its aspects is to 
 be worthy of the servants of a holy God. Israel is to be, as 
 another writer expresses it, "a kingdom of priests and a holy 
 nation " (Exod. xix. 6.) 3. There is to be only one temple ; the 
 many local shrines and stone monuments of a lower worship 
 are to be destroyed. This was on account of the licentious 
 nature-worship which connected itself with the festivals held in 
 the open air around the " high places." * 4. One tribe alone (in 
 
 1 Such " chapels " as may have existed must have been for the most part 
 rather rude ; the essential thing was the altar. Comp. the Homeric T^IIVOQ 
 fiufioQ re Gvl)ti (" II." .viii. 48 ; xxiii. 148 ; "Odyss." vii. 363). The later 
 Jewish traditions on the construction of these chapels are put together in 
 Levy's " Neuhehraisches Worterbuch,' 1 art. bamah. See also Ewald, 
 " History of Israel," iii. 306 note.
 
 THE ANCIENT LAW TRANSFORMED. 65 
 
 Opposition to the custom of the northern kingdom '), is to supply 
 ministers for the sanctuary ; they are to be no mere servants of 
 the king (contrast 2 Sam. viii. 17, xx. 25), but to have an inherent 
 authority of their own. Not all Levites, however, are to have 
 the duties and privileges of the priesthood. Those who are not 
 priests may be local teachers and judges, and are commended 
 to the liberality of their fellow-Israelites ; and any Levite may 
 remove from the country-districts to Jerusalem, and receive a 
 share of the priestly duties and emoluments. These ideas are 
 inculcated or promoted in two ways by series of definite laws 
 and by exhortations. Hence there is both a priestly and a pro- 
 phetic element in Deuteronomy. The charm of the book lies 
 in the sweetly impressive tone of the prophetic passages. But 
 we must not forget the Divine sanction given afresh to the 
 principle of law ; the prophetic element does but spiritualize 
 the legal. And, if the trite but natural reflexion may be 
 pardoned, the Redeemer has delivered His followers from the 
 " curse " but not from the obligation of law. Indeed, was it not 
 the leading object of His holy life to make men perform the 
 law of God " His Father and their Father" from love ? And 
 may we not venture to say that the authors of Deuteronomy 
 have so transformed their hero as to make him a true though 
 imperfect type of Christ ? It is true that St. John says, The law 
 was given tJirougJi Moses, but loinngkindness and truth came 
 through Jesus Christ (John i. 17), apparently assuming an anti- 
 thesis between them ; but the word " came " here means " were 
 fulfilled" (see Prov. xiii. 12), and is there not a promise or 
 anticipation of the Divine lovingkinclness in the discourses of 
 Deuteronomy? It is indeed a most superficial view which 
 treats this book as a mere legal document. The Moses whom 
 it brings before us really represents noble spirits like Jeremiah 
 (whom we have learned to regard as a type of Christ). He 
 can indeed command, but, like our Lord, he prefers to persuade. 
 He does not refuse to incorporate many very imperative utter- 
 ances monuments of an earlier stage into his so-called 
 recapitulation of the torah. There are whole series of laws in 
 Deuteronomy which have quite the short, dictatorial style of 
 the old legislation. But in those prophetic passages of which 
 I spoke, the "stiffness and severity" of the ancient form of 
 
 1 We must remember that part of the northern kingdom had been 
 attached to the dominions of Josiali (see below). 
 
 6
 
 66 JEREMIAH. 
 
 expression disappears. Moses becomes like unto Christ ; he 
 " speaks in his own name to the people ; he searches out every 
 human reason which could operate on their conscience, and 
 impel them to keep the law ; and, moved by the warmth of his 
 love, he speaks to the heart, because the action of this alone 
 can proceed from love." 1 
 
 That the view of Moses and his teaching given in Deuteronomy 
 is a highly idealized one could not escape the attention even of 
 those English scholars who still occupy the antiquated position 
 of Hengstenberg. " His work (i.e., that of Moses)," remarks 
 one of the youngest and, though still immature, not the least 
 able of the number, " was not for one generation : ' mediator of 
 the Old Covenant,' he stands high above all other prophets and 
 saints ; already half glorified, no longer subject to the limitations 
 of time, he surveys the Israel of all ages until the coming of 
 Christ, and accordingly his work assumes (viz. in Deuteronomy) 
 a prospective and ideal character, so striking that unbelieving 
 critics could not but mistake it as the evidence of a much later 
 origin." 2 To " unbelieving," say rather " modern, 1 ' critics 
 Deuteronomy is conspicuously devoid of the ecstatic element 
 which theory compels this writer to assume ; but they will all 
 gladly welcome the admission that the book stands by itself, 
 and has a message and an interest for the Christian as well as 
 for the Jewish Church. 
 
 " Love is life's only sign," says the poet of the " Christian 
 Year." This is the very essence of the religious thinking of the 
 Deuteronomist. Israel, like the Church, has been "first loved" 
 by Jehovah ; and " the true Israelite is he who loves both his 
 fellow-Israelites and Jehovah of his own accord, just as Jehovah 
 of His own accord loved Israel." 3 This truth is equally set 
 forth in Deuteronomy and in the Deuteronomist's great 
 spiritual predecessor, Hosea. The primal love of Jehovah to 
 Israel fills the foreground of each writer's discourse, and all 
 human relationships within the Israelitish community are 
 rooted in this. This love is, however, a moral love : Jehovah 
 
 1 Ewald, " History of Israel," iv. 223 (but compare the more nervous 
 and forcible German of .the original work). 
 
 2 G. Vos, "The Mosaic Origin of the Pentateuchal Codes" (Lond. , 
 1886), p. 90. The author is an American of Dutch extraction, and, we may 
 confidently expect, will before ten years are over have changed his opinions. 
 
 3 Cheyne, ' ' Hosea " (Cambridge School and College Bible), p. 28 (Introd.)
 
 THE ANCIENT LAW TRANSFORMED. 67 
 
 is not more loving than righteous. Moral and spiritual cor- 
 ruption will be must be punished by ruin and destruction. 
 The abominations old and new which disfigured the national 
 religion in the time of the authors of Deuteronomy, must, as 
 these inspired men felt, bring God's curse upon those who 
 practised them. This is the essential idea of the awful threats 
 hurled throughout this book by the imaginary Moses at the 
 close of his career against the races which would be found in 
 Canaan by the Israelites. As a matter of fact, it cannot be 
 proved on historical grounds (see "Encyclopaedia Britannica," 
 art. " Canaanites") that those races were either expelled or de- 
 stroyed by the invaders. On the contrary, they were gradually 
 amalgamated with the Israelites, who became in the arts of 
 civilization, and too often in the practices of religion, their 
 willing pupils. It was never the policy of the leaders of Israel 
 to lay waste cities and massacre their populations indiscrimi- 
 nately, and even destroy the innocent cattle. "These are only 
 the pictorial mode in which the writers (of Deuteronomy) express 
 their utter abhorrence of the practices which destroyed the 
 sanctity of Israel and insulted the majesty of Israel's Holy 
 One. Strangely do these fierce sentiments read beside the 
 repeated declarations of the divine compassion, the reiterated 
 appeals to the heart of loyalty and trust, which give to these 
 pages such a kindling glow. It is well that we can in part 
 resolve the inconsistency which seems to discredit the value 
 of a piety apparently marred by such bloodthirsty ferocity. 
 The writers present their principles under the limitations of 
 imaginary circumstances that were never real." x This will not 
 indeed apply to the case of the Amalekites, for there is no 
 evidence that this race was religiously dangerous to the 
 Israelites. The explanation is given in Deut. xxv. 17, 18 ; comp. 
 Exod. xvii. 14. The Deuteronomist would of course remember 
 the extinction of the remnant of Amalek in the days of 
 Hezekiah (i Chron. iv. 41-43). 
 
 I must leave the reader to compare the reforming measures 
 of Josiah (2 Kings xxiii.) with the directions in the Book of 
 Deuteronomy. Each fact will be found to correspond to some 
 provision in the law, except to some extent the treatment of the 
 country priests. According to Deut. xviii. 6-8, the Levites of 
 
 'Carpenter, article on the Book of Deuteronomy, "Modern Review," 
 April, 1883, p. 274.
 
 68 JEREMIAH. 
 
 the provinces were to have equal rites with the priests of the 
 temple, if they came up to Jerusalem. But in 2 Kings xxiii. 9 
 we read that the priests whom Josiah brought up to join in the 
 Passover were not permitted to sacrifice, but ate unleavened 
 bread among their brethren. 1 This fact is interesting, because 
 the mention of it seems to contradict the theory that Deutero- 
 nomy was a forgery, composed either (if before the iSth year 
 of Josiah) in the interests of the temple-priests, or (if after the 
 Reformation) to justify the course which Josiah and his friends 
 had taken. Would that it were possible to compare the system 
 exhibited in Deuteronomy with the civil and religious condition 
 of Judah some years after the Reformation. Were the laws 
 strictly observed ? and above all, did the spiritual teaching ot 
 the prophetic passages take hold upon the people ? Alas ! we 
 lack the material for a satisfactory answer to these questions. 
 The account of Josiah's reign in 2 Kings is tantalizingly 
 fragmentary, and it is impossible to point definitely to any 
 prophecy of Jeremiah's as describing the post-Reformation part 
 of the reign of Josiah. That Jeremiah himself was deeply 
 influenced by Deuteronomy both in his ideas and in his 
 phraseology, is no new proposition to the reader. The phe- 
 nomena have led some critics to conjecture that he even wrote 
 Deuteronomy. 2 This I see no sufficient reason to believe. It 
 is certain, however, that he was far the greatest of the school of 
 writers formed upon the Book of Deuteronomy a school which 
 includes historians, poets, and prophets, and without which the 
 Old Testament would be deprived of some of its most valued 
 pages. 
 
 1 I follow Klostermann, who holds that the words, And he brought up all 
 the priests from the cities of Judah (2 Kings xxiii. 8), and the whole of ver. 
 9, are misplaced, and belong properly to a description of the preparations 
 for the Passover which once existed but is not now preserved (see 2 Kings 
 xxiii. 21, 22). This view accounts for the mention of the "unleavened 
 bread." Comp., however, Robertson Smith, "The Old Testament and 
 the Jewish Church," pp. 360-362. 
 
 3 Comp. a valuable excursus in Kleinert's "Das Deuteronomium und 
 der Deuteronomiker " (1872) comparing the vocabulary of Deuteronomy 
 with that of other books, which specially notices not only those words and 
 phrases which occur but also those which do not occur in the Book of 
 Jeremiah, and which also distinguishes between Deuteronomy proper and 
 the additions to it.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 TKAUD OR NEEDFUL ILLUSION ? 
 
 Criticism of the narrative in 2 Kings.xxii. The Mosaic authorship of the 
 Lawbook, not tenable Reasons for this Notes on the allusions to 
 Egypt in Deuteronomy, and on the finding of the Lawbook. 
 
 I HAVE endeavoured in the preceding chapter to give a general 
 sketch of Josiah's great reformation, without diverting the 
 reader's attention to modern disputes whether of a historico- 
 criticai or of a purely exegetical character. The latter are 
 doubtless more capable of settlement, but the former raise 
 points of a more wide-reaching significance. I must therefore 
 at least touch upon the former ; a slight treatment of historico- 
 critical questions is painful to me, but it is all that a regard 
 to the proportions of this work will allow me to attempt. 
 A monograph on Deuteronomy would only make incidental 
 reference to Jeremiah ; a monograph on Jeremiah, especially if 
 not written solely for the college student, can only present a 
 short and far from exhaustive account of the controversy of 
 Deuteronomy. There are some points which can be and have 
 been settled, and some upon which a degree of uncertainty can- 
 not be avoided ; it is right to lay most stress upon the former. 
 Let us not then be concerned if we hear it said in some 
 quarters that the narrative in 2 Kings xxii. contains patent im- 
 probabilities, and is inconsistent with facts derived from the 
 Book of Jeremiah. There are many other ancient narratives 
 presumably based upon tradition which are in the main accepted 
 in spite of similar difficulties. It is difficult to believe that so 
 elaborate a narrative is purely fictitious. It is not the wont of 
 Hebrew story-tellers to draw exclusively upon their imagination, 
 liven the Chronicler, who is sufficiently biassed by what we 
 may call his ecclesiastical interest, would not have indulged
 
 70 JEREMIAH. 
 
 in so flagrant a violation of the truth of facts. 1 And if the 
 narrative were indeed a pure fiction, it would surely not have 
 contained an incidental and perfectly simple-minded admission 
 that Josiah had, in one important respect, not carried out the 
 directions of the lawbook (2 Kings xxiii. 9 ; comp. Deut. 
 xviii. 6, 7). Two points at least ought, I think, by the most 
 sceptically inclined critic to be accepted as historical, viz. 
 (i) that the "lawbook" was published in Josiah's reign with 
 the view of recommending certain reforms and establishing the 
 national religion on a firmer basis ; and (2) that Hilkiah, one 
 of its chief promulgators, asserted that he had found it in 
 the temple. The view implied (probably) in 2 Kings xxii. and 
 expressed in 2 Chron. xxxiv., that the " book of torah " had the 
 leader of the Exodus for its author, cannot from a critical 
 point of view be maintained, for these among other reasons, 
 that the Deuteronomist (if we may so for convenience refer to 
 the author or joint-authors of the original Deuteronomy) has 
 (i) employed documents manifestly later than Moses, (2) made 
 allusions to circumstances which only existed long after Moses, 
 and (3) expressed ideas which are not such as are, psycho- 
 logically speaking, possible in the age of Moses. 
 
 i. The evidences of the Deuteronomist's dependence on the 
 Yahvistic narrative 2 in the Pentateuch written, at earliest 
 (Dillmann), in the middle of the sejtetttii century B.C., are em- 
 barrassing from their very abundance. Here are a few head- 
 ings of statements borrowed from the Yahvist, which I quote 
 with but little attempt at selection from the classical treatise 
 
 1 It is worth noticing that the Chronicler adopts the narrative of the 
 finding of the lawbook in the temple (2 Chron. xxxiv. 14-33), although its 
 tendency is directly opposed to his own simple-minded view that the Law 
 had been the foundation of Israelitish life since the time of Moses. Con- 
 sidering that he certainly selects and modifies his material with a view to 
 edification, it is singular that he adopts a statement which, on the hypothesis 
 mentioned above, was of comparatively recent origin. He actually does 
 omit another important part of the narrative in Kings, viz., the description 
 of Josiah's violent measures, which implied a previous state of things very 
 inconsistent with Mosaic orthodoxy. He writes as a devout churchman, 
 but he is not without some claim to the character of a historian. 
 
 2 " All are agreed that Deuteronomy is later than the Yahvist," remarks the 
 orthodox theologian, H. L. Strack (" Handbuch der thcologischen Wis- 
 senschaften," i. 136). To use the non-form " Jehovist" in this connexion 
 would be absurd.
 
 FRAUD OR NEEDFUL ILLUSION? 71 
 
 of K. H. (iraf. 1 Jacob's going down to Egypt with seventy 
 persons (Dent. x. 22 ; xxvi. 5). The oppression of the Israelites 
 and the Exodus (vi. 12, 21, 22 ; vii. 8, 18, 19; and often). 
 The destruction of the Egyptians in the Red Sea (xi. 4). 
 The manna (viii. 3, 16). The water out of the rock (viii. 15), 
 The temptation at Massa (vi. 16, ix. 22). The tables of stone 
 and the golden calf (ix. 7-21). The forty years' wandering 
 (viii. 2, 15, xi. 5). The serpents (viii. 15). Balaam (xxiii. 5, 6). 
 It is true that in the Deuteronomic parallels we sometimes 
 meet with deviations from the Yahvistic narrative, but these 
 are hardly sufficient to outweigh the minute points of agreement 
 which also occur. They only prove that our author derived 
 his material from more than one source, his secondary 
 authority being sometimes popular tradition, sometimes perhaps 
 his own creative imagination. But the case becomes even 
 stronger when we consider the introductory portion of the book 
 (i. i-iv. 40) by itself. This is a free recapitulation of the account 
 of the wanderings contained in the earlier books, and was evi- 
 dently intended as a convenient connexion between Deutero- 
 nomy proper and the Yahvistic narrative. Let the reader only 
 carry his studies a little farther, and see how a scholar of the 
 Deuteronomist has edited Joshua, and he will not quarrel with 
 any one for asserting that the Yahvistic narrative must have 
 been written first, and that a Deuteronomistic writer composed 
 Deut. i.-iv. 40 as a link between his own and the earlier work. 
 
 2. But these are far from being the only points in which the 
 author of Deuteronomy has betrayed himself. He is full ot 
 allusions to circumstances which did not exist till long after 
 Moses. The Israel of his description is separated from the 
 Israel of the Exodus by a complete social revolution. The 
 nomad tribes have grown into a settled and wealthy com- 
 munity (notice the phrase "the elders of the city," xix. 12, &c.), 
 whose organization needs no longer to be constituted, but only 
 to be reformed. I do not say that no directions can be found 
 which bear on their face the stamp of a primitive age. Our 
 author did not hesitate to adopt earlier laws, though he neutra- 
 lized their possible evil effect either by distinct modifications or 
 by the context in which he placed them. But the elaborate 
 
 1 Graf, "Die geschichtlichen Biicher," u.s.vv., pp. 9-19; comp. Bp. 
 Colenso, "The Pentateuch and Book of Joshua Critically Examined," 
 vi. 34. 35-
 
 72 JEREMIAH. 
 
 character of most of the Deuteronomic arrangements con- 
 clusively proves the lateness of their origin. See, for instance, 
 the laws of contracts (chaps, xv., xxiii., xxiv.), of inheritance 
 (chap, xxi.), and, above all, of war (chap, xx) ; and contrast the 
 last-mentioned with the very primitive directions in Numb. 
 xxxi. 25-30. The fact that in Deut. xx. the law-giver distinctly 
 contemplates wars of foreign conquest, brings down the date -of 
 the law below the period of David. Or take still more definite 
 allusions. The law regulating the kingship is proved by its 
 contents to be later than the time of Solomon, whose dangerous 
 tendencies are not obscurely alluded to (xvii. 14-20) ; the law 
 confining the right of sacrificing to the tribe of Levi, to be 
 later than the Mosaic age * (even in the widest sense of the 
 term), later than the times of David and Solomon, 2 later than 
 Jeroboam,^ and probably later than Azariah; 4 the warnings 
 against the lower forms of prophecy (xviii. 10-12), to be not 
 earlier than the first of the great succession of prophetic 
 teachers of a moral and spiritual religion Amos and Hosea ; 
 the prohibition of star-worship (iv. 19, xvii. 3), to be not earlier 
 than the Assyrian period; 5 and lastly, the law restricting sacri- 
 fices and festival observances to the temple at Jerusalem (xii. 
 5-27, xvi. 1-17, &c.) to be later certainly than Amos and Hosea, 6 
 later certainly than Mesha's Moabitish inscription, 7 and later 
 almost certainly than the reign of Hezekiah. 8 
 
 1 Exod. xx. 24-26, as all critics (see especially Dillmann) agree, is ad- 
 dressed to the whole body of the Israelites, not to a single tribe. 
 
 2 2 Sam. viii. 18 (see "Variorum Bible"), vi. 13, 14, xxiv. 25 ; i Kings 
 viii. 62, 63. 
 
 3 i Kings xii. 31 (see "Variorum Bible"). Had the sacerdotal rights 
 of the Levites been generally recognized, Jeroboam would not have 
 ventured on promiscuous ordinations. * 2 Chron. xxvi. 16-21. 
 
 5 This form of worship being derived immediately from Assyria, Amos 
 prophesies that the Israelitish star-worshippers shall have to carry the 
 images of their star-gods (to which he gives Assyrian names) beyond 
 Damascus, a vague but significant expression for Assyria : "Therefore ye 
 shall take up Sakkuth your king, and Kaivan your star-god ; even your 
 images, which ye have made unto yourselves " (Amos v. 26 ; see Schrader, 
 and comp. 2 Kings xxi. 5). 
 
 6 Amos and Hosea, though denouncing star-worship, say nothing against 
 the non-idolatrous worship of Jehovah at the local shrines. 
 
 7 Mesha states that he took "altars (strictly, altar-hearths) of Yahveh " 
 from the town of Nebo in the trans-Jordanic country (Moabite Inscription, 
 line 18). 
 
 8 According to 2 Kings xviii. 4, Hezekiah abolished the " high places"
 
 FRAUD OR NEEDFUL ILLUSION? 73 
 
 3. It will also be clear, on a little reflexion, that there are 
 ideas expressed in Deuteronomy which can only have arisen at 
 an advanced stage of religious development. 1 I will not now 
 appeal to the Deuteronomic idea of the exclusive right of 
 Jehovah to Israel's worship, for that is also expressed in the 
 Decalogue. Nor will I lay any stress on the repeated prohibi- 
 tions of the use of " similitudes " in the worship of Jehovah 
 (Deut. iv. 12, 15-18, &c.). For this prohibition, too, occurs in 
 the Decalogue. But there are several characteristic ideas of 
 Deuteronomy, to the use of which as evidence of a late date 
 no exception can be taken. 
 
 Thus (i.) the thought of giving a religious colour to the 
 whole of the national organization is the logical develop- 
 ment of the idea so earnestly inculcated by Isaiah (iv. 3, 
 vi. 13, xi. 1-9, &c.) of the "holy people 1 ' (seven times in 
 Deuteronomy). It is the thought of one who was a states- 
 man, as well as an inspired prophet, and who saw that in the 
 coming struggle for the national existence of the Israelites, 
 their only hope lay in the deepening and concentrating of their 
 religious life. Hence those elaborate arrangements which 
 descend even to such minutiae as the substance of a man's 
 clothing (xxii. 11, 12), but which are all set in a framework of 
 religious precepts and principles. We have before us, in fact, 
 the prelude of the Levitical reformation set on foot by Ezra. 
 The author of Deuteronomy and his friends, with not inferior 
 earnestness though with less rigour than Ezra, attempted the 
 bold experiment (bold, for any but prophets and the disciples 
 of prophets) of converting a nation into a church, and an 
 earthly kingdom into a theocracy. But the fundamental idea 
 of the "holy people" is Isaiah's. It was that great prophet's 
 function to transfer the conception of holiness from the physical 
 to the moral sphere. Others no doubt had laboured in the 
 
 or local sanctuaries. It is an open question whether this strong statement 
 is correct. Evenjosiah, though he insists on the sanctity of Mount Zion 
 never fulminates against " high places." From 2 Kings xxiii. 13 we gather 
 that even very near Jerusalem the reformation was but slight. 
 
 1 Not only are the ideas peculiar, but they are expressed in a phraseology 
 as peculiar thoroughly unlike that of the rest of the Pentateuch, and 
 presenting many points of contact with Jeremiah. Besides, the general 
 character of the style points equally to the silver age of Hebrew literature 
 (comp. Ewald, " History of Israel," i. 137).
 
 74 JEREMIAH. 
 
 same direction, but none was so "clothed with the Spirit" for 
 the work as Isaiah. The notion current among the Israelites 
 of their relation to Jehovah was of a privilege enjoyed by a 
 natural, indefeasible right. Isaiah fought against this illusion. 
 He taught that it was not enough to be outwardly a child of 
 Abraham ; the enjoyment of the Divine favour was conditional 
 on the performance, not merely of ceremonies, but of certain 
 primary moral acts. The difference between Isaiah and the 
 author of Deuteronomy is simply that the one looks for the 
 " holy people " to an ideal future ; the other seeks, prematurely 
 enough, to realize the conception in the present. 
 
 (ii.) The idea of limiting the public worship of Jehovah to a 
 single sanctuary (xii. 5-17, &c.) is closely connected with that 
 of the "holy people." If Israel took his stand on his religion, 
 it was necessary for him to distinguish it as sharply as possible 
 from that of his neighbours and antagonists. As long as 
 Jehovah was worshipped at the local sanctuaries called "high 
 places," the forms of worship were liable to become assimilated 
 to those of alien, unspiritual religions. The significant figure of 
 "whoredom" for idolatry (Jer. ii. 20, &c.) sufficiently indicates 
 the danger by which the Israelites of this period were threatened. 
 Yet religion could not be entirely divested of material symbols. 
 Hence even Isaiah, with all his hatred of formalism, insists 
 repeatedly on the sanctity of the temple-mount, though (call it 
 inconsistency, or call it a wise discretion) he refrains from 
 fulminating against the country sanctuaries. A complete 
 measure of religious centralization was reserved for the author 
 of Deuteronomy. 
 
 (iii.) Still further to increase the popular reverence for the 
 temple-worship, the Deuteronomic legislator gave a solemn 
 sanction to the exclusive claims of the Levitical priesthood. 1 
 From the Mosaic age onwards, they ministered the Divine 
 torah to the Israelites who came to them (comp. Deut. xxxiii. 9, 
 Jer. ii. 8) ; but it cannot be shown that they alone " stood 
 before Jehovah to minister unto him," as this legislator com- 
 manded that they should do. It is only natural to suppose that 
 this important innovation (so it may be called, even though it 
 may have been based on a growing custom) belongs to a late 
 and somewhat revolutionary age. 
 
 1 Passages friendly to the Levitcs, Deut. xviii. 1-5 (comp. xii. 12, 18, 19, 
 xiv. 27, 29, xvi. ii, 14, x.\ vi. 11-13), xxiv. 8, xxxi. 9, 25, 26.
 
 FRAUD OR NEEDFUL ILLUSION? 75 
 
 In the course of the foregoing negative proof I have been 
 compelled to bring forward positive evidence in favour of a very 
 late date for Deuteronomy. David and Solomon, Mesha, king 
 of Moab, the Yahvist, Amos, Hosea, and Isaiah, must have 
 lived prior to the author of the lawbook ; and we have just 
 found reason to suppose that its composition belongs to a 
 revolutionary period of Israel's history. Now, Hezekiah's reign 
 being excluded 1 (see above), the reigns of Manasseh and 
 Josiah remain the only ones of which the Second Book of 
 Kings relates any reformation or revolution. The former is 
 the more plausible from the point of view of the ordinary 
 reader. 2 Assuming this to be the period of the composition of 
 the book, we could make a shrewd guess as to the cause of its 
 being deposited in the temple. Manasseh, it seems, hated the 
 strict religion and morality which Deuteronomy was written to 
 promote, and the true-hearted prophet and priest who composed 
 the book could not venture, we might reasonably assume, to keep 
 it in their own hands. It is no doubt strange that the book 
 should have been lost sight of by its priestly custodians. Possibly, 
 however, the secret of its hiding-place had been confided to but 
 one or two, and the few who knew it had died without handing 
 it on. At any rate, one might say that Providence watched 
 over the roll, and caused it to be brought forth at the right 
 moment. I do not myself hold this view, however, and only 
 develop it here to assist the reader's imagination. If the book 
 were written under Manasseh, it is at least strange that the 
 book should not, either in its exhortations or in its commands, 
 make any allusions (tpwavTa ovvtTotviv) to the fact that Jehovah's 
 central sanctuary had been invaded by idols (2 Kings xxi. 4, 
 &c.). Looking at the lawbook by itself, one can understand 
 it better if written tinder Josiah. The hopefulness of the 
 writer, which penetrates each page of his book, was justified by 
 the character of the new king, and it seems reasonable to sup- 
 
 1 S'.-c, however, Vaihingcr in Herzog's " Realencyclopadie," cd. i, xi. 
 327-8. 
 
 - Since writing the above, I find that a young and able German writer, 
 Rudolf Kittel, who began his career with a temperate criticism of Well- 
 hausen's " Geschichte Israels" (now more fitly styled " Prolegomena zur 
 Geschichte Israels") adopts Manasseh' s reign an the date of Deuteronomy 
 in his new " Geschichte der Hebriicr." I agree with Dillmann that 
 ]osiah's reign is rather more probable.
 
 ?6 JEREMIAH. 
 
 pose that the book was published soon after it was written, 
 
 while its joint-authors were still alive, because this helps us to 
 
 account for the rapid success of its ideas. Add to this the fact 
 
 irr tbtrt- the literary influence of Deuteronomy lyiftg (as it would 
 
 1 seem) v/5h' Jeremiah, and there remains but little excuse for 
 
 doubting that the authors of Deuteronomy were among the 
 
 actors in the great reformation of King Josiah. 
 
 The one great advantage of referring the lawbook to the 
 reign of Manasseh, is that it permits us to form the highest 
 possible moral estimate of Hilkiah and Shaphan. Rough 
 critics (especially if tinctured with the old-fashioned dogmatic 
 rationalism) are apt to fly off from the one extreme of Bible- 
 hero-worship to the other of Bible-hero-depreciation, and 
 accuse at any rate Hilkiah of complicity in a forgery. We still, 
 in English books especially, meet with statements that our only 
 choice lies between the " good old view " of the Mosaic origin 
 of Deuteronomy and that of its purely fictitious character. I 
 confess that, in spite of these statements, I cannot think that 
 the latter hypothesis merits a long examination. Let the 
 following remarks suffice. 
 
 I will admit that the hypothesis of forgery (advocated by Von 
 Bohlen and others) is not to be rejected straightway on the 
 ground of its moral repulsiveness. M. Alexandre, the editor of 
 the Sibylline Oracles, has remarked on the excellent morality of 
 their contents coexisting with the fiction of their authorship. 
 The moral standard of one age is not that of another, and great 
 saints have allowed themselves in practices which would now be 
 disclaimed by all good men. Nor yet may it be scouted on the 
 ground that it is plainly impossible to palm off a modern statute- 
 book as ancient upon a whole nation. Sir Henry Maine has given 
 an instance of such a successful forgery in the history of Eng- 
 lish law ("Ancient Law," p. 82), and what has been done in one 
 country may, the conditions being not essentially different, be 
 effected in another. But the hypothesis is in the highest degree 
 improbable, because Deut. xviii. contains (as we have seen) a 
 law relative to the country Levites which directly clashes with 
 the class interests of the Zadokite priests, from whom, on the 
 hypothesis of forgery, Deuteronomy proceeds. It is also 
 critically unnecessary. Of course, it is only the middle part of 
 the book (chaps, v.-xxvi.) about which there can be any dis- 
 putethat part which in the opening and closing chapters is
 
 FRAUD OR NEEDFUL ILLUSION? 77 
 
 referred to as " this torah," i. 5, iv. 8 (comp. v. 44), xxvii. 3, 8, 
 26, xxviii. 58, xxix. 28, xxx. 10, xxxi. 11, 12, 26, xxxii. 46. This 
 portion is no doubt declared to be Mosaic. There is no possi- 
 bility of explaining this away. Listen to the Book, 
 
 And Moses called all Israel^ and said unto them, Hear, O 
 Israel, the statutes and ordinances which I speak in your ears 
 this day. . . . (Deut. v. i). 
 
 And Moses wrote this law [/Jrd/i] (Deut. xxxi. 9). 
 
 What did this mean to the mass of those who, in Josiah's 
 eighteenth year, heard the lawbook read? It is self-evident 
 that no human being could recall from oblivion the statement 
 of fundamental laws which Moses (by a sudden concentration 
 of his intellectual powers for he was primarily a man of action, 
 and neither an orator nor a writer) may possibly have given at 
 the close of his career. It would be difficult ' to suppose that the 
 men of Judah adopted such an absurd idea, or even that they 
 held a theory most reasonable in the case of Ecclesiastes that 
 the author did but assume the character of a hero of antiquity 
 by a literary fiction. 2 They were not subtle-minded people, and 
 must have drawn the most obvious inference from the facts 
 presented to them, viz., that the lawbook had been lost for 
 centuries, and been recovered only now by the high priest 
 Hilkiah. That the latter (who had his own interpretation of 
 the word " Mosaic," to which I will turn presently) permitted 
 this belief to exist may be stigmatized by some as deceit ; what 
 he practised, however, was not deceit nor rtHusion, but rather 
 zTlusion. Need I justify the principle which, unconsciously 
 to himself, lay beneath his action ? Novalis may exaggerate 
 
 * I say "difficult" and not "impossible," for I remember that Fathers 
 of the Church did believe Ezra to have rewritten the Law of Moses 
 under Divine inspiration. But the credulity of theologians, when 
 assisted by a predisposing motive, is greater on some points than that 
 of ordinary men. Besides, the doctrine of verbal inspiration was not as 
 yet developed. 
 
 2 I do not in the text refer to the theory of a legal fiction, because I 
 doubt whether, unless we use the pruning-knife very vigorously, the middle 
 part of Deuteronomy can have been understood on this theory or principle. 
 I do not deny the existence of legal conventions generally understood as 
 such by educated Israelites (comp. Robertson Smith, " The Old Testament 
 in the Jewish Church," p. 387), but the nucleus of our Deuteronomy seems 
 to me too large and complex to be put on a level with isolated laws such as 
 Numb, xxxi, 27,
 
 78 JEREMIAH. 
 
 when he says, *' Error is the necessary instrument of truth ; 
 with error I make truth." But he is strictly correst in his 
 following words, " All transition begins with illusion." ' Both 
 historically and educationally it is clear that at certain stages 
 of development men cannot receive the pure truth, which must 
 therefore be enclosed for a time in a husk of harmless error. 
 The history of the prophets shows us that, as a matter of fact, 
 Providence employed much illusion in training its instruments. 
 Jeremiah himself at length became aware of this in his own 
 case, and not without a momentary disappointment at the 
 discovery. " Thou hast deceived me, Jehovah," he ex- 
 claims, "and I was deceived" (or, "enticed"; Jer. xx. 7, 
 R.V.) ; and the New Testament suggests the view that, when 
 the older writers speak of the rewards of Israel's obedience, 
 they sometimes make a large use of illusion : For if Joshua 
 had given them rest, he (David) would not have spoken after- 
 ward of another day. There remaincth therefore a sabbath 
 rest for the people of God (Heb. iv. 8, 9, R.V.). The illusion 
 respecting the authorship of Deuteronomy lasted for centuries, 
 and produced, as we may reverently suppose, no injurious effect 
 upon the Church. But in modern times, and especially now, 
 when the reign of law is recognized not less by the defenders 
 than by the opponents of theology, to ask men to believe that 
 Deuteronomy was written by Moses, or that its substance was 
 spoken though not written by Moses and supernaturally com- 
 municated to Hilkiah, would be to impose a burden on the 
 Church which it is not able to bear, and to justify the prejudice' 
 against the Church's Biblical scholars which finds frequent 
 utterance in the secular press. 
 
 But in what sense did Hilkiah himself call " the book of 
 tdrah" (for 2 Chron. xxxiv. 14 substantially expresses his mean- 
 ing) " Mosaic " ? He means partly that the Deuteronomist 
 absorbed older laws into his code (the full evidence for which 
 must be sought in Dillmann's great critical and exegetical work); 
 partly and more especially that this keen-sighted man wrote as 
 Moses would have written, had he been recalled to life for this 
 purpose. For instance (i), Moses, as the Deuteronomist firmly 
 believed, maintained the claims of Jehovah to an exclusive 
 worship. Hence, even if Moses in his own very early days 
 
 1 "Hymns and Thoughts on Religion by Novalis," translated and 
 edited by W. Hastie (1888), p. 90.
 
 FRAUD OR NEEDFUL ILLUSION ? 79 
 
 permitted or even perhaps encouraged local sanctuaries (Exod. 
 xx. 24, comp. xxii. 30), it was clear to the Deuteronomist that, 
 when they had ceased to be useful, Moses would have abolished 
 them. Therefore he, " sitting in the seat of Moses," did abolish 
 them. (2) In Deut. v. 9 the Deuteronomist reverently reproduced 
 the statement of the Decalogue that God " visits the iniquity of 
 the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth genera- 
 tion," a statement true to the experience of an earlier age, and 
 yet, in his faithfulness to the later leadings of the Divine Spirit, 
 he frankly declared (as he thought that Moses in his place would 
 have declared) in vii. 9, 10, that while mercy is transmitted, 
 wrath is fully worked out on those who have incurred it. Comp. 
 Deut. xxiv 16, the doctrine of which encountered extreme oppo- 
 sition in the post-Josian period (see Jer. xxxi. 29, 20 ; Ezek. xviii. 
 2-4), many Jews being still incapable of appreciating a truth 
 which the " good old view " absurdly supposes to have been pro- 
 pounded at the Exodus. (3) In Exod. xxi. 7 (a passage belonging 
 to the greater " Book of Covenant," and doubtless regarded by 
 the Deuteronomist as Mosaic) it is enacted that a Hebrew 
 bondwoman shall not be set free at the end of seven years like 
 a bondman ; but in Deut. xv. 12-18 the law is made uniform for 
 both sexes. (4) In Exod. xxii. 30, firstlings are to be offered to 
 God on the eighth day; but in Deut. xii. 17, 18, xv. 19, 20, they 
 are to be eaten at the sanctuary at the yearly festivals. 1 (5) In 
 Exod. xxii. 31. carrion is to be cast to the dogs ; but in Deut. 
 xiv. 21, social relations having become more developed, the 
 " sojourner " (ger^n'tToiKas) is allowed to eat it. At other times 
 the author of Deuteronomy simply gives a further development 
 to an ancient law. Thus the law of usury in Exod. xxii. 24 recurs 
 in Deut. xxiii. 19, 20, with a permission to take usury from a 
 stranger ; and the directions as to taking pledges in Exod. xxii. 
 26, 27, recur in Deut. xxiv. 10-13, with the addition that the 
 choice of the pledge is to be left to the giver of the pledge. 
 Thus the law on the punishment of death for the renegade, 
 which in Exod. xxii. 19 receives the most concise expression 
 possible, is expanded in Deut. xvii. 2-8 into the description of 
 a complete judicial procedure. Thus, too, the law of the sab- 
 
 1 Comp. Robertson Smith, "Additional Answer to the Libel" (1878), 
 pp. 17, 18, 55 ; and especially the full comparison of the laws in Deutero- 
 nomy and in the "Book of Covenant" in Graf, "Die geschichtlicheii 
 Biichur," pp. 20-24.
 
 80 jEREMiAtt. 
 
 batical year in Exod. xxiii. 10, i r is condensed into as short a 
 space as possible in Deut. xv. i, in order to throw into bolder 
 relief an independent ordinance on the mercy to be shown to 
 the debtor during this year. 1 I might, in fact, far exceed my 
 available space in showing how largely older collections of 
 laws have been used. To sum up briefly : The object of 
 the Deuteronomist was to keep up the historic continuity of 
 the " Mosaic " school of legalists the orthodox school, one 
 may call it, in opposition to those " lying pens " of which 
 Jeremiah speaks (Jer. viii. 8). The object of Hilkiah was to 
 terminate the painful hesitancy of the believers in a spiritual 
 religion by producing the joint work of some well-trained priest 
 and prophet as the only suitable and divinely appointed law 
 of the state. To abolish polytheism and the dangerous local 
 shrines a new prophecy and a new lawbook, of a more effi- 
 cacious character than any which had yet been seen, were 
 clearly necessary. These were provided in the original Book 
 of Deuteronomy. 
 
 Who was the author, or rather, who were the authors, of the 
 original lawbook ? The question reveals, first of all, a want of 
 comprehension of the ethos of the inspired writers. No trace 
 can one find in them of the least regard for personal distinction ; 
 indeed, the Oriental mind in general is so convinced of the 
 littleness of the individual, that even outside the " household of 
 saints " personal fame is an object of trifling importance. Let us 
 take a lesson from Josiah, whose anxiety was not as to the original 
 author of the lawbook, but as to its agreeableness to the will of 
 God. It argues, next, a defective sense of what it really con- 
 cerns us to know. What does it matter whether the prophet 
 of Israel's Restoration was, or was not, literally a "second 
 Isaiah " ? or whether the author of the prophecy (or of part 
 of the prophecy) attached to Zech. i.-viii. was, or was not, like 
 his predecessor named Zechariah ? Whether Hilkiah was or 
 was not a joint-author of Deuteronomy is a point which has 
 much exercised some critics. No doubt " Moses " in Dent. 
 xxxi. 26* directs the Levites to take this lawbook and put it 
 by the side of the ark of the covenant; this may seem to sup- 
 
 1 Kleinert, "Das Deuteronornium und der Dcuteronomiker " (1872), 
 pp. 49, 50. 
 
 2 From the point of view of critical analysis, Dcut. xxxi. 26 docs not 
 belong to the book read by Josiah (sec further on).
 
 FRAUD OR NEEDFUL ILLUSION? 8 1 
 
 port the hypothesis of forgery. And yet can we suppose that 
 Hilkiah was clever enough to justify his (supposed,) forgery in so 
 natural a way ? Was the art of forgery already so far advanced ? 
 It would be interesting biographically could we ascertain 
 that Jeremiah was the prophet who (as it seems) assisted 
 the unknown priest in the composition of the book. Could it 
 further be shown that the high priest Hilkiah was Jeremiah's 
 father, one would be strongly tempted to accept Hitzig's view 
 that the " finder " of the lawbook was also its joint-author. 
 But I doubt whether the knowledge of these facts would throw 
 any fresh light on the prophet's character. As a matter of fact, 
 the internal evidence supplied by the Book of Jeremiah is 
 strongly opposed to his having been a Deuteronomist. It is 
 true that the Book is full of phraseological points of contact with 
 Deuteronomy. That great scholar Zunz (whom George Eliot 
 has made known to many unlearned readers) has pointed out 
 sixty-six passages of Deuteronomy, echoes of which occur, as 
 it seems, in eighty-six passages of Jeremiah. 1 We must re- 
 member, however, (i) that Jeremiah is imitative ; (2) that not 
 all these passages are undoubtedly Deuteronomic and Jeremian 
 respectively ; 2 (3) that the influence of Deuteronomy can be 
 traced in many pages of the Old Testament, which there is no 
 ground whatever for assigning to the Deuteronomist ; and 
 (4) that while the mood of Jeremiah alternates between 
 despondency and indignation, the Deuteronomist's is that of 
 majestic calm and trust. There are also remarkable differences 
 
 1 " Gesammelte Schriften," i. 219-222. Bishop Colenso's list in the 
 Appendix to Part vii. of his work on the Pentateuch includes too much. 
 Kleinert's excursus on the phraseology and vocabulary of the Deuterono- 
 mist is more truly critical. In his sixth dissertation he sums up the lin- 
 guistic differences of the two books. Konig's list in his " Alttestamentliche 
 Studien," Heftii. (1839), pp. 23-98, requires sifting. 
 
 2 In the original Book of Deuteronomy (if the whole of chaps, v.-xxvi. 
 may be regarded as such) there occur twenty-four passages which are 
 echoed in prophecies of undoubted Jeremian origin. Taking these latter 
 together, there are (according to Zunz's list) only seven chapters or sections 
 (i., iv., x. 17-25, xviii., xxxi., xlv., xlvii.) which do not present phraseolo- 
 gical points of contact with our Book of Deuteronomy. These calculations 
 will give the reader some idea of the state of the case. To be strictly 
 accurate several tables would be necessary. No "echo " of Deuteronomy 
 is detected by Zunz in Jer. iv. and xxxi. But does not the prophet allude 
 (though in a perfectly free manner) to Deut. x. 16, xxx. 6 in Jer. iv. 4, 
 and to Deut. xxvi. 19, xxviii. i in Jer. xxxi. 7? 
 
 7
 
 82 JEREMIAH. 
 
 both in the choice of words and expressions, and in the lin- 
 guistic type of the two books. The Deuteronomic exhorta- 
 tion to "love God," and the Deuteronomic titles of God and 
 of Israel respectively, "a consuming fire," " a jealous, a merciful, 
 a faithful, a terrible God," " a special people," ''a holy people," 
 " thine inheritance," are wanting in Jeremiah ; on the other hand, 
 there is nothing in Deuteronomy corresponding to those descrip- 
 tions of God's attributes in the style of the Psalms in which 
 Jeremiah takes so much delight, e.g., " O Jehovah, my strength, 
 and my fortress, and my refuge," Jer. xvi. 19, cf. ix. 23, x. 7, 10, 
 xi. 20. Still more remarkable, perhaps, are the linguistic 
 phenomena. Aramaism abounds in Jeremiah ; it is hardly 
 to be traced in Deuteronomy. Any student approaching 
 the subject with a fresh mind will, I think, agree with me 
 on the general superiority of the style of the Deuteronomist. 
 
 Consider this point, too that, however akin Jeremiah's con- 
 ception of religion may be to that of the Deuteronomist, he 
 shows no sign of interest in the cultus or of any special regard 
 for the Levitical priesthood, He denies thaf the regulation of 
 sacrifices formed any part of the Sinaitic law (Jer vii. 22), and 
 continually denounces the conduct of the priests (Jer. i. 18, 
 ii. 8-26, iv. 9, v. 31, viii. I, xiii. 13, xxxii. 32). The number 
 and vehemence of the passages referred to are not outweighed 
 by such sporadic instances of a milder view as xvii. 26, xxxi. 14, 
 xxxiii. ii, and 17-24. Indeed, this last passage (xxxiii. 17-24) 
 is very possibly not Jeremiah's work. The whose section in 
 which it occurs (vv. 14-26) is omitted in the Septuagint. I may 
 now safely leave this question. It was worth discussing, because 
 the reader may now see less arbitrariness in my future treatment 
 of Jeremiah's course as a preacher. 
 
 It only remains to explain the phrase " the original Book of 
 Deuteronomy." We can scarcely claim to restore with precision 
 the very book which made such an impression on Josiah. It is 
 undoubtedly contained in the middle part of Deuteronomy ; the 
 only question is whether the whole of this part belongs to the 
 original book. I think that, allowing for some few later inser- 
 tions 1 and glosses, we may regard chaps, v.-xxvi. as the original 
 
 1 As such Dillmann . regards ix. 25~x. ii, and xi. 29-33. I n m 7 critical 
 analysis I mainly follow Kuenen's new edition of Vol. i. of his " Onder- 
 zock," translated as a separate work by Mr. Wicksteed (1886); compare 
 (with this Wellhausen's reprinted in his " Skizzen und Vorarheiten," Heft ii. 
 1885), and Horst's in " Revue de 1'histoire des religions," 1888, p. i, &c.
 
 FRAUt) Ok NEEDFUL ILLUSION ? 83 
 
 "book of (Divine) instruction." It is probable that i. r-iv. 44, 
 and iv. 45-49 are two distinct introductions, composed inde- 
 pendently by two different writers, close students of the original 
 " book of torah " in that which is most distinctive of it, the 
 former of whom may perhaps have had some really Deutero- 
 nomic material to work upon. The book itself begins with the 
 " Ten Words " (not, Commandments), of the first of which 
 (Deut. v. 6, 7) chaps, vi. 4-xiii. 18, and, in a less strict sense, 
 chaps, xiv. i-xvi. 17, may be considered as an exposition. The 
 author then " passes (though not without re-crossing the line 
 occasionally) from that which concerns religion in the narrower 
 sense of the word to the outward realm and its arrangement " 
 (xvi. i8-xxvi. 15). And here comes in that appeal, couched in 
 the liveliest prophetic style, to the instinct of self-preservation, 
 which seems to have made so deep an impression on Josiah and 
 his contemporaries : it was for them indeed that it was specially 
 written. As the Book of Deuteronomy now stands, this appeal 
 is interrupted at the very outset (as any one may see by reading 
 xxvi. 16-19, xxvii. 9, 10, and xxviii. I, &c. consecutively) by 
 directions (not by the Deuteronomist) about some great stones 
 or oTj/Xot on which "the words of this tvra/i" were at a later 
 time to be inscribed. They are further interrupted by certain 
 formulae of benediction and malediction to be recited in the ears 
 of the people on mounts Gerizim and Ebal respectively. " In- 
 terrupted " may seem to imply blame ; but it is not the passage 
 itself, which in the light of travel is one of the most striking in 
 the Bible, but its unfortunate position which one criticises. 
 Chaps, xxvii. 9, 10 and xxviii. form the true conclusion of the 
 original Deuteronomy; to which, as an epilogue, the writer added 
 xxxi. 9-13, containing the directions of Moses on the writing of 
 the orally-delivered toni/i, on its safe custody, and on its public 
 recitation every seven years. 1 Chaps, xxix., xxx. are by a student 
 of the Deuteronomist, who takes for granted the fulfilment of 
 the curse (comp. Lev. xxvi. 44), and makes it the point of de- 
 parture for his hopes of Israel's conversion and prosperity in the 
 future. Possibly he had Deuteronomic material to work upon ; 
 this point cannot be dogmatized upon. But at any rate he was 
 a noble writer ; the holy affectionateness of Moses, as he is 
 
 1 I low dearly this is an imaginary Mosaic word. Comp. Deut. xvii. 18, 
 where every king is directed to writ,: him a copy of this law (tordh] in ./ 
 took.
 
 84 JEREMIAH. 
 
 here represented, is most affecting. The Song of Moses (xxxii. 
 1-43), together with xxxi. 14-23 and xxxii. 44, not improbably 
 once belonged to a different work on the life of Moses. Chaps, 
 xxxi. 24-30 and xxxii. 45-47, which are in the Deuteronomic 
 manner, may have been inserted by a writer of the school of the 
 Deuteronomist when he fitted the Song and the accompanying 
 passages into their present place. The Song is a fine work of 
 the best type of prophetic religion, and has many points with 
 Jeremiah. The writer of the book from which it was taken 
 thought it worthy to be ascribed to Moses. There are linguistic 
 affinities between it and the ninetieth psalm to which early 
 Jewish students gave the same origin. The collection of 
 rhythmical sayings on the tribes in chap, xxxiii. is certainly 
 an early work, 1 and of great historical interest. 1 But neither this 
 nor the few remaining passages of the book need detain us now. 
 Let me only add, that, in spite of the critical dissection of Deu- 
 teronomy which in honesty I have been obliged to give, I can 
 enjoy the book as a whole as much as any one, and can admire 
 the skill with which the different parts have been put together. 
 It is a fine imaginative account of the latter days of Moses, and I 
 glow with pleasure as I read the concluding words, There hath 
 not arisen a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses (Deut. 
 xxiv. 10). Yes, truly ; for in this Moses I detect the germ of 
 Jeremiah the forerunner of Christ. 
 
 NOTE ON THE "FINDING" OF THE LAWBOOK IN THE TEMPLE. 
 
 It would perhaps have startled the reader, if, in the preceding note, I had 
 mentioned the statement of Hilkiah in 2 Kings xxii. 8 as due to the imitation 
 of an Egyptian custom, and urged that this created a presumption in favour 
 of the view that the philo-Egyptian circle from which this statement pro- 
 ceeded was also the circle within which the original Deuteronomy was com- 
 posed. And yet there would have been some plausibility in this. It was a 
 suggestion of M. Maspero's in the " Revue critique " (I think, in 1878) which 
 first drew my attention to the subject, and it has often struck me, as from 
 an Egyptological point of view, a not unreasonable one. Ewery year, in 
 fact, reveals fresh points of contact between the culture of Egypt and that 
 of the neighbouring countries, and it requires a firm hold on the peculiarity 
 of Hebraism not to exaggerate the role of teacher which in many respects 
 
 1 As early, certainly, as the reign of Jeroboam II., the " saviour " given to 
 Israel (2 Kings xiii. 5) ; see Graf's very cogent argument, " Der Segen 
 Mose's," p. 8 1.
 
 FRAUD OR NEEDFUL ILLUSION? 85 
 
 belongs to the people of the Nile-valley. The facts on which M. Maspero's 
 suggestion is bnsed are these : It was a common practice of Egyptian 
 scribes to insert in their transcripts of great religious or scientific works a 
 statement that the writing in question had been " found " in a temple. For 
 example, chap. Ixiv. of the "Book of the Dead" (an authority for some 
 important religious doctrines) was declared in certain documents to have 
 been found by an Egyptian prince, in the reign of Mencheres, beneath the 
 feet of the god Thoth. 1 Again, a chapter in the medical papyrus preserved 
 in the British Museum bears the following rubric: ''This cure was dis- 
 covered at night by the hand of a minister of the temple of the goddess who 
 happened to go into the Hall in the temple of the city of Tebmut in the 
 secret places of that goddess. The land at the time was in darkness, but 
 the moon shone on that book all over it. It was brought as a valuable 
 treasure to His Majesty King Kheops." 3 And one of the medical treatises 
 in the Berlin papyrus edited by Brugsch " was found, in ancient writing, in 
 a coffer of books at the feet of the god Anup of Sekhein, in the days of the 
 holiness of the king of the two Egypts, the Veracious. "3 Now it is too 
 much to believe that the priests and learned men of Egypt were so ignorant 
 of their own literature as to discover these important works by a pure acci- 
 dent. It is much more probable that it was a conventional fiction of the 
 priestly class to say that a book had been " found " in a temple, when it 
 was wished to affirm and inculcate its sacred and authoritative character 
 with special emphasis. May there not then (considering the other traces of 
 an acquaintance with Egypt in the book) be an imitation of this custom 
 when Ucut. xxxi. 26 makes " Moses" say, Take this book of /orit/i, and put it 
 by the side of the ark of tlic co-ccnantl The position assigned to the law- 
 book beside the ark (in a box of some kind, we must suppose) corresponds 
 to that of the " coffer of books at the feet of (the Egyptian god) Anup." 
 Deuteronomy does not indeed bear the title ' ' found in a coffer beside the 
 ark" ; but Hilkiah in the narrative of 2 Kings says that he found the book 
 in the temple. Is it not possible that the book was not lost by accident, 
 nor yet placed in the sanctuary with the intention to deceive but simply 
 taken to the temple and formally placed there as authoritative Scripture, 
 and then communicated to Josiah with the view of its promulgation ? My 
 answer is that the lawbook as known to Hilkiah did not (as we have seen) 
 contain Deut. xxxi. 24-30 ; that Hilkiah represents a party opposed to 
 foreign influences (comp. Jer. ii. 18) ; and that the authors of none of the 
 other religious classics of Israel (however Egyptian their colouring, as in 
 the case of the Joseph-story) imitate this custom of the Egyptian litcmti. 
 It is only in Phoenician literature than we can perhaps find a parallel to 
 it ; Philo of Byblus (second cent. A.D.) asserts that the Phoenician history 
 of Sanchoniathon had been concealed and brought back to light by himself. 
 
 1 Brugsch, "Geschichte ^Egyptens," ed. i, p. 84 ; Maspero, "Ilistoire 
 ancienne de 1'Orient," cd. i, p. 73. 
 
 - Birch, " Egyptische Zeitschrift " (1871), p. 63. 
 
 3 Brugsch, as above, p. 60 ; Maspero, as above, p. 57.
 
 86 JEREMIAH. 
 
 NOTE ON THE AI.UTSIONS TO EGYPT IN DEUTERONOMY. 
 
 One of the principal arguments for the Mosaic authorship of Deuteronomy 
 is based on its allusions to Egypt and to Egyptian customs, combined with 
 the absence of allusions to Assyria. Dr. Bissell, one of those young 
 American scholars from whom so much may be hoped, goes so far as to 
 represent this as fatal to the theory of the late origin of the lawbook. 1 Such 
 allusions to Egypt doubtless exist, though the list requires sifting. Among 
 the best attested are the references to the ox treading out the corn un- 
 muzzled (Deut. xxv. 4) ; cf. Wilkinson, "Ancient Egyptians," ii. 46 ; and to 
 the practice of irrigating the soil " with thefoot '' (Deut. xi. 10), i.e., in Mr. 
 Espin's words, " by means of tread-wheels working sets of pumps, and by 
 means of artificial channels connected with reservoirs, and opened, turned, 
 or closed with the feet." The frequent references to the servitude of the 
 Israelites in Egypt (Deut. v. 15, vi. 21, &c.) are also remarkable. We 
 might have expected that the writer would show a horror of the Egyptians, 
 but no ; he represents Moses as deprecating such a feeling, and permitting 
 an Egyptian to be admitted to religious privileges in the third generation 
 (Deut. xxiii. 7, 8). Lastly, I must mention a very singular passage in the 
 law for the king (Deut. xvii. 14-20) : " But he shall not multiply horses to 
 himself, nor cause the people to return to Egypt, to the end that he should 
 multiply horses : forasmuch as Yahveh hath said unto you, Ye shall hence- 
 forth return no more that way " (v. 16). No thoroughly satisfactory expla- 
 nation of this prohibition has, perhaps, yet been given. We may, however, 
 at least, infer from it that in the time of the writer an attachment to Egypt 
 prevailed among the highest classes of the Israelites. Possibly we may 
 illustrate this by the name of Josiah's father Amon, which is identical with 
 that of the Egyptian Sun-god (cf. No-Amon, No of Amon, or rather Amen, 
 the name of the Egyptian Thebes in Nahum iii. 8). But at any rate there 
 is no necessity from these Egyptian allusions to argue the Mosaic author- 
 ship of Deuteronomy. In fact, the communication between Palestine and 
 Egypt was so easy, that the wonder is, not that there should be some allu- 
 sions to Egypt in the Old Testament, or in any book of it, but rather that 
 there should be so few. Allusions to Assyria were of course not to be ex- 
 pected in a summary of " Mosaic " laws and discourses. I do not venture 
 to assume that the form of the literary fiction in Deuteronomy is borrowed 
 from Egypt, though the assumption would have some plausibility. It would 
 of course cut away the ground for the theory of Mosaic authorship. 
 
 x "The Pentateuch : its Origin and Structure" (1885), p. 278, &c.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 "HIS REMEMBRANCE IS LIKE MUSIC" (ECCLUS. XLIX. l). 
 
 David's "last words" fulfilled in Josiah His thirteen golden years after 
 the great covenant Jeremiah's comparative happiness His friends 
 among the wise men Pharaoh Neco profits by the weakness of Assyria 
 Josiah's defeat at Megiddo ; his death The national mourning 
 The tragedy of his life, and of Israel's history. 
 
 " And these are David's last words : 
 
 David, son of Jesse, saith, 
 The man whom God exalted saith, 
 The anointed of the God of Jacob, 
 And the darling of the songs of 
 
 Israel ; 
 
 Jehovah's spirit spake by me, 
 And his word was on my tongue ; 
 
 The God of Israel said, 
 To me the Rock of Israel spake : 
 Who ruleth justly over men, 
 Who ruleth in the fear of God, 
 Is like the morning light at sunrise, 
 A morning without rain. 
 Through sunshine, through rain, 
 
 grass springcth from the earth." 
 (2 Sam. xxiii. 1-4.) 
 
 THESE are the words dramatically put into the mouth of 
 David by one of those nameless writers who flourished in 
 the period of the greater prophets themselves filled to over- 
 flowing with the spirit of prophetic religion. Just as several 
 great inspired prose-writers and poets busied themselves in 
 the Book of Deuteronomy (see end of Chapter VII.) with 
 reproducing what must have been the last words of Moses, or 
 what would have been his last words if he had lived in their own 
 time, so several great inspired poets endeavoured, so to speak, 
 to think themselves back into the soul of David, and complete 
 the scanty number of the songs of the founder of psalmody. 
 One of these poets is the author of the eighteenth psalm ; 
 another composed that beautiful poem the first part of which is 
 the motto of this chapter. This latter writer may well have
 
 88 JEREMIAH. 
 
 lived in the time of Hezekiah or Josiah, 1 and the second part of 
 his poem may reflect the vigorous measures of one or the other 
 of these great reformers. But whichever king suggested this 
 idealization of his remote ancestor, it is in Josiah alone that the 
 opening words of the poem are fully realized. Of him, more 
 than of any other king, may it be said that he was the darling 
 both of Jehovah and of Israel ; and the words of the poem do but 
 express in ornate language the idea of Jeremiah's noble epitaph 
 (as I have called it) on his friend : Did not thy father eat and 
 drink, and do judgment and justice, and then it was well with 
 him ? He judged the cause of the poor and needy ; then it was 
 well with him; was not this to know me, saith Jehovah ? (Jer. 
 xxii. 15, 16). 
 
 For thirteen years after the publication of the first Scripture, 
 Josiah continued to occupy the throne of David, of whose ideal 
 he seemed the living embodiment. David fell far short of his 
 ideal, because he had no Scripture as the compass of his life ; 
 whereas the mingled sentiments of fear, love, and hope, 
 awakened in Josiah by the reading of Deuteronomy, could at 
 any time be kindled again to a white heat by meditation upon 
 that inspired volume. The words, Then said I, Lo, I am come ; 
 in the roll of the book is my duty written j my delight, O my 
 God, is to do thy will j yea, thy law (torah) is within my 
 heart (Psa. xl. 7, 8), even if written later, must represent the 
 state of mind of the good Josiah. I can well believe that he 
 fulfilled the direction in Deut. xvii. 18, and wrote him a copy of 
 this law, and read therein all the days of his life. And I think 
 we may safely conjecture that these last thirteen years of his 
 reign were among the happiest of the long period of the mon- 
 archy. Certainly they must have been so if the Deuteronomic 
 code was approximately carried out. Even where its provisions 
 seem to us unpractical, their spirit is so exquisitely humane, that 
 a modern reader may well sigh at the slow pace of our improve- 
 ments. Here is a lawbook, made in the interests not of any 
 class or caste, but of the whole people ; or, if it does display a 
 
 1 The song must be taken in connexion with the prophecy put into the 
 mouth of Nathan (see especially 2 Sam. vii. ti-i6) by a writer who lived 
 when prophecy had long assumed a literary garb, and, in all probability, at 
 the time assigned above to the author of our song, who " thought himself 
 into the soul " of David, just as the author of 2 Sam. vii. 5, &c. " thought 
 himself into the soul " of David's prophet.
 
 "HIS REMEMBRANCE IS LIKE MUSIC." 89 
 
 preference for any part of the community, it is for the poor and 
 weak. Where is the Christian nation which recognized this 
 even as a standard to be aimed at, until that great awakening 
 of the moral and religious conscience or, in Bible language, 
 that great Day of the LORD (Jehovah) which filled up the close 
 of the eighteenth century ? Well said the author of Deutero- 
 nomy, in the introduction r which (after perhaps a few years' 
 experience of the benefits to the nation at large of the system 
 introduced through him) he prefixed to his original work, What 
 great nation is there, tliat hath statutes and judgments so 
 righteous as all this law (tord/t), which I set before you this day? 
 (Deut. iv. 8). He speaks, no doubt, in the assumed character 
 of Moses ; but by the three times repeated expression great 
 nation (see vv. 6-8) he reveals the fact that the people of 
 Israel had, either through God's longsuffering mercy (Rom. ii. 4) 
 or through His blessing upon its obedience, attained a high 
 degree of temporal prosperity. 
 
 It is remarkable that not one of the prophecies of Jeremiah can 
 be referred to these years. Either he still devoted himself to the 
 exposition of the Deuteronomic law, or, if he delivered original 
 prophecies of his own, he did not afterwards care to reproduce 
 them, except of course so far as their contents reappeared in 
 prophecies of later reigns. At any rate, in spite of his melan- 
 choly statements at an earlier and a later period, I make no doubt 
 that these thirteen years were a time of comparative happiness 
 to the prophet, that, like Isaiah, he enjoyed the society of 
 friends and disciples, and that to these among others he refers in 
 a subsequent discourse respecting those captives in Babylon 
 on whom Jehovah graciously promised to set His eyes for good 
 (Jer. xxiv. 2-7). Among these friends may have been the name- 
 less author of the first nine chapters of the Book of Proverbs, 
 which were not written to fill their present place, but once 
 formed an independent work in praise of true Wisdom. 2 In 
 its genial, persuasive tone and sunny spirit, this book reminds 
 us not so much of Jeremiah as of the exhortations in the Book 
 of Deuteronomy, like which it inculcates the doctrine, so well 
 adapted to young pupils and primitive nations, that the fear of 
 God is the one source of earthly happiness. 
 
 1 On the critical analysis of the book, see end of Chapter VII. 
 
 2 "Job and Solomon" (1887), p. 156, &c. ; comp. Stanley, "Jewish 
 Church," ii. 170, &c,
 
 90 JEREMIAH. 
 
 My readers will admit that there is nothing violent or far- 
 fetched in the view which I have put forward, and which fits 
 itself admirably into a harmonious and well-proportioned his- 
 torical picture of the times. There were three orders of God's 
 ministers in what by anticipation I may venture to call the 
 Jewish Church priests, wise men or moral teachers, and pro- 
 phets. Their respective functions are well indicated in a popu- 
 lar saying reported by Jeremiah (xviii. 18), Religious direction 
 shall not be lost from the priest, nor counsel from the wise man, 
 nor revelation from the prophet. There is no doubt that other 
 prophets of the nobler type were on friendly terms with the best 
 of the wise men, whose very language they sometimes borrow, 1 
 and how can Jeremiah have been unacquainted with so eminent 
 a wise man as the author of this lovely treatise, so closely akin 
 to his own favourite book, Deuteronomy ? The value of such 
 conjectures (which, when supported by all the attainable evi- 
 dence, approach indefinitely near to facts) is that they help 
 to make the Bible story live again to us, and I hope never to 
 cease repeating that this is one of the greatest tasks of the 
 Christian teachers of our day, and closely connected with the 
 future of Christianity among the educated classes. 
 
 The wise men or moral teachers flourished most in periods 
 of tranquillity. It was in such a period that of Solomon that 
 we can first confidently trace them, and a not less golden oppor- 
 tunity was furnished for their work by these last thirteen years 
 of Josiah. Alas that the " fine gold " so soon "became dim" 
 (Lam. iv. i) ! Alas that the teachers so soon had to become 
 learners again in the stern school of calamity ! The inspired 
 poet to whom I owe my motto spoke of a summer sky, with 
 its sweet vicissitudes of sun and shower, causing the grass to 
 spring up, and all homely, common blessings. Suddenly and 
 without a warning, that smiling heaven became black with 
 clouds. Do not let us despise the elementary lesson which this 
 supports, aud which it took God's ancient people so long to 
 learn. Trust not the future ; fierce are the storms of spring, but 
 those of summer can be as wild ; God is not bound to make the 
 years resemble each other in the cloying sweetness of perpetual 
 ease. Midway in I'rfe 2 to each of the two best kings of Judah 
 
 1 "The Prophecies of Isaiah," note on Isa. xxviii. 23. In Jer. viii. 9, 
 our prophet refers perhaps to the less religious class of wise men. 
 3 Hitzig would render, in the opening line of Hezekiah's psalm (Isa.
 
 "HIS REMEMBRANCE IS LIKE MUSIC." 91 
 
 caiVie a sore calamity ; Hezekiah became sick unto death, but 
 the Lord's hand held him back ; ' Josiah, at the same age of 39,* 
 was overmatched by a too powerful opponent, and died in battle. 
 This is how it came about, and why we should regard this event 
 as one of the greatest tragedies of the sacred story. 
 
 Let us now go back in imagination about twenty years to the 
 time when the Scythian hordes overran Assyria and Babylonia." 
 Both countries, as we remember, suffered cruelly, but the 
 Assyrians, up to this time the more aggressive and warlike race, 
 had at length been overtaken by a lassitude which had de- 
 stroyed their physical power of recovering from injury. They 
 had added conquest to conquest, but taken no pains to weld 
 their dominions into a durable empire, and so revolt followed 
 upon revolt, and the reign of Assurbanipal was like the last fine 
 day in autumn the too brilliant forerunner of a period of trouble 
 and disaster. The death of Assurbanipal (was it 626 B.C. ?) 
 certainly fell in the first part of the reign of Josiah, and the 
 dangerous position of that great king's successor may have en- 
 couraged Josiah to extend his own sway over part of the former 
 kingdom of Ephraim, for we find him continuing his iconoclastic 
 progress to Bethel and "the cities of Samaria 3 (2 Kings xxiii. 
 15-19; comp. 2 Chron. xxxiv. 6). At any rate, Neco II., the 
 reigning Pharaoh, an enterprising monarch (as we know from 
 Herodotus), 4 and strong in all military resources, resolved to 
 
 xxxviii. 10), " In the middle of my days must I go," &c. ; comp. the ex- 
 treme limit of the age of man in Psa. xc. 10. A suggestive even if wrong 
 rendering ! 
 
 1 Isa. xxxviii. 17, thou hast held back my soul from the pit of destruction. 
 R.V.'s rendering is barely possible ; but the text only says, " thou hast 
 loved my soul out of," &c. I prefer to follow the reading of the Septuagint 
 and the Vulgate, with most recent critics. 
 
 2 With most, I assume the correctness of the revised text of 2 Kings 
 xvii. i. 
 
 3 Is it possible to account for Jeremiah's special kindness and courtesy 
 towards northern Israel in chaps, iii. and xxxi. by a desire to make up for 
 the judicial severity of his royal patron (2 Kings xxiii. 19. 20), which must 
 have deeply wounded the feelings of the remnant of Ephraim? 
 
 4 In v. 21, two words need correction from 3 Esdras i. 25 "house" be- 
 comes " Euphrates "; " disguised himself" becomes " firmly resolved "the 
 latter correction is also confirmed by the Septuagint ; lastly, where the 
 received text reads " to make haste," I follow Klobtermann in reading "in 
 a dream."
 
 92 JEREMIAH. 
 
 profit by the manifest weakness of Assyria. In the spring of 608, 
 he began a series of campaigns, designing to conquer one by 
 one the provinces of feudatory states of the Ninevite empire. 
 Of these feudatory states Judah had formerly been one. I think 
 it probable that Josiah had for some time past, like Hezekiah 
 (2 Kings xviii. 7), refused tribute to the Assyrian suzerain ; at 
 least, it would be unreasonable to suppose that Josiah took the 
 field against Neco, as he presently did, in the character of 
 a vassal of Nineveh. This is all that the earlier of the two 
 Hebrew narrators says on the intervention of Josiah, 
 
 In his days Pharaoh Neco king of Egypt went up against 
 tlic king of Assyria to the river Euphrates : and king Josiah 
 went against him, and he slew him at Megiddo when he hud 
 seen him (2 Kings xxiii. 29). 
 
 The Chronicler is rather more full. He feels the fragmentary 
 character of his preceding record, and connects this record with 
 the sad story which follows in a purely mechanical manner. 
 
 After all this that Josiah had prepared the temple, Neco 
 king of Egypt went up to fight by Carchemish on the Euphrates ; 
 and Josiah went out against him. And Neco sent messengers 
 to him, saying, What have I to do with thce, king of Judah? 
 Not against thee am I come this day ; for upon Euphrates is my 
 ivar. And Elohim hath commanded me in a dream j keep thee 
 away from Elohim, who is with me, that he destroy thee not. But 
 Josiah turned not his face from him, for he had firmly resolved 
 to fight with him, and hearkened not unto the words of Neco 
 from the mouth of Elohim ; and he came to f-ght with him in 
 t/ie valley of Megiddo (2 Chron. xxxv. 20-22). * 
 
 We may perhaps regard it as a historical fact that Neco sent 
 an embassy to Josiah ; the Chronicler certainly preserves some 
 
 1 This delightful writer becomes our chief authority for this period, as 
 Brugsch in an eloquent, melancholy sentence tells us ("Geschichte ALgyp- 
 tens," ed. i, p. 737). From Herod, ii. 152, iv. 42, we learn to respect in 
 Neco (Ne/ctuf) the predecessor of Lesseps (for the Egyptian king fully de- 
 served to succeed in cutting through the isthmus of Suez) and of Diaz and 
 Vasco de Gama (in the circumnavigation of Africa). If Neco and his 
 imitator, the Corinthian tyrant Periander, had but succeeded in their 
 enterprising schemes, hoVv profoundly they would have affected the course 
 of history ! The true cause of Neco's abandonment of the canal was pro- 
 bably, not the supposed oracle in Herodotus, but the necessity of increasing 
 his forces for the defence of the Egyptian frontier after his defeat in Asia. 
 On the canal, comp. Ebers, " Durch Gosen zum Sinai," p. 471, &c.
 
 "HIS REMEMBRANCE IS LIKE MUSIC." 93 
 
 historic traditions omitted in Kings. Even the contents of the 
 message are in themselves probable enough. Like the bold 
 statement of the Rabshakeh in Isa. xxxvi. 10, they may be fitly 
 illustrated by the striking description of a dream-oracle in the 
 Annals of Assurbanipal. 1 Neco had his own prophets who could 
 doubtless interpret dreams. If, however, we decline the con- 
 jectural reading "in a dream" (see below), we may, if we will, 
 follow 3 Esdras i. 28, when the words of Neco become the words 
 of Jeremiah. Certainly, it is probable enough that Jeremiah's 
 person had a supernatural sanctity in the eyes of Egyptian as 
 well as of Assyrian generals. But we know nothing from the 
 Book of Jeremiah of any advice which he gave to Josiah, and 
 the point of the narrative seems to be that even Neco had a true 
 presentiment, while Josiah, the darling of God and man, rushed 
 blindly to his fate. But what was the cause of his aggressive 
 conduct? It is quite impossible that he should have been 
 affected by considerations of statecraft, not merely because he 
 was the friend of Jeremiah, and must have accepted as Divine 
 the early fulminations of the prophet (chap, ii.), but also from 
 the very nature of the case. For policy would have suggested 
 to him cither to help Neco, or at any rate not to oppose him. 
 What harm could the Pharaoh possibly do to the Jews? Sup- 
 posing that he defeated the Assyrians, would he not soon have 
 more formidable opponents in the Medes and Babylonians, 2 a 
 rumour cf whose warlike movements must by this time have 
 reached Palestine, and be only too glad to return within his own 
 borders ? 
 
 I think that a comprehensive study of the history of revealed 
 religion suggests the true explanation. God sometimes sacri- 
 fices the individual for the sake of the community allows him 
 to become the victim of dangerous illusions, in order that they 
 may be seen to be illusions. Josiah if I have described him 
 rightly made the Scripture of Deuteronomy the rule of his 
 li/e. It was not merely a formal but a spiritual obedience that 
 
 1 "Records of the Past," ix. 52. It was Assurbanipal's prophet who 
 had the dream. Probably, like the Egyptian priests, when they sought for 
 oracles, he slept, like Samuel, near the holy place, and regarded his 
 " thoughts from visions of the night " (Job iv. 13) as necessarily Divine. 
 
 2 Joscphus ("Ant." x. 5, i) actually says that Neco's object was to war 
 witli tin; Medcs and Babylonians, " who had overthrown the empire of the 
 Assyrians."
 
 94 JEREMIAH. 
 
 he gave to it ; he performed God's law from love. I do not in 
 this equalize him with our Lord or even with His saintly fol- 
 lowers ; but upon the whole we must believe him to have assimi- 
 lated that great idea, first clearly announced, though not in 
 such few words, by Hosea, and incorporated into the prophetic 
 portion of the Book of Deuteronomy that " God is love." 
 Josiah cannot have known his countrymen as Jeremiah knew 
 them ; he was of too exalted a rank to gauge their spiritual 
 attainments. The idea that his reformation was half a failure 
 could never have occurred to him, and if suggested by another, 
 it would have been against nature for him to admit it. This, 
 then, was one of the illusions to which he became a victim the 
 illusion that his countrymen knew and served Jehovah, and were 
 consequently the objects of His loving favour, in the same sense 
 or degree as himself. The other was one to which in all pro- 
 bability even Jeremiah was still subject, in common with such a 
 noble and inspired religious thinker as the author of the little 
 book on Divine Wisdom in Prov. i.-ix. It was this that in 
 the long run righteousness is rewarded in this world by pros- 
 perity, and unrighteousness punished by adversity. Josiah 
 would certainly have called himself a righteous man, not in the 
 sense of that Chinese who said that he had never committed a 
 single " sin " (he added that neither had his father nor his 
 grandfather ever done so), but in the sense that he had given 
 his heart to God, and that his chief desire was to perform that 
 law which he so much loved. He must have argued therefore 
 (comp. the argument which Assurbanipal pleads to Istar) J that 
 Jehovah would meet love with love, and reward him openly for 
 his faithful obedience. It would have been quite intelligible 
 had Josiah aspired to revive the glorious days of David. Dr. 
 Oort of Leyden and Mr. F. W. Newman have indeed too 
 boldly conjectured that Psa. Ixxii. expresses such anticipations 
 on the part of one of Josiah's subjects, and Deut. xx., xxi. might 
 conceivably have stimulated warlike feelings in the monarch. 
 But at any rate, when, at the head of warriors not less righteous 
 (as he fondly supposed), Josiah took the field against a heathen 
 invader, he must, one imagines, have been full of a David-like 
 boldness and faith. Nor, sympathetic as he must have been 
 towards pious psalmists, can he have failed to recall those words 
 which a recent poet had put into the mouth of David, 
 1 See " Records of the Past," ix. 51.
 
 "HIS REMEMBRANCE IS LIKE MUSIC." 95 
 
 Jehovah dealt with me according to my righteousness, 
 
 According to the cleanness of my hands he recompensed me, 
 Because I kept the ways of Jehovah, 
 
 And did not wickedly depart from, my God: 
 For all his ordinances -were before me, 
 
 And I did not put away his statntes from me / 
 / was also perfect towards him, 
 
 And I kept myself from guiltiness. 
 So thou gavest me thy shield of victory ; 
 
 Thy right hand Iicld me up, 
 
 And thy condescension made me great. 
 I pursued mine enemies and overtook them ; 
 
 And turned not again till I had consumed them, 
 I dashed them to pieces that they could not rise, 
 
 But fell under my feet (Psa. xviii. 20-23 ; 35-38). 
 
 But still more must he have thought of those glowing benedic- 
 tions at the end of Deuteronomy which are expressly attached 
 to the faithful observance of the book of the covenant, 
 
 And it shall come to pass . . . that Jehovah thy God will set 
 thee on high above all nations of the earth. Blessed shalt ihou 
 be in the city, and blessed in the field. Blessed shall be thy basket 
 and thy store. Blessed shalt thou be when thou contest in, and 
 blessed when thou goest out. Jehovah shall cause thine enemies 
 that rise up against thee to be smitten before thy face j they shall 
 come out against thee one way, and flee before thee seven ways 
 (Deut. xxviii. 1-8). 
 
 For it was not a war of conquest in which Josiah was engaging, 
 but a holy war. The south of the land of Israel had, it is true, 
 been spared ; but both in his reforming progress, and, we may 
 now add, even in his final choice of a battlefield, Josiah de- 
 clared himself to be the rightful king both of north and of south 
 the legal representative of David and Solomon. 1 If the 
 Assyrians had withdrawn their heavy hand from the territory 
 of Ephraim, was it to be endured that another unbelieving foe 
 should pitch his tents in the very heart of the sacred land? 
 And so no doubt costly sacrifices were offered in the temple 
 before the army set forth, and the twentieth psalm was sung, 
 containing the words, 
 
 Now am I sure that Jehovah saveth his anointed, 
 He will answer him from his holy heaven 
 With the mighty saving acts of his right hand (Psa. xx. 6). 
 
 1 See above, p. 60,
 
 96 jKREMIAtf. 
 
 The two armies met in the strategically important valley 
 or, to use the more accurately descriptive term, plain (Heb., 
 bik l dh, a broad plain between mountains) of Jezreel or Esdra- 
 elon. 1 The name of the place was confounded by Herodotus' 
 informant with that of a town on the north-east frontier of 
 Egypt, which I shall have to mention again later ; it was really 
 Megiddo, not Magclol, where the fatal clash of arms took place 
 (2 Kings xxiii. 29). By what route did the Egyptians arrive ? 
 Just before his reference to- Neco's defeat of the " Syrians" at 
 " Magdolos," Herodotus speaks of the docks where the ships 
 were built which that king "employed wherever he had occa- 
 sion." 2 It is not impossible that, to avoid hostilities with 
 Josiah, Neco took his troops by sea to some landing-place 
 north of Judah proper say, to Dor, an ancient and famous 
 port, 3 which probably remained Phoenician, even after Nafath 
 (or Nafoth) Dor was conquered by the Israelites (Josh. xi. 2, 
 xii. 23, Judges i. 27, I Kings iv. 11). its Phoenician inhabitants 
 were doubtless as politic as Josiah was the reverse. From Dor 
 (slightly to the north of the modern village Tantura) to Megiddo 
 in the great plain of Jezreel was no great distance ; Duru (Dor) 
 and Magidu or Magadu (Megiddo) are in fact mentioned to- 
 gether in the Assyrian inscriptions. The alternative is to 
 suppose that Neco took the same route as Thothmes III. (B.C. 
 1600?), in whose reign, as the inscriptions tell, "Egypt placed 
 its frontier where it pleased," and who led his invading forces 
 by land to " Maketa " or Megiddo, where he routed the combined 
 forces of Syria and Mesopotamia. 4 At any rate, it was on the 
 battlefield of Megiddo, 5 famous already in the poetry of Israel 
 by the defeat of Jabin and Sisera, and not less celebrated in 
 apocalyptic vision (Rev. xvi. 16), that the unequal struggle 
 
 1 Herod, ii. 15* , 
 
 2 For the historical associations connected with this " battlefield of 
 Syria," ranging from Thothmes III. and Rameses II. to Bonaparte and 
 Kleber, see Lias's note on Judg. vi. 33 (Cambridge Bible). 
 
 3 See Schiirer, " The Jewish People in the Time of Jesus Christ," E. T. 
 Div. ii., Vol. i., p. 88. 
 
 4 " Records of the Past," ii. 37-39 (Birch) ; comp. Brugsch, "Geschichte 
 /Egyptens," ed. i, pp. ,295-6. 
 
 5 On a low promontory thrown out from the Samaritan hills towards the 
 recess between the Nazarene range and Jebel Dahy ("Little Hermon ") 
 stood the Roman Legw, whence the modern Lejiin. Here, too, probably, 
 in the most peaceful of landscapes, stood Megiddo.
 
 "HIS REMEMHRANCE IS LIKE MUSIC." 97 
 
 between Neco and Josiah took place. Alas ! the men of Israel 
 fled at the very beginning of the battle ;* it was as if (applying 
 a well-known Hebrew figure 2 ) the aspect of the angry Egyptian 
 king had scattered his enemies. The fate of Ahab became that 
 of Josiah: " a certain man drew a bow at a venture, and smote 
 the king of Israel" (i Kings xxii. 34, comp. 2 Chron. xxxv. 23). 
 He was brought to Jerusalem to die. What were his last 
 thoughts ? Did he still trust God ? None can answer that 
 question ; but that the faith of many of his subjects was shaken, 
 we may be certain. The problem of a perfect and upright man 
 given into the hand of " the Satan " became from this time forth 
 the problem of Jewish wisdom the problem of which there is 
 but a faintly hinted solution in the noblest monument of that 
 wisdom, the Book of Job. 
 
 That blessed results accrued in the long run to the Jewish 
 Church from this great calamity, could easily be shown. From 
 Megiddo the eye turns instinctively to the hillside on which, 
 twelve miles distant, lovely Nazareth stands. But who thought 
 of looking beyond the sad sights of the immediate present ? 
 Faith was paralyzed ; the heart of the nation seemed to stand 
 still. Unmixed sadness and consternation spread through all 
 classes. The more recent of our two narrators makes this 
 statement, to which I shall have to return later, 
 
 And all Judah and Jerusalem mourned for Josiah. And 
 Jeremiah lamented for Josiah : and all the singing men and the 
 singing women spake of Josiah in their lamentations unto this 
 day j- and they were made an ordinance (i.e., institution) in Israel 
 (2 Chron. xxxv. 24, 25). 
 
 Such a national mourning was doubtless very different from 
 the prescribed lamentations at an ordinary king's death ; one 
 thinks of the mourning after the field of Flodden in Scottish 
 history. The whole land mourned ; every family felt bereaved 
 (Zech. xii. 11, 12). But some may in a special sense be called 
 
 1 So we must explain the words, when he had seen him. It is not stated 
 in the Old Testament that the men of Israel fled ; but we may safely pre- 
 sume that the presence of the king was still as all-important to the army as 
 in Ahab's time. So Josephus understood the Biblical passages. He says 
 that Josiah was setting his army in array when one of the Egyptians shot 
 him, and put a stop to his eagerness for the fray ; on which he commanded 
 a retreat to be sounded. 
 
 8 See e.g. Lam. iv. 16. 
 
 S
 
 98 JEREMIAH. 
 
 " chief mourners." First of all, the poor and weak, to whom 
 it had been Josiah's delight to do justice ; and next, the friends 
 of spiritual religion with whom from his earliest youth he had 
 been so closely allied. Let us sympathize, then, most deeply 
 with Jeremiah, whose hopes have once more been dashed to the 
 ground. For the result of the defeat and death of Josiah was, 
 not merely the reduction of Judah to the rank of a subject-state, 
 but above all, the revival of idolatry and the sore discourage- 
 ment of the little band of reformers. Jeremiah, the most 
 illustrious mourner, must indeed have felt the blow. Henceforth 
 his life is a true martyrdom, only relieved by his rock-like 
 constancy, and by that wondrous revelation to which I have 
 already alluded, and which represents the high-water mark of 
 Jewish religion before the Captivity. 
 
 The story of Israel is a succession of tragedies ; but perhaps 
 there is none more touching than the tragedy of the death of 
 Josiah. And for this reason that he is so entirely innocent. 
 His case was not that of so many of the later Jews, who fell 
 back into an illusion which revelation ought to have dissipated. 
 No ; he could not have believed otherwise than he did. What 
 an enigma his fate would remain, if Jesus Christ had not ratified 
 the presentiments of the noblest Jews since Jeremiah, and 
 proved that the way to the crown lies by the cross. Can we 
 doubt that even this defeated king has received a crown the 
 crown of one who has lived by the light of God's word, and 
 ventured all rather than distrust His promises? And in the 
 spirit of Josiah's life shall not we, my readers, follow him ? 
 Say not that the standard is too high, that such passionate 
 earnestness is not in our character, that such devotion to con- 
 science is Quixotic. It is the glory of the Gospel that, by using 
 its resources, the common man or woman may exceed the 
 standard of the highest Old Testament saint (Matt. xi. u). 
 Our heart may be an unsteady thing; but, as the psalmist says, 
 Jehovah is not only the believer's portion in eternity, but his 
 rock in time. With God's " light " and God's " truth " (that is, 
 "faithfulness") for guides (Psa. xliii. 3), the weakest character 
 and the strongest gain alike a supernatural depth and seriousi 
 ness. They will go with us into battle, like the ark of Jehovah, 
 and ensure us the victory, even though, as in Josiah's case, the 
 victory may not be manifest even to ourselves till we reach the 
 other side I will not say, of death, but of life. With these
 
 "HIS REMEMBRANCE IS LIKE MUSIC." 99 
 
 heavenly guides, we need fear no shocks whether to our out- 
 ward or to our inward being. Riches may take to themselves 
 wings and flee away; friends may pass before us into the "silent 
 land ' ; forms of doctrine may, as with Josiah's contemporaries, 
 prove to be not free from educational illusion ; but " Israel's 
 Rock" (Isa. xxx. 29, R.V.) remains. My flesh and my heart 
 faileth) but God is the rock of my heart, and my portion for ever 
 (Psa. Ixxiii. 26). 
 
 I spoke of Josiah's death as one of the greatest of religious 
 tragedies. Alas that in Israel's history there should be one 
 still greater, which, if we felt it aright, would make our hearts 
 bleed. It is a perennial tragedy that of the veiled face set 
 forth in sculpture on the lovely door of the Chapter-room of 
 my own cathedral. The mourning of the people of Judah 
 for Josiah is taken in the Book of Zechariah (xii. 10-14) a s 
 an emblem of a mourning yet future, when God's " ancient 
 people" 1 (Isa. xliv. 7) shall look on him 2 whom they pierced^ 
 and shall mourn for him as one mourneth for an only son, and 
 as the mourning for Hadad-rimmon 3 in the plain of Megiddo. 
 The tragedy lies in the well-nigh two thousand years' wander- 
 ings of Israel through a labyrinth of slowly brightening 
 
 1 It is often impossible to determine with certitude between different 
 interpretations, and one may sometimes believe that, like other Oriental 
 writers, the prophets and psalmists meant to be enigmatical (comp. 
 Delitzsch's note on Psa. l.xxii. 15). Delitzsch explains this phrase of the 
 people of the antediluvian world ; Brcdenkamp (the latest commentator, 
 who doubtless ought to be the wisest), of the people of Israel, called to be 
 God's people since the earliest times. 
 
 2 The received text has "unto me," but the last letter (i) representing 
 the pronoun "me," is probably the first letter, or a fragment of the first 
 letter, of some lost word, the middle part of which has dropped out, and 
 the last part is represented (or misrepresented) by the letters HM- The 
 reading "unto him" is, probably, only a conjectural emendation, the accept- 
 ance of which does not modify the syntactic peculiarity of the phrase. I 
 have adopted it above, simply from ignorance of the true reading, which may 
 either have been a proper name or a term descriptive of character or office. 
 Who was the person alluded to? Was it the same martyr who seems to 
 be referred to in the ancient prophecy adopted and modified in Isa. lii. 
 i3-liii. ? If so, Jehovah sympathized with His martyr, and regarded the 
 " insult " as offered to Himself (cf. Psa. Ixix. 9). 
 
 3 Jerome says, " Adadremmon is a city near Jerusalem, now called 
 Maximianopolis, in the field of Mageddon, where the righteous king Josiah 
 was wounded by the Pharaoh called Nechao." At a short distance from
 
 100 JEREMIAH. 
 
 darkness. The clue is missing ; when shall the wanderer find 
 it ? Sad, beyond expression sad ; but is it not a fascinating 
 tragedy ? Why do so few of us know this ? Is it nothing to 
 vou, all ye that pass by, whose eyes are never satisfied with 
 seeing, nor whose ears with hearing, for whom no poetry is 
 too sensuous, no romance too strange ? Ye who have been 
 nourished on the story of the Israel of Scripture has it so 
 fully satisfied your curiosity that you have not a thought for the 
 second part of that wondrous tale ? Has no one told you of the 
 manifold interest of Jewish history in the middle ages, and of 
 Jewish life at the present time ? Some of you, who think scorn 
 of poetry and romance, find your pleasure perhaps in the 
 records of missionary work in heathen lands. Is there no 
 pleasure to be won from the records of missions (not merely 
 English missions) to the Jews a pleasure mingled (I must 
 sadly confess) with pain at the faulty methods which have too 
 often been adopted, but one which brings you very near the 
 heart of Jesus ? There may be others among you who fear 
 even this chastened pleasure, and who promote Christian 
 missions simply from a sense of duty. Does not the thought 
 of five thousand poor Jewish refugees added to the population 
 of East London suggest to you the idea of a duty the duty of 
 bringing them to the great Teacher if you can, but at any rate 
 of helping them, and especially of sympathizing with them, of 
 giving some thought to their past history and present condition. 
 God hath not cast away his people? says St. Paul, with the 
 passionate earnestness which is the keynote of his character. 
 Nay, a part of the prophecy is being fulfilled. A " spirit of 
 supplication" has been " poured out " upon many of those who 
 are still in the fullest and truest sense Israelites. No people on 
 the face of the earth weeps so much for its sins and their 
 punishment as the eastern Jews. Those who have once heard 
 them in their synagogues cry in Hebrew, " Forgive us now, 
 forgive us now," confess that they can never forget it. It is 
 almost as touching to see the Jews, as Sir Richard Temple 
 truly remarks, come singly and quietly, without any form or 
 
 Lejjiin there is still a place called Rummanc, in which the second part of 
 the name Hadad-rimmon may perhaps survive. It ought to be mentioned 
 that there is another explanation of Zech. xii, n ; but to do it justice, would 
 tarry us too lar into criticism. 
 
 1 Rom. xi. i ; comp. Jer. xxxi. 38.
 
 "HIS REMEMBRANCE IS LIKE MUSIC." IOI 
 
 ceremony, to weep over the beloved stones at the accustomed 
 " Wailing-place." ' When shall the other part of the prophecy 
 be fulfilled ? When shall they look with desire on Him whom 
 by their ignorant unbelief they have so long pierced ? 3 
 
 This is the tragedy of Israel a people, than which there is 
 none more ancient 3 nor more noble, but neglectful of its highest 
 honour and grandest privilege. To understand the causes of 
 this tragedy, will be the reward of him who ponders the later 
 pages of the romantic story of God's people. 
 
 1 " Palestine Illustrated " (1888), p. 40. 
 
 2 In a few sentences, one can hardly express a point of view, much less 
 give conclusions. May I therefore refer to the article entitled " The Jews 
 and the Gospel " in "The Expositor," 1885 (i), pp. 405-418, which seeks 
 to be just to all who "turn upwards " (Hos. vii. 16) in Israel, whether in a 
 manner congenial to ourselves or not. 
 
 3 I do not forget the constancy of the old Egyptian ethnic type, which 
 permits you, as M. E. M. de Vogue" remarks, to confound the fellah who 
 guides you in the Bulak museum with the statues against which he jostles. 
 But can the motley population of Egypt be called a nation ?
 
 PART II. 
 
 THE CLOSE OF JUDAH' S TRACED V 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE CLOUDS RETURN AFTER THE RAIN. 
 
 Consequences of Josiah's death Jeremiah's changed attitude towards 
 Deuteronomy His visit to Anathoth. 
 
 IN a volume of poetic reproductions of sacred stories by the 
 late Dr. Neale there is one entitled " Josiah," which suggests a 
 modification of an image employed in the last chapter. At the 
 opening of Josiah's reign it might indeed be natural to compare 
 it to a bright summer sky, but we who know its sad termination 
 must feel with the poet that the pensive beauty of an autumnal 
 day is a more appropriate figure, especially when we remember 
 how, even in England, the glories of autumn sometimes pass 
 away in the tempest of a single night. Yes ; and it was not 
 an English but an Eastern winter, such as we find described 
 by the world-weary Preacher (Eccles. xii. 2) which followed 
 Josiah's death. The religious results of that great calamity were 
 twofold. First, the revival, to some extent at least, of idolatrous 
 practices. This is what Jeremiah himself says (xvii. 2), The 
 sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron and with the point of 
 a diamond; it is graven upon the tablet of their hearty and upon 
 the horns of their altars; inasmuch as their children (stilt) 
 bethink them of their altars and their AsheraJis tinder the leafy 
 trees upon the high hills (the conical hills of Judah which so 
 well adapt themselves to such forms of worship). We cannot 
 wonder at such a natural though inopportune revival. Deep in 
 the heart of primitive man lies the instinct of sacred places and of
 
 THE CLOUDS RETURN AFTER THE RAIN. 103 
 
 polytheism. It would be absurd to connect Moslem saint-worship 
 as a whole with the polytheism of the ancient Israelites, but 
 who can doubt that those little white cupolas (Arabic, qitbba) 
 which continually meet the eye in Palestine, each on its 
 eminence, and often (see the Palestine Fund's photographic 
 view of Tell Hazur near Banias) with its sacred tree or trees, are 
 the direct successors of those "altars upon the high hills under 
 the leafy trees " of which Jeremiah speaks ? If, after the lapse 
 of centuries, and in spite of the levelling hand of the conqueror 
 and the sweeping torrent of invasion, the fellaheen are still 
 drawn to the old consecrated spots, and gaily dressed groups 
 can still be seen going up hill and down dale to " visit " some 
 saint or prophet (i.e., his reputed tomb), is it wonderful that 
 the same fascinating beliefs should have reasserted their sway 
 over the half-converts of Josiah ? Why, even Mohammed's 
 early converts longed after the old Semitic sacred trees. One 
 of the oldest Arabic historical works" contains this interesting 
 tradition, " The Ourashites and other heathen Arabs ac- 
 counted holy a large green tree, and every year had a festival 
 in its honour, at which they sacrificed and hung their arms 
 upon it. On the way to Hunain we called to God's Messenger 
 [Mohammed] that he should appoint for us such trees. But he 
 was terrified and said, ' Lord God, Lord God ! ye speak even as 
 the Israelites did to Moses, Make us such a god as the others 
 have ; ye are still in ignorance ; those are heathen customs.' " 
 Mohammed could talk thus, for fortune was on his side ; but 
 Jeremiah had a harder task to reconvert his contemporaries, 
 for it must have seemed to them as if the old beliefs were not 
 merely pleasant but efficacious. We may perhaps express their 
 thoughts thus : " All the early days of Josiah we had pros- 
 perity ; why ? Surely because we not only appeased the god 
 of our own nation but also the old divinities of the land, and 
 besides these, the gods of the powerful nations around us who 
 need to be propitiated even more (comp. Jer. xliv. 17). We 
 believe that it was the jealousy of these supernatural powers, so 
 seriously injured by Josiah, which led to the defeat and death 
 of that wrong-headed king." The details of this recrudescence 
 of the old wounds are not given us, but the general statement 
 in 2 Kings that the four successors of Josiah did evil in the 
 1 " Vakidi's Book of the Campaigns of God's Messenger," by Wellhauscn, 
 P- 356.
 
 104 JEREMIAH. 
 
 sight of Jehovah according to all that their fathers had donc> 
 and that of Josephtis respecting Jehoahaz in particular that he 
 was "an impious man and impure in his course of life," permits 
 us to form but a low estimate of the national religion. The 
 case of Juclah under its kings was not like that of England 
 under the second Charles. If the " head " was " sick," we may 
 be sure that the "heart " WAS " faint." A formal revocation of 
 Josiah's covenant was unnecessary ; it is always simpler to 
 allow laws to fall into desuetude than to repeal them. Those 
 who liked to obey it, might do so ; those who did not, might 
 equally follow their inclination. In short, we can hardly doubt 
 that the wise and beautiful Deuteronomic law became at this 
 time, in the vivid language of another contemporary prophet, 
 benumbed or paralyzed (Hab. i. 4). 
 
 In one point, at any rate, it may be reasonably held that the 
 work of Josiah was not undone, viz., the abolition of the cruelties 
 of " the Topheth." Although the nineteenth chapter of Jeremiah 
 forms part of a section which principally relates to the reign of 
 Jehoiakim, yet I cannot draw from it the inference that the 
 worship of Moloch had been restored after the death of Josiah- 
 In fact, v. 13, where the houses of the kings of Jtidah are 
 threatened with a defilement comparable to that of the place 
 of the Topheth, sufficiently shows that " the Topheth " had 
 been disgraced ever since the Reformation ; ' the sins which are 
 rebuked must therefore be the inexpiable abominations of 
 Manasseh's reign (comp. Jer. xv. 4). But with this and 
 perhaps a few other exceptions, we may fairly assume that the 
 old cults came to life again, or rather, were brought back to the 
 light of day. For in fact it is doubtful whether any really 
 popular cult can be put down by main force. Neither Islam 
 nor the Roman Catholic Church has succeeded in doing this. 
 Not to mention the survivals of paganism in both, it is enough 
 to refer to the communities of crypto-Jews which so long 
 existed both in Christian and Mohammedan countries, and one 
 of which in Arabia still exists. 8 
 
 1 How strong an abhorrence of Hinnom was felt by the later Israelites is 
 shown by the use of Geenna in the New Testament for the abode of con- 
 demned spirits. (Gccnna.= Ge-l>en-/iinn<Jm.) 
 
 2 See an interesting article on Crypto-Jews in the Sf. Jamfs's Gazette, 
 May 24, 1888, and compare a letter by George Eliot in her " Life and 
 Letters " (by Cross).
 
 THE CLOUDS RETURN AFTER THE RAIN. 105 
 
 A passage in Psa. Ixxxv. has lately been explained as 
 referring to this period. 1 We read in v. 8, according to A.V. 
 and R.V., 
 
 / will hear what God the Lord [Jehovah] will speak : 
 For he will speak peace unto his people, and to his saints ! 
 But let them not turn again to folly. 
 
 Prof. Cornill thinks that the psalm reflects a definite historical 
 situation, the heavy affliction referred to in v. 4 being the tragic 
 death of Josiah. The psalmist doubts the permanence of the 
 good king's work. In w. 9-13 he gives an ideal picture of 
 Josiah's reign, which will also be true of the time to come 
 (that glory may dwell " that glory may continue to dwell ") if 
 Israel is faithful to its God. He seems to hear Jehovah 
 whisper this to him an oracle of peace, coupled with one con- 
 dition, viz., that the people does not fall back into idolatry 
 And Prof. Cornill thinks that this psalm follows Psa. Ixxxiv. 
 with chronological accuracy, for that lovely poem, according to 
 him, was composed in the latter part of the reign of Josiah. It 
 is a very suggestive and plausible view more so, I think, than 
 Ewald's conjecture that Psa. 1. expresses the mind of a pro- 
 phetic writer (who agrees with Jer. vii. 22, 23) when troubles 
 began to close round Josiah and his people. Neither view can 
 I discuss here ; the historical occasions of the psalms are not 
 to be determined by a dictatorial assertion. Neither view, I may 
 add, do I myself hold, but I would rather that my readers adopted 
 one or the other than that they rejected all attempts to find 
 historical situations for the sacred lyrics. Without reconstruct- 
 ing the porticoes, we shall not be in a position to do full justice 
 to the inner glories of the palaces of the Psalter. 
 
 Folly it might most truly be called this falling back into a 
 purely nationalistic view of Jehovah, as a supernatural Power 
 not able or willing at present to protect his people, as not even 
 the chief god of a crowded Pantheon. To such another prophet 
 exclaims, with cutting irony, in the name of the true God, " Of 
 whom wast thou in fear that thou wast thus faithless, and 
 forgattest Me ? But thy works shall not profit thee ; let thy 
 rabble of idols, when thou criest to them, deliver thee, if they 
 
 1 See essay by Dr. Cornill in the Homiletic Magazine, July, 1882. The 
 original is in Lmhardt's " Zeitschrift," 1881, p. 337, &c.
 
 106 JEREMIAH. 
 
 can ! " ' But there was also a class of persons, not belonging 
 to the lowest ranks, who were differently and not less injuriously 
 affected by the recent catastrophe. These men could not even 
 yet shake off the illusion that righteousness is always rewarded 
 in the present life by prosperity, and wickedness punished 
 by adversity. They had never been able to assimilate the 
 prophetic element in the Detiteronomic fusion of legal and 
 evangelical religion. They were now more than ever bent on 
 reducing religion to a system of rules which might be "learned 
 by rote" (Isa. xxix. 13, R.V. margin). But they were not 
 satisfied with the scanty prominence given to sacrifices in the 
 Deuteronomic tordh, and if we may understand Jer. vi. 20 as 
 well as Jer. vii. 4 as referring to this period, they attempted to 
 bind Jehovah to them and to their interests by lavish sacrifices, 
 while sadly neglecting those " weighty matters of the law," 
 "judgment, mercy, and faith." 
 
 These two classes of persons would naturally give different 
 explanations of the recent calamity. How the former set must 
 have argued we have seen. With it the latter will have agreed 
 in viewing Josiah's death as a sign of the Divine anger. " But 
 the sole divinity," they would say, " whom Judah has offended 
 is Jehovah. We lost our king because we did not as a nation 
 observe the law strictly enough ; because idolatrous customs 
 still lingered in our midst. More sacrifices are wanted to bring 
 back the sunshine of prosperity. But at least we need not be 
 afraid of a severer punishment. The temple of Jehovah j the 
 temple of Jehovah; the temple of Jehovah are these, i.e., these 
 buildings (Jer. vii. 4). Thus did these men faithfully hand on 
 the teaching of those prophets of a former generation, who, as 
 Micah tells us (iii. n), were wont to lean upon Jehovah, and 
 say, Is not Jehovah among us? no evil can come upon us. 
 
 Such is the obstinacy of old illusions, even when Providence 
 attempts, as one might say, to dissipate them, even when they 
 have become dangerous errors. Let us not be hard upon the 
 Jews ; how uncommon it is for the actors of history to be fully 
 able to read its lessons ! We know that Josiah's death was 
 " the beginning of sorrows " the first scene in the last act of 
 
 1 Tn these words Prof. Driver (" Isaiah : His Life and Times," p. 158) 
 condenses Isa. Ivii. 11-13 ( nrst part). I have myself long since adopted 
 the critical theory of Ewald relative to Isa. Ivi. Q-lvii. n<z (see '* Encyclo- 
 paedia Britannica," art. " Isaiah ").
 
 THE CLOUDS RETURN AFTER THE RAIN. 107 
 
 the tragedy (not indeed of that national tragedy which is 
 still in progress, but of the tragedy of Israel before the Cap- 
 tivity). We know that God had decreed to send His people 
 into captivity. We know His merciful object in doing so 
 viz., first, to cure the nation of idolatry, and next, to lead 
 individuals to " serve God for nought," and after conceiving the 
 idea of " saving others," to form the magnificent conception 
 of a perfect Israelite Israel's and the world's Saviour. We 
 know all this ; but how could the Jews ? Unless those are right 
 who date the Book of Job in this period, there was but one 
 clear-sighted Jew Jeremiah, and even he could not see to the 
 end of God's ways. One step however we are sure that he took 
 now, if he did not take it before. He cannot any longer have 
 been an itinerant expounder of Deuteronomy. Nothing which 
 could be colourably represented as favouring mechanical religion 
 was a fit text-book for a progressive teacher. It is perhaps a 
 significant fact in this connexion that, in Jeremiah's epitaph 
 (if I may call it so) upon Josiah, he praises the king, not for 
 introducing the- tonik, but for doing justice to the poor, and 
 thus proving that he " knew " Jehovah (Jer. xxii. 16). Later on 
 he even becomes the prophet of a " new covenant " which is to 
 supersede all previous torah (Jer. xxxi. 31). Clearly, then, 
 Jeremiah must before this have begun to be disappointed with 
 Deuteronomy. He may have read it privately this perhaps we 
 may argue from his continued allusions to it, but in public he 
 confined himself to reproducing its more spiritual, more pro- 
 phetic portions. As a whole, Deuteronomy must be regarded 
 as thrust somewhat into the background, until at length the 
 problem which it sought to solve was resumed at the close of 
 the Exile, and afresh combination of elements, partly historical, 
 partly sacerdotal, partly prophetic, was published as our present 
 Pentateuch by the great reformer Ezra. 
 
 But though a kind of travel-weariness, to be accounted for 
 on moral rather than on physical grounds, may have attacked 
 the prophet, there was one place not far from the capital which 
 a natural feeling still prompte i him to visit. This was his 
 native town, Anathoth in Benjamin, which had been inhabited 
 for centuries by many priestly families. Jeremiah's own family 
 was not one of the poorest, so that his movements, whenever 
 he went there, could not fail to draw public attention. In fact 
 had he been less known, he might have been more honoured
 
 108 JEREMIAH. 
 
 according to that saying of our Lord, A prophet is not without 
 honour save in his own country, and among his own kin, and 
 in his own house (Mark i. 28). Doubtless he had often ex- 
 perienced this on previous visits, but now after the death of 
 Josiah he found the neglect of contempt deepening into hatred. 
 He had gone to his native town, absorbed in his message, and 
 as unsuspicious of evil (see the Revised Version of Jer. xi. 19) 
 as a gentle lamb that in led to the slaughter, when an unpro- 
 voked attempt was made upon his life. With fair speeches (see 
 Jer. xii. 6), unworthy kinsmen of his own sought to draw him 
 into an ambush, and but for a "special providence" his career 
 would have been prematurely cut short. And Jehovah gave me 
 knowledge of it and I knew it; then thou shewedst me their 
 doings (Jer. xi. 18, R.V.). "Then" means "when I was in 
 utter unconsciousness." No one can think of excusing such 
 dastardly conduct, only worthy of the Bedouin robbers on the 
 other side of Jerusalem (Luke x. 30, comp. Jer. iii. 2) ; but can 
 we throw any light upon its motives ? 
 
 History requires that we should do equal justice to men who 
 in the heat of conflict may have misunderstood each other 
 that we should remember the complexity and the almost 
 tyrannical power of circumstances, and try and think ourselves 
 back into the position of both parties. In our present study, 
 it may help us to bear in mind that the word of a true prophet 
 was universally believed to have a supernatural efficacy. Balak, 
 for instance, sought to force Balaam to curse the Israelites, and 
 Esau was mortally offended with Jacob for coming " with 
 subtilty" and "taking away his blessing" (Gen. xxvii. 35). 
 Jeremiah himself held the same view, which is of course 
 only a primitive thinker's inference from the Divine origin of 
 prophecy. But who is the true prophet and which word of 
 prophecy has a Divine origin? There were always many com- 
 peting prophets at Jerusalem, and till the value of their oracles 
 had been tested by history, it did not seem possible to say 
 which of them were true prophets. This view of prophecy is 
 not obscurely expressed in Deut. xviii. 22, 
 
 And if thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word 
 which Jehovah hatli not spoken ? When a prophet speaketh in 
 the name of Jehovah, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, 
 that is the thing which Jehovah hath not spoken. 
 
 It is not by any means a complete theory of prophecy (it is
 
 THE CLOUDS RETURN AFTER THE RAIN. 109 
 
 in fact qualified by Deut. xiii. 1-3), or even of the relation of 
 predictive prophecy to fulfilment ; but it is one which naturally 
 commended itself to the people, and which prior to his own sad 
 experience our prophet himself probably held. 1 Jeremiah him- 
 self cannot have had a high place as yet in popular esteem. 
 For the people appear to have been sceptical as to the claims 
 of a prophet of woe to Divine inspiration, and Jeremiah had 
 delivered most emphatic predictions of national disaster which 
 moreover had not as yet been fulfilled. During the panic 
 caused by the Scythians, he probably was for a time encircled 
 by a halo of sanctity ; this we may infer from the fact that a 
 brief repentance followed upon his impassioned exhortations. 
 But the Scythians returned at last without molesting Judah, and 
 the respect for Jeremiah's prophesying appears to have vanished. 
 Whenever he went abroad, he had to listen to the mocking 
 inquiry, Where is the word of Jehovah ? pray, let it come to 
 pass' (Jer. xvii. 15). And so the wheel of fortune went round ; 
 the prophets who shouted "Peace, peace" (Jer. vi. 14) caught 
 the popular ear, and Jeremiah had either to keep silence or to 
 take up the new vocation of expounder of the law. But now it 
 must have seemed to the Jews as if those old predictions of 
 disaster, which had hitherto, so to speak, floated in the air 
 (comp. Isa. ix. 8), had come down charged with a first instal- 
 ment of disgrace and ruin. The smile of indifference was 
 exchanged for the scowl of hatred. Men began to fear Jere- 
 miah, and when the priests at Anathoth heard him say these 
 
 1 In Jer. xxviii, 8, 9 the prophet qualifies the older theory thus : True 
 prophets have, as a rule, for the sins of the people, predicted ' ' war. and 
 evil, and pestilence " ; therefore if a prophet falls into the new, sweet strain 
 of peace, he must be regarded with suspicion until the event proves that he 
 has been truly sent. Comp. Jer. xiv. 13-15. The popular argument, if I 
 have not been unjust to it, was exactly the opposite Jehovah was Israel's 
 God, and received all due homage from Israel ; consequently Israel (now 
 virtually synonymous with Judah) shall have peace. Once, but once only. 
 Jeremiah seems to ascribe the current prophecies of peace to Jehovah as 
 their author (Jer. iv. 10, comp. i Kings xxii. 20-23). This may perhaps 
 be due to the as yet imperfect distinction between true and false prophets 
 (contrast Jer. xiv. 13-15, xxiii. 25, Ezek. xiii. 1-16). But the passage re- 
 ferred to admits of another explanation (see my commentary). 
 
 2 Some think, however, that this passage refers to the time when Nebu- 
 chadnezzar returned in haste to Babylon, after defeating Neco, to secure 
 his crown.
 
 1 10 JEREMIAH. 
 
 awful words in the name of Jehovah, What hath my beloved to 
 do in mine house ? 'will "vows and hallowed flesh take thy 
 wickedness from thee ? wilt thou therefore rejoice? (Jer. xi. 15, 
 Ewald), they began to feel towards him as their fathers would 
 have done to that prophet of Kemosh who said to Mesha, king 
 of Moab (so the ancient stone records), "Go destroy Israel." 
 Add to this that the foe, as they deemed him, of the common 
 weal was a kinsman of their own, and we have a sufficient ex- 
 cuse, not indeed for their treachery, but at least for the bitter 
 hostility with which the prophet's relations regarded him. 
 
 Can we help remarking the parallel between Jeremiah's early 
 history and that of Jesus Christ? Our Lord, like the prophet, 
 found His truest home-life at least, after His ministry had 
 begun in Capernaum and Bethany, and not in Nazareth. Of 
 his neighbours in that village-community it is true in the 
 fullest sense, that his own received him not (John i. n). They 
 did not indeed have recourse to cunning and treachery, but led 
 him to the brow of the hill (well known and dear to Jesus) on 
 which their city was built, that they might hurl him down the 
 cliff (Luke iv. 29). No wonder that He whose heart was far 
 more loving even than Jeremiah's lavished the wealth of His 
 affection on a few, and especially on the one most congenial to 
 Himself, among His disciples ; of this ore at least it could not 
 be said, 
 
 It is not an enemy that revilelh me, , . . - 
 
 (But) my companion and familiar friend (Psa. Iv. 12, 14). 
 
 Both our Lord and His prophetic predecessor had a longing 
 for true friendship which was very imperfectly satisfied. In 
 Jeremiah's case this was so keen as to be oppressive, and, as I 
 have ventured to point out, some of the psalmists, feeling a 
 special interest in this prophet, and having formed their ideals 
 partly upon his life and character, seem to have expressed his 
 very soul more strikingly even than he has done himself. Es- 
 pecially touching is the new sense which one of these temple- 
 poets has given to the familiar word " bereavement,'' 
 
 They render me evil for good ; 
 
 Bereavement hdth come upon my soul (Psa. xxxv. 12, De Witt). 
 
 This, as we feel at once, sounds a lower depth of grief than 
 Jacob's If I be bereaved of my children, I am bereaved (Gen,
 
 THE CLOUDS RETURN AFTER THE RAIN. Ill 
 
 xliii. 14), or than the following sad words of an imaginative 
 writer of our own day, 
 
 There's a rival bauld wi' young and auld, 
 
 And it's him that has bereft me ; 
 For the surest friends are the auldest friends, 
 
 And the maist o' mine hae left me. 1 
 
 The psalmist, I say, who thinks himself back into the soul of 
 Jeremiah, expresses a grief more bitter than that of the patriarch 
 or of the sufferer imagined by the Scotch poet it is that the 
 oldest friends did not prove the surest that they left him by no 
 natural compulsion but through treachery. This truly is a grief 
 which can "sap the mind" which did sap even Jeremiah's 
 mind, not completely indeed, for he knew the friend which 
 stickcth closer tlian a kinsman (Prov. xviii. 24), but enough to 
 breathe into him thoughts which are inconsistent with a perfect 
 inspiration. But thou, Jehovah, knowest me ; than seest me, 
 and triest my heart toward thcc; pull them out like sheep for 
 the slaughter, and consecrate them (like sacrificial victims) for 
 the day of slaughter (Jer. xii 3). There is the dross of human 
 frailty in this to be excused as we excuse the bitterness of the 
 prophet-like poet of mediaeval Christendom to be excused, not 
 to be justified. And whenever we read such words even in the 
 Scriptures, whether it be in Jeremiah or in psalms affected only 
 too intimately by Jeremiah, let us mentally correct them in 
 accordance with the words, Father, forgive them; for they know 
 not what tJiey do, 
 
 In the conjecture which I am now about to hazard I leap over 
 a wide space of time. But Jeremiah's life and character contain 
 the germ of so much that is Christian, that psychologically the 
 conjecture seems admissible that a period came when the flame 
 of resentment died away in the prophet's breast died away 
 quite naturally, because nothing remained as an object of 
 resentment. Is it not so with ourselves in so far as we have 
 the Spirit of Christ ? Does not life bring to each of us in a too 
 often dull and dusty pathway moments of a spiritual quality so 
 rich and rare that our past troubles appear but a slight bruising 
 (as St. Paul expresses it), and as working out for us in its initial 
 stage an eternal weight of glory (2 Cor. vii. 17)? Such a 
 
 1 Mr. Robert Louis Stevenson (" Underwoods").
 
 112 JEREMIAH. 
 
 moment was given to the Florentine poet when, like St. Paul, 
 he was caught up 1o the third heaven (2 Cor. xii. 2), and 
 "smiled" at the "vile semblance" of earth and its miseries 
 (Paradiso, xxii. 133-135). And had not the prophet of the new 
 covenant similar moments, when, like him who in Psa. xvii. 
 has so piercingly complained of his bitter enemies, he could 
 pass into the world of God's light and truth, and say, 
 
 As for me, I shall behold thy face in righteousness ; 
 
 hlay I be satisfied, when I awake, -with thine inutge (Psa. xvii. 15). 
 
 The Christian proto-martyr himself used language only less 
 bitter than Jeremiah's in his grand final invective (Acts vii. 
 S'-SS^but his rough journey to Paradise was brightened by 
 the far holier inspiration, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge 
 (v. 60). And must not Jeremiah, amid that shower of cruel 
 stones which legend asserts to have crushed his earthly 
 tabernacle, have had the same angelic visitant, and so resembled 
 St. Stephen, not only (as they say) in the form of his martyr- 
 dom, but also in his intuition of a Divine fairness which is as 
 far above natural human justice as heaven is above the earth 
 a fairness which is but one aspect of essential love. 
 
 Jeremiah, as idealized by the noblest of his disciples or 
 admirers, was free from any morbid tendency to vindictiveness. 
 Among the psalms of the Passion, as we may call them, for 
 which we are indebted to these nameless writers, there is one 
 which stands out by its complete freedom from the sad legacy 
 of imprecation it is the twenty-second. This is not to be 
 ascribed to ignorance of Jeremiah's infirmity, for the psalm 
 alludes (or appears to allude) to a verse in the very section 
 which we have been considering. Jeremiah expresses himself 
 thus (Jer. xi. 20), 
 
 But, O Jehovah Sabdoth, that judgest righteously, that triest 
 the reins and the heart, let vie see thy -vengeance upon them : 
 for upon thee do I roll my cause (i.e., " I disburden myself by 
 commending my cause to thee ") ; and the words may, I think, 
 be in the psalmist's mind, when he represents the enemies of 
 that ideal Israelite, who is not unlike Jeremiah, but soars above 
 him, being a poetical anticipation of Israel's and the world's 
 Saviour, as uttering this derisive speech, 
 
 He has rolled (his cause) upon Jehovah ; let him deliver him ; 
 Let him rescue him, since he delighteth in him (Psa. xxii. 8).
 
 THE CLOUDS RETURN AFTER THE RAIN. 113 
 
 And if you ask me how the disciple could rise above such a 
 master, whose works were to him the oracles of truth, I reply 
 that because his eyes were more fully opened by the lessons 
 of Providence. And this may suggest a comforting thought 
 for ourselves, preceded as we are by so many great teachers 
 that religious truth seems (but only seems) to lie before us full- 
 orbed, that it may be possible for us to divine what they 
 would say, if placed where we now stand, and reverently to 
 correct and supplement their words, just as the authors of 
 Deuteronomy did to Jeremiah, and the later psalmists to 
 Jeremiah. God's revelations let me say it again are never 
 ended ; the elements of truth may be as old as the first 
 "covenant" and as changeless as the nature of man, but new 
 combinations of those elements, both in Christian ethics and in 
 Christian theology, have the charm and novelty of fresh com- 
 munications from the spirit-world. When he, the Spirit of 
 truth, is come, he ^uill guide you into all the truth.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ON THE VERGE OF MARTYRDOM. 
 
 Jeremiah's sermon in the temple The fate of Shiloh The prophet's trial 
 and acquittal The martyrdom of Uriah. 
 
 IN the process of the Church's education, of which Pentecost 
 does but begin the second or rather the third part, Jeremiah's 
 completed life forms one of the chief waymarks. But as yet 
 one half of it still lies before us. It is a story of bold adven- 
 ture and of faith ; of heroic endeavour persistently maintained, 
 like Christ's, in spite of failure foreseen ; of danger encountered 
 against heaviest odds in the cause of true religion and, in a 
 very high sense, of patriotism. Jeremiah's experience at his 
 native place was the prelude of this part of his career. Hence- 
 forth, however, like our Lord at the close of His ministry, he 
 concentrated his efforts upon Jerusalem. There too he was 
 sometimes in danger through treachery. This is his own 
 account of it. For I have heard the backbiting of many ; there 
 is terror on every side. Inform, say they, and let us inform 
 against him (Jer. xx. 10) ; i.e., his enemies, including some 
 former friends, were not contented with injurious reports re- 
 specting him, but encouraged one another to lay an information 
 against him as a public criminal (comp. Psa. xxxi. 13). And 
 then Jeremiah continues with the grand but too passionate 
 outburst, 
 
 But Jehovah is with me as a fierce warrior; therefore shall 
 mine enemies stumble and not prevail; they shall be greatly 
 ashamed, because they have not prospered, with an everlasting 
 reproach that shall never be forgotten. And thou, Jehovah 
 Sabdoth, that triest the righteous, that seest the reins and the 
 heart, let me see my revenge upon them, for upon thee do I roll 
 my cause (Jer. xx. u, 12).
 
 ON THE VERGE OF MARTYRDOM. 115 
 
 The concluding words are repeated with slight variations 
 from Jer. xi. 20, showing that the prophet himself saw the 
 analogy between the two sets of circumstances. He had 
 indeed escaped from persecution at Anathoth, but only to 
 experience a worse renewal of it at Jerusalem. There too 
 he carried on a life and death struggle, though as a rule with 
 less ignoble enemies. Here is a specimen of it. The incident 
 to which I shall refer arose out of a prophetic discourse, which 
 we fortunately possess in two editions (one in chap, vii., and 
 the other in chap. xxvi.). It appears that some great festival 
 or possibly fast had brought together a large number of people 
 from all quarters to the temple, and that Jeremiah was directed 
 to stand between the inner and outer court and address them. 
 One wishes that this among other fine passages of the Bible 
 could be faithfully re-translated in modern English, that the 
 reader might see how forcible the timid, shrinking Jeremiah 
 can become. (Is there any force like his who only bursts out 
 now and then, like a volcano, because the fire within cannot be 
 restrained ? Comp. Jer. xx. 9.) But I will at least quote here 
 a few important verses in the best version which suggests itself. 
 
 Put not your trust in the lying words, The temple of 'Jehovah, 
 the temple of Jehovah, the temple of Jehovah, is this * (vii. 4). 
 
 What? steal and murder and commit adultery and swear 
 falsely, and burn incense to Baal, and go after other gods which 
 ye knew not ! and then ye come and stand before me in this 
 house upon which my name has been called, and think, We have 
 escaped (only) to repeat 2 all these abominations (vii. 9, 10). 
 
 Do we not seem to hear these self-deluded men (fanatical in 
 the worship of Jehovah in spite of their combination of this 
 with Baal-worship) filling the air with their shrill cries, and 
 calling upon Jehovah to deliver them, because " the temple, 
 
 1 Lit., are tfase (i.e., these buildings). The Hebrew suggests more than 
 we can express in English viz., that the sanctity of the temple proper com- 
 municated itself to all the various buildings connected with it (comp. Matt, 
 xxiv. i). Similarly in Psa. Ixviii. 35 a translator will do well to change 
 " thy (v.l., his) sanctuaries" into " thy (or, his) sanctuary." 
 
 2 The Hebrew has simply " to do " (or " practice "). Comp. Psa. Ix. 4, 
 Thou hast giroi a banner to them that fear thec, (only] Unit they may jlce 
 from before the bow. In each passage a striking effect is produced by 
 representing the consequence of an act as something deliberately intended. 
 Some indeed suppose that in the psalm-passage " only 1 ' AMS originally a 
 part of the text.
 
 Il6 JEREMIAH. 
 
 the temple, the temple is this," as if the iteration of the phrase 
 increased its efficacy, while others give equally formal thanks 
 for deliverance, blindly arguing that, because no invader has 
 yet "cast a bank against" the city (Isa. xxxvii. 33), their escape 
 is assured, and they may go on practising all their old im- 
 moralities ? 
 
 Jeremiah continues, still merging his own personality in that 
 of his Divine Sender, and giving Jehovah's message, 
 
 A den of robbers then has this house whereupon my name is 
 called become in yottr eyes ? /, even /, have surely seen /'/, is 
 Jehovah's oracle. 
 
 To see with God is to punish. The lawless rich say in their 
 hearts, " Thou wilt not require satisfaction." So one of the 
 psalmists tells us, adding, 
 
 Thou hast seen it ; for thou lookest on mischief and vexation, 
 To deal out (vengeance) with thy hand (Psa. x. 14). 
 
 No wonder then that Jeremiah next announces the punishment 
 of those who thus abuse the holy name of religion. How he 
 leads up to this, deserves an attentive study. A single verse 
 doubtless condenses a fuller and more descriptive passage of 
 an oral prophecy. Nearly the whole of the period of the 
 Judges or more exactly, between Joshua's latter days (Josh, 
 xviii. i) and Eli's death (i Sam. iv. 3), the ark found a "resting- 
 place " the name given to the Shiloh temple in the later 
 tradition in the famous Ephraimitish town of Shiloh. It is 
 evident that a mere tent would not have sufficed for this long 
 period; there must have been some kind of permanent "house" 
 or temple. This is no mere presumption, but is confirmed by 
 the language of the narrative books see especially i Sam. i. 9, 
 where Eli is represented as sitting by the door-post of the temple 
 of Jehovah. For a long time this was the most honoured 
 sanctuary of the Israelites ' its central shrine, in a different 
 sense from that in which Jerusalem is sometimes called the 
 centre of worship, for its existence did not exclude that of 
 numerous banwth or "high places." But its "day of visitation" 
 (Isa. x. 3) came at length. When, we cannot say with certainty, 
 but from the fact that one of the psalmists introduces the 
 catastrophe immediately before the accession of David to the 
 
 1 In Jer. xli. 5 "Shiloh" should be "Salem " (Sept. Cod. Vat.). Comp. 
 John iii. 23.
 
 ON THE VERGE OF MARTYRDOM. 117 
 
 throne (see Psa. Ixxviii. 59-72), we may plausibly infer that the 
 temple was destroyed during the Philistines' oppression. 1 How- 
 ever this may be, it is probable that Jeremiah found in the 
 history of Samuel and Saul current in his own time a full 
 account of this great event. 2 I suppose that he also found 
 there that prophecy of Samuel, which seems to refer, partly at 
 any rate, to the destruction of the Shiloh-temple. For he 
 announces in Jer. xix. 3 that Jehovah will bring evil upon tliis 
 place, ivhich whosoever heard h, his ears will tingle, evidently 
 alluding to I Sam. iii. n. So it appears that his "Book of 
 Samuel" was similar in some respects to ours, though dissimilar 
 in others. It was in fact a complete narrative, and was doubt- 
 less supplemented by a living popular tradition. Mothers told 
 their children of the fate of the " house of Jehovah " at Shiloh, 
 where God had revealed Himself to ancient prophets more 
 distinctly if not more truly than to those of their own time, 
 and the blood of the youthful listeners curdled in their veins. 
 That " uncircumcised Philistines " should have laid low that 
 most holy place, seemed too strange for aught but the fictions 
 of the professional story-teller. The supernatural sanctions of 
 prophecy guaranteed it, however, and more than one of the 
 youths who heard that prophecy (i Sam. iii. 11-14) never forgot 
 it, but introduced its phraseology into works of their own. 3 
 
 In respect for the memory of the Shiloh-temple and horror 
 at its end, Jeremiah and his fanatical hearers were agreed. As 
 a doom, they both regarded its destruction by the Philistines. 
 The latter, I make no doubt, confirmed themselves in blind 
 self-righteousness by thinking of the wickedness which must 
 have caused this awful judgment. " God, I thank thee that I 
 am not as other men " heterodox and schismatical ritualists, 
 despisers of the house of David and of the more recent but 
 
 1 From Judg. xviii. 30, 31 it may at first seem as if the Shiloh temple 
 lasted till the captivity of the northern tribes. But any clear head will see 
 at once that Judg. xviii. 30 is a later addition (see Ewald, "History of 
 Israel," ii. 348 note ; Wellhausen's edition of Bleek's "Einleitung," p. 199). 
 
 2 See Wellhausen's " Prolegomena " (Germ, ed.), p. 44, and his edition of 
 Bleek's "Einleitung," 103 (p. 210) ; also Maybaum, article in Steinthal's 
 " Zeitschrift fiir Volkerpsychologie," 1887, pp. 290-315 ; Vatke, " Biblische 
 Theologie," p. 318, &c. ; Graf's note on Jer. vii. 12 and his early treatise 
 " De Templo Silonensi." Comp. also Bertheau's note on Judg. xviii. 31. 
 
 3 Another allusion to this prophecy occurs in 2 Kings xxi. 12, 13.
 
 IlS JEREMIAH. 
 
 far worthier sanctuary, which has proudly withstood Egyptian, 
 Assyrian, yes, and Israelitish invaders. This must have been 
 their spoken or unspoken monologue with Jehovah ; and 
 Jeremiah, seeing through them, virtually answers them like our 
 Lord, Except ye repent, ye shall all in like manner (o/)/o-, 
 " similarly '') perish (Luke xiii. 3, R.V.). But he has his own 
 way of expressing this. By a most effective turn in the 
 discourse, he bids them come with him to Shiloh, and scan the 
 desolate ruins of that once glorious shrine glorious, not 
 perhaps by its outward magnificence, but by the accumulated 
 veneration of centuries. (Popular respect is indeed not always 
 given to the symbols or the sanctuaries which are outwardly 
 the most magnificent.) There was, it would seem, a special 
 appropriateness in the time when this invitation was given. 
 For we cannot suppose that so sacred a place as Shiloh had 
 been entirely without a sanctuary between the times of Saul 
 and Josiah. There must have been an altar there, and at least 
 a humble " chapel," though none that could bear comparison 
 with the king's at Bethel (Amos vii. 13). But Josiah, not many 
 years since, had broken down both altar and " chapel " (as he 
 had done to those at Bethel), and it may well be that Jeremiah, 
 on that visit to Shiloh 1 which (see Part I., Chap. V.) I ventured 
 to assume, saw (like Dr. Robinson 2 ) the owls fly off from the 
 desolate spot. At any rate, all knew the two destructions of 
 the sanctuary of Shiloh, the latter of which was but a rc- 
 affirmation of the original doom worked out by the abhorred 
 Philistines. And now for the argument which Jeremiah builds 
 upon the facts of past and present history. If the actual re- 
 ligion of Judah,no\v that Josiah's reforms have half collapsed, is 
 in its idolatry and in its mechanical formalism so similar to that 
 of its northern sister, and results in moral practices no better 
 than those for which Hosea denounced the Israelites, and if 
 the most ancient temple of Jehovah which lay within the 
 Israelitish border was by His will profaned and destroyed, 
 
 1 I know of course that " Go ye now," &c. in Jer. vii. 12 may be merely 
 a rhetorical phrase, as in Amos vi. 2. But it may equally well be intended 
 literally ; and if so, one must suppose Jeremiah to have set the example in 
 visiting Shiloh. 
 
 2 "Biblical Researches," iii. 86. To this eminent American traveller 
 belongs the credit of having discovered the true site of Shiloh (now Seilun), 
 which, in spite of Judg. xxi. 19, had been forgotten since St. Jerome.
 
 ON THE VERGE OF MARTYRDOM. IIQ 
 
 does it not follow that the same fate must soon overtake 
 Jerusalem and its sanctuary ? Both temples were successively 
 " places of the name 1 of Jehovah Sabdoth " (comp. Jer. vii. 12 
 with Isa. xviii. 7, Deut. xii. 5) ; how could one be punished and 
 the other escape ? 
 
 Thus far Jeremiah has addressed himself (see Jer. vii. 9) to 
 the idolatrous party, who do indeed worship Jehovah, but do 
 homage to " other gods beside" Jehovah, violating the first 
 (or second) of the Ten Words of God (Exod. xx. 3). I do not 
 say that the analogy between the Shiloh and the Jerusalem 
 temple is as perfect as Jeremiah represents. 2 But his main idea 
 is certainly correct. Throughout the history of Biblical religion 
 we find righteousness described as essential to the true worship 
 of God. The wrath of Cod is revealed from heaven against all 
 irreligiousncss and immorality (Rom. i. 1 8) ; " irreligiousness " 
 and " immorality " describe different aspects of the same idea. 
 No religious observances can " wipe out the old score," and 
 give us liberty to break the commandments of God. And now 
 comes the turn of those who worship Jehovah alone but in a 
 purely formal way, who are free from the worst moral excesses 
 of the others, but rest their hopes for Judah's future on the sacri- 
 fices for which the Deuteronomist cared so little and Jeremiah 
 still less. This was in effect what he said to them : " If ye 
 think to serve God by a multitude of sacrifices, ye do greatly 
 err. Jehovah did indeed allow your fathers to offer Him sacri- 
 fices, but He gave no special directions concerning them." The 
 Divine silence is significant ; it means that nothing has an 
 absolute value with God but an obedient heart. 
 
 / spake not unto your fathers nor commanded them, when I 
 brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings 
 or sacrifices; but this thing commanded I them, saying, Obey my 
 voice, and I will be to you a God, and ye shall be to me a people; 
 and walk ye in all the ways that I have commanded you, that it 
 may be well with you (Jer. vii. 22, 23). 
 
 Can we doubt that the speaker is thinking of Deuteronomy, 
 
 1 Guthe has remarked that the expression "the name of Jehovah" is 
 sometimes virtually synonymous with the ark. Certainly the special sanctity 
 both of the Shiloh and of the Jerusalem temple arose out of the presence 
 of the ark of the covenant. 
 
 2 Jeroboam was apparently much opposed to heathenism proper and the 
 introduction of new gods (Ewald, " History of Israel," iv. 27).
 
 120 JEREMIAH. 
 
 one favourite phrase of which he instinctively repeats, and more 
 especially of that sacred Decalogue, adopted into the Deute- 
 ronomic tordh, which relates entirely to moral and spiritual 
 duties, and not at all to ritual ? As for your sacrifices, they 
 would have been poor and imperfect things at the best (comp. 
 Psa. 1. 12, 13), and yet graciously accepted, as the expressions of 
 childlike love. But this is a nation that obeyeth not the voice of 
 Jehovah their God (ver. 28). Therefore /#/ your burnt offerings 
 to your sacrifices, and eat them as Jlesh (ver. 21, Ewald), i.e., 
 throw all your offerings into a mass, and eat them at your 
 pleasure ; they have neither any inherent sanctity nor any 
 secondary importance from the character of the offerers. 
 
 And what, the reader may ask, was the fate of this bold 
 preacher of righteousness ? We must turn to the parallel 
 twenty-sixth chapter for a full description of the scene which 
 ensued. The narrative is most effective in its unadorned sim- 
 plicity ; I need only recall its leading features. The priests, the 
 prophets, and the people surrounded the prophet with angry- 
 looks and words. Like St. Stephen's audience long afterwards, 
 they were cut to the heart, and gnashed upon him with their 
 teeth (Acts vii. 54). Narrowly indeed did he escape St. 
 Stephen's fate, for when they heard those echoing words of re- 
 lentless doom, " This temple shall become like Shiloh," they 
 seized him, saying, Thou shalt surely die (vers. 8, 9). But in 
 the nick of time a fresh power appeared on the scene the 
 "princes," or high officers of the state, who came up from their 
 place of deliberation in the "king's house" (v. 10, comp. xxxvi. 
 12), and apparently the "elders," some of whom had doubtless 
 taken part in Josiah's reformation. Without the concurrence 
 of these, the legal forms would not have been duly complied 
 with ; the prophet's violent death would have been a mere 
 assassination. Jeremiah in dignified terms defended his own 
 right to prophesy, and warned the people of the consequences 
 of their act. Then said the princes and all the people the crowd 
 were as easily led by their superiors now as at Josiah's reforma- 
 tion to the priests and to the prophets, This man is not worthy 
 to die, for he hath spoken unto us in the name of Jehovah out- 
 God (ver. 16). "-Certain of the elders " helped this view of the 
 matter, and acted a truly patriotic part, by appealing to a fact 
 in the past religious history of Judah (vers. 18, 19) ; and observe 
 by the way, how much we arc indebted to those who in our own
 
 ON THE VERGE OP MARTYRDOM. 121 
 
 day bring to light half-forgotten facts in religious history. The 
 fact about Micah (or, as he is here called, Micaiah, see v. 18, 
 R.V.) was not unknown, but its full significance had not as yet 
 been seen. Micah may be called the morning-star of the evan- 
 gelical movement in the Jewish Church. He saw that society 
 needed to be reorganized on a new moral and spiritual basis, 
 and that Zion must be ploughed as a field, and Jerusalem become 
 heaps ) and tJie temple-mount as thicket-covered heights T (Mic. 
 iii. 12). This implies the essential reformation-truth that a 
 temple is consecrated not merely by containing sacramental 
 symbols of the Divine presence, but through being resorted to 
 by holy worshippers. I do not say that no prophetic writer ex- 
 pressed this between Micah and Jeremiah ; for however Isaiali 
 may vary his descriptions of Israel's future, he never fails to 
 insist on the necessity of a judgment and the indispensableness 
 of a righteous remnant. But Isaiah's truly evangelical teaching 
 had to some extent been counteracted by the Deuteronomic 
 compromise between Law and Gospel. And at any rate our 
 prophet was the first to proclaim this great truth so distinctly as 
 to strike even the dullest listener. 
 
 The glory of being the evangelical proto-martyr was, however, 
 reserved for another prophet, named Uriah, son of Shemaiah, of 
 the "town of the copses " (or thickets), Kiryath-Yearim. 2 In 
 
 1 The word for " heights " (biimdlh) only has this general meaning in 
 poetic style (so again in Mic. i. 12) ; in prose, it has the specialized sense of 
 " high places." That rendered "thicket-covered "(the Hebrew has "heights 
 of thicket") is explained in the next note. The Jerusalem hills were 
 anciently more overgrown with capse than they are now (see above). Hence 
 we are not surprised that Judah the Maccabce and his brethren found 
 (agreeably to the wide-reaching prophecy of Micah) the s>sn<-/ miry dcsolati , 
 and the altar prof atud, and the gs.ta; [>i/riifJ il<>n'it, and shrubs growing in 
 the court as in a forest or in one of the mountains (i Mace. iv. 38). 
 
 2 The ancient "copse-town" has now become a "grape-town" (Karyet 
 el-'Enab), if Robinson's identification be accepted. Condor's proposal to 
 place Kiryath-Yearim. on the site of the copse-enclosed ruin called 'Erma, 
 "on the south side of the great ravine which is the head of the valley of 
 Sorek," is in some respects plausible, though a philological connexion 
 names does not exist. "Yearim" may however be explained, after the 
 Arabic use of wa'r, as " rough, impracticable tracts of country" (comp. 
 Isa. xxi. 13, where Wctzstein gives this sense to ya'ar, the singular of 
 yeCirim}. Thomson remarks that there are very rough " wa'rs " on every 
 side almost of Karyet el-'Enab, and that the ark would have had a rough 
 road from this village to Jerusalem ; Conder, that the dense thickets of
 
 122 JEREMIAH. 
 
 spite of the traditional connexion of his native city with the most 
 sacred symbol of his religion (see i Sam. vi. 2i-vii. 2), Uriah, 
 possibly a disciple and doubtless a friend of Jeremiah, had the 
 insight to discern the superstition and immorality which degraded 
 the national religion, and the imminent danger which beset his 
 country. He preached the truth, and paid the forfeit with his 
 life. That he at first fled into Egypt, is not to be interpreted as 
 an act of cowardice. Surely an inner voice had said to him> 
 " Wait ; it may be that Israel's God has more work yet for 
 thee as well as for Jeremiah to do." The latter, at any rate, was 
 saved for the Master's future use by the interposition of the 
 v ' princes," and especially of Ahikam z (one of the deputation 
 sent to Huldah the prophetess, according to 2 Kings xxii. 14), 
 whose friendly interest in Jeremiah may remind us of that of the 
 Duke of Lancaster in John Wycliffe. 
 
 See from the narrative which we have had before us the good 
 results of the prophet's self-communings after his trouble at 
 Anathoth. " Peace was not made for earth, nor rest for thee "- 
 such was now his conclusion, like that of ' c New Self " in Hurrell 
 Fronde's poem. 2 He had fought his inner fight, not unaided by 
 the sense of spirit-borne warnings and expostulations, such as 
 these which he has ventured to clothe in words, 
 
 If thou hast run -with the footmen, and they have wearied 
 thee, then how canst thou contend with horses ? and though in a 
 land of peace thou art secure, yet how wilt than do in the pride 
 of Jordan ? (Jer. xii. 5, R.V.) 
 
 The " footmen " and the " land of peace " are Jeremiah's rela- 
 tives and the town of Anathoth, where, but for secret machina- 
 tions, he would have dwelt in peace. The " horses " and the 
 " pride of Jordan '' are the mighty multitude and the city where 
 enemies beset the faithful prophet, who can only be compared 
 to the fierce lions in the jungle of tamarisks on Jordan's banks. 
 Looking back on his recent bitter experience, Jeremiah that is, 
 
 copses must once have been more widely spread than they are now. I 
 cannot discuss the geographical or philological questions further here. (See 
 preceding note.) 
 
 1 One of Ahikam's sons, Gemariah, lent Baruch his official room for his 
 recitation of the prophecies of Jeremiah (Jer. xxxvi. 10) ; another son, 
 Gedaliah, showed himself Jeremiah's friend, and politically his disciple, 
 when governor of Judah under Nebuchadrezzar (Jer. xl. 5-10). 
 
 2 " Lyra Apostolica," Ixxix. , " Old Self and New Self."
 
 ON THK VERGE OF MARTYRDOM. 123 
 
 his "Old Self" complains of his sad lot ; but looking forward 
 to the trials which must, if he follows his conscience, be in store 
 for him, he checks his sveak complainings, and comforts himself 
 with the inerrancy of the Divine justice. These thoughts were 
 to his mind the direct suggestions of his ever-present Lord ; 
 hence their power hence the wonderful transformation which 
 ensued (strictly speaking, indeed, it had begun earlier, see 
 Part I., Chap. III., end) in the prophet's character. At Anathoth, 
 in a comparatively small danger, he gave way to impatient 
 murmurs; at Jerusalem, amidst an infuriated mob led by priests 
 and prophets, he is as calm as if he were amidst friends. Human 
 nature was the same then as it is now. Are not many of us too 
 ready to lose our self-command under small trials ? And is 
 there not still but one unfailing source of calmness the presence 
 of God in the soul? 
 
 Thus, from the point of view of the Christian, Jeremiah's 
 message comes ultimately to this that the lowly and believing 
 heart is God's favourite temple, and the only one which has the 
 promise of permanence. Full often has the course of history 
 taught us the same truth. No need to point to Furness or to 
 Melrose. " Go ye now to Shiloh " ; or rather, 
 
 " Go down with yonder abject few, 
 
 In caftan green or dim white veil, 
 Who hurry by to raise anew 
 
 Their feeble voice of endless wail, 
 Before Moriah's stones of might. 
 Scant beards are torn, old eyelids stream 
 
 With many a sad, unhelpful tear ; 
 Man's weeping and earth's ruin seem 
 
 To find their common centre here." * 
 
 But, thank God ! there are more cheerful preachers than those 
 of the Jewish " wailing-place." Elevating indeed must have 
 been the sight of those five thousand French Protestants who 
 gathered together the other day in the mountains of the 
 Cevennes 2 to commemorate beneath the summer sky the stolen 
 religious meetings of their forefathers. The gathering may 
 indeed have partaken of the nature of a fast as well as of a 
 
 1 St. John Tyrwhitt, " Poems," "The Jews' Wailing Place." 
 
 2 Alluding to an impressive ceremony recorded in the newspapers, August, 
 i83/. This passage is retained from a cathedral sermon.
 
 124 JEREMIAH. 
 
 festival ; for where are the moral representatives of the heroic 
 though far from faultless Cevenols ? 
 
 " Cold mountains and the midnight air 
 Witnessed the fervour of their prayer," 
 
 who died even as they lived the spiritual children of psalmists 
 and prophets. Yet we may be grateful to those who, in cele- 
 brating the centenary of Louis XVI.'s edict of toleration, and 
 praising the new virtue of religious tolerance, could not and did 
 not withhold their homage to the more fundamental qualities 
 which distinguished their ancestors. By this commemoration, 
 the patriarchs and martyrs of the Cevennes, "being dead, yet 
 speak," and hand on the lesson afresh to later ages that " God is 
 spirit" (John i. 24, R.V. margin), and that the fairest contribu- 
 tions of art and of historic tradition to the outward forms of 
 worship cannot compensate for the absence of spiritual re- 
 ligion, of an open Bible, and of hearts where Conscience reigns.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 KKKP THE MUNITION, WATCH THE WAY ! 
 
 Progress of Xeco Accession of Jehoahaz, and soon after of Jehoiukim 
 Fall of Nineveh Neco's defeat by Nebuchadrezzar Dread of Babylon 
 at Jerusalem Jeremiah's new peace of mind His prophecy on Egypt, 
 &c. 
 
 So Jeremiah was snatched from his enemies delivered from 
 that most terrifying of all dangers the fury of a fanatical mob. 1 
 He was acquitted ; but his position was not thereby materially 
 improved. The elders who so opportunely interposed may 
 or may not 2 have been hearty believers in his special Divine 
 mission ; but it is certain that the new king was not, that the 
 bulk of the priests and of the prophets was not, and that the 
 people had only a temporary access of superstitious awe at the 
 troublesome preacher. It was indeed morally impossible that 
 any but an elect few could tolerate such a violent reversal of re- 
 ceived ideas. But how came the prophet to venture on such a 
 step ? What was it that so far altered the nature of this sensitive 
 man that he could thus court opposition, and provoke the spirit 
 of fanaticism ? Was it as a forlorn hope that he took up his 
 station that morning in front of the assembled pilgrims and 
 devotees ? Was it the inspiration of despair at the strong back- 
 ward current which had set in both in morality and in religion ? 
 I reply that it was not this, though Jeremiah's " Old Self" may 
 well have troubled his "New Self" with despairing suggestions. 
 
 1 May I at least illustrate this by the vivid description of the mob at 
 Charing Cross in "John Inglesant," chap, xiv., and the remark of the officer 
 to Inglesant, " You stood that very well. I would rather mount the dead- 
 liest breach than face such a sight as that." 
 
 2 In their favour it may be urged that they treat Jeremiah's case as entirely 
 parallel to Micah's. But the low tone of their concluding words Thus 
 should ive commit great evil against our own souls may by some be taken 
 to prove that they were merely afraid of the probable dangerous conse- 
 quences of putting Jeremiah to death.
 
 126 JEREMIAH. 
 
 Listen to this a favourite passage with our own sensitive poet 
 Cowper, 
 
 O that I had in the wilderness a lodging-place of 'wayfaring 
 men, that I might leave my people and go from them ! (Jer. ix. 
 2, A.V.). 
 
 And then the prophet proceeds to describe the wickedness of 
 the times in terms which remind us partly of his experience at 
 Anathoth, 
 
 Take ye heed every one of his neighbour, and trust ye not in 
 any kinsman 1 ; for every kinsman useth trickery, and ei.>ery 
 neighbour goeth about with slander (ver. 4). 
 
 Yes, Jeremiah's inner voices did not always appeal to his 
 higher nature. And one of the psalmists who, as we have seen, 
 thought themselves back into the soul of this prophet, was so 
 moved by this passage that he amplified it in lyric verse, 
 
 Fear and trembling have come upon me. 
 
 And horror ovcrwhelmeth me ; 
 
 And I say. Oh that I had wings like a dove ! 
 
 Then -would 1 fly away, and be at rest : 
 
 Lo, then would I wander far off, 
 
 I would lodge in the wilderness ; 
 
 I would haste me to my safe retreat 
 
 From the stormy wind and the tempest. 
 
 (Psa. Iv. 5-8, De Witt.) 
 
 I am sure that those who agree with me on the subject of the 
 porticoes of psalm-palaces (seep. 105) will enjoy this psalm more 
 as the work of a writer circumstanced like Jeremiah and there- 
 fore drawn in an especial manner towards his life and character. 
 The imitation is lovely, but the original passage is more vigorous. 
 One feels that the speaker will not long remain in despondency. 
 That he should be cast down, is only natural ; the prophetic call 
 was not designed to kill nature, but to control and elevate it. 
 And if, intelligibly enough, Jeremiah had his occasional moods 
 of deep sadness, he had also, as I will presently show, his moods 
 of lofty satisfaction at the providential ordering of affairs in 
 Western Asia. These alternations are, in my opinion, clearly 
 traceable in the changing tones of the prophetic strain, to 
 
 1 I adopt the translation " kinsman," to bring out the chronological con- 
 nexion of chap. ix. with xi. i8-xii. 6 (see especially the last verse in this 
 section). One might of course render or paraphrase " fellow-Israelite." The 
 Hebrew has " brother."
 
 KEEP THE MUNITION, WATCH THE WAY ! 12J 
 
 account for which let us resume for a few minutes the thread 
 of history. 
 
 Josiah had thrown himself, as it were, before Neco's chariot- 
 wheels, and been crushed to Israel a piteous tragedy, but a 
 matter of supreme indifference to an Egyptian conqueror. 
 Straighten went the proud Pharaoh towards the Euphrates, only 
 halting before the renowned city of Kaclesh, 1 now easier to take 
 than of yore, when first one and then another Thothmes 
 penetrated to the north of Palestine. He then continued his 
 triumphal march, none venturing to check him, till once more 
 after the lapse of nine centuries Egyptian garrisons looked 
 down on that historic stream, and Neco could then return to 
 secure his hold on Syria and Palestine. Three months after the 
 battle of Megiddo he paused at Israel's ideal northern frontier 
 (Num. xxxiv. 11, Ezek. vi. I4 2 ), where, by the walls of Riblah, 
 not many miles from the already captured city Kadesh, in a 
 " deep and lazy stream " the Orontes flows, to receive the sub- 
 mission of the petty Syrian princes. There he learned that the 
 Jews had lost no time in providing themselves with a new king 
 an act of rebellion, for which he summoned Jehoahaz (to 
 whom I shall return later) to answer. At Riblah the unhappy 
 
 1 This statement depends on the interpretation of a famous passage in 
 Herodotus (ii. 159). Neco is there said to have defeated the Syrians (i.e. 
 the Jews) at Magdolus, and then taken Cadytis, "a large city of Syria." 
 Magdolus is obviously an error for Megiddo, which Herodotus confounded 
 with the Magdolus Egyptian frontier-city Migdol or Magdol, now Tell el- 
 Hir (Jer. xliv. i). Cadytis in Herod, iii. 5 means Gaza, which is Katatu or 
 Kazatu in the Egyptian, Khazitu in the Assyrian inscriptions. The con- 
 quest of Gaza would, however, certainly not have been mentioned just after 
 the battle of Megiddo, whereas that of Kadesh or Kodshu (the ancient 
 capital of the Hittites) would be quite in order. In the accounts of the 
 Syrian campaigns of Thothmes I. and III. the names Magidi (Megiddo) and 
 Kodshu (Kadesh) constantly occur together. The Syrian chiefs, after being 
 defeated at Magidi, generally retreated to Kodshu, and a second engage- 
 ment took place beneath its walls. Is it not reasonable to suppose that 
 Herodotus once more made a confusion of names (Katatu and Kadshu, 
 or Kodshu) ? The site of Kadesh has been identified by Conder with Tell 
 Neby Mendeh (Laodiccea) ; see "Twenty-one Years' Work in the Holy 
 Land," pp. 152-156. M. Maspero, the Egyptologist, however, is not fully 
 convinced. 
 
 - Here we should evidently correct "Diblath" (or, " Diblah ") into 
 " Riblah " (see " Variorum Bible "). The mistake of the Massoretic text is 
 repeated by the Septuagint in 2 Chron. x.xxvi. 2, Jer. Iii. 9, 27.
 
 128 JEREMIAH. 
 
 king was deposed, and an elder brother, 1 known to us as 
 Jehoiakim, set up by Neco in his stead. Probably it did not 
 take the Jews long to accustom themselves to the new state 
 of things. A powerful philo-Egyptian party had long existed 
 in Judah, and if a national choice had to be made, the Jews 
 could not help preferring an Egyptian overlord to an Assyrian ; 
 the Assyrians were in fact the most cruel of all the conquering 
 nations of antiquity. But soon another great piece of news 
 startled the Jewish world. The Medes had long since given 
 much trouble to the Assyrians. Once already indeed they had 
 attacked Nineveh (Herod i. 103), and but for the invasion of 
 Media by the Scythians would doubtless have taken it. Upon 
 the withdrawal of the Scythians, they returned to the assault, 
 and the Assyrian capital fell before the combined forces of 
 Media and Babylonia. This was probably in the year 607. The 
 remains of his hastily built and unfinished palace testify to the 
 disquiet of the closing years of the last Assyrian king (Assur- 
 etililani). 
 
 It is an immense loss that we have no historical account of the 
 details of this great event. The cuneiform records as yet disco- 
 vered even those which belong to the reign of Nabopolassar 
 are silent respecting them, while the classical writers confounded 
 this final catastrophe with the temporary humiliation of Assyria 
 in 788. But if a historian may be called a "backward-looking 
 prophet," a prophet may surely be regarded in some degree as a 
 " forward-looking historian." For the feelings of the Jews at 
 any rate, as well as for the fact of the inevitableness of 
 Nineveh's ruin, we may refer to Nahum the Elkoshite, who 
 about 66o, 2 when Assurbanipal was still at the height of his 
 glory, predicts the destruction of the lion's lair. It was the 
 cruel punishment of Thebes (No-Amon) for its defection to the 
 Ethiopians which opened' the eyes of Nahum to the necessity 
 
 1 According to i Chron. iii. 15, Josiah had four sons Johanan, 
 Jehoiakim, Zedekiah, Shallum. Shallum is supposed to be the name of 
 Jehoahaz before he became king. Though placed fourth, he was older than 
 Mattaniah or Zedekiah (comp. 2 Kings xxiii. 31, xxiv. 18). On the changes 
 of names I will speak later. 
 
 2 The Assyrian inscriptions enable us to fix the date of Nahum in the 
 most positive manner. They prove that the capture of Thebes, referred to 
 by the prophet, took place about 663. Now as the event was still fresh in 
 Nahum's recollection, he can hardly have written later than 660 (Schrader, 
 "Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament," ed. i, p. 290).
 
 KEEP THE MUNITION, WATCH THE WAY ! 129 
 
 of Nineveh's fall. History confirms not only the accuracy of 
 his anticipation, but the principle upon which it is based. The 
 Roman empire lasted, because it was based not merely on force, 
 but on that unwritten covenant which Virgil has described in 
 imperishable lines. The Assyrian fell, because the conquered 
 provinces were only kept under by the iron heel of tyranny. I 
 quote a passage in which, with a keen sense of retributive 
 justice, the prophet argues from the cruelty of the Assyrian 
 tyrants to the downfall of their capital : 
 
 And all they that see thee shall flee from thee and say, De- 
 stroyed is Nineveh I who will condole with her ? Whence shall 
 I seek comforters for thee ? Art thou (O Nineveh ! ) better 
 than No-of-Amon, which was enthroned by the Nile-streams^ 
 surrounded by water; which was a fortress of the sea, whose 
 wall was water? 1 Ethiopia was her strength, and Egypt, and 
 there was no end; Put and the Lubim were thy helpers. She 
 however went as captive into exile ; her children also were 
 dasJied in pieces at every street-corner, and for her honoured 
 ones men cast lots, and all her great ones were bound in fetters. 
 Thou also shalt be drunken, thou shall faint away ; thou also 
 must seek a refuge because of an enemy (Nah. iii. 7-11). 
 
 That there is no exaggeration in the atrocities here ascribed 
 to Assyria, a glance at the monuments or at the translated 
 inscriptions is enough to prove. Well might Nahum, as a 
 representative of the petty states of Asia, draw breath in the 
 striking words which conclude his prophecy, 
 
 All that hear the rumour of thee clap the hands over thee ; 
 For upon whom hath not thy wickedness passed continually ? 
 
 (Chap. iii. 19 ; comp. the delicate touch 
 in the last line of chap. ii. 13.) 
 
 The burden of this grand triumphant strain was taken up by 
 Jeremiah's contemporary Zephaniah, but with less ardour of 
 passion. The fall of Assyria is to this prophet merely a detail 
 in the general judgment of the nations, and the last feature in 
 his description " every one that passeth by her shall hiss and 
 wag his hand contains a reminiscence of the vigorous distich 
 just now quoted from Nahum. We need not be surprised at 
 this, for not only was Zephaniah a less original and effective 
 writer than Nahum, but he lived at a time when Nineveh was 
 1 I point maylm with the Septuagint, the Peshitto, and the Vulgate. 
 10
 
 130 JEREMIAH. 
 
 no longer dangerous to the populations of Palestine. Whether 
 spoken with more passion or with less, however, the maledic- 
 tions of the prophets were accomplished to the letter. Xenophon 
 and his Ten Thousand passed by the ruins of Nineveh in 401, 
 and mistook them for the remains of Median cities laid waste by 
 the Persians : the very name of Nineveh had been forgotten. In 
 the lapse of years the ruins themselves became unrecognizable, 
 and it is only in our own day that they have been discovered 
 beneath their clothing of sand. 
 
 So colossal an event could not but involve grave consequences 
 it was destined to change the face of Asia. Not indeed 
 all at once ; for the next two years Syria and Palestine con- 
 tinued to be attached to the empire of Egypt. But about 
 605 Nabopolassar (more correctly, Nabu-pal-u$ur, i.e., " Nebo, 
 protect the son " !), originally a general sent out by the 
 former of Assurbanipal's two successors to quell a Chaldrean 
 revolt, 1 but too ambitious to resist the temptation of seizing the 
 Babylonian crown, and now the conqueror of Assyria, sent his 
 son to recover the southern provinces of the empire from 
 Pharaoh-Neco : it is the prince who bears the fatal name 
 Nebuchadrezzar 2 (more strictly, Nabu-kudur-ugur, i.e., "Nebo, 
 protect the crown"). Neco too set forth once more on the way 
 to Syria, and halted near Carchemish 3 on the Euphrates. In 
 olden times this had been a great city as the capital of the 
 Hittites, but its commercial prosperity dated from its conquest 
 by Sargon in 717. To the Assyrio-Babylonian king, the pos- 
 session of this point was of the utmost consequence, for it 
 secured the passage of the River and the high road from Meso- 
 potamia to Palestine. With a well-appointed army Pharaoh- 
 Neco encountered his young rival ; but oh the strange sight to 
 all whoknew Egyptian warriors ! the heroes were bcatenin pieces 
 (by the heavy Babylonian maces), they fled away, and looked not 
 back; or rather, the sivift could not flee, nor the heroes escape 
 
 1 Tiele rightly regards this as the kernel of the strange account given by 
 Abydenus. It is possible, however, that Nabopolassar was not merely a 
 general sent on a special mission, but viceroy of Babylon. Assurbanipal had 
 suppressed the viceroyalty ; the increasing peril of the empire may have 
 induced his successor to restore it. 
 
 2 So given in Jer. xxi. 2, 7 and twenty-four other passages. 
 
 3 Identified by George Smith, in his last fatal journey, with Jerablus or 
 Jinibis, on the right bank of the Euphrates.
 
 KEEP THE MUNITION, WATCH THE WAY ! 13! 
 
 (Jer. xlvi. 5. 6), because those swifter than the leopard (Hab. i. 8) 
 were upon them. Nothing but the death of the old Babylonian 
 monarch arrested his son's triumphant progress. Fearing to be 
 absent from his capital, the young king committed the charge of 
 his garrisons to his generals, and, with characteristic prompti- 
 tude, dashed homeward with a small escort the shortest way 
 across the Arabian desert. 1 
 
 And now, what was the tone of mind in Judah during these 
 eventful years ? The reiterated references in Jeremiah to the 
 " Peace, peace" of the flattering or' false prophets 2 sufficiently 
 show that, as in Isaiah's time, " they which should lead had 
 caused Israel to err, and destroyed the way of his paths " (Isa. 
 iii. 12). Putting aside a few individuals, the nation (i.e., all those 
 classes of the nation which counted) neither had nor wished to have 
 any true conception of its position. Neither had, nor wished to 
 have, I say designedly. For a long time past, prophecy had 
 been a source of national danger. It had always been a regular 
 and tolerably lucrative profession ; but whereas in a simpler 
 age, the prophets had " divined for money " and yet been con- 
 scientious, in the luxuriousness of the later regal period they 
 had more and more laid themselves out for gain apart from con- 
 science (see Mic. iii. n). Their sole object was to please, and 
 the way to please was to keep up all agreeable illusions. Listen 
 first to Isaiah and then to Jeremiah. 
 
 For it is a disobedient people, lying sons, sons that will not hear 
 the direction of JehovaJi, who say to the seers, Ye shall not see 
 [//v//t'], and to the prophets, Ye shall not prophesy unto us right 
 things ; speak unto its smooth things, prophesy illusions (Isa. 
 xxx. 9, 10). 
 
 The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule at their 
 beck, and my people love to have it so (Jer. v. 31). 
 
 It may be remarked by some reader of Wellhausen that the 
 latter passage does not apply to the period which followed the 
 Reformation. For the public recognition of the Deuteronomic 
 Scripture must have greatly increased the authority of the 
 priests, under whose care (comp. Deut. xxxi. 25, 26) it was 
 placed. The prophet who was a joint-author of Deuteronomy 
 gave up much for himself and his order that he might gain 
 
 1 Berossus,/r<7?v. ir, in Joscplnis, " Ant." x. n. 
 
 2 Jer. vi. 14, viii. n, comp. iv. 10 (all these passages occur in contexts 
 referring pmly to the Scythians, but partly no doubt to the Chaldoeans)
 
 132 jEREMIAtf. 
 
 more for the community. This is true, from whatever source 
 the reader's insight may be derived. But we must remember 
 that the Deuteronomic torah was suffering a temporary eclipse. 
 The old conditions of things were partly restored. Unity was 
 lost, and the excited people must now more than ever have 
 turned to the prophets for comfort. They at least could offer 
 what no mere priests and no mere book could pretend to offer 
 a direct revelation from the Deity on matters of present moment. 
 And so both statesmen and priests had to bend low before the 
 prophets, or at least before the prophetic order. But the prophets 
 (among whom I of course do not now include Jeremiah) could 
 not afford to follow the inner voice. They were led by love of 
 gain and of influence to ascribe a Divine authority to the blind 
 instincts of the people, which received a fresh glamour from 
 being expressed in the rhetorical style of prophecy. These in- 
 stincts were at present those of self-complacent vanity. Three 
 times over had God spoken in history, and loudly enough, one 
 might think, to awaken all who had the power to reflect, but 
 each of these unexpected events had but lulled the Jews in a 
 deeper security. Again and again, one may suppose, Jerusalem 
 gave itself up to the wild rejoicings of which Eastern nations 
 alone are capable. Nineveh had fallen ; Neco had been de- 
 feated ; and now the prince who wielded the dreaded power of 
 Babylon, had been turned back, as it seemed, by some super- 
 natural hand. 
 
 Jeremiah at least saw more clearly. Not to him could those 
 words of Jesus be applied, Ye can discern the face of the sky, but 
 ye cannot discern the signs of the times (Matt. xvi. 3). He saw 
 once more the seething caldron ready to precipitate a flood of 
 ruin over his dear country (Jer. i. 13, 14). You might think 
 perhaps that the vision would strike him dumb with terror, as 
 he thought of the fierce warriors streaming in from the north 
 under the greatest general of the Semitic East before Hannibal. 
 Listen to Habakkuk, who lived at Jerusalem about this time,* 
 and see how awful the prospect really was : 
 
 Look ye among the nations and behold; amaze yourselves, be 
 ye amazed ! for a deed doeth he in your days 'which ye believe 
 not when narrated. For behold I raise up the Chaldceans, the 
 rough and the restless nation, which goeth through the breadth 
 of the earth, to possess dwellings which are not his. Frightful 
 1 That is, after the battle of Carchemish.
 
 KEEP THE MUNITION, WATCH THE WAY I, 133 
 
 and terrible is it, from himself his justice and his majesty gocth 
 forth ; and swifter than leopards arc his horses, and fiercer than 
 evening wolves his chargers leap, and his horsemen go far away, 
 fly as an eagle haslet h to gorging; each cometh to do wrong, the 
 endeavour of their faces is towards assault, so that he collecteth 
 prisoners like the dust; and at kings he mocketh, and princes 
 are to him a laughingstock, and he laugheth at every stronghold, 
 and throweth up dust and laketh it. But he exceeded in daring 
 and transgressed, and be cometh guilty : this his strength be- 
 cometh his God 1 (Hab. i. 5-11, Ewald). 
 
 The rapidity of the rise of the new conquering power had 
 evidently impressed Habakkuk. He compares the Chaldtean 
 horses to leopards meaning perhaps the chetah, or hunting 
 leopard, still found in Palestine, " the rush of which on its prey 
 is the most rapid of possible movements; 2 and he gives the 
 former the superiority in swiftness (comp. Dan. vii. 6). The 
 thought of what is coming paralyzes him, and all the more be- 
 cause this physical energy of the Chald&ans is combined with a 
 fierce and defiant assertion of their own standard of justice and 
 their own all-surpassing majesty. But, as Ewald says, the pro- 
 phet, commenting on the revelation which he has uttered, gives 
 a hint of comfort to the true believer. The Chaldasan idolizes 
 that strength which he owes to Another, and denies the true God. 
 Then, in the next section, his tone becomes more pleading. The 
 death of Israel as a nation would be equivalent to the death of 
 Jehovah. There have no doubt been divine deaths. Where is 
 thegodofHamathandthegodofArpad(lsa..-xxxv\\. 13)? But 
 art thou not from everlasting, Yahve my God? my Holy 
 One, thou canst not die / . . . Thou of too pure eyes to behold 
 iniquity, and who to look at evil art not able, wherefore lookest 
 thou upon the treacherous, holdest thy peace when the unjust 
 devoureth the just, and makest men as fish of the sea, as the 
 worm that hath no ruler f (Hab. i. 12-14). Thus Habakkuk 
 like Jeremiah (xii. i) is troubled by the incompleteness of the 
 Divine retribution. Judah, by comparison with Chaldaea, is 
 righteous (Ewald, for greater vigour, shortens the literal render- 
 ing, which is, "the unrighteous devoureth him who is more 
 righteous than he ") ; as for the covetous invader, his inmost 
 soul is puffed up, it is not iipright (or perhaps, humble j lit., 
 
 1 I have here followed Mr. J. Frederick Smith's accurate translation, 
 * Tristram, " The Land of Israel," p, 495.
 
 J34 JEREMIAH. 
 
 " level "), but tlie righteous shall live by his faithfulness ' (ii. 4). 
 Such is the sure hope which pierces the clouds of trouble. 
 Righteousness must outlive unrighteousness ; and when we add 
 to this the faith in a God who only hath immortality (i Tim. 
 vi. 16), what can the prophet need more to revive his courage? 
 Alas that Habakkuk should have so far miscalculated the 
 moral value of the two nations Chaldasa and Israel, and seen 
 so dimly into the abyss of the Divine purposes ! Like Jeremiah, 
 he "stood in the council of Jehovah" (Jer. xxiii. 18) ; why did 
 he not " see and hear " better ? He did indeed " see " that God 
 loves and will have righteousness ; but he did not see the moral 
 and religious need of a complete subversion of the existing 
 order of things. He saw that "law" (torali) even the incom- 
 parable Deuteronomic law was benumbed (Hab. i. 4) ; but he did 
 not see that bright spiritual landscape beyond the sea of afflic- 
 tion (Zech. x. n), in which rises the mount of beatitudes and 
 the second and better covenant. His fate reminds us somewhat 
 of Josiah's. He trusted God implicitly, and his trust was not 
 rewarded in the way that he expected. But he was probably 
 spared Josiah's premature end ; he may have lived to take to 
 his heart of hearts the purer hopes and loftier aspirations of 
 Jeremiah. 
 
 Or listen to the latter prophet's expressions of horror in one 
 of his gloomier moods, 
 
 Behold, as clouds he cotneth up, and as the whirlwind are his 
 chariots; swifter than eagles are his horses. Woe unto us! 
 for we are spoiled (iv. 13). 
 
 O daughter of my people, gird thee with sackcloth, and roll 
 thee in ashes j make thee an only son's mourning, most bitter 
 lamentation j for suddenly cometh the spoiler iipon us (vi. 26). 
 
 Oh that my head were waters,. and mine eyes a fountain oj 
 tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the 
 daughter of my people (5x. I ). 
 
 The last of these passages is surely a direct expression of 
 Cassandra-like horror at the fate which impends over Judah. In 
 some places the prophet may have husbanded his talent, and 
 adapted old prophecies respecting the Scythians to the new and 
 
 1 "Faithfulness" should be interpreted as in Jer. v. i, where it is 
 synonymously parallel to "right." There is an implied antithesis to the 
 unfaithfulness of the Chnldcean invader, who acknowledges not God nor 
 Ihe Divine law.
 
 KEEP THE MUNITION, WATCH THE WAV ! 135 
 
 greater Chaldaean crisis ; but surely not here. But the fact that 
 there are so few direct expressions of grief confirms the view 
 that the sensitive Jeremiah was lifted up by a wonderful inspira- 
 tion to a height like that which Christian poets love to describe 
 a height from which past troubles appear to be swallowed 
 up in light. As soon as the prophet gained his first clear intui- 
 tion of the future, what, think you, was his mood? The answer 
 is given in chaps, xlvi.-xlix., a group of prophecies on the 
 foreign nations (A.V.'s " Gentiles " is surely a most inappro- 
 priate rendering), written at various times during the period 
 beginning 606-605. Here, more than anywhere else, is revealed 
 Jeremiah's conviction that prophetic oracles are, not less than 
 wind and storm, messengers of God, fulfilling His word, in 
 destruction not less than in reproduction, and through this faith 
 he obtains a profound repose for his throbbing heart. His own 
 consciousness becomes more than ever absorbed in the divine 
 at least, in that aspect of the divine which at this moment 
 forces itself upon him ; and so he shuts up his heart's best trea- 
 sure of love and pity (like Jehovah Himself, according to Isa. 
 Ixiii. 15, R.V.), and rejoices, not unlike the prophet-poet Dante, 
 in the just judgments of God. Does not this suggest to us the 
 true explanation of that calmness which surprised us in Jere- 
 miah not long ago, and which contrasts so strikingly with his 
 irritation at Anathoth? The prophet's intuition of the future 
 was acquiring greater definiteness ; and tired of his ceaseless 
 anxiety, he was relieved to know that the end was so near. It 
 is somewhat as when a man is told by his physician that he has 
 not many months to live ; the certainty has been known to bring 
 to such an one a new, strange peace of mind. The fret and 
 fever of life vanishes in a moment ; troubles and disappoint- 
 ments assume another aspect, and he even welcomes weak- 
 ness and pain as the harbingers of a change which, if God be 
 faithful, cannot be for the worse. 
 
 In the opening oracle of the series referred to, Jeremiah's 
 new peace of mind appears to be intensified into a kind of stern 
 joy. I suppose that on this one occasion at least his words 
 may have been echoed by the majority of his countrymen, who 
 only remembered that it was by Neco that the nation's darling 
 had been slain, and saw not that the Pharaoh's defeat did but 
 prepare the way for a more severe master. Jeremiah's rejoicing, 
 however, was not like that of his light-hearted people. He
 
 136 JEREMIAH. 
 
 may indeed have hated Egypt only less than Assyria, and 
 on much the same grounds as his countrymen, but this is not 
 the whole secret of his triumph at its humiliation. He knew 
 but too well the blow that was preparing from Jehovah's, not 
 Nebo's, hammer ' Nebuchadrezzar. And this was to him the 
 source of an inward transformation as remarkable as any in the 
 New Testament. The Divine rebuke in Jer. xii. 5 was never 
 required again. The prophet's sensitive nature was recast, and 
 though traces of the old infirmity remained, yet, whenever 
 there was a need for action, he was calm, adventurous, and 
 resourceful. 
 
 I wish I had space to enter at length into the truly remark- 
 able prophecy on Egypt, which should be read by all who would 
 estimate the poetic capacity of Jeremiah. It falls into two 
 parts, which cannot have been composed at quite the same 
 time. In the former (vers. 3-12) the point of time assumed is 
 immediately before the battle of Carchemish. It is a grand 
 triumphal ode, describing this fatal blow as a Divine judgment 
 from which Egypt cannot possibly recover. The latter (vers. 
 14-26 2 ) is a prediction in highly poetic imagery of Nebuchad- 
 rezzar's conquest of Egypt. 3 The date is not to be deduced 
 with precision from the contents, but it is safest to refer both 
 this and the following prophecies to the anxious time of Nebu- 
 chadrezzar's first Palestinian campaign. How striking is the 
 picture which in the former passage unrolls itself before the 
 prophet's imagination ! First, the setting forth of the splendid 
 Egyptian army ; then the strange contrast knights sans peur 
 et sans reproche perishing miserably, their shields (to quote 
 from an earlier poet) being " vilely cast away " (or perhaps, 
 "defiled" 2 Sam. i. 21). Well for mankind, thinks our pro- 
 
 1 Jer. 1. 23, How is the hammer of the -whole earth cut asunder and 
 broken ! The passage represents Jeremiah's view of Nebuchadnezzar, even 
 if it be not written by him. 
 
 2 I make this prophecy close at v. 26 and not at v. 28, because the two 
 concluding verses of the chapter are evidently inserted at a later time from 
 xxx. 10, IT, where they cohere far better with the context than they do here. 
 
 3 Egypt certainly had more claims upon Jeremiah's sympathy than Moab. 
 Had the prophet foreseen the hospitality accorded by Egypt to the Jews at 
 a somewhat later time, and the important consequences which were to flow 
 from this, he would perhaps have devoted more than half a verse to Egypt's 
 happier future,
 
 KE^P THE MUNITION, WATCH THE WAY! 137 
 
 phet, that it was so ! for the march of an Egyptian army is 
 like nothing so much as a monstrous devastating river. But 
 the day of vengeance is come. Gilead's costly balm, so 
 prized in Egypt (Gen. xliii. n, 1. 2), has no healing virtue for 
 Egypt's wound. 
 
 "To pluck up and to break down and to destroy" (Jer. i. 10) 
 was no small part of Jeremiah's ministry at this time. We can- 
 not however pause beside each canvas in this prophetic por- 
 trait-gallery. Suffice it to mention that what may seem repellent 
 is mitigated by bright glimpses of the future. When the sword 
 has done its work, it will be sheathed (Jer. xlvii. 6) ; Moab, 
 Ammon, and Elam shall not always be exiled from the eternal 
 providence (Wisd. xvii. 2), and even exhausted Egypt shall 
 again support a teeming population. But what shall we say of 
 chap, xxv., which gives the substance of chaps, xlvi.-xlix. in 
 a more fearfully impressive form ? Well, even here a bright 
 prospect opens in vers. 12-14 to the nations (including Judah) 
 which have drunk the wine of God's fury. It does not indeed 
 commend itself to a Christian reader, but to Jeremiah's con- 
 temporaries it was only too congenial a picture (see vers. 
 12-14). "Fearfully impressive" is, I think, not too strong 
 an epithet to use of this chapter as a whole. It deserves an 
 attentive study on various grounds, historical, exegetical, and 
 critical. As a survey of the Eastern world, in which Judah 
 occupies no more than its due place, it reminds us of the pro- 
 phecy of Zephaniah (see p. 33) ; as a list of the "nations round 
 about" (vers. 19-26), it has even a geographical value; and 
 from the peculiar arrangement of this chapter in the Septuagint 
 interrupted as it is after ver. 13 by the insertion of xlix. 34-39, 
 xlvi., xlvii., xlix. 7-22, 1-6, 28-33, 2 3~ 2 7> xlviii.) it presents the 
 student with a curious critical problem. How much the early 
 students of the Scriptures were interested in this chapter, is 
 shown by several important interpolations ; ' evidently they 
 
 1 Tims in v. 9 we should probably omit all between "saith Jehovah" 
 and "and will bring them " ; in v. 12, "the king of Babylon and," and 
 also "and the land of the Chaldaeans " ; and in v. 26, "and the king of 
 Sheshach shall drink after them " (most inappropriate, at the end of a list 
 of the nations to be punished by Babylon ; a little more elaborateness was 
 surely required in the deseription of Babylon's retribution). See, however. 
 Ewald's note on v. 9 in his " Prophets," vol. ii., where a brave attempt 
 is made to defend the Massoretie text (only changing 'cl into 'et/i).
 
 138 JEREMIAH. 
 
 had brooded deeply over it. Very different must have been 
 the effect of this chapter on most of those who originally heard 
 its substance. But was it ever publicly delivered ? the reader 
 may ask ; for sometimes the denunciations of prophets would 
 seem to have been elaborated in private for the reading of dis- 
 ciples or future generations. My own opinion is that it was, 
 and that it is the prophecy which Jeremiah dictated to Baruch 
 according to Jer. xxxvi. I find it difficult to believe that the 
 roll referred to in that striking chapter contained the substance 
 of all Jeremiah's prophecies from the beginning of his ministry. 
 A complete reproduction of the prophecies would not have 
 suited Jeremiah's purpose, and Jer. xxxvi. 29 expressly states 
 that the obnoxious roll contained one great and terrible de- 
 claration the very same which we find in Jer. xxv. But I am 
 in danger of anticipating, and must now prepare to resume the 
 thread of the narrative.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THERE BE GODS MANY, LORDS MANY. 
 
 Jeremiah's verdict upon the later kings Nebuchadrezzar crosses the border 
 Duel between Jeremiah and Jehoiakim. 
 
 IT may have struck some readers that in hastening on to the 
 great catastrophe which was to revolutionize Asia, I passed 
 somewhat lightly over the fate of Josiah's successor. Let me 
 now correct this involuntary injustice. In 2 Kings xxiii. 33, 34 
 we are simply told that Neco bound Jehoahaz at Hamath, and 
 then took him away to Egypt, where he died in captivity. His 
 melancholy end deeply moved his contemporaries, not, as that 
 of another " king for a hundred days " has moved our genera- 
 tion, from its moral significance, but at least from its pathetic 
 suggestions. 
 
 \\~ccpye not for tlic rtV<7</(said the tender-hearted man beneath 
 one of the prophets of that day), neither bemoan him: but weep 
 sore for Mm that is gone away; for he shall return no more, nor 
 see his native country. For thus saith Jehovah touching Shalluin 
 the son ofjosiah, king of Judah, ivhich reigned instead ofjosiah 
 his father, "which -went forth out of this place : He shall not re- 
 turn thither any more ; but in t/te place whither they have led 
 Jiim captive there shall he die, and he shall see this land no more 
 (Jer. xxii. 10-12). 
 
 Jeremiah feels and writes in complete sympathy with his 
 people ; and so, it seems to me, does his younger contem- 
 porary Ezekiel, who perhaps (as Ewald suggests) has adopted 
 one of the popular elegies upon Shallum or Jehoahaz in Ezek. 
 xix. 1-4. " A young lion of royal strain, caught untimely, and 
 chained and carried away captive, this was how the people of
 
 i.;o JEREMIAH. 
 
 Israel conceived of Shallum. 1 ' ' Sooner would they have chosen 
 for him the tragic but not dishonourable end of his father, than 
 that he should be dragged with the rope of a captive to a foreign 
 land, and be buried in the "house of bondage "far from the 
 tombs of his ancestors. The words of Huldah to Josiah, Thou 
 shall be gathered to thy grave t'n peace (2 Kings xxii. 20), hardly 
 seem an exaggeration in the light of coming events. Of the 
 character of Jehoahaz, Jeremiah generously says nothing ; even 
 if the report of this king's wickedness (see p. 104) be well- 
 founded, yet he can hardly have done much good or evil in his 
 short reign of three months. Of his elder brother Jehoiakim, 
 however, the prophet speaks with great positiveness and pa- 
 triotic resentment, drawing a pointed contrast between him 
 and his noble father (Jer. xxii. 13-17). The same kingly virtues 
 which were so conspicuous in David (2 Sam. viii. 15^) adorned 
 Josiah ; covetousness and oppression and judicial murders dis- 
 graced the rule of Jehoiakim. 
 
 Woe tinto him that buildeth his house by unrighteousness, and 
 his chambers by injustice ; that inakcth his neighbour work for 
 nought, and giveth him not his hire. . . . Shalt ihou reign be- 
 cause thou vicst -with Ahab? did not thy father eat and drink 
 (i.e., enjoy life), and do judgment and justice ? then it -was well 
 ivith him. He judged the cause of the poor and needy j then it 
 ivas well. Was not this to know me? saith Jehovah. But 
 thine eyes and heart are only tipon thy (dishonest] gain, and on 
 shedding innocent blood, and on carrying out a crushing oppres- 
 siveness (Jer. xxii. 13, 15-17). 
 
 What a picture ! Josiah's model was David ; Jehoiakim's is 
 Ahab, whose judicial murder of Naboth was the culminating 
 sin of his life (i Kings xxi.). Is it not an apostrophe worthy of 
 the great Elijah, whose vigorous expression (suggested, it is 
 true, by his antagonist) " disturber of Israel" i.e., subverter of 
 the ancient social and religious order is quite as applicable 
 to Jehoiakim as to Ahab ? We owe the genuine reading of 
 Jer. xxii. 15^ to two of our great Septuagint manuscripts (the 
 Alexandrine and the Friderico-Augustan) ; the Massoretic read- 
 
 1 Cox, " Biblical Expositions," p. 120. Tristram was reminded of Eze- 
 kiel's imagery in observing the rude Syrian mode of capturing a lion by 
 driving it with cries and noises into a pitfall with spikes at the bottom 
 (" Natural History of the Bible," p. 118).
 
 THERE fcE GODS MANY, LORDS MANY. 141 
 
 ing is almost impossible to construe, 1 and the other Septuagint 
 reading " with Ahaz " (so the Vatican MS.), though accepted by 
 Ewald, is to be rejected (i, because "vying with Ahaz" has 
 no historical basis ; and 2, because " Ahaz " might easily be 
 misunderstood to mean " Jehoahaz," of which name "Ahaz" is 
 an abbreviation). 
 
 But the description of Jehoiakim is not confined to gene- 
 ralities. He is brought before us in i>. 14 (which is a digression 
 or parenthetic illustration) as a great builder, and as such re- 
 ceives severe censure. This is worthy of remark. The archi- 
 tectural tastes of Solomon are mentioned (i Kings v.-vii.) without 
 a word of blame ; why should those of Jehoiakim be treated 
 differently ? At another time certainly no one could have 
 blamed Jehoiakim and his nobles 2 for being discontented with 
 the narrow, ill-lighted chambers of Syrian houses, and saying, 
 / will build me a wide house and spacious chambers, and cutting 
 out their windows, inlaying the chambers with cedar, and paint- 
 ing them with vermilion (Jer. xxii. 14). But was this the 
 moment for beautifying Jerusalem when the land was still 
 groaning under Neco's war-fine 3 (2 Kings xxiii. 33) ? And how 
 could a worshipper of Jehovah wrong his brother-Israelite by 
 exacting labour for which he had neither the will, nor (we may 
 fairly assume) the ability to pay? 
 
 The truth is that Jehoiakim was smitten with a passion for 
 the pomp and splendour of an Oriental despot. He knew by 
 hearsay of the great buildings of Egypt and Assyria which had 
 been erected by forced labour, and may perhaps already have 
 heard of some of the grand royal constructions of Nebuchad- 
 rezzar. 4 Another prophet may be taken to allude to these in 
 
 1 R.V., however, attempts what is almost impossible; " thou strivest 
 to excel in cedar" (i.e., in cedar buildings), is at any rate good English, 
 and masks the difficulty that Jehoiakim's self-chosen rival is not named. 
 The reason why "with Ahab " has not met with more favour is that critics 
 supposed his " ivory house " to be alluded to. But really there is no direct 
 connexion between v. 14 and v. i$a. 
 
 3 See Jer. xxii. 23 (quoted later on), which was addressed to the richer 
 inhabitants of Jerusalem, including the king. 
 
 3 It was a comparatively small fine (comp. 2 Kings xv. 19, xviii. 14) ; 
 was the land already too impoverished to bear a larger one? One seems 
 to feel in reading 2 Kings xxiii. 35 that the new king's mode of collecting 
 it caused great dissatisfaction. 
 
 * On the building tastes of Assyrio-Babylonian kings, comp. Perrot- 
 Chipiez, " History of Art in Chaldsea and Assyria," i. 51. For Nebuchad-
 
 142 JEREMIAH. 
 
 the following passage, the conclusion of which is closely parallel 
 to Jer. xxii. 13, 17, 
 
 Woe to him that gaineth evil gains for his house, that he may 
 set his nest on high, that he may withdraw himself from the 
 grasp of misfortune. . . . For the stone shall cry out of the wall, 
 and the beam out of the timber shall answer it. Woe to ///;/. 
 that buildeth a town with bloodshed, and establishcth a city im.'ii 
 wrong (Hab. ii. 9-12). In fact, neither Solomon nor Nebu- 
 chadrezzar can have seemed to a prophet like Jeremiah or 
 Habakkuk a much fitter model than Ahab, and to accuse Je- 
 hoiakim (whether directly or indirectly) of copying either of 
 these kings was to pronounce his religious condemnation. 
 
 In their religious estimate of Nebuchadrezzar the prophets 
 may possibly have done him some injustice ; into this delicate 
 question we must not refuse to enter at a more advanced point 
 of the narrative. But we have no reason to question Jeremiah's 
 verdict upon Jehoiakim, who, alike from a religious and a 
 political point of view, appears to have been unequal to the 
 crisis in the fortunes of Israel. It might indeed be urged in 
 favour of Jehoiakim that in his own way he was as zealous for 
 Jehovah as his father. Had he not even changed his original 
 name Eliakim (with the Pharaoh's approval) into Jehoiakim, 1 
 to assure to himself, by a name compounded with Jehovah, the 
 special protection of Israel's God ? To apply the language of 
 Prof. Milligan, " As in the case of so many of the Old Testa- 
 ment worthies, his name is the index to what he was," 2 or at 
 least to the religion which he professed. Now what does "Je- 
 hoiakim " mean? "Jehovah (rather Yahveh) raiseth up." It is 
 an expression of faith that it is by Jehovah (Yahveh) that princes 
 reign, and that not alliances, not defenced cities, not "the mul- 
 titude of an host," can deliver a king, but the God in whom he 
 trusts. Some, I know, have said that it was Neco who changed 
 
 rezzar's beautification of Babylon, sec his inscriptions (e.g., in " Records of 
 the Past," vol. xii.). 
 
 1 See 2 Kings xxiii. 34 (Dr. Lumby's note in the "Cambridge Bible" 
 does not quite meet the difficulty). Eliakim's brother Shallum (Jer. xxii. n) 
 had also changed his name, as most suppose. Possibly the two names, 
 Ilubid and Yahubid, of a certain king of Hamath in Sargon's reign may be 
 accounted for on these analogies. On the Assyrian custom, see Sayce, 
 " Hibbert Lectures," pp. 303, 304 ; and on Egyptian and Arabian parallels 
 Goldzihcr, " Dor Mythos bei den Ilcbracrn," p. 351. 
 
 2 " Elijah : his Life and Times," p. 43.
 
 THERE BE GODS MANY, LORDS MANY. 143 
 
 the name of Eliakim into Jehoiakim, and Nebuchadrezzar who 
 altered Mattaniah's name into Zedekiah. They have on their 
 side the meagre and perhaps hastily compiled Hebrew record 
 of the reigns of the later kings, which in this one particular 
 reads more like an Egyptian than a Jewish document. But if 
 the names Jehoiakim and Zedekiah had been directly chosen 
 by the Egyptian and the Babylonian king respectively, why is it 
 that they have not an Egyptian and a Babylonian colouring 
 (comp. Gen. xli. 45, Ezra v. 14, Dan. i. 7, and the names given 
 to captured cities by the Assyrians) ? To meet this, it has been 
 suggested that the names of the Jewish vassal kings may have 
 been compounded with the name of Israel's God, because they 
 had been made to swear by Jehovah. This view is barely pos- 
 sible with regard to Zedekiah, because his oath of fidelity to 
 Babylon had been sanctioned by Jehovah's prophets (2 Chron. 
 xxxvi. 13, Ezek. xvii. 13), but hardly with regard to Jehoiakim. 
 The prophets of this period were as a rule the advocates of a 
 strong nationalistic policy ; the higher prophets those like 
 Jeremiah recognized the necessity of submission to Babylon, 
 but none, so far as we know, were in favour of Egypt. But 
 without the consent of prophets of Jehovah it is difficult to 
 say how a king of Judah could swear allegiance to Egypt by the 
 name of Jehovah. I think then that Shallum's and Eliakim's 
 and Mattaniah's change of name must have had a religious 
 motive ; it was as if the king entered thereby into a special, 
 personal covenant with his father-God (comp. Psa. Ixxxix. 26). 
 Assyrian, Egyptian, and Arabian analogies appear to me to 
 confirm this view. 
 
 But was the religion professed by Jehoiakim identical with 
 Josiah's ? It was of course based on the worship of Jehovah ; 
 but then who was this Jehovah, and what amount of truth was 
 there in his godship? Certainly he did not rank as high in 
 the scale of divinity as either Merodach (Maruduk), in whose 
 honour, and not simply for his own aggrandizement, Nebuchad- 
 rezzar strengthened and beautified Babylon, or Merodach's divine 
 son Nebo (Nabu), whose " darling " the great king called him- 
 self both of these deities were honoured by him with a worship 
 only less pure and noble than the Hebrew psalmists' worship 
 of their God. I And most certainly this Jehovah was not the 
 
 1 For Nebuchadrezzar's prayers, sec "Records of the Past," vol. xii. ; 
 Sayce's " Hibbert lectures," p, 97. In all religiously important points, 
 the interpretation of them is, I believe, secure.
 
 144 JEREMIAHi 
 
 equal of the holy Cod who spoke by Moses, by Elijah, by 
 the Deuteronomist, by Jeremiah, by the psalmists, and who 
 attached the enjoyment of His favour to compliance with strict 
 moral conditions. No ; the Jehovah in whom Jehoiakim truly 
 enough professed his faith on ascending the throne was not He 
 whom a great disciple of St. Paul so emphatically identifies 
 with the Father of the Lord Jesus (Heb. i., ii.) ; rather he may 
 be called, without any rhetorical flourish, a rival of the true 
 God. A poor rival, some may say, for his dangerousness to 
 Israel consisted in the fact that he too claimed the name 
 Jehovah. But is there not often very much in a name ? Was 
 not the contest between the God of Elijah and the God of 
 Ahab and Jezebel a contest between two rival claimants of 
 the title " Lord " (Baal) ? ' May we not even venture to say 
 that upon the death of Josiah a contest (or a new phase of a 
 contest) began between two Jehovahs, not in the sense in 
 which such a contest is carried on in the speeches of Job, 2 but 
 in that in which in other countries besides Palestine a bitter 
 but not doubtful contest has been waged between a partly 
 moral God, who tolerates no rival, and claims the empire of the 
 world, and a mere territorial divinity, the impersonation of the 
 natural forces which the cultivator of the soil desires to pro- 
 pitiate. The true "son" or "servant" of Jehovah (for these 
 terms are nearly equivalent ; see 2 Kings xvi. 7, Mai. iii. 17, 
 Gal. iv. i) was no longer the Israelitish but startling though 
 most true paradox ! the Babylonian king. And this in a 
 twofold sense : i, because Nebuchadrezzar carried out the true 
 God's providential purposes, and 2, because there are strong 
 points of affinity between the religion of Merodach and that 
 of Jeremiah's Jehovah. We have indeed no such prophetic 
 glorification of Nebuchadrezzar as the " second Isaiah " gives 
 of Cyrus, Thus saith- Jehovah to his Anointed, to Cyrus, 
 "whom I grasp by his right hand, words which so strikingly 
 
 1 We may legitimately infer this from Hos. ii. 16 (on which see my note 
 in the " Cambridge Bible "). Ahab would not have confessed that he was 
 an opponent of the worship of Jehovah. But to the great prose-poet who 
 has described the contest on Mount Carmel it appeared as if Ahab had in 
 very deed led the Israelites into forsaking Jehovah's covenant and throwing 
 down His altars. The exaggeration was only natural ; it reveals the true 
 poet who delights in simple, direct issues, and the disciple of the later 
 prophets. 
 
 8 See "Job and Solomon," pp. 31, 32.
 
 THERE BE GODS MANY, LORDS MANY. 145 
 
 remind us of expressions in the Cyrus cylinder-inscription 
 (line 12), "whose hand he (Maruduk or Merodach) holds." 
 IUit I see no reason why Jeremiah should not have used 
 them as a direct contradiction to the misleading name of the 
 preceding king (Jehoahaz, i.e. "he whom Jehovah holdeth"), 
 except perhaps that he was unaware of the strong resemblance 
 in character between Nebuchadrezzar's God and his own. At 
 any rate, he does twice call the Babylonian king "my ser- 
 vant " (xxvii. 6, xliii. 10, not in xxv. 9, which is interpolated), 
 and even if he means this in the lower sense of "one who, 
 with or against his will, cannot help forwarding the designs 
 of Me, who am God of Israel and of all the nations," we who 
 read his words in the light of history know that they mean this, 
 and more than this, viz., that Nebuchadrezzar's worship, however 
 imperfect, was accepted by Jehovah, while that of Jehoiakim, 
 nominally Jehovah's " son " and " servant," was rejected. 1 
 
 To this battle of rival Jehovahs, there corresponds an 
 antagonism between their respective representatives Jehoiakim 
 and Jeremiah, a specimen of which is presented to us in Jer. 
 xxxvi. The date of the event is the fifth, or more probably, as 
 the Septuagint of verse 9 says, the eighth year of Jehoiakim, 
 /.('. the fifth year of Nebuchadrezzar. The king of Babylon 
 has hitherto spared Judah, having more important work in 
 other frontier territories. But at last he finds leisure to glance 
 at its mountain fortress Jerusalem, which lies too near Egypt 
 (then as now the coveted prize of ambition) to be left in the 
 hands of a friend of Neco. He takes the field or, as Bible 
 language puts it, "goes up" against Judah (2 Kings xxiv. i), 
 but he encounters no resistance, for Jehoiakim makes haste 
 to swear the oath of fidelity. 2 How shall we account for the 
 Jewish king's good resolution ? Was he completely taken by 
 surprise ? Had he made no request for Egyptian aid ? Or 
 had the inflated self-conceit of the Pharaohs been so reduced 
 by the disaster at Carchemish that Neco refused to listen to 
 Jehoiakim's prayer ? One or the other of these alternatives 
 
 1 I fear that the " lower sense " is the one intended by Jeremiah, to whom 
 the few spiritual believers in Israel formed, collectively, the only "servant 
 of Jehovah " as yet in existence (Jer. xxx. 10, xlvi. 27, 28). 
 
 2 Note how even a Jewish prophet recognizes an oath of fidelity to 
 1'abylon (Ezek. xvii. 11-21), and contrast Isaiah's indifference to Hezekiah's 
 breach of faith towards Assyria. 
 
 1 1
 
 146 JEREMIAH. 
 
 may be correct ; but a third view is suggested by an atten- 
 tive reading of the striking chapter referred to. The sub- 
 ject, as I have said, is a duel between Jeremiah and his bitter 
 opponent the king a duel, however, in which the combatants 
 do not meet face to face. It is wonderful, let us notice in 
 passing, how much could be done in the political world even 
 then merely by pen and ink. Jeremiah was certainly no 
 Cobbett, but he produced an effect with the help of his scribe 
 which even Cobbett would not have disdained. Let us try to 
 picture the scene. Nebuchadrezzar and his army have crossed 
 the Jewish border. The country-places are being deserted ; 
 Isaiah's description of a northern army (Isa. xi.) is being 
 verified to the letter. A temple fast is about to be proclaimed 
 (just as the last Assyrian king at a similar crisis proclaimed 
 one) for the citizens of Jerusalem, and for all who have flocked 
 in from the cities of Judah (Jer. xxxvi. 6-9). Jeremiah seizes 
 the opportunity to carry out a new plan. The people will not 
 allow him to address them ; then Baruch the scribe shall read 
 the most relevant of his. prophecies to them, especially that 
 very important one (chap, xxv.) written in the fatal year of 
 Carchemish, and containing a new and definite announcement 
 of most serious import. The trumpet is blown in Zion (Joel 
 ii. i), and at the first notes citizens and refugees alike hasten 
 to the temple. Soon sacrificial smoke ascends ; suppliant pro- 
 cessions go round the altar ; penitential psalms are chanted, 
 and those piercing cries of which Jewish throats are capable 
 resound through the temple-courts. Baruch, too, the brave 
 and faithful Baruch, betakes himself to God's house ; or rather, 
 for how should he win the attention of this busy multitude ? 
 to one of the many chambers of different sizes attached to the 
 temple. A fellow scribe, whose duties bring him into constant 
 relations to the king, and who is the brother of Jeremiah's 
 patron Ahikam, offers him hospitality. Probably he is ac- 
 quainted with Baruch, who himself has a family connexion 
 with the court, being the brother of one high functionary (Jer. 
 li. 59, see " Variorum Bible ") and the grandson of another 
 (2 Chron. xxxiv. 8). x In this large room Baruch recites one or 
 more prophecies to many of the people, declaring that "this 
 
 1 The respectful behaviour of the princes to Baruch in v. 15 confirms 
 the view that he was of good social rank; comp. Joscphus, "Ant." x, 
 9, i. This illustrates Jeremiah's caution to Baruch in |cr. xlv. 5,1.
 
 THERE BE GODS MANY, LORDS MA\Y. 147 
 
 house shall become like Shiloh," and that " Nebuchadrezzar shall 
 destroy this land and all the countries round about " (Jer. xxvi. 
 6, xxv. 9 ; comp. xxxvi. 29), but doubtless adding a strong 
 appeal to them to " return every man from his evil way that I 
 (Jehovah) may forgive their iniquity " (Jer. xxxvi. 3). 
 
 Not a very attractive sermon for those who think to move 
 Jehovah by forms and ceremonies ! The next to hear it, by their 
 own request, are the princes in their council-chamber. They too 
 are startled at its boldness. They know Jeremiah, but a pre- 
 diction quite so definite as this they have not yet heard from 
 him. They also know Jehoiakim, and how passionately he 
 resents the least infringement of his royal rights. As politicians, 
 too, perhaps they partly sympathize with him, even though, as 
 fellow-converts of Josiah, the oldest and gravest of them revere 
 Josiah's prophet. They turn trembling one to another, and say 
 unto Barucli, We have to tell tJie king of all these words (ver. 
 1 6). We all know the sequel ! it is one of the scenes in the 
 Bible-story which has engraved itself the most deeply on the 
 memory. Jehoiakim sends for the scroll. It is December ; 
 Jehoiakim is sitting in the " winter house," i.e., in that part of 
 the royal palace which was arranged for use in winter (comp. 
 Amos iii. 15), and there is a fire burning in the fire-pan or 
 brasier still, as I know by experience, commonly used in Syria? 
 and called by a name (kamlti) which also designates the months 
 of December and January. How piercingly cold these months 
 can be, even to those who have come from temperate climes, is 
 well known. One remembers, too, how in Ezra's time, on the 
 twentieth day of the ninth month (i.e., some time in December), 
 all the people sat in the street of the house of God, trembling 
 because of this matter, and for the great rain (Ezra x. 9). A 
 group of courtiers stands in the background. Jehudi (a courtier ; 
 but, being the son of an Ethiopian, not a Jewish citizen) comes 
 forward and reads first one column, then another, and then 
 another. But the proud king can bear it no longer ; he rises 
 he steps forward three high officers in vain attempt to check 
 him he snatches the scroll from the reader's hands he cuts it, 
 with a cruel kind of pleasure, into piece after piece, and throws 
 it into the fire. Then, as he watches the curling fragments, he 
 despatches three other high officers, to arrest the prophet and 
 the scribe on a charge of high treason. 
 
 The fortunes of spiritual religion hang upon the escape of 
 Teremiah.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 BRIGHT VISIONS IN THE DEATH-CHAMBER 
 
 Jeremiah's Wartburg period and its results The drought The problem ot 
 Israel's spiritual condition The new covenant Jehoiakiin's rebellion 
 The Rechabites Two symbolic actions Jehoiachin's captivity His 
 character and Nebuchadrezzar's. 
 
 THE duel between Jehoiakim and Jeremiah reminds us to some 
 extent of that between Ahab and Elijah. Differences of course 
 there are, but both at any rate agree in this, that a prophet 
 singlehanded overmatched a king and his false prophets. Take 
 Jeremiah for instance. Even if he had paid for his boldness 
 with his life, yet he had effectually thwarted the advocates of 
 the insane policy of resistance. You remember the complaint 
 of the enemies of Jeremiah some time after this, He iveakeneth 
 the hands of the men of war and of all the people in speaking 
 'itch words unto them (Jer. xxxviii. 4). This was precisely 
 what the prophet did, with truest patriotism, on this occasion. 
 The stern oracles recited by Baruch produced such an effect 
 that no one either would or could lift a hand against Nebuchad- 
 rezzar. Thus a brief respite was gained for earnest preachers 
 to renew God's conditional offers of mercy, and a last chance 
 presented to the Jews for repentance. Do you not admire the 
 loving craft by which Jeremiah accomplished this ? Said I not 
 rightly that he was fertile in resources ? 
 
 Elijah and Jeremiah were both for the moment successful, 
 but each of them had to flee from his defeated antagonist. Of 
 the latter we are told that Jehovah hid him " (Jer. xxxvi. 26). 
 
 1 The princes had already told Baruch to go into hiding with Jeremiah 
 (v. 26) ; but how easy it should have been for the king's officers to track 
 them, as they tracked Urijah (Jer. xxvi. 20-23) '
 
 CRIGIIT VISIONS IN THE DEATH-CHAMBER. 149 
 
 May there not be an allusion to this in a psalm plausibly 
 ascribed to Jeremiah, In the covert of thy presence dost than 
 hide them from the ploitings of man ; thou kcepest them secretly 
 in a pavilion from the strife of tongties * (Psa. xxxi. 20, see 
 R.V.) ? One loves to linger on such sweet words, and even to 
 hope that they may often be verified in lives far humbler than 
 Jeremiah's. To be kept in a pavilion from the strife of tongues 
 oh how much one needs this amidst the jangling controversies 
 of our time ! Oh how hard it is to preserve the attitude of the 
 peace-maker, of one who does justice to the elements of truth 
 in contending parties, a Falkland in theology and in politics ! 
 How hard, nay, how impossible, without a special benediction 
 not vouchsafed to those who do not seek it. Keep me, as the 
 apple of the eye; hide me tinder the shadow of thy wings not 
 that I may evade my share in the work of the age, but that, 
 being in heaven with my heart, I may work the better with head 
 and hands upon earth. Fairness and charity are sure tests of 
 this heart-communion with heaven, and these perfum.es of the 
 soul cannot be long preserved unless we come sometimes 
 into a desert place apart, and rest awhile. There we repent of 
 having followed human leaders, instead of Him whose name is 
 Truth, and whose " banner over us is Love." There we bathe 
 in the waters of life, and lose the morbid craving for earthly 
 excitements, the joy of battle and the fame of achievement. 
 Too seldom have we collectedness enough for this spiritual trans- 
 figuration ; and so God Himself gently draws us apart into soli- 
 tude. This was now the case with our prophet, who had indeed 
 acquired a new peace of mind, but who was still ignorant of that 
 sweet charity which believeth and hopeth all things. Perhaps 
 "the Lord hid" His faithful servant, in order to guide him to this 
 loftier height. Jeremiah should not die knowing no more than 
 a Moses or an Isaiah. It was not enough that he had lost the 
 irritation of conflict, and accepted God's will as in some unconi- 
 prehended way the best ; not enough that he loved God and 
 God's people with a pure heart fervently. A great thing was 
 to happen. Jeremiah was to be taken into God's secrets, as no 
 other prophet had been ; and as a consequence of this, he 
 was to realize the capacities of the individual soul as he had 
 not done before. He was to learn to love, not merely Israel, 
 but each Israelite. 
 
 1 See also Psa. xxxi. 21, and cf. Jcr. i. 18.
 
 150 JEREMIAH. 
 
 And the king commanded to take Bantch and Jeremiah; 
 but Jehovah hid them. The first result of this enforced 
 seclusion reminds us of Martin Luther's Bible-work in the 
 Wartburg. Jeremiah too betook himself to Bible-work. The 
 first prophetic roll had been destroyed ; but, as in the case of 
 Tynclale's New Testament, a new and improved edition issued, 
 as it were, from the flames. Jeremiah cared intensely for his 
 people ; he might win a deeper love for individuals, but no man 
 could love Israel more than he. And if love if even his love, 
 anxious, importunate, and sometimes disguised under threaten- 
 ings was powerless to move his people, yet a stronger appeal 
 to the motive of self-interest might perhaps do so. Therefore, 
 we are told, he not only reproduced the old prophecies, but 
 added thereto " many like words " (Jer. xxxvi. 32). Only for 
 the king, though a son of his friend Josiah, he had no love and 
 consequently no hope left. He foresaw that Jehoiakim's vow 
 of fidelity was only a momentary shift, and spared no circum- 
 stance of horror in foretelling his end. But we must not think 
 that the wacle in Jer. xxxvi. 30 is simply retaliation on Jere- 
 miah's part. It is no doubt called forth by a personal offence 
 against Jehovah's prophet, but the same awful details come 
 before us again in a different setting (Jer. xxii. 19) as the 
 punishment of a life of consistent transgression of God's law. 
 Jeremiah was already moving towards the individualistic view 
 of morality implied, as we shall see, in his great final discovery 
 in the sphere of religion, and which a prophet considerably 
 influenced by him (Ezekiel) expresses in these striking words, 
 
 The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear 
 the iniquity of the father^ neither shall the father bear the 
 iniquity of the son: -the righteousness of the righteous shall 
 be upon him, and the "wickedness of the wicked shall be -upon 
 him (Ezek. xviii. 20 ; " soul" = person, cf. Ezek. xvi. 5, A.V.). 
 
 Among the prophecies written in the strict privacy of this 
 period I am tempted to include at any rate chaps, xiv., xv. (or 
 xiv. i-xv. 9). The softer side of the prophet's nature comes 
 out finely in the first of these chapters, which brings vividly 
 before us the painful " searchings of heart" which accompanied 
 the exercise of his prophetic ministry. One of those terrible 
 droughts which so frequently visited Palestine had caused acute 
 suffering among all classes, as well as among the cattle with 
 whom psalmists and prophets never fail to sympathize. Jere-
 
 BRIGHT VISIONS IN THE DEATH-CHAMBER. 151 
 
 mi ah's picture of it is "like some of Dante's in its realisir, its 
 pathos, and its terror." Twice he intercedes for his people on 
 the ground of the covenant, but in vain. How pathetic is the 
 pleading in v. 8 ! 
 
 O thou hope of Israel, the saviour thereof in time oj 
 trouble, why shonldest thou be as a stranger in the land (a 
 /ulroiicoc, who had no civic rights, and no interest in the com- 
 monwealth), and as a wayfaring man that trtrneth aside to 
 tarry for a night? (Jer. xiv. 8, A.V.) The first verse of chap, 
 xv. connects it very clearly with that which precedes. 
 
 11 On receiving a revelation (xv. 2-9) of the bitter fate in 
 store for his people, Jeremiah bursts out into a heart- 
 rending complaint that his destiny should throw him into such 
 a whirlwind of strife. His Lord at once corrects and consoles 
 him (xv. 10-21)." So I have myself explained the connexion, 1 
 though not concealing my strong doubts. Surely we cannot 
 appreciate chap. xvi. unless we read it in close connexion with 
 xv. 7-9. Could we venture on a rearrangement of the prophet's 
 discourses, we should, I think, be justified in placing this 
 thrilling passage (xv. 10-21) immediately before the section xl. 
 1-6, which relates the prophet's decision to remain with the 
 Jews at home, and not to go to Babylon with the exiles. At 
 any rate, it is this passage of Jeremiah's life which seems to 
 me to be best illustrated by it. I do not think that Jeremiah's 
 newly gained acquiescence in the will of God concerning his 
 people was so quickly lost. But how his heart must have bled 
 that even the comparatively small trouble of the drought could 
 not be taken away in answer to his prayers ! In this respect 
 again he reminds us of Elijah, who, charitable as he was by 
 nature (i Kings xvii. 17-24), and fervent and effectual as his 
 supplications were (James v. 16, 17), could not help his people 
 till it turned back to Jehovah. 
 
 The drought in Jehoiakim's reign, however, was but a 
 " beginning of pangs," a prophecy of severer judgments, a 
 sign that Jehovah's longsuffering was exhausted. The northern 
 Israel, when gathered in a national assembly, returned from 
 " the error of its way." Till Judah did the like, what hope 
 was there for its future ? And this is partly why Jeremiah 
 from the very first is so earnest in attacking the moral abuses 
 
 1 "Jnrcmiah" (in the " Pulpit Commentary"), i. 372.
 
 152 JEREMIAH. 
 
 of his time. Jehovah could not be to His people that which 
 He wished to be until they had offered Him that to which He 
 could respond. / said, Obey my voice, and walk in my ways, 
 and I will be to you a God (Jer. vii. 23). Nevertheless they 
 proceed from evil to evil, and know not me, saith Jehovah (Jer. 
 ix. 3). Therefore, O Jerusalem, wash thine heart from wicked- 
 ness (Jer. iv. 14). 
 
 But can such a great thing be? The prophet has heard of 
 physical but not of moral miracles. He thinks with Zophar in 
 the Book of Job written as some think at this very time that 
 an empty man will get understanding, when a wild ass's coll 
 is born a man (Job xi. 12, R.V. marg.). Can the Ethiopian 
 change his skin, or the leopard his spots ? . . . Woe unto thcc, 
 O Jemsalem ! how long yet ere thou become pure f ' (Jer. xiii. 
 23, 27). You see the prophet is like a man without a clue in a 
 maze. The intricacy of the problem baffles him. It is not 
 Job's difficulty of the righteous man suffering, but the still 
 greater one of the want of means for breaking the force of 
 habit, and giving the will a new bias. 
 
 I venture to suppose that Jeremiah began to make the dis- 
 covery, or, speaking religiously, to receive the revelation, which 
 threw a flood of light on this spiritual problem, during his 
 enforced seclusion, 2 and that this is why Jehovah hid Baruch 
 and Jeremiah. It takes long to bring a great thought to 
 maturity. The process was certainly completed in Jeremiah's 
 case at the fall of Jerusalem ; when did it begin ? Surely on 
 the day when the last hope of Judah's repentance began to 
 fade away when the faithful prophets had either been killed 
 (like Uriah) or driven into hiding-places (like Jeremiah), so that 
 the work of preaching could only be done by obscure disciples 
 at the peril of their lives. The last hope had not yet quite dis- 
 appeared ; but it was as feeble as the last gleam of departing 
 day. What, then, is this sublime truth which visited the pro- 
 phet's mind, and enabled him to look forward to the dread future 
 with more than calmness, to bear up under the personal perils of 
 
 1 R.V.'s rendering, in some respects an improvement upon A.V., retains 
 the faulty "be made clean." "Allow thyself to be made clean " would be 
 better ; but this is too lengthy. 
 
 2 I do not deny that in their present form Jer. xxx., xxxi. belong to a 
 later period than the reign of Jehoiakim. See Kuencn, " Ondcrzock," ii. 
 207, but comp. Graf, " Jcremin," pp. 365-368.
 
 BRIGHT VISIONS IN THE DEATH-CHAMBER. 153 
 
 the siege and the privations hardly less painful which fol- 
 lowed ? 
 
 The problem which besets Jeremiah is not quite the same 
 as that which beset St. Paul, when he wrote those three 
 memorable chapters, Rom. ix., >:., xi. St. Paul's problem is 
 twofold, first, how the apparent fact of Israel's rejection is to 
 be accounted for; and next, how, in spite of this fact, the 
 ancient promises to Israel are to be fulfilled. The first part of 
 St. Paul's problem is discussed by him at great length. He 
 answers it both upon theological and anthropological or psycho- 
 logical grounds. IlatJi not the potter a right over the clay, from 
 the same lump to make one part a vessel unto honour and another 
 unto dishonour? (Rom. ix. 21, R.V.) This question gives the 
 kernel of his theological argument : God predestines. As to 
 Israel he saith, All the day long did I spread out my hands 
 unto a disobedient and gainsaying people (Rom. x. 21, R.V.). 
 This quotation from Isaiah gives the substance of his psycho- 
 logical argument : man is free to obey or disobey. The second 
 part of his problem the apostle does not discuss at all ; it was 
 unnecessary after the many glimpses which he had given into 
 his Divine philosophy. A hardening in part hath befallen 
 Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in ; and so all 
 Israel shall be saved (Rom. xi. 25, 26, R.V.). The judicial 
 blindness from which the Jews suffer at present shall in Cod's 
 good time be taken away, and then the gospel will find an 
 entrance into their heart ; or, to quote from an earlier Epistle, 
 Unto this day, whensoever Moses is read, a veil lictli upon their 
 heart ; but whensoever it shall turn to the Lord, the veil is 
 taken away (2 Cor. iii. 15, 16). 
 
 Our prophet would not have sympathized with St. Paul's 
 theological use of the figure of the potter. Very different is his 
 own application of it in chap, xviii. Jehovah, according to 
 him, has not the sovereign right to do as He will either with 
 individuals or with nations, His action being strictly limited by 
 a regard to character. Israel was, no doubt, in these latter 
 years, like clay in the hand of the potter : its fate is about to 
 be determined, liut Jehovah has endowed His creature with 
 the power of choosing its own lot. No threat of punishment 
 can be unconditional. One instant (such is the Divine voice 
 in our prophet's heart) / may speak concerning a nation and a 
 kingdom, to pluck up and to pull deivn and to destroy; but ifthat
 
 1 54 JEREMIAH. 
 
 nation, against which I have spoken, turn from their evil t 1 
 repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them (Jer. xviii. 7, 
 8). Nor would Jeremiah have laid such a stress on the judicial 
 hardening of Israel's heart. If it be true that Jehovah hath 
 rejected them (Jer. vi. 30), it is because they are all grievous 
 revolvers (Jer. vi. 28). Isaiah may introduce Jehovah saying, 
 Co on hearing, but understand not, and go on seeing, but per- 
 ceive not (Isa. vi. 9), but Jeremiah accounts for Israel's rebellion 
 simply and solely by a spontaneous action on Israel's part : 
 This people hath a revolting and a rebellions heart j they arc 
 revolted and gone (Jer. vi. 23). It is therefore not difficult to 
 Jeremiah to take in the idea of the rejection of Israel, con- 
 sidered apart from the Divine covenant ; but it is an enigma 
 how Jehovah's sure word of promise is to be fulfilled. Let us 
 see how light dawns upon the prophet. The record of it is to 
 be found in chaps, xxx., xxxi., which represent, as xxx. 4 states, 
 " the words which Jehovah spake concerning Israel and con- 
 cerning Judah." It is clear that Jeremiah can never have 
 delivered this prophecy before a mixed audience ; it is an 
 anticipation of Isa. xl.-lxvi., and meant for the comfort of 
 penitent believers during the Exile. The later seer's prophecy 
 of Israel's Restoration may be, poetically regarded, finer than 
 Jeremiah's, but except in chap. liii. (the chapter of the Sin-bearer, 
 and in the passages relative to the Church), is less original ; 
 so that the earliest " evangelical prophet " is, not the Baby- 
 lonian Isaiah, but Jeremiah, and chaps, xxx., xxxi., are the 
 casket in which the evangelical truths are enshrined. The 
 prophecy falls into two parts, the first reaching from xxx. 5 to 
 xxxi. 14, the second from xxxi. 15 to xxxi. 40. Part I. itself 
 has four sections, in each of which the prophet (or shall 
 I say ? the seer) reveals himself as a master of picturesque 
 imagery. His usual practice is to begin a section with a picture 
 of the calamitous present, but this is only to enhance the effect 
 of a prophetic description of the glorious future. Yes ; the 
 prophet has come to the end of his jeremiads ; he can almost 
 welcome calamity in the strength of his new faith in the Divine 
 promise. As one of the later psalmists wrote from the point of 
 view of at least an initial fulfilment, He hath sent redemption 
 unto his people j he hath appointed his covenant for ever j 
 holy and reverend is his name (Psa. cxi. 9). Redemption ! A 
 short time ago Jeremiah would not perhaps have thought it
 
 BRIGHT VISIONS IN' THK DEATH-CHAMBER. 155 
 
 possible ; but now he builds upon it as an assured certainty. 
 With the eye and car of faith, he discerns Jehovah approaching 
 to redeem Israel, and saying, I have loved thce -with an ever- 
 lasting love ; therefore do I continue lovingkindncss unto thee. 
 
 In the fourth section (vv. 7-14), transported with joy, the 
 prophet breaks through his custom, and at once gives an 
 idyllic sketch of the future prosperity. Specially beautiful is 
 the opening of the second part, 1 which, as Matt. ii. 16-18 
 shows, found a home in the Jewish heart. The prophet 
 seems to hear Rachel weeping for her banished children, 
 and comforts her with the assurance that they shall yet be 
 restored. For Ephraim has come to himself, and God, who has 
 overheard his soliloquy, advances towards him with gracious 
 promises. Then another voice is heard calling Ephraim 
 home. See the generosity of a true prophet a statesman in 
 the kingdom of God. Should Jeremiah's prophecy fall into 
 the hands of the recently acquired subjects of Judah, how they 
 will contrast his treatment of them with Isaiah's ! The older 
 citizens of the enlarged state sufficiently know their prophet's 
 passionate love for his people. Well may they be content 
 with the few but radiant lines given them in Jer. xxxi. 23-25. 
 Alas ! too soon the sweet vision vanishes ; but it continues 
 to supply food for his Spirit-guided meditations. How this 
 strange reversal of Israel's fortunes (Israel's, not less than 
 Judah's, the " ten tribes " cannot be lost) can possibly be, is 
 as yet a moral mystery to Jeremiah, just as it was to the 
 psalmist who wrote those two strangely-contrasting verses, 
 
 Lord, where are thy old lovingkindnesses 
 
 Which thou swarest unto David in thy faithfulness ? 
 
 For thou hast said, levingkindness shall be built for ever ; 
 In tite heaven (itself) -wilt thou stablish thy faithfulness. 
 
 (Psa. Ixxxix. 49, 2.) 
 
 But the fact, to both writers, is not less certain than the exist- 
 ence of God. The first helpful idea that occurs to him (Jer. 
 xxxi. 29, 30) is that God cannot, strictly speaking, be said to 
 
 1 At that most interesting place Eleusis, I could not help comparing Demeter, 
 sitting on the mystic stone, and weeping for her daughter, with the poet- 
 prophet's Rachel. May not both be fitly taken as symbols of Humanity 
 weeping for its children carried off into the " land of the enemy " ? Surely 
 this is in the spirit of St. Matthew (comp. Dame, " Convito," ii. i). We all 
 of us find such higher meanings in Shakespeare ; \\!iy not in Jeremiah?
 
 I$6 JEREMIAH. 
 
 "visit the iniquity of the fathers upon the children.'-' If the 
 children are punished, it must be because human sin has a 
 natural tendency to perpetuate itself in succeeding generations ; 
 no transgressor is punished simply for the sin of his ancestor. 
 As Barabas asks the cruel governor in Marlowe's "Jew of 
 Malta " (act i., scene 2), 
 
 " But say the tribe that I descended of 
 Were all in general cast away for sin, 
 Shall I be tried by their transgression? 
 ' The man that dealeth righteously shall live' " 
 
 A comforting idea, doubtless, during the Captivity, but one 
 which does not clear up the difficulty how an ungodly nation 
 is to be made godly. Hezekiah and Josiah had cut the Gordian 
 knot, but to the little band of advanced religious thinkers a 
 violent reformation had become intensely repugnant. Even 
 Deuteronomy did not meet the wants of the time ; it was a 
 compromise between two opposing principles the legal and 
 the evangelical. Jeremiah felt that if the problem were to be 
 solved, it must be on the evangelical and not on the legal 
 principle ; in short, that he must work out the germinal ideas 
 found in the prophetic not the legal part of Deuteronomy. 
 Obedience, according to this part of the book, is based, not 
 upon compulsion, but upon love (see Deut. xi. i), and in one 
 remarkable passage (Deut. x. 16 for I exclude Deut. xxx. 6, as 
 not in the original book) we find the strangely new phrase " to 
 circumcise the heart." But was this "evangelical" enough? 
 Had not Israel lost (if it ever possessed it) the faculty of loving 
 God? What great things God had done in the past ! and yet 
 Israel had never- felt more than a slight tingling of gratitude 
 comparable to morning dew. And how could Israel "circum- 
 cise " his own heart ? The virgin of Israel is fallen; she can 
 no more rise ; she is cast down upon her land; tlicrc is none 
 to raise her up (Amos v. 2). Moses has not sympathy enough ; 
 he broke the two tables of stone at the sight of Israel's very 
 first sin, and what means of help has he in his covenant ? 
 Surely the thunders of Sinai do but sound the knell of con- 
 demned sinners. And so with the boldness of despair, and the 
 intensity of a love like St. Paul's (Rom. ix. 3), Jeremiah dares 
 to proclaim that the old covenant is superseded by a new one 
 which more completely meets the wants of poor human nature.
 
 BRIGHT VISIONS IN THE DEATH-CHAMBER. 157 
 
 Its contents may be summed tip thus. God, of His free grace, 
 will make the people what He would have them to be, by first 
 forgiving their sins in so absolute a manner that it shall seem 
 as though He had forgotten them, and then as it were writing 
 His requirements on the tablets of their hearts (comp. Psa. xl. 
 8). Neither priests nor sacrifices will therefore be henceforth 
 necessary the one for making known to men the details of 
 Jehovah's tordh, and the other for expiating sins and trans- 
 gressions. A written /Jrd/i, too, will become superfluous, and 
 there will be no longer the terrible fear that the copies in 
 circulation may be " handled deceitfully " (see Jcr. viii. 8). 
 
 Some one, however, may ask, Is not this going too far ? 
 Does the promise of the new covenant really anticipate that 
 priesthood and sacrifices will be abolished ? But did I use the 
 word " abolished " ? Jeremiah's words do indeed appear to me 
 to point to a time when a regenerate people will, as the hymn 
 says, 
 
 see Thee face to face, 
 
 In peaceful, glad Jerusalem, thrice holy, happy place, 
 When Sacrament and Temple shall never more be known, 
 When Thou art Temple, Sacrifice, and Priest upon the throne." 
 
 But neither here nor elsewhere does the prophet explicitly 
 announce such wonderful things ; nor do I say that the last 
 line was within the range even of his thoughts. All that he 
 affirms here is that there shall be direct relations between 
 Jehovah and each member of His people (individuality shall 
 come to its rights) ; all that vii. 22 declares is that the Sinai 
 covenant related not to sacrifices but to obedience ; all that 
 xvii. 12, 13 and iii. 16, taken together, say is that Jehovah is 
 Israel's true sanctuary, so that the presence of the ark in the 
 earthly temple was unimportant. 1 We may safely assume that 
 Jeremiah's disciples consisted of two classes of men those 
 who could rise to the sunlit heights of spirituality (comp. Psa. 
 li. 17), and those who into their pictures of the future could not 
 help introducing temple and ark, priests and sacrifices (see 
 xvii. 26, xxxi. 11, 14, and comp. Psa. li. 19). In truth, Jeremiah's 
 predictions of the Messianic age were all the more stimulative 
 
 1 The Deuterononiic lorCih (apart from its setting) does not mention the 
 ark. Josiah, to prevent superstition, forbade it to be carried about in 
 processions (2 Chron. xxxv. 2). A late legend says that Jeremiah afterwards 
 hid it in a cave on Mount 1'isgah (2 Mace. ii. 4, 5).
 
 158 JEREMIAH. 
 
 because of their real or apparent inconsistencies. It would not 
 have been well that one class of thinkers alone should be able 
 to appeal to Jeremiah ; he shines out more gloriously as the 
 author of a movement than he would have done as the founder 
 of a sect. If Isa. Ixvi. i is inspired by Jeremiah, so also is 
 Ezek. xxxvii. 26-28,' and, may we not add, the prophecies on 
 the Church and on the Sin-bearer due to that great prophet, who 
 was "hidden" in Babylonia (like Jeremiah in Jeiusalem) that 
 he might brood deeply over the spiritual problem of Israel. 
 Not Jeremiah, but the Second Isaiah, had the first dim intuition 
 of the " mediator of the new covenant," but the "new covenant " 
 itself was first foreseen by Jeremiah. 
 
 Said I not right that " the fortunes of spiritual religion hung 
 on the escape of Jeremiah ? " But in fact his life is a series of 
 escapes. He was soon to exclaim whether he wrote the words 
 or not, they must express his feeling, Blessed be Jehovah ! for 
 he hath shewed me passing great kindness in a besieged city 
 (Psa. xxxi. 21). Wishing himself back under the Pharaoh's 
 supremacy, Jehoiakim in B.C. 597 broke his oath to Babylon, 
 three years after he had taken it. The neighbouring peoples 
 refused to join him. Following the example of "the Chaldaeans " 
 (i.e., those left in garrison in Syria), they made raids upon the 
 country districts of Judah (2 Kings xxiv. 2, 2 Chron. xxxvi. 5 
 Sept.), driving a crowd of fugitives before them to Jerusalem. 
 One dramatic scene in Jeremiah's biography, well versified by 
 Dean Plumptre, belongs to this period (Jer. xxxv.). Venturing 
 forth in this great crisis, he noticed among the refugees a group 
 of men of strange aspect, seldom or never seen before in 
 Jerusalem. These men belonged to the tribe of the Rechabites, 
 who were a branch of the Kenites, and therefore bound by an 
 ancient alliance to the Israelites, and who stood, both socially 
 and religiously, exactly where the Israelites stood during their 
 wanderings, after they had consolidated their union on the basis 
 of Jehovah-worship. 2 They had had, as it seems, a great 
 reformer, who had restored the purity of their social and 
 religious customs, one Jonadab, whose zeal for Jehovah is 
 described in 2 Kings x. 15-27, and whose personal influence on 
 
 1 Note, in this connexion, Ezekiel's fondness for the term "covenant" 
 (see Ezek. xi. 20, xiv. u, xxxiv. 24, xxxvi. 28, xxxvii. 23, 27). 
 
 2 Probably enough, the Rcchabites adopted into their clan many who, 
 like the Esscnes afterwards, were disgusted with a too sensuous civilization.
 
 BRIGHT VISIONS IN THE DEATH-CHAMBER. 159 
 
 his clan exceeded, as Jeremiah declares, that of even the greatest 
 prophets on the Israelites. Jeremiah knew the religious con- 
 stancy of these Rechabites, and put it to a severe test, in order 
 to contrast it with the religious inconstancy of the Israelites. 
 According to their law, these simple folk ought not to have 
 entered a walled city like Jerusalem. If they had broken their 
 vows in one respect, why should they not in another ? There 
 were the wine-bowls and the drinking-cups ; why not enjoy one 
 of the sweetest and most valued products of civilization ? 
 Plainly and even bluntly the Rechabites refused to drink. 
 Jeremiah was prepared for this result, and at once pointed the 
 moral. 
 
 Jonadab had tied up his people to a life of hardship; Jehovah 
 had done the opposite, simply requiring obedience to certain 
 precepts, chiefly moral, which would set Israel on high above 
 the nations of the earth. Yet Jonadab's precepts were obeyed 
 and Jehovah's were not. Therefore all the threatenings con- 
 ditionally pronounced against Israel must be fulfilled, whereas 
 Jonadab, the son of Rechab, shall not want a man to stand 
 before me for ever (Jer. xxxv. 19). What does this closing 
 promise mean? "To live long in the land" is the reward of 
 filial obedience in Exod. xx. 12. The Rechabites therefore are to 
 continue in Judah, while the Jews are carried captive to Babylon. 
 Nor will their life be useless. They will go on witnessing to 
 the divinity of Jehovah in Jehovah's land. Although without 
 any but the simplest ritual, they will be, what Israel ought to 
 have been, a " kingdom of priests " (Exod. xix. 6) ; for " to stand 
 before Jehovah " is specially the function of priests. 1 
 
 The ceaseless inroads of the "bands" of divers nations were 
 almost worse to bear than a regular invasion. What such 
 "bands " could do, we may see from i Sam. xxx. i, 2 (comp. v. 
 8). Even the Rechabites fled before them in dismay. The land 
 of Judah was passing through a similar experience to that of 
 Babylonia during the Scythian invasion. Was Jehoiakim, then, 
 defenceless ? Yes ; the warriors were paralyzed by dread of 
 the Chaldasans, and Neco's troops, on which (comp. Jer. xvii. 5, 
 6) the king probably relied, were slow to appear. In the midst 
 of this confusion the chief author of it all died. How, we 
 cannot say for certain. Did he, like Joash, fall by the assassin's 
 
 1 Was Jeremiah thinking of the favourite phrase of Jonadab's great 
 predecessor Elijah, Jehovah, before whom I stand ?
 
 l6o JEREMIAH. 
 
 hand, and was his dead body thereupon cast out unburied, as 
 Jeremiah had threatened ? Or does the Septuagint correctly 
 report (2 Chron. xxxvi. 8) that " Joakim slept with his fathers, 
 and was buried in ganozan " (i.e., the garden of Oza or Uzza) ? 
 The latter view is at any rate much the easier. 1 Jehoiakim 
 died in peace, and upon his unoffending son was visited the 
 collective sin of his family. It was a short reign which fell to 
 the lot of Jehoiachin just as long as Napoleon's after his land- 
 ing in March, 1815, or as that of his own uncle Jehoahaz, and 
 then more bitter weeping than even for his ill-fated uncle. 
 But I must not anticipate ; for Jeremiah has left us an ample 
 record of his prophetic activity during these three months. 2 
 
 We know the prophet's tone of mind already. He was no 
 longer called upon 
 
 " To watch with firm, unshrinking eye 
 His darling visions as they die." 
 
 The old visions had long since died away ; new and more 
 divine ones had taken their place. One of his first actions was 
 to renew the terrible announcements familiar to us already from 
 chap. vii. To emphasize this, he had recourse to that sign- 
 language in which the heroes and prophets of Israel delighted 
 (i Sam. xi. 7, Amos vii., viii.), although the words of the Hebrew 
 tongue were as full of expressive figure as they could be. Once 
 more, it was the work of the potter which he chose for a symbol, 
 but not the still soft though moulded clay (as in chap. -xviii.), 
 but the already definitely formed vessel. With this he went 
 with certain elders into the glen of Hinnom, and, as a Syrian 
 fdlah still does when under the dominion of violent passion, 
 shivered the jar to atoms. 3 Need I repeat the prophet's sermon, 
 or need I add that it drew down upon him the wrath of the 
 priests ? The instrument of torture applied to him (Jer. xx. 2) 
 was doubtless more painful than our " stocks " ; and his punish- 
 ment was equivalent to a declaration that he was a madman 
 and a pretender to the prophetic office (see Jer. xxix. 26). It 
 was the duty of the " second priest " (comp. Jer. lii. 24) to keep 
 
 1 The statement in the Greek version runs directly counter to the terms 
 of the denunciation in Jer. xxii. 19, xxxvi. 30, and must therefore be founded 
 on tradition. 
 
 2 2 Kings xxiv. 8 says "three months" ; 2 Chron. xxxvi. 9 adds, "and 
 ten days." 
 
 3 Similar actions are ascribed to early Quaker zealots.
 
 BRIGHT VISIONS IN THE DEATH-CHAMBER. 161 
 
 an eye on such ; in fact, the guild of the prophets was subject 
 to a certain official control on the part of the priests. 1 Jeremiah, 
 though in the "stocks," will not be hindered from uttering his 
 revelations. He answers Pashhur very nearly as Amos answered 
 Amaziah the priest of Bethel in like circumstances (Amos vii. 16, 
 17). I do not think, however, that because of this bitter utterance 
 I need modify what I said just now of Jeremiah's tone of mind. 
 It is true that Jer. xx. 7-18 contains expressions which are not 
 in harmony with the heroic temper which I have ascribed to him. 
 But this section is almost entirely out of chronological order ; 
 probably it was placed where it now stands simply because 
 the phrase Mcigor-missablb occurs both in v. 4 and in v. 10. 
 
 This was not the prophet's only use of sign-speech. He is 
 deficient in that fine taste which distinguishes a greater than 
 the prophets in His parables from common life. But when we 
 see his meaning, I think we shall excuse him for the symbolic 
 text of his sermon against Judah's pride. Evidently his mind 
 was much exercised by the dissolution of the bond between 
 Jehovah and Israel. This is what he says elsewhere, in a 
 choicer style, of the new king, 
 
 As I live, saitk Jehovah, though Coniah, the son ofjehoiakim, 
 king of Judah, be a signet upon my right hand, surely I will 
 pluck thee thence (Jer xxii. 24). 
 
 The humiliation of course is greater when the object of com- 
 parison is a rotting linen apron. I cannot help thinking that 
 the choice of this symbol was dictated by a proverb like the 
 Arabic, " He is unto me in place of a waist-wrapper 2 ; " it will 
 be noticed that the second part of the discourse actually has a 
 proverbial saying foHts text. The strangeness of Jer. xiii. i-i i 
 will now perhaps offend the reader less, especially if I add that 
 "Euphrates" in A.V. and R.V. is probably a mistake; the 
 Hebrew has P'rath, which may be a name, or a corrupted name, 
 of a place near Anathoth, still known, as our maps show, by the 
 name Farah. 3 It was not, then, by the Euphrates (which is not 
 
 1 W. Robertson Smith, " The Prophets in Israel," p. 389. 
 
 a We have no more dignified equivalent for 'ezor = Arab, 'izdr (on which 
 see Lane, "Arabic Lexicon," i. 53 ; Dozy, " Dictionnaire detaille des noms 
 des vGtements," p. 24, &c.). 
 
 3 See Robinson, "Biblical Researches," ii. 288. Should not P'ralh be 
 Parah (Josh, xviii. 23), as Birch suggests ("Palestine Fund Statement," 
 Oct. 1880, p. 236) ? 
 
 12
 
 i62 JEREMIAH. 
 
 a rocky stream) that Jeremiah hid his apron, but in a rocky and 
 yet even in summer verdant retreat, not so far from the famous 
 Michmash, close to one'of the torrents which unite to form the 
 Kelt (Cherith ?). How he must have suffered as he walked 
 alone to this spot, perhaps repeating the words, But if ye will 
 not hear it, my soul shall weep in secret for your pride (Jer. xiii. 
 17) ; or, Is this man Coniah a despised broken pot? is he a 
 "vessel wherein is no pleasure? (Jer. xxii. 28, comp. xiii. 14). 
 
 Soon after Jeremiah's return the second time, may we not 
 suppose that his worst previsions began to be realized ? Up to 
 the last he had cried, Hear ye, and give earj but now tlie De- 
 stroyer of the nations is on his way. The cities of the Southland 
 are shut up (blocked up with ruins), and the daughter of Zion 
 is left . . . as a besieged city (not yet beleagured, but cut off 
 from communication with the provinces). 1 Neco seems at 
 length to have despatched troops in aid of Judah, but it was of 
 no avail. A part of the Destroyer's army was detached to invest 
 Jerusalem, while he himself (probably) met and defeated the 
 Egyptians, so that the king of Egypt came not again any more out 
 of his land (2 Kings xxiv. 7) . The harvest is past, cried Jeremiah, 
 the summer is ended^ and we have not been saved (Jer. viii. 20). 
 Nebuchadrezzar's arrival determined the young king and his 
 mother and his court to surrender at discretion ; and the king 
 of Babylon took him in. the eighth year of his reign (2 Kings 
 xxiv. 12). Never again did Jehoiachin see the land of Judah 
 or Judah's last great prophet. But was there no mitigation of 
 his lot ? Yes ; a sad one indeed, but one for which Jehoahaz 
 might have envied him. All that was best and worthiest in the 
 old capital city went with Jehoiachin to Babylon. Most of the 
 trained warriors (who were doubtless also the proprietors of the 
 soil),- 7000 in all, most of the artisans, amounting to 1000, 
 and 2000 more heads of families, including doubtless many 
 refugees from the provinces, were carried away from their own 
 dear hill-country to the monotonous but fertile plain between the 
 Euphrates and the Tigris. Of the two greatest religious thinkers 
 of that time, one (Ezekiel) was taken and the other (Jeremiah) 
 was left. The numbers indeed arc not quite certain. Some 
 think that the passage, 2 Kings xxiv. 13, 14, has been misplaced.* 
 
 1 Jer. xiii. 15, iv. 6 ; Isa. i. 8. 
 
 a Stade thinks that these two verses properly refer to the deportation of 
 the year 586, and points out that they interrupt the flow of the narrative 
 (" Gcschichte," p. 680, and see the reference there given).
 
 BRIGHT VISIONS IN THE DEATH-CHAMBER. 163 
 
 I do not see that this makes much difference (see vers. 15, 16) ; 
 but the total number of the captives must have been larger than 
 that mentioned in the narrative. We may be sure that sons 
 and daughters very often (not always ; see Ezek. xxiv. 21) ac- 
 companied their parents. This was the beginning of the " dis- 
 plantation " (to use a word of Sir Walter Raleigh's) of Judah 
 the first great fulfilment of the ancient prophecy in Isa. iii. 1-3. 
 Let us pause here to contrast the two men thus strangely 
 brought together Jehoiachin and Nebuchadrezzar. Both 
 indeed are called lions, the former in Ezek. xix. 6 ; the latter 
 in Jer. iv. 7, xlix. 19 ; but if Jehoiachin had really shown a war- 
 like and ambitious character, would his offended overlord have 
 spared his life? From Jer. xiii. 18 it would almost seem that 
 he shared the supreme power with his mother Nehushta. 1 If 
 he did so, we may be sure that Nehushta had the reality and he 
 the semblance of power, according to the old saying, A child is 
 my people's tyrant, and women rule over it (Isa. iii. 12). Add 
 to this the friendly feelirigs which he inspired alike in Babylonian 
 kings, contemporary Hebrew prophets, and the later generations 
 of the Jews, 2 and I think we may safely describe Jehoiachin as 
 a man of mild and probably (even from the higher point of view) 
 not irreligious character. I cannot, however, go to the length 
 of ascribing to him (with Ewald) the composition of Psalms 
 xlii., xliii., Ixxxiv. ; the " last sigh of the royal exile," as he 
 gazed from the hill above Banias, was one of those which "can- 
 not be uttered," least of all in lyric poems which soar so high 
 into the regions of faith. Perhaps, indeed, Nebuchadrezzar 
 could have appreciated these psalms better than his captive. 
 Energy and force of will sit upon the brows of the young hero 
 in the cameo portrait of him at Berlin ; 3 there is, however, a 
 
 1 Great stress is laid on the fact that the queen-mother accompanied her 
 son into exile (see Jer. xxii. 26, xxix. 2 ; 2 Kings xxiv. 12, 13). 
 
 2 See z Kings xxv. 27-30 ; Ezek. i. 2 ; Lam. iv. 20 ; Josephus, "De 
 Bello Jud. " vi. 2, i (where an annual commemoration of Jehoiachin is 
 spoken of). One of the gates of Jerusalem bore his name (Mishna, " Mid- 
 doth," ii. 6). 
 
 3 The type of features might no doubt be accounted for if Nebuchad- 
 rezzar could be shown to have had (like the Assyrian king Shashanq) an 
 Egyptian mother. But Babelon's view (in the large edition of Lenormant's 
 "Histoire, " iv. 394) does violence to Herodotus, who may himself have 
 credulously adopted a mere legend. On the Berlin portrait, my friend Prof. 
 Schrader has learnedly commented in the "Transactions of the Berlin 
 Academy, 1879," pp. 293-298.
 
 164 JEREMIAH. 
 
 refinement of feature which suggests that he is above the 
 savage inhumanities of the Assyrian kings. Even if we hesitate 
 to accept the evidence of this portrait, there is the undeniable 
 evidence of facts. Nebuchadrezzar could indeed be severe 
 (like the Asmonaean princes among the Jews, and like the chival- 
 rous Saladin himself) to those who rebelled against his divine 
 King, 1 but he willingly tempered the lot even of those whom 
 he regarded as rebels. He was cruel, according to our ideas, 
 to Zedekiah, but that unhappy king had broken his pledged 
 word, and even to Zedekiah he was less cruel than Saladin to 
 Raynald after the battle of Hattin. How gentle he was to the 
 Jews left in Judah, and how respectful to Jeremiah in particular, 
 the sequel of this story will show. "Such treatment," remarks 
 an American Assyriologist, 2 "is a beautiful contrast to the way in 
 which Saul or David would have dealt" [four centuries earlier]. 
 Both these men, therefore, come out better in a historical 
 picture than they did in the Scripture handbooks of our youth. 
 The shock, so far as Nebuchadrezzar's character is concerned. 
 will be mitigated by remembering that Jeremiah honoured him 
 as "Jehovah's Servant," a distinction which carries more weight 
 than the blame of a too patriotic, too sanguine contemporary, 
 Habakkuk3(Hab. i. 13). 
 
 1 For a case in point, see Jer. xxix. 22. The punishment referred to there 
 was not arbitrarily chosen, but common both in Assyria and in Babylonia 
 (see " Records of the Past," ix. 56 ; and comp. Berlin in " Babylonian and 
 Oriental Record," vol. i. No. 2). 
 
 2 Prof. Lyon, " Israelitish Politics," p. 10. 
 
 3 That " the wicked " here means the Babylonians collectively is certain. 
 But we must not with Hooker, in his second sermon, give the same sense 
 to "the wicked" in Hab. i. 4, which, as the context shows, means the 
 lawless men in Jerusalem.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 IF THOU HADST KNOWN, EVEN THOU ! 
 
 Zedekiah ; liis accession and character Ezekicl, the prophet of the exiles 
 The lower prophets at home and in Babylonia Zedekiah's revolt- 
 First siege of Jerusalem Imprisonment of Jeremiah His purchase of 
 family-property He is again in danger of his life Cast into the 
 cistern Ebedmelech's help Fall of Jerusalem Book of Lamenta- 
 tion. 
 
 IN spite of his virtual abdication, Jehoiachin (like Edward II. 
 in Berkeley Castle) still wore a crown, at least in the eyes of his 
 fellow-exiles. Doubtless they bewailed his hard fate, and the 
 elegy, based probably on a popular song, in which Ezekiel 
 laments over "the princes of Israel," contains this verse on the 
 sad termination of Jehoiachin's reign, 
 
 And they put hint into a cage with hooks, and brought him to 
 the king of Babylon, that his voice might no longer be heard upon 
 the. mountains of Israel (Ezek. xix. 9). 
 
 Deeply too must Ezekiel, and all true priests and worshippers, 
 have mourned their removal from the holy city, though as yet 
 sobs must have stifled the utterance of their grief. Not less 
 bitter must have been the mourning in Jerusalem, not only for 
 the material losses to church 1 and state, but for the vanished 
 familiar faces. What an official mourning meant to a Semitic 
 race, we know from the cuneiform inscriptions ; and what a 
 national mourning was in Judah, the last sad page of Josiah's 
 
 1 The temple vessels, remarks Evvald, were the things most regretted at 
 Jerusalem in the next few years. Comp. 2 Kings xxiv. 13 with Jer. xxvii, 
 l6, 18-22, xxviii. 3-6, Dan. i. 2, v. 2, &c., Baruch i. 8,
 
 1 65 JEREMIAH. 
 
 story tells us. This new lamentation was a national one 
 indeed. 
 
 A phantom-king had meantime been set up by Nebuchad- 
 rezzar, but his want of maturity of character must already have 
 excited the fears of religious patriots both at home and in 
 Babylon. His name was Mattaniah he was " Jehovah's gift " 
 to Josiah in the memorable year of the finding of the lawbook ; 
 but on his elevation to the throne he was allowed to take the 
 name Zedekiah or Zidkia, 1 i.e., "Jehovah is righteousness." 
 Was he already (like his namesake in Jer. xxix. 22) cherishing 
 dreams of a "righteous" interposition of Jehovah for Israel, or 
 even applying to himself the great prophecy of the Branch 
 (rather, Shoot) in Jer. xxiii. 5, 6 ? 
 
 I doubt it ; the name of this poor rot faineant (see Jer. xxxviii. 
 5) must have been chosen for him by others. Personally, he 
 would have been content with the " base kingdom " given him 
 (Ezek. xvii. 14). It was not repugnant to him to be like a vine 
 trailing along the ground (such as any one may see in the 
 Lebanon), watered, as it were, by the favour of Babylon ; 
 Ezekiel's parable, so far as he was concerned, might have been 
 comprised in the first six verses of his seventeenth chapter. It 
 was Zedekiah's " environment " (if we may use a word of recent 
 coinage) which was the chief source of his trouble. The Jewish 
 princes may have had their faults, but at any rate they formed 
 a true aristocracy ; and when most of them had been removed 
 to Babylon, it was as if a fair garden-land (Jer. ii. 7 Heb.) had 
 been robbed of all its good fruit (Jer. xxiv.). There was no 
 wisdom left to direct, no strength to carry out. no moral prin- 
 ciple among the governors or the governed. Woe unto the 
 shepherds, cries Jeremiah to the wretched " princes " of this 
 period (Jer. xxiii. i, 2). All the old evils had, under their 
 utterly selfish rule, suddenly gathered to a head ; both prophet 
 and priest are profane j yea, in my house have I found their 
 wickedness, saith Jehovah (Jer. xxiii. n). Jeremiah alludes to 
 practices specially inconsistent with the holy place, and one of 
 the Jewish captives explains what they were (Ezek. viii. ; comp. 
 v. n, and 2 Chron. xxxvi. 14). There was i, an image of 
 Asherah ; 2, totemistic animal emblems on the wall of a temple- 
 
 1 Zidkia was the name of a king of Ashkelon in Hezekiah's time (see 
 Schrader on Josh. xiii. 3). What the relation is between the Israelitish 
 Yahveh and the Canaanitish Yahu, I will not attempt to decide.
 
 IF THOU HADST KNOWN, EVEN THOU ! 167 
 
 chamber ; 3, weeping for " Thammuz yearly wounded " ; 4, 
 sun-worship and the rite of holding up " the twig " to the nose. 1 
 Side by side with these heathenish usages, some of them of a 
 low type, there was the self-righteousness and formalism of a 
 large number of Jehovah's worshippers, who still trusted in the 
 inviolable sanctity of the temple, and perhaps thought that, in 
 spite of a few violations of the Law, 2 they could still claim the 
 fulfilment of Deuteronomic promises. The popular discontent 
 was fanned by the arrival of ambassadors from the neighbouring 
 nations, who had come to draw Judah into a confederation 
 against the common foe. 3 Jeremiah thought that he could give 
 no better expression to the Divine warnings entrusted to him 
 than by a symbolic act like that ascribed to Isaiah in Isa. xx. 2. 
 This was probably in the fourth year of Zedekiah (comp. Jer. 
 xxvii. I, " Var. Bible," xxviii. i), the year to which chap, xxviii. 
 refers the episode of Hananiah "the prophet," who with a light 
 heart made promises in Jehovah's name, inconsistent with the 
 moral condition of the people, and therefore not to be realized. 
 It was Jeremiah's own symbolic action which in the same sign- 
 speech Hananiah contradicted ; the prophetic denunciation of 
 the former followed the next day, and was literally fulfilled. 
 Perhaps this awful fact gave a temporary weight to Jeremiah's 
 warnings. At any rate Zedekiah became anxious to dissipate 
 the rumours of his infidelity, and either journeyed himself or 
 sent an embassy to Babylon to give fresh assurances to his 
 strict overlord. According to Jer. li. 59-64, it was on this oc- 
 
 1 This reminds us of a precept respecting a twig called baresma, in a 
 Zoroastrian Scripture (" Vendidad " xix. 64), and of a custom (Sir Monier 
 Williams says that it still exists among the Parsees) of holding up a veil to 
 prevent impurities of breath from passing into the sacred fire. 
 
 2 I do not think we can take all Ezekiel's descriptions of the heathenism 
 of Judah in their most obvious sense. Ezek. viii. seems to say that the 
 " high-places " were resorted to in Zedekiah's reign ; but surely he throws 
 himself back into Manasseh's reign, the abominations of which he cannot 
 recall without a deeply felt -woe, woe unto thee (Ezek. xvi. 23 ; comp. a 
 Kings xxiv. 3). 
 
 3 It has been supposed that troubles in Elam may have favoured these 
 projects of revolt. But, as Tiele remarks, in the division of the Assyrian 
 empire Elam (or the Assyrian claims upon Elam) passed to Media. The 
 conqueror pointed to in Jer. xlix. 34-39 may be Teispes ( Tsheispa] of the 
 Achcemenid family, the ancestor of Cyrus II. and Darius Hystaspis, of 
 whom Jeremiah may have heard through the Jewish exiles in Babylon 
 ( " Babylonisch-assyrisch Geschichte," p. 435),
 
 l68 JEREMIAH. 
 
 casion that Jeremiah committed the long prophecy in Jer. 1., li. 
 to the friendly prince Seraiah, who, after reciting it, was to bind 
 it to a stone and cast it into the Euphrates, with the words of 
 doom, Thus shall Babylon fall. I have elsewhere given the 
 reasons for holding these chapters to be wrongly ascribed to 
 our prophet, 1 just as Isa. xl.-lxvi. and certain parts of Isa. i.- 
 xxxvi. are erroneously assigned to Isaiah. They furnish a wel- 
 come addition to our already large collection of literary products 
 dating from the close of the Exile. 
 
 Let us pause a moment, for this reference to Jer. 1., li. suggests 
 the thought of the great intellectual refreshing for which Israel's 
 genius was indebted to the sojourn in Babylonia. The first 
 great writer of this period began his career in the year follow- 
 ing Zedekiah's journey or embassy. After passing his first four 
 years of expatriation by one of the many canals of the Euphrates 
 (called the Chebar), Ezekiel the priest saw divine visions (Ezek. 
 i. i), and came forward among a people, whose God seemed to 
 it to have been defeated, to show how great and wondrous and 
 righteous and yet merciful Jehovah was. With this object in 
 view, he scrupled not to press into his service the novel and 
 stupendous imagery of Babylonia, and became a great imagi- 
 native writer. But alas ! his fellow exiles " refused to hear the 
 voice of the charmer ; " the poetry of Ezekiel was too enig- 
 matical and his prose too coldly judicial in tone to produce 
 much immediate impression. His influence, like Jeremiah's, 
 was most felt by individuals ; his conception of religion, though 
 churchly, was also individualistic, and it was his task to gather 
 out of the corrupt mass those who might in time form the 
 nucleus of a Jewish Church. As a poet, he has sometimes been 
 overrated ; it is absurd to compare him, with De Quincey, to 
 jEschylus. As a teacher, he has been equally underrated. He 
 owes, indeed, much to Jeremiah, whose very phrases, as Movers 
 has shown (in his work on the two recensions of Jeremiah, part 
 iii. sect. 16), he sometimes reproduces, but he has added much 
 from his own Spirit-led meditations. His book is more dis- 
 tinctly literary than those left by Isaiah and Jeremiah, but, 
 though written long after the latter had passed away, is of the 
 
 1 Orelli, a good scholar, still holds out against this result of criticism. 
 But this half-hearted critic regards Isa. i. -xxxvi. as altogether the work of 
 Isaiah !
 
 IF THOU HADST KNOWN, EVEN THOU ! 109 
 
 utmost value for the period which we are studying ; would that 
 my limits permitted me to draw more from it ! 
 
 How constant the intercourse was between Jerusalem and the 
 Jewish colonies in Babylonia, we may see, not only from Ezekiel, 
 but from Jeremiah. In Jer. xxix. we have the substance of a 
 letter sent by Jeremiah through two royal officials to the exiles, 
 exhorting them to resign themselves to the will of God, and obey 
 their foreign lords, in spite of the misleading advice of the lower 
 prophets. On the receipt of this, one of the latter wrote letters 
 to the Jews at home, especially to Pashhur's successor in the 
 office of "second priest," named Zephaniah,but only to his own 
 confusion. Build ye houses, and dwell in them; and plant 
 gardens, and cat the fruit of them, . . . and seek the welfare of 
 the city whither I have sent you as captives, and pray unto 
 Jehovah for it, such was Jeremiah's advice. Nebuchadrezzar 
 was, at present, Jehovah's commissioned Servant (Jer. xxviL 6), 
 and as Bossuet says, applying Jer. xxvii. to Oliver Cromwell, 
 " Quand ce grand Dieu a choisi quelqu'un pour etre I'instriiment 
 de ses desseins, rien n'arrete le cours ; ou il enchaine, ou il 
 aveugle, ou il dompte lout ce qui est capable de resistance." 1 If 
 the Jews could only be persuaded of this, there might yet be 
 two Judahs, a greater and a lesser ; the one in Babylonia, the 
 other in Judah to be reunited after seventy years, 2 by which is 
 perhaps meant a long and indefinite period (comp. Jer. xxv. n, 
 xxix. 10, with Jer. xxvii. 6). It appears certain that chaps, 
 xxvii.-xxix. have not come down to us as their author left them 
 (among other peculiarities, note the spelling Nebuchadnezzar *) ; 
 the section xxvii. 16-22 ought certainly to be restored to its 
 original purity from the Septuagint. 4 But the historical state- 
 ments of the chapters are above suspicion. How interesting, 
 although painful, are the notices of prophets like Hananiah, 
 who was not exactly a " false prophet " as the Septuagint calls 
 him (Jer. xxxv. i), but rather a fallen prophet, one who devoted 
 
 1 " Oraison funcbre de Henrietta Marie de France, reine d'Angleterre." 
 
 2 " Seventy " is a symbolic number both in Jeremiah and, partly at least, 
 in " Daniel" (Dan. ix. 24). 
 
 3 " Nebuchadrezzar " only occurs once in these three chapters (Jer. xxix. 
 21). The only other places where " Nebuchadnezzar " occurs in Jeremiah 
 are xxxiv. i and xxxix. 5. 
 
 * See Movers' Latin treatise on the recensions of Jeremiah, part ii. sect, 
 i.-i ; Matthcs, Modern Review, 1884, p. 438.
 
 170 JEREMIAH. 
 
 his natural prophetic gifts to the service of a Jehovah who was 
 not the true one, because not "the God who ruleth in righteous- 
 ness," and who had " sent " Jeremiah to warn His people of their 
 too sure punishment. Stationary or retrograde prophets could 
 only do harm to Israel. Hence Ezekiel compares such to jackals 
 burrowing in ruins, and says that in fostering Israel's blind self- 
 love, they do but give a coating of plaster to mud- walls (Ezek. 
 xiii. 4, 10). No good word can either Jeremiah or Ezekiel find 
 to say for them, and the only palliation of their conduct is that 
 though the true Jehovah hath not sent them, and, as we are told, 
 hath deceived (or, enticed) them, they expect the confirmation oj 
 the oracle (Ezek. xiii. 6, xiv. 9.) they are honest though mis- 
 guided enthusiasts. 1 Why, indeed, may not such prophets, 
 however blameable, as having fallen from their "high calling of 
 God," yet have been fanatically sincere in their patriotism and 
 their religion ? Superficially regarded, does their prophesying 
 differ from that of Isaiah in some of his discourses (comp. 
 Hananiah's expressions in Jer. xxviii. n with those of Isa. x. 25, 
 xxix. 17) ? If this leading prophet refused to " bate a jot of heart 
 or hope " in Judah's extremity, and grew still bolder in faith, 
 why should not his successors copy him in this respect ? The 
 answer is, that Isaiah's encouraging promises were combined 
 with a resolute maintenance of the highest moral standard, 
 whereas our only authorities distinctly assert that the lower 
 prophets (and, as one of them says, prophetesses) of their time 
 lived evil lives themselves, and " strengthened the hands of the 
 wicked" (Jer. xxiii. 14, xxix. 23; Ezek. xiii. 19, 22). If, like 
 Habakkuk a few years earlier, they had been equally earnest 
 for moral and for political salvation, Jeremiah and Ezekiel 
 would not have opposed them so bitterly as "conspirators" 
 (Ezek. xxii. 25) against the common weal. May we take all 
 their vehement expressions literally? It matters not ; whatever 
 the lower prophets were in private, they neglected their public 
 duty when they might perhaps have saved the state. And 
 though the exiles as a body may have been superior to the 
 home-community (comp. Ezek. xiv. 22, 23), there is no evidence 
 that the prophets of Babylonia were wiser or better than their 
 fellows at Jerusalem. 
 
 1 For a fair view of these lower prophets, see Rowland Williams, 
 " Hebrew Prophets," ii. 56, 57, and Matthes' valuable monograph "De 
 pseudoprophetismo Hebrrcorum" (Lugd. Bat. 1859).
 
 IF THOU HADST KNOWN, EVEN THOU ! 171 
 
 " Like prophet, like people," we may say, applying Hos. iv. 9. 
 It is clear that, from the point of view of the higher religion, 
 the Jews both at home and in Babylonia had not been brought 
 nearer to God by calamity, but driven farther from Him. Sin- 
 gularly enough, whereas it is prosperity which too often makes 
 its forget God, it is adversity which had this effect among the 
 early Jews, brought up in the narrow belief that Israel's God 
 was bound to be Israel's protector. God had His own pur- 
 poses, however ; Ezekiel believes in the " new covenant " as much 
 as Jeremiah (Ezek. xi. 19, 20, xxxvi. 25-27), and knows that the 
 next generation will confess, It is good for me that I have been 
 afflicted (Psa. cxix. 71). But the vine-stock of ancient Israel, 
 half-consumed already, has no possibility of usefulness. Let it 
 be again consigned to the purifying flames (Exek. xv). Did 
 the Jews believe this ? No ; they only said, Doth he not make 
 fine parables (Ezek. xx. 49) ? Was there not a new Pharaoh, 
 whom men praised already for his energy and ambition (Uahibri, 
 called Hophra in the Hebrew of Jer. xliv. 30, Ovnipprj in the Sept., 
 'ATI-JO/?;? in Herodotus) ? So the people had their way, and Zede- 
 kiah rebelled against Babylon, Tyre and Ammon joining him, 
 and Egypt promising " horses and much people" (Ezek. xvii. 
 15). At once Nebuchadrezzar takes the field, but against which 
 adversary ? He stands where the ways divide to use divination; 
 he shuffles the arrows J (Ezek. xxi. 21), and decides for Jerusalem. 
 How could he hesitate? Strategically the capture of Jerusalem 
 was too important to be postponed. In January 587 the siege 
 began. Had Zedekiah done nothing to avert this ? No ; the 
 experience of Jehoiakim was repeated. They have blown the 
 trumpet, and made all ready ; btit none goeth to the battle (Ezek. 
 vii. 14). An attempt was indeed made to increase the number 
 of Jerusalem's defenders, by reviving a neglected law, not long 
 since adopted and expanded in Deuteronomy, which directed 
 that every enslaved Hebrew or Hebrewess should be emanci- 
 pated after seven years. To atone for their previous neglect, the 
 princes did more than fulfil this law, for they set all their slaves 
 and handmaids free. And behold ! a wonder happens, which 
 seems like a blessing upon their obedience, and a repetition of 
 the great deliverance in Hezekiah's reign. The approach of an 
 Egyptian army compelled Nebuchadrezzar to raise the siege, 
 
 1 See Lyall, " Ancient Arabian Poetry," p. 106 ; Lenormant, "La divi- 
 nation," p. 18 ; Wellhausen, "Skizzen," iii. 127.
 
 172 JEREMIAH. 
 
 and go to meet it. In vain did Jeremiah try to sober the excited 
 minds of his people. At once the freedmen were enslaved 
 again, and the one true patriot Jeremiah was arrested at one 
 of the city-gates on a charge of " falling away to the Chaldaeans." 
 The poor weak king had probably nothing to do with either 
 transaction (comp. Jer. xxxiv. 8 with v. 15). Certainly he had 
 a superstitious veneration for Jeremiah, to whom he had not 
 long before sent a deputation of priests, hoping to obtain through 
 him another " wonderful work " like that granted of old to the 
 prayers of Isaiah. 1 The excuse for those who arrested Jeremiah 
 on a false charge is that the prophet had actually said (Jer. xxi. 
 9), He that goeth away and fallcth away to the Chaldccans^ he 
 shall live j and judging him by the ordinary standard, was it 
 not (so his accusers may have said) only too clear that he was 
 basely deserting his post in the hour of danger ? The grounds 
 were doubtless insufficient ; for had not the Chaldaeans raised 
 the siege ? But the prophet's old friends among the princes 
 were now in Babylonia, and he was as helpless before his low- 
 minded adversaries as a suspected aristocrat before a French 
 revolutionary tribunal. He was consigned to an unhealthy 
 prison, until the king, with whom, upon the return of the 
 Chaldaeans, he had a private interview, gave orders for his 
 removal to the " court of the guard," which adjoined the palace 
 (Jer. xxxii. 2, comp. Neh. iii. 25). Soon after this, he received 
 a visit from his cousin Hanameel, who, strange to say, invited 
 him at this dark moment to purchase the family property at 
 Anathoth. To Jeremiah this was clearly the hand of God. He 
 called witnesses, paid the price of the land, had the purchase- 
 deed prepared, subscribed and sealed it, and then gave it to 
 Baruch to keep securely, and all this in spite of a mental struggle 
 which even he, the prophet of the " new covenant," 2 could not 
 escape. Yes ; even after his great victory on Carmel, Elijah 
 must have his doubting time in the wilderness, and Jeremiah's 
 bright visions must once more be renewed to him in his cap- 
 
 1 To obtain a full account of this episode, we should, with Stade, connect 
 Jer. xxi. i, 2, xxxvii. 4-10, xxi. 4-14. The more original form of the 
 prophecy is that given in Jer. xxxvii. 7-10. 
 
 2 The form of chap. xxxi. may here and there (e.g. in v. 15, on which see my 
 note) have been affected by later experiences ; but the kernel of the prophecy 
 I regard as earlier. How can we understand his prophecies or account 
 for his development otherwise ?
 
 IF x;:ou HADST KNOWN, EVEN THOU ! 173 
 
 tivity. So once again he is assured that a new and better 
 covenant will be given to Israel, and that as one consequence 
 of this, houses and fields and vineyards shall yet again be bought 
 in this land (Jer. xxxii. 15). 
 
 So the days went by in prayer and prophecy (notice the con- 
 nexion of these in Jer. xxxiii. 3) and intercourse with those who 
 like Zedekiah retained some belief in the prophet. But the 
 bitter end of the struggle was visibly approaching, and the 
 princes, to whom the defence of the city was committed, 
 thought that Jeremiah was playing an unpatriotic part by 
 counselling surrender. We can hardly wonder at this. Rightly 
 or wrongly, the princes had decided on resistance, and felt 
 bound to enforce at any rate silent acquiescence. Surely any 
 modern government would do the like. Jeremiah had " de- 
 spaired, not merely of his country, which any man may in- 
 nocently do : but also for her, which no man has a right to do " 
 (if I may apply Thirlwall's words, spoken of Phocion), at least 
 from the point of view of a politician. We, who are free from 
 their illusions, can pity the princes, and partly even respect them. 
 But still more can we respect and admire the prophet. Alone 
 among these desperate men he persisted in advocating what 
 was then the only "way of life" (Jer. xxi. 8), though, as 
 Niebuhr remarks, he would doubtless have spoken differently 
 in the days of the Maccabees. Such lonely heroism was worthy 
 of a type of Christ. Imagine the scene ; recall the faces in 
 Munkacsy's " Christ before Pilate," and compare the psalmist's 
 words in Psa. xxii. 12-17 (written perhaps with more thought 
 of Jeremiah's trouble). Neither Christ nor Jeremiah could 
 soften unwelcome truths nor, at the supreme crisis, look to God 
 to hide him from his enemies (comp. Jer. xxxvi. 26, Luke ^vj 30). 
 Jeremiah fell a victim to his cowardly foes " cowardly "~T call 
 them, because they were too superstitious to kill Jeremiah, as 
 Jehoiakim killed Urijah ; they would rather that famine should 
 do their work for them. So, like Joseph in the fine old story, 
 he was cast into a cistern, and Jeremiah sunk in the mire (Jer. 
 xxxviii. 6). 
 
 Now, thought the princes, we may safely forget Jeremiah. 
 But they overlooked one thing, that the cistern was near the 
 palace, and that about the king's person were some who by the 
 accident of birth were free from the prejudices of Israelites. 
 (Need I say that none of the cisterns under the floor of the so-
 
 i;4 JEREMIAH, 
 
 called Grotto of Jeremiah can be that intended, for the simplest 
 topographical reasons ; ' mediaeval traditionalists have indeed 
 much to answer for !) Assistance prompt, courageous, and effec- 
 tual was on its way when the prophet least thought it. Three men 
 ("thirty," Jer. xxxviii. 10, is a scribe's error), with "old cast 
 clouts" to ease Jeremiah where the cords might cut him, were 
 sent to draw him up out of the cistern. That dark form which 
 bends over the pit is, not the angel of death, but a friendly Ethi- 
 opian who has used his influence with the king in favour of the 
 prophet. His true name we know not ; he passed among the 
 Jews as " King's slave " Ebedmelech ; but he ranks in the 
 Bible with the eunuch of queen Candace (Acts viii. 27) as one 
 who feared God and was accepted by Him. " Can the Ethiopian 
 change his skinf" (Jer. xiii. 23). True ; but where is white- 
 ness of soul to be found in Ebedmelech or in the Jewish 
 princes ? in Livingstone's tender-hearted African bearers or in 
 the Arab slave-merchants ? Jeremiah at any rate knew who 
 was his true " neighbour." A short prophecy in his works is 
 devoted to Ebedmelech, closing with the words (with which 
 compare Psa. xxxvii. 40), because than hast put thy trust in me 
 (Jer. xxxix. 18). 
 
 One person there was whose " feet were sunk in a mire" 
 worse than that of Jeremiah's cistern ; this was king Zedekiah. 
 His character at this period seems a bundle of inconsistencies. 
 He deserves credit for bravery in sitting at the gate of Benja- 
 min, where Ebedmelech found him (Jer. xxxviii. 7) ; for this, 
 being in the north of the city, was the point most exposed to 
 the besiegers. He has also relieved himself from the imputa- 
 tion of cruelty by assenting to the transference of Jeremiah 
 from the cistern to his old safe lodgings. But he is now to be 
 tested again for the last time, and fails shamefully. / am afraid 
 of the Jews that are fallen away to the Chaldczans, lest they (i.e., 
 the latter) deliver me into their hand, and they mock me (Jer. 
 xxxviii. 19). What unkingly cowardice and selfishness ! Why 
 should Zedekiah fear taunts or ill-treatment from these deserters, 
 when he would rather deserve thanks, for having justified their 
 own course of action ? And how could he think of himself when 
 the fate of his country and, as it might seem, of his religion 
 was in question ? Especially when, as he probably thought, 
 Jeremiah had guaranteed his own personal safety and comfort, 
 1 Ses Thomson, "The Land and the Book" (1881) p. 555.
 
 IP THOU HADST KNOWN, EVEN THOU ! 17$ 
 
 by prophesying (as Zedekiah might easily infer from Jer. xxxii. 5, 
 xxxiv. 5) that after a short stay in Babylon, he would return to 
 " die in peace " in his own country. With kindly earnestness 
 Jeremiah presses the king, whose weakness he pities, to listen 
 to his advice, but in vain. Zedekiah cannot bear the thought 
 of being ridiculed, but can with calmness picture Jerusalem in 
 flames and its inhabitants, except himself, exposed to every 
 outrage. Let him be; vengeance is on its way ; the oracles 
 concerning him will be fulfilled, but not as he thinks. Let us 
 keep our sympathy for worthier objects. Oh for a solemn 
 symphony to attune the mind ! For the end of the first part of 
 Israel's tragedy is at hand. Tints saith the Lord Jehovah : An 
 evil, an only (i.e., unique) evil ; behold it cometh. An end is 
 come, the end is come, it awaketh against tJiee j behold, it cometh 
 (Ezek. vii. 5, 6). Primitive Israel is about to pass through its 
 supreme agony. Good may come out of this great " evil " ; yet 
 we can but sympathize with those upon whom the ploughshare 
 of captivity made such "long furrows " (Psa. cxxix. 3). 
 
 The siege had now lasted for one year, five months, and 
 twenty-seven days. It was early in July, 1 586, and the wheat 
 harvest ought to have been near. Provisions had long since 
 begun to fail; indeed, but for this we might never have heard of 
 the capture of Jerusalem. There was still no thought of sur- 
 render. Zedekiah stayed within the walls from pure weakness 
 of mind ; the "princes," because they would sooner starve than 
 see their proud city laid low. Some homes there were in which 
 (as in the later siege) sights of horror were seen (Lam. ii. 20, 
 iv. 10), which I will merely hint at in the reticent words of 
 Ugolino's poet, "Then even grief by hunger was outdone."- The 
 famished warriors could no longer defend the one weak point 
 in their fortifications. With a wild shout, the besiegers poured 
 in through a breach in the northern wall. It was night, and 
 under cover of the darkness Zedekiah and his little army 
 hurried in the opposite direction. By the rocky ravine of the 
 Kedron they fled as far as the " plains of Jericho " ; doubtless 
 they hoped to cross the Jordan, and elude their pursuers in the 
 
 1 The exact day is chronicled the ninth of the fourth month. Like 
 the other "black days" of this period, it was afterwards observed as a fast 
 (Zech. viii. 19). 
 
 2 " Poscia piu che' 1 dolor poti il digiuno," Dante, " Inf." xx.xiii. 75. 
 Above, I have followed Dean Plumptre.
 
 176 JEREMIAH. 
 
 mountains of Moab. But it was too late ; the Chalckeans were 
 upon them. The army melted away ; the king was captured, 
 and carried to the headquarters atRiblah (see p. 127), where, as 
 a punishment for his perfidy (Ezek. xvii. 16), his eyes were put 
 out, his sons and "all the nobles of Judah" 1 having been 
 previously executed (Jer. xxxix 6, 7 ; 2 Chron. xxxvi. 13). Ruth- 
 less Nebuchadrezzar ! some one may say. But it was the just 
 reward of Zedekiah's perfidy (Ezek. xvii. 16), according to the 
 ideas of those times ; Nebuchadrezzar was of a more refined 
 character than any of the Assyrian kings (see p. 146). Jeremiah 
 foresaw this gloomy issue of the building extravagances of 
 Jehoiakim's reign. In an impassioned address to the nobles 
 of Jerusalem (collectively described as a maiden dwelling in 
 Lebanon, because of their houses inlaid with cedar-wood) he 
 says, 
 
 O inhabitress of Lebanon that makest tJiy nest in the cedars, 
 how wilt thou groan* when pangs come upon //iee, the pain as oj 
 a woman in travail ! (Jer. xxii. 23). 
 
 A month of passive submission to the outrages of the soldiery 
 followed. The officers of the king of Babylon had posted them- 
 selves by the so-called " middle gate," from which they doubt- 
 less commanded both parts of the city, the upper and the lower. 
 The names of the two chief officers 3 are preserved (Jer. xxxix. 
 13), showing that the narrative (which, of course, is not Jere- 
 miah's work) is based on a contemporary record. On the 
 seventh day of the fifth month came the chief of Nebuchadrez- 
 zar's bodyguard, Nebuzaradan by name, 4 and burned all the 
 
 1 More complete details are given in 2 Kings xxv. 18-21. The chief 
 priest and the second priest were included. 
 
 2 So the Septuagint, which is followed by the Peshitto and the Vulgate. 
 The text-reading gives, according to the Revised Version, "How greatly 
 to be pitied wilt thou be" ; this, however, is improbable. The difference 
 of readings is slight. 
 
 3 V. 3 should be corrected in accordance with v. 13, " Nebushazban 
 (Nabfisezibanni] the chief eunuch, and Nergalsharezer (Nergalsarttfur) the 
 chief Magian." "Chief Magian " is, however, an uncertain rendering 
 of " Rab-mag . " "Mag "is probably a synonym for rubft, Assyrian for 
 "prince." Tiele, "Bab. -ass. Geschichte," p. 430. 
 
 * NabAziriddin would be the Babylonian form ; his office may be more 
 strictly defined as that of "chief of the executioners." Dr. Lansing's 
 objection (Expositor, Sept. 1888, p. 224) cannot stand; Ass. tal>ikhu=. 
 " executioner."
 
 F THOU HADST KNOWN, EVEN THOU ! 177 
 
 houses of the city, and with them the palace and the house of 
 Jehovah. The sacred vessels still remaining, together with the 
 two splendid pillars (i Kings vii. 15-22), were carried away. 
 How many of the inhabitants were carried away, we know not ; 
 Nebuchadrezzar's library is likely to be more precise on this 
 point than the fragmentary Jewish narrative. One day we shall 
 doubtless have it ; till then, we must rest content with a few 
 facts and possibilities. 
 
 Certain it is that agriculture was not entirely interrupted by 
 the calamities of the state. Besides the incidental notice in 
 Jer, xli. 8, we have the definite and trustworthy statement in 
 Jer. xxxix. 10 that Nebuzaradan left of the people the mean ones 
 who had nothing, and gave them vineyards and fields. From 
 Jer. xliv. 2, Ezek. xxxvi. 4, Isa. li. 3, c., it is clear that the 
 remaining inhabitants of Judah were comparatively few ; this 
 was only too natural, for the previous calamities had reduced the 
 land of Israel to a waste condition, as Ezekiel testifies (Ezek. 
 xxxiv. 23, 27). But it would be hasty to infer that these few 
 were entirely composed of the lowest class. Criticism has shown 
 it to be not impossible that the educated class was to some 
 extent represented among them. 1 To members of this literary 
 class in Judah some critics have ascribed the Book of Obadiah 
 and the prophecy which now forms chaps, xxiv.-xxvii. of Isaiah, 
 also the Lamentations. Yes ; these touching elegies, which have 
 so long been ascribed to Jeremiah, are now generally denied to 
 him on grounds which no archaeological research can deprive of 
 their force. Poems like these cannot, it is urged, have been pro- 
 duced till the worst misery of conquest had been mitigated by 
 time. The technical artificiality of their form proves this. In 
 the first four it is noteworthy that each verse begins with one of 
 the Hebrew letters, according to the alphabetical order. Even 
 in the fifth, in which this strict " alphabetic" structure is not 
 found, there is at least an approximation to it ; the number of 
 verses being the same as that of the Hebrew letters, viz., twenty- 
 two (comp. Psa. xxxiii., xxxviii., ciii.). To assert, with Dean 
 Plumptre, that the born poet "accepts the discipline of a self- 
 imposed law just in proportion to the vehemence of his 
 emotions," still seems to me incapable of proof from modern 
 European poetry, and, if possible, still more opposed to the 
 facts of Hebrew literature. Some of the examples which the 
 1 See Kuenen, " Religion of Israel,' ii. 176. 
 '3
 
 i;8 JEREMIAH. 
 
 dean adduces, in the introduction to Jeremiah in Bishop 
 Ellicott's series of commentaries, " are merely the rhetorical 
 exercises of poets learning their craft ; others merely conces- 
 sions to the taste which every now and then prevails for super- 
 fine elaboration in every branch of art ; others again 'and these 
 few examples are alone in point), the attempts of the artists to 
 help Nature to recover her balance, when the recovery has 
 already begun, and emotion has already lost its overpowering 
 vehemence." l 
 
 Surely we ought to be glad and not sorry at this result, the 
 critical grounds for which I have explained in detail elsewhere. 
 We are introduced through it to three writers. One is the 
 author of Lam. i., ii., iv. ; a second, of Lam. iii. ; and a third, of 
 Lam. v. The second, who is acquainted with Job as well as 
 with Jeremiah, may have lived either in Judah or in Babylonia ; 
 the first and third are most naturally regarded as resident in 
 Judah. Jeremiah was apparently the favourite book of all 
 these poets, though the second seems also to have been well 
 acquainted with Job (written most probably in the exile period). 
 If therefore a title had to be given by way of defining the 
 authorship, we might perhaps style the entire collection, on 
 the analogy of portions of the Psalter, " The Book of the 
 Lamentations of the Sons of Jeremiah." 2 
 
 The author of the Septuagint version may therefore be 
 excused for representing the Lamentations to have been indited 
 by Jeremiah, seated (like another Job) on the dustheaps of 
 Jerusalem. He says (and this notice is repeated with a few 
 additional words in the Vulgate), "And it came to pass, after 
 Israel was taken captive, and Jerusalem made desolate, that 
 Jeremias sat down weeping, and lamented with this lamenta- 
 tion over Jerusalem, and said." Some account for this preface 
 by supposing the writer to have followed 2 Chron. xxxv. 25, 
 which states (see p. 97) that Jeremiah "lamented for Josiah," 
 and also " all the singing men and singing women," and 
 that these lamentations are written down in a collection called 
 qinoth ("elegies"). If this view were correct, the Chronicler 
 must have absurdly interpreted Lam. iv. 20 of Josiah. It is 
 quite enough, however, to suppose that the Septuagint translator 
 was struck by the affinities of phraseology between Jeremiah 
 
 1 '' Lamentations " (in " Pulpit Commentary "), Introduction, p. vii. 
 a Ibid. Comp. my crit. note on Psa. xxix. i.
 
 IF THOU HADST KNOWN, EVEN THOU ! 179 
 
 and the Lamentations, and also found a certain poetic pro- 
 priety in ascribing the authorship of the latter to Jeremiah, just 
 as some Hellenistic Jew actually assigns Psa. cxxxvii. to this 
 prophet, 1 because of the words " sat down and wept," although 
 Jeremiah never saw the " rivers of Babylon," at any rate with 
 his outward eyes. More elaborately imaginative than the 
 Septuagint translator of Lamentations were the traditionalists 
 who fixed upon a cave near the Damascus Gate for the abode 
 of the weeping prophet. The " savage wildness " of the spot 
 " may well seem," as George Williams thinks, " to have caught 
 the gloomy colour of the desolate heart that pours forth its 
 plaintive melody" 2 in the Lamentations. I cannot myself see 
 that " savage wildness " of which the learned archaeologist 
 speaks. It was natural for a Jew to seek refuge in a cave, and 
 Jeremiah could hardly have found a grander or a more convenient 
 hermitage than the cave which bears his name. According to 
 Thomson, it extends about 120 feet under the cliff, and I can 
 well believe it. In fact, but for the much more extensive 
 quarries close by, it would be reckoned among the wonders of 
 Jerusalem. A vast column of rock, left and indeed produced 
 by the quarrymen, supports the roof and adds to the impressive- 
 ness of the place. But the elliptically shaped cave which you 
 see first is not the whole of the excavation. To the left of the 
 column you enter a second cave, not so large, nor so light and 
 pleasant, as the first, and forming as it were an inner chamber. 
 Clearly this is no common hermit's cell, but worthy of the 
 large-hearted prophet, to whom it would have afforded both 
 space' and quiet for his poetic toils. Nor is it incredible that 
 some of the inhabitants of Jerusalem should have found refuge 
 both here and in the larger quarries. Addressing Moab, Jere- 
 miah says (and he may well have thought of his own advice 
 when the " day of Jerusalem " came) 
 
 ye inhabitants of Moab, leave the cities and dwell in the 
 rock j and be like the dove that maketh her nest in the sides oj 
 the hole's mouth (Jer. xlviii. 28). 
 
 In later times these quarries were used, like the catacombs, for 
 graves. It is not an ignoble fancy that Jeremiah " sat down and 
 wept " over the grave of his youthful hopes in this grand natural 
 hermitage, the rock-doves round about him cooing in unison with 
 
 1 The Septuagint has a conflation of two titles, T<jJ &avi5 ' j 
 * Supplement to vol. i. of " The Holy City," p. 67.
 
 180 JEREMIAH. 
 
 his elegies. Yes ; it is not an ignoble fancy, and even Dean 
 Stanley sees no strong objection to accepting it. 1 But truth must 
 prevail over mere imagination. Jeremiah could not have stayed 
 long in a cave in the "day of Jerusalem." We mistake the 
 result of providential training when we suppose that he all at 
 once forgot his highest intuitions, and his far-seeing religious 
 patriotism. His words are not, as Stanley thinks, "preserved 
 to us in the Book of the Lamentations." We wrong him by 
 too exclusively picturing him with the " awestruck figure" and 
 " attitude of hopeless sorrow " attributed to him by Michel 
 Angelo. It is a touching idea of a Jewish Rabbi (Eleazar) that 
 though the gates of prayer are closed, the gates of tears are not, 
 but though suggested by the Lamentations (Lam. iii. 8, comp. 
 Psa. xxxix. 12), it does not express the mind of Jeremiah. 
 This spiritual hero is not rightly styled the weeping prophet. 
 There was a time, no doubt, when he really was that which 
 poor Matthew Arnold so much disliked ; it was when his 
 intuition was clear enough to show him the swiftly approaching 
 judgment, but not the buds of peace and holiness blossoming 
 on the fields of ruin. Jeremiah's anguish in his helpless 
 wisdom, when he alone a grander Demosthenes saw how the 
 judgment could be stayed, and no one would give heed to him, 
 when he wished that " his head were waters and his eyes a 
 fountain of tears, that he might weep day and night for the 
 slain of the daughter of his people " (Jer. ix. i), is indeed a 
 subject worthy of a painter's hand, but is there not a still nobler 
 theme the same once sad man taking up his cross and bearing 
 it aloft, strengthened (like his great antitype) by "the joy that 
 was set before him " (Heb. xii. 2) ? 
 
 Of this I shall be called to speak in the next chapter. 
 Meantime let me not withhold the truest and most admiring 
 sympathy from those "sons of Jeremiah," who followed the 
 prophet in his weakness rather than in his strength, but who so 
 sweetly struck the keynote of captive Israel's mourning. 2 Is 
 
 1 " Sermons on Special Occasions," p. 311. Comp. p. 317, "We are with 
 Jeremiah on the rocky mount, weeping over Jerusalem." Truly we could 
 hardly imagine that even a weeping prophet always remained in his cave- 
 dwelling. 
 
 2 These elegies were the forerunners of a large body of synagogue poetry. 
 The most famous of the later glnoth is that of Yehuda Halevi (twelfth 
 century A.D.), known even to general readers by Heine's poem in the
 
 IF TIIOU HADST KNOWN, EVEN THOU ! iSl 
 
 there another such book in the whole world such an " almost 
 unalloyed expression of unrestrained anguish, and utter, incon- 
 solable desolation" ? Well did Stanley draw out the permanent 
 elements of human interest which it contains, and find a pathetic 
 present-day illustration of them in the Siege of Paris, 1870-71. 
 But there is that in the circumstances of the original writers to 
 which, from the nature of the case, there can be no complete 
 parallel. The tragedy of Israel is greater than that of any other 
 people : Behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my 
 sorrow (Lam. i. 12).
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 A PASTOR'S STRANGE FAREWELL. 
 
 Gedaliah becomes viceroy The prophet stays with him at Mizpah 
 Ishmael's outrages Flight from Mizpah Migration into Egypt 
 The heathen festival The stormy colloquy. 
 
 "BUT have you not been somewhat too hasty in rejecting the 
 help of tradition ? Have you not expressly accepted the help 
 of imaginative conjecture in filling up the scanty notices of 
 contemporary records (see p. 13) ? Why should you refuse 
 the co-operation of those early traditionalists, who were them- 
 selves so imaginative?" So some one may ask, dismissing 
 with a wave of the hand the reasons which I have offered, and 
 pointing triumphantly to the four verses which follow the 
 account of Nebuzaradan's displantation of the " remnant of the 
 people "(Jer. xxxix. 11-14). In this paragraph we are in fact 
 told that Nebuchadrezzar gave special injunctions to his high 
 officer to " set his eyes on Jeremiah, and do him no harm," 
 in consequence of which the prophet was brought from the 
 " court of the guard " into u the house " (i.e., perhaps the 
 royal palace), and given perfect liberty of movement. Is it 
 likely that Jeremiah would feel happy in the home of fallen 
 greatness ? Why may we not suppose that, while the captives 
 were awaiting the order to remove, Jeremiah "sat down and 
 wept " in the dim seclusion of the cave, 
 
 " Still round and round that strange old alphabet 
 Weaving his long funereal chant of woe?" 
 
 (Alexander, " The Waters of Pabylon.")
 
 A PASTOR'S STRANGE FAREWELL. 183 
 
 I am afraid that this imaginative inference from those four 
 verses will not hold, for we have an express statement in Jer. 
 xl. which militates altogether against it. There we are told that 
 the prophet was taken with the other captives, bound with 
 chains, to Ramah, where he was set at liberty by Nebuzaradan. 1 
 This is much more likely than that Jeremiah received any 
 special attention in the turmoil of the capture, and most of all 
 improbable is it that Nebuchadrezzar himself had anything 
 to do with his liberation. Let us then accept the historical 
 picture suggested by Jer. xl. Jeremiah, who doubtless passed 
 at first for one of the dependents of the palace, went with 
 Ebedmelech and the rest to Ramah. 2 That conspicuous hill- 
 town, five miles north of Jerusalem, now became the meeting- 
 place of bands of exiles from all quarters. It was there that 
 Jeremiah, in the greatest of his prophetic visions, had seemed 
 to hear " ancient Rachel " (as Dante calls her) weeping for her 
 captive children (Jer. xxxi. 15), and there that, in sober, waking 
 reality, he now saw and heard the bitter grief of the last repre- 
 sentatives of the true people of Israel. It is in a dreary, 
 lonesome country only interesting to us from its historical 
 associations, and surely the saddest of these is that connected 
 with the starting of the Jewish exiles for Babylonia. Not far 
 off, to the south-west, was a still more strikingly situated 
 hill-town called Mizpah, 3 where in the period of the Judges 
 popular assemblies had been held (Judg. xx. I ; I Sam. x. 17). 
 This place had been selected for the residence of the newly 
 appointed governor of " the cities of Judah," himself a Jew, 
 and bound by family ties to Jeremiah Gedaliah, the son of 
 Ahikam (comp. Jer, xxvi. 24). It now became the duty of 
 Nebuzaradan to consider the special circumstances of any 
 particular captive, and Gedaliah appears to have called his 
 
 1 It will be noticed that two remarkable expressions in Jer. xxxix. 11-14, 
 "set eyes upon" and "dwell among the people," occur also in Jer. xl. 
 Probably therefore the shorter account in Jer. xxxix. is not to be regarded 
 as a distinct tradition. 
 
 x Ramah (now the village er-Ram) was on the frontier of the two king- 
 doms (see i Kings xv. 17, 22). Hence the reference in Jeremiah's vision. 
 
 3 I do not see how the well-known Mizpah of Benjamin can be identified 
 with Nob (so Conder). Neby Samwil, where traces of an ancient town 
 are still found, answers all requirements (see Robinson, "Biblical Re- 
 searches," ii. 144). It has a grand view, "the most comprehensive in 
 southern Palestine," thus justifying its name.
 
 1 84 JERF.MtAIf, 
 
 attention to Jeremiah. There was much in the character and 
 previous history of the prophet to command even a Babylonian's 
 respect. We know how susceptible of reverence for all that 
 was good and spiritually noble Nebuchadrezzar was, and we 
 cannot doubt that Nebuzaradan acted in the spirit of his 
 master when he gave Jeremiah the choice of either going to 
 Babylon with the exiles, or dwelling with the Jews who remained 
 under the native governor. In an impassioned section of his 
 prophecy (Jer. xv. 10-21) Jeremiah (as some think) reveals the 
 state of mind in which his difficult decision was made. " He 
 tells his friends that the resolution to go to Gedaliah costs him 
 a severe struggle. He longs for rest, and in Babylon he would 
 have more chance of a quiet life than among the turbulent 
 Jews at home. But he has looked up to God for guidance, 
 and, however painful to the flesh, God's will must be obeyed. 
 He gives us the substance of the revelation which he received. 
 The Divine counsellor points out to him that He has already 
 interposed in the most striking manner for Jeremiah, and 
 declares that if he will devote himself to the Jews under 
 Gedaliah, a new and fruitful field will be open to him, in 
 which, moreover, by Divine appointment, no harm can happen 
 to him." ' Yes; in these trying circumstances Jeremiah may have 
 wavered for a moment, and longed that " this cup might pass 
 from him." How much he had suffered from the intense strain 
 of the last few years ! Would it be wrong to live in compara- 
 tive ease in Babylonia, varying the elegies of the mourner with 
 the bright visions of the heaven-taught prophet ? No ; it 
 would not be wrong in another ; but it would be inconsistent 
 with his unselfish character. There was Ezekiel for the exiles ; 
 the poverty-stricken remnant at home 2 could not dispense with 
 Jeremiah. So he bade farewell to the captives, and went to 
 Mizpah. It is a noble example, and those who can follow it 
 
 1 "Jeremiah " (in " Pulpit Commentary") i. 373. In this view I follow 
 Gratz. It is no doubt only a conjecture, but it enables us to realize the 
 words of the prophet more vividly. There are some great difficulties in the 
 text, and apparently one interpolation, verses 13, 14 being probably an 
 incorrect copy of xvii. 3, 4. 
 
 2 I see no reason to suppose with M. Clermont-Ganneau that the 
 "remnant of Judah" consisted merely of "serfs of the Israelitish aris- 
 tocracy, themselves not of pure Israelitish blood " (see his lecture, trans- 
 lated in " Palestine Fund Statement," 1875, p. 206). Observe that 
 princesses of the blood royal were among those who were left behind.
 
 A PASTOR'S STRANGE FAREWELL. 185 
 
 may miss much that is pleasant in life, but show that they have 
 the true prophet's spirit. 
 
 It was a bold experiment which was about to be tried, and 
 Nebuchadrezzar deserves credit for the kindness which prompted 
 it. The newly organized subject people might perhaps be 
 less fickle than the primitive Israel now numbered with the 
 dead, but there was certainly a risk of disappointment. There 
 was also not a little danger from the small neighbouring 
 peoples, which had looked with malicious pleasure on the 
 calamity of Juclah, and hoped to increase their territory at 
 its expense (see Lam. iv. 22, Ezek. xxv., xxxv., Obad. 10-16). 
 The governor, however, had been carefully selected ; his views 
 (see Jer. xl. 9) were precisely those which Jeremiah had so 
 long vainly inculcated in Jerusalem. General confidence ap- 
 pears to have been reposed in his upright character, and 
 crowds of Jewish fugitives resorted to him from their tempo- 
 rary hiding-places in foreign lands. Even the leaders of the 
 Jewish guerilla bands condescended at his entreaty to engage 
 in husbandry. Nature did her best to efface the sad marks of 
 invasion ; we are told that the husbandmen (most of them now 
 for the first time proprietors, Jer. xxxix. 10) " gathered wine and 
 summer fruits very much " (Jer. xl. 12). No doubt they took 
 this for a favourable omen, and ventured to hope that He, who 
 had not forgotten His covenant with the land, would yet call to 
 remembrance His covenant with His people (Hos. ii. 21-23). 
 Our prophet would be the last to blame them ; but he would 
 warn them not to forfeit these blessings by disobedience to the 
 authority which had Jehovah's sanction. A certain chastened 
 happiness must have been Jeremiah's at this time ; he had the 
 governor on his side, and the other prophets (who found no 
 more vision from Jehovah, Lam. ii. 9), had left the field free 
 to their "despised and rejected" colleague. For about four 
 years' all went smoothly; but in the fifth, grave events took 
 place. It was now Tisri, the month of the Feast of Booths 
 1 Comparing Jer. xli. i with 2 Kings xxv. 8, we might infer that only 
 two months elapsed between Nebuzaradan's arrival at Jerusalem and the 
 massacre at Mizpah. This is in itself improbable ; besides, in lii. 32 a 
 third deportation of Jews is mentioned, which certainly stands in some 
 connexion with the murder of Gedaliah and the Chaldeeans. Such an open 
 insult to Babylon would surely not wait nearly five years for a severe punis!:- 
 ment. It is only fair to mention that Jer. xli. i does not mention the year 
 in which the events to be described took place.
 
 l86 JEREMIAH. 
 
 the annual thanksgiving for the crops. Ishmael, a prince of the in- 
 jured royal house, had determined to spoil this year's celebration 
 for all peaceable Jews. He obtained the support of Israel's 
 bitter foe, Baalis, the Ammonite king, and began to seek an 
 opportunity of wreaking his vengeance on the Babylonian 
 viceroy. One of the old guerilla-leaders Johanan by name 
 heard of it, and gave notice to the governor ; but he in the 
 simplicity of his heart refused to credit such baseness. The 
 warning was repeated, Why should he slay ihee, that all the 
 Jews which are gathered unto thee should be scattered, and all 
 the remnant should perish ? (Jer. xl. 15) but in vain. Gedaliah 
 refused to give leave for Ishmael to be slain ; " thou speakcst 
 falsely? he said, " of IshmaeL" 
 
 And now we hear no more of the Ammonite: the story of 
 accumulated murders which follows has for its central figure 
 the inhuman Ishmael. With ten companions he reaches the 
 hill-town where Gedaliah resides, and is entertained by the 
 governor at a meal. Generous, simple-minded Gedaliah ! how 
 could he dream that even the law of hospitality was no longer 
 sacred to his guest, and that he who had, from the purest 
 patriotism, accepted the unenviable position of head of a 
 ruined house (Isa. iii. 6), would be called to account for mis- 
 fortunes which none more than he deplored ? Then arose 
 Ishmael, and the ten men that were with him, and smote 
 Gedaliah the son of Ahikam the son of Shaphan with the 
 sword, and slew htm whom the king of Babylon had made 
 governor over the land (Jer. xli. 2). Too significant words ! 
 Gedaliah, the innocent Gedaliah, suffered the vengeance in- 
 tended for Nebuchadrezzar, and with him all the trained 
 warriors who were about him, including, we are expressly 
 told, u the Chaldeans who were present there.' 11 Whether the 
 interests of Judah were promoted or not by these murders, was 
 not a question which occurred to Ishmael. Perhaps he would 
 have been content himself with the position of a chieftain of a 
 small Israelitish tribe under the suzerainty of the Ammonites. 
 As yet, however, his predominant feeling was that of rage at 
 any Israelite who recognized "the logic of facts," and submitted 
 to the Babylonians. The second day after the murder, " while 
 no one knew it" (had Ishmael, then, closed the gates of the 
 town ?), there came eighty men from Shechem, Shiloh (or 
 perhaps rather Shalem or Salem '), and Samaria places 
 1 See p. 116, note i.
 
 A PASTOR'S STRANGE FAREWELL. 187 
 
 which, probably through Josiah's exertions, still maintained 
 their religious interest in Jerusalem, on their way to the site 
 of the destroyed temple. They had all the outward signs of 
 mourning ; it was no joyous festivity which they thought to 
 celebrate ; but, so far as they could, they wished to observe 
 the accustomed .forms by bringing oblations (ininkhali) to 
 Jehovah. Truly a noteworthy phenomenon ! How great is 
 the power of sacred spots, even apart from the buildings 
 essential, as one might think, to religious observances ! The 
 temple has been burned, but the temple-precincts are not less 
 sacred to these faithful worshippers. And now that the sad 
 procession has almost reached Mizpah, they can clearly see 
 these precincts, and weep anew. 1 Perhaps it was evening ; at 
 any rate, one more halt would be necessary. Hence the men 
 were not surprised at the seemingly hospitable invitation, 
 " Come to Gedaliah the son of Ahikam." But the speaker 
 was the ruthless Ishmael ; of those eighty men only ten re- 
 turned home. Unchanging East ! still dost thoti nourish the 
 same hot, revengeful natures as of yore ; still does thy revenge 
 accept the help of treachery in the execution of its fell designs. 
 Cawnporc and Mizpah stand together in the annals of Oriental 
 passion. 
 
 There was a " great cistern " in the middle of the town which 
 king Asa had constructed during his war with Baasha king of 
 Israel (comp. i Kings xv. 22) ; into this Ishmael threw the 
 dead bodies of the murdered seventy. And what of the ten ? 
 Was it pity which saved them ? No ; it was greed. Then, as 
 now, husbandmen who feared robbers stored the rich products 
 of the soil where no one would suspect them in carefully con- 
 cealed openings in the rocky hill-side. These ten men were 
 more prosperous than the rest, and ransomed theirlives by 
 their wealth. 2 Ishmael was doubtless a poor adventurer, and 
 material means were wanting to carry out his plans. The 
 greatest difficulty, however, still remains to be explained. 
 How could Ishmael venture to touch the sacred persons of 
 pilgrims ? I suppose that he was one of those whom Jeremiah 
 
 1 Following the Suptuagint (see "Variorum Bible"). 
 
 2 There is a Zulu formula for deprecating death on the ground of some 
 important work which cannot be done without the person whose life is in 
 danger. Bishop Callaway compares this with the story before us (" Zulu 
 Nursery Tales," i. 242) ; but it is not a very close parallel.
 
 1 38 jEftEMIAfr. 
 
 addresses in that indignant strain, What f steal, murjcr, atid 
 commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense iinto 
 Baal? (Jer. vii. 9). Possibly too he thought that Jehovah 
 had deserted his land, and that now less than ever were those 
 moral laws, of which Jeremiah was the exponent, binding upon 
 an Israelite. These eighty men were carrying oblations to 
 Jehovah ; he, for his part, was satisfied with the less exacting 
 religion of Baal. But why were the people of Mizpah spared ? 
 Did he think that those poor northern people could be better 
 dispensed with than the inhabitants of his own native Judah ? 
 Or that seventy was about the number of those Jewish nobles 
 whom Nebuchadrezzar had slain in Riblah (Jer. xxxix. 6), so 
 that the avenger of blood could now afford to be merciful ? At 
 any rate, the people of Mizpah, including, besides Jeremiah, 
 kinswomen of Ishmael belonging to the royal house, were being 
 carried off by these few bold adventurers in the direction of the 
 land of Ammon. 
 
 The route which they adopted led them at first northwards. 
 Before they had got far, they paused to drink by "the great waters 
 that are in Gibeon." ' How natural ! Remember that they had 
 started in haste. One can still observe an ancient broken 
 reservoir on the west side of the hill of Gibeon (el-Jib) and in 
 the wet season, says Thomson, there is a considerable pond in 
 the plain below the modern village. While the caravan halted, 
 Johanan and his fellow-captains came up with them. What could 
 Ishmael and his ten warriors 2 do against this superior force ? 
 Blows were exchanged, and Ishmael lost two of his men, and 
 made off with the rest to the Ammonites. What was Johanan 
 to do now ? Had he been able to deliver up the arch-conspirator 
 to the Chaldoeans, he might perhaps have hoped for a con- 
 tinuance of Nebuchadrezzar's favours. But appearances were 
 against him. He had (so it would be said at the court) allowed 
 a few bold men to subvert the existing organization, to kill 
 the representatives of Babylon, and to escape unpunished. 
 
 1 In 2 Sam. ii. 13 these " waters " are called " the pool of Gibeon." 
 
 2 In Jer. xli. 16 "men of war" must surely be an interpolated gloss. 
 According to v. 3 the warriors had all been slain by Ishmael. The Hebrew 
 g'barim (represented in A.V. by "mighty") simply means "men" as 
 opposed to " women." In Jer. xliii. 6, where the sexes and classes of the 
 people of Mizpah are again catalogued, we have simply gbarlm (comp. 
 xliv. 20).
 
 A PASTOR'S STRANGE FAREWELL. 189 
 
 Vengeance would assuredly be taken for this, and among the 
 leading sufferers would be Johanan and his fellows. So they 
 thought it most prudent to make for the Egyptian frontier, and 
 without stopping at Mizpah, pressed on to the hospice or khan 
 of Chimham (if the reading is correct '), close to Bethlehem. 
 Here they halted to hold a fresh council of war, and more 
 especially to obtain supernatural light from the prophet of 
 Jehovah. It was indeed no slight matter for the choicest part 
 of the remnant of Israel to return to the very land out of which 
 their fathers had been divinely guided. So they (i.e., the whole 
 community) approached Jeremiah in suppliant guise, as one 
 who, like Moses and like Samuel, had power with God to turn 
 the destinies of his people. Jeremiah agreed to this request, 
 and Johanan promised in return that, whatever the oracle 
 should be, they would cheerfully obey the commandment of 
 Jehovah. " Methinks he doth protest too much," was perhaps 
 the unspoken thought of Jeremiah. 
 
 Nine days the prophet passed in meditation and prayer. 
 Knowing him as we do, we cannot doubt that he sustained a 
 severe mental conflict. His dear friend and patron, who 
 seemed to have been raised up " for such a time as this," 
 had been brutally murdered, and Jehovah had not warned 
 him of it. Common sense seemed to bid acquiescence in the 
 policy provisionally adopted by Johanan. Jeremiah knew as 
 well as any one what Babylonian vengeance meant ; could he 
 imperil the lives of so many of his countrymen by advising 
 them to remain ? It was hard no doubt to condemn them- 
 selves to exile ; but in all material respects might they not hope 
 to be the gainers, and if Isa. xix. 18-25 was really written by 
 Isaiah, did it not indicate that, even religiously, Israelites might 
 have all their cravings satisfied in Egypt ? And yet the pro- 
 phetic spirit had distinctly assured him that in Babylon alone 
 could the regeneration of Israel be effected. Had not the 
 silence of Jehovah in the recent crisis proved that the delight- 
 
 1 Chimham (rather, Kimham) is most probably a personal name. To 
 founcf*a khan for the accommodation of travellers was a most natural ex- 
 pression of public-spirited liberality. Possibly it is the son of the rich 
 Gileaditu Barzillai (2 Sam. xix. 37-40) who is meant. But Josephus and 
 Aquila appear to have read "by the hurdles of Chimham," which is almost 
 more probable. Gcderah, Gederothaim, and Gederoth, are the names of 
 three places belonging to Judah in josh xv.
 
 190 JEREMIAH. 
 
 ful project of a small home-community was not from Him? 1 
 And was He not the God of the innocent, and the helper of the 
 friendless ? So faith spoke louder than policy, and on the 
 tenth day the prophet had a clear intuition of the Divine will, 
 or, in the consecrated phrase, the word of Jehovah came unto 
 Jeremiah. He sent word to Johanan, and the whole com- 
 munity again met before the great prophet. No longer, how- 
 ever, in the same submissive spirit. These ten days had not 
 been spent idly by the captains and their companions. The 
 more they considered the question, the less they could regard it 
 as an open one. Jeremiah was in a difficult position. Never 
 was the need more obvious of a class of teachers distinct from 
 the prophets, who could inculcate prophetic ideas in a more 
 conciliatory style. Such a class had never existed at Jerusalem, 
 though some of the "wise men " had down to the time of the 
 death of Josiah helped to predispose suitable individuals in 
 favour of the prophetic point of view. 2 There was certainly no 
 one to stand by Jeremiah now no one to go in and out of the 
 tents, preparing the people to receive his address, and explain- 
 ing it kindly and wisely after it had been spoken. So the 
 words of the "allocution" fell upon unfriendly ears, and the 
 increasing sternness of its tone suggests that clouds of wrath 
 were visibly gathering on the brows of the excitable audience. 
 This is what Jeremiah in effect said : " I know that ye are sick 
 of the trumpet's blare, and of the never long absent fear of 
 famine. I know that ye long to live together under a mild 
 sovereign. All these things that ye desire shall ye have, if ye 
 will only dwell in this land. Jehovah is satisfied with the 
 chastening which Israel has received, nor does He wish to 
 root up His people altogether. Be not afraid of Nebuchad- 
 rezzar ; he is the instrument of God's purposes, and God will 
 turn his heart like the water-courses. But if ye obstinately 
 disobey, I warn you that the evils which ye dread shall over- 
 take you there ; ye shall see this land no more. Do ye 
 scowl at me ? Infatuated men ! Ye deluded yourselves 3 when 
 ye protested such willingness to obey God's word. Ye have 
 
 1 In imagining such a thought to have passed through Jeremiah's mind, 
 I assume that Jer. xlii. 10 does not accurately represent the point of view of 
 Jeremiah. See below. 
 
 2 See p. 90. 
 
 3 In Jer. xlii. 20, we should render, " Yea, ye misled your own selves," &c.
 
 A PASTOR'S STRANGE FAREWELL. 191 
 
 made your choice ; know, then, that sword, famine, and pesti- 
 lence await you in Egypt." 
 
 It is a striking narrative. The writer does not conceal iiom 
 us that he has taken his side. Azariah * (who seems now to 
 have pushed himself to the front) and Johanan are the leaders 
 of a band of disobedient apcstates. 2 Their reply to Jeremiah is 
 preserved ; it places us in the very midst of the religious party- 
 struggles of the day. Thou spcakest falsely, they say ; Jehovah 
 our God hath not sent tliee, saying, Go not into Egypt to sojourn 
 there. Their point of view is precisely that of the priests and 
 prophets on an earlier occasion. When Jeremiah prophesied, 
 "This house shall be like Shiloh," they arrested and con- 
 demned him to death, not on the ground that he was a false 
 claimant of the prophetic gift, but that he had mistaken his 
 private opinion for the " word" of Jehovah. So his opponents 
 argued now, though they cast a part of the blame on one of 
 whom we should never have thought the prophet's faithful 
 scribe : Baruch the son of Neriah setteth thee on against us, to 
 deliver us into the hand of the Chaldceans (Jer. xliii. 3). Was 
 there any foundation for this story? It is possible. From the 
 special oracle to Baruch, spoken in the fatal fourth year of 
 Jehoiakim, we may gather that Baruch was inclined by nature 
 to paint things in rose-colour. And seekest thou great things 
 for thyself ? seek them not? Behold, that which I have built 
 will 1 break down, and that which I have planted will I pluck 
 up, even this whole land (Jer. xlv. 5, 4). Taking this passage 
 in connexion with Jer. xlii. 10, I infer that Baruch, though his 
 moral standard was as high as Jeremiah's, believed that, even 
 after its heavy losses, Israel as a nation could yet be "built up" 
 in its own land. No doubt the oracle in Jer. xlv. weakened his 
 illusion for the time ; indeed, the logic of facts had already 
 added sorrow to Itis grief. But, as is the wont of human nature, 
 his personal bent reasserted itself, and the establishment of 
 Gedaliah at Mizpah seemed a providential confirmation of his 
 hopes. Will it not help us to understand Jeremiah's attitude, 
 
 1 Azariah, whose name appears in Jer. xlii. i by mistake as Jezaniah 
 (Sept. gives "Azariah "), is not mentioned among the captains, Jer. xl. 8. 
 
 2 "All the proud men." The word (zcdini) is one which occurs re- 
 peatedly in Psa. cxix. (see the author's note on v. 21). Compare the anti- 
 thesis between restless pride and composed humility in Psa. cxxxi. 
 
 3 Gentle Bishop Ken's motto (in his copy of Grotius " De Veritate ").
 
 192 JEREMIAH. 
 
 if we suppose that Baruch really did influence him during this 
 period ? The prophet does not appear to have remonstrated 
 with Gedaliah for accepting the responsibilities of a vassal 
 chieftain, nor to have given him any prophetic counsel, nor to 
 have received any prophetic warning of his death : in short, so 
 far as we can see, his communion with his God was not as vivid 
 nor as direct as it had been formerly. May we not ascribe this 
 to some shade of human reason intervening between the prophet 
 and his Sun, and probably enough, to his intercourse with 
 Baruch? I cannot help thinking that we not only may, but 
 must ; and considering that these chapters, as they stand, 
 cannot be the work of Jeremiah, my loyalty to the prophet 
 suggests the conjecture that Jer. xlii. 10 embodies ideas for 
 which Baruch is chiefly responsible Baruch, whom the pro- 
 phet has already described as being (in no ignoble sense, of 
 course) ambitious of great things, and as listening with a heavy 
 heart to the oracle, " I will break down, and I will pluck up." 
 
 Angry as the captains were, they made no attempt on the 
 life either of Jeremiah or of Baruch. They had not that class- 
 jealousy of the prophet which doubtless animated his enemies 
 in the temple at Jerusalem (Jer. xxvi.). They carried the 
 prophet with them to Egypt. If he could not protect them 
 by his presence, he should at least share their fate. Beyond 
 the frontier they doubtless found other Jewish fugitives already 
 settled (Jer. xxiv. 8), and it would seem from Jer. xliv. I that 
 they separated into two bands, some going to the two northern 
 frontier cities Migdol and Tahpanhes (inhabited to a great 
 extent by foreigners), others further south to Noph and 
 Pathros (or Upper Egypt). 1 From these havens of rest they 
 looked with a pity mingled with self-satisfaction on their less 
 
 1 Migdol (comp. xlvi. 14, Ezek. xxix. 10, xxx. 6, R.V. marg. } is the 
 Magdolon of Herodotus (ii. 159, see above, p. 96) ; it is also mentioned in 
 the Itinerary of Antoninus, as being twelve Roman miles from Pelusium. 
 It derived its name from one of the forts connected by a wall on the Asiatic 
 frontier. (This is not the Migdol of Exod. xiv. 2 ; see Naville, " Pithom," 
 p. 25.) Tahpanhes is doubtless Daphnae (comp. Septuagint) ; Noph is 
 more probably Memphis than Napata (comp. Jer. ii. 16, xlvi. 14, Ezek. 
 xxx. 13, 16, 18). Pathros (pa Hathor, " place of the goddess Hathor ") 
 means first the nome of Thebes, and next the whole of Upper Egypt. See 
 Ebers, " Aegypten und die Biicher Mose's," i. 81-83, "S- I2 < anc * comp. 
 Mr. Stuart Poole's excellent little volume, "The Cities of Egypt." [At the 
 last moment, I can add Part II. of Mr. Petrie's " Memoir on Tanis."]
 
 A PASTOR'S STRANGE FAREWELL. 193 
 
 fortunate fellow-countrymen in Judah, some of whom were at 
 this moment perhaps being carried oft" by Nebuzaradan 
 out of vengeance for the recent outrage to the majesty of 
 Babylon (Jer. lii. 30). Jeremiah was now at Tahpanhes. There 
 he laid a fresh prophetic burden on the land of Egypt, which 
 calls for attention (Jer. xliii. 8-13). It is introduced by another 
 specimen of sign-speech. A prophetic impulse bade him take 
 great stones and imbed them in the mortar (not " clay," as 
 A.V.) in the pavement at the entry of the royal palace. This 
 means that Nebuchadrezzar, who all men thought would stop 
 short at the Palestinian frontier, would soon set up his throne 
 here, and from here penetrate into Egypt, slay or lead captive 
 its inhabitants, destroy its obelisks and temples, and go fortli 
 from thence in peace. An indefatigable English explorer (Mr. 
 Flinders Petrie) is the best commentator on this "sign-speech" 
 of Jeremiah. In the year 1886 he found at Tell Defenneh the 
 ruins of a fort built by Psametik I., and now called "the palace 
 of the Jew's daughter," and could identify Jeremiah's " pave- 
 ment " with " a great open-air platform of brickwork, a sort 
 of mastaba, such as is now seen outside all great houses, and 
 most small ones, in this country." 1 Little, however, he says, 
 is left of the palace. But have we gained as much as some of 
 us thought when the news of this interesting discovery reached 
 us ? Not unless further corroboration of the details of Jere- 
 miah's prophecy comes from contemporary inscriptions. As 
 to the burning of the temples spoken of (Jer. xliii. 12), that 
 of course is a prophetic hyperbole, which is simply useful as 
 giving us a measure of the feeling which animated the speaker. 
 On the other hand, the particular instance of Divine vengeance 
 specified by the prophet is true to fact. Of the obelisks of the 
 Sun-god's temple at Heliopolis (in Egyptian, " Pe-Ra " or " Ra's 
 Abode" ; in Hebrew, " Beth-Shemesh " or" House of the Sun"), 
 only one remains, to prove the venerable antiquity of the fallen 
 religion." But what of Nebuchadrezzar and his desolating in- 
 vasion of Egypt ? Did he erect his tribunal at Tahpanhes ? 
 \Ve shall return to this later ; Jeremiah himself will give us the 
 best of opportunities. But we must, even here, carefully notice 
 the difference between this and the other prophecies of the 
 calamities of Egypt (Jer. ix. 25, 26, xlvi. 2-26), viz., that 
 
 1 " Memoir on Tanis," Part II. "Egypt Exploration Fund," 1888, p. 50. 
 - Mr. Stuart Poole states that " it was set up at least 4000 years ago, ' 
 
 14
 
 194 JEREMIAH. 
 
 Jeremiah is here thinking as much of his fellow-countrymen 
 as of the Egyptians. It was by the Divine will that Jacob and 
 his sons went down into Egypt ; but there is no " land of 
 Goshen" for those who go there of their own will. When the 
 " woe to Egypt " is fulfilled, let not the foreign refugees expect 
 to be mere spectators. " Death, captivity, and sword " in Jer. 
 xliii. ii correspond to "sword, famine, and pestilence" in Jer. 
 xlii. 17 ; comp. xliv. 12-14. 
 
 The last discourse of Jeremiah which is preserved to us 
 (chap, xliv.) is in several respects an interesting one. Wo 
 might have thought that the change of the old order of 
 things would have brought some peace and quiet to the 
 harassed prophet. But no the great Huguenot's motto, rcpos 
 ailleurs, might have been Jeremiah's. Not yet could he put 
 off Elijah's mantle ; the close of his ministry was to be as full 
 of rejected calls to repentance as the beginning. No more 
 bright and original ideas, but sad reminiscences of a past 
 which must have seemed to Jeremiah far more distant than it 
 really was. Must we not admire him for thus calmly resuming 
 his thankless task, and renewing offers only too sure to be 
 despised ? Where the scene of the prophecy is laid, and 
 what was its occasion, we shall see presently. It falls into 
 five sections. In verses 2-10 Jeremiah reminds his hearers 
 of the terrible judgment upon Judah. Surely this part of the 
 discourse at any rate must have been modified by the hand 
 of Baruch, for the description of the state of Judah is a very 
 exaggerated one. 1 Suicidal, continues the prophet, is the 
 conduct of the refugees in continuing their polytheistic prac- 
 tices even after such a warning. How contrite they ought to 
 be ! With what trembling hope they ought to approach 
 Jehovah, remembering that with t/iee there is forgiveness, in 
 order that thou mayest be feared. But what a different tale 
 is told by these unmoved countenances (see Jer. xliv. 10) ! 
 
 In verses 11-14, tne doom already proclaimed (Jer. xlii.) is 
 repeated with a terrible particularity. Did Jeremiah really use 
 
 1 We are only told that the citizens of Mizpah and their families went to 
 Egypt ; the farmers (as we should call them) of whom Jer. xxxix. 10, xl. 10, 
 speaks remained to cultivate the soil, and kept certain "cities" from abso- 
 lute desolation. In a subsequent passage (Jer. xliv. 22) the exaggeration is 
 still stronger, unless "without inhabitant" be an interpolation (see Sep- 
 tuagint).
 
 A PASTOR'S STRANGF. FAREWELL. 195 
 
 these words? Or may we not ascribe some of them, as well as 
 the parallel expressions in chap, xlii., to the editor, Baruch ? I 
 for my part can with difficulty realize the relapse of Jeremiah 
 into his old, too vehement manner, considering the Pisgah-view 
 which he has taken of a better and happier age. The section 
 concludes with the words, for none but (single) escaped ones 
 shall return (comp. 7'. 28). At this point an explanatory 
 statement is inserted, with reference to the speech of the Jews 
 which follows. Isaiah at the close of two of his greatest pro- 
 phecies (Isa. iii. i6-iv. I, xxxii. 9-12) turns to the women, 
 " gathered, we may suppose, at a little distance from the rest, 
 and testifying their indifference." ' So Jeremiah appears to have 
 done at least he distinctly addresses his answer (vv. 21-30) 
 to the women who had boldly addressed him as well as to the 
 men. This is the note in question, 
 
 Then all the men who knew that their wives burned incense 
 unto other gods, and all the women who were standing by, a 
 great assembly, even all the people who dwelt in the land oj 
 r.gypt, in rathros, answered Jeremiah (Jer. xliv. 15). 
 
 " Great assembly " (comp. i Kings viii. 65) is clearly a reli- 
 gious phrase ; these men and women had resorted to some 
 central place in Upper Egypt to celebrate the worship of 
 the " queen of heaven." Not an encouraging circumstance 
 for Jeremiah, some one may say. No, truly ; he carried 
 his life in his hand, and thought perhaps of that other 
 " assembly " (Jer. xxvi. 17) when he had had such a hair- 
 breadth escape from danger. He now ventured again before 
 a crosvcl of religious enthusiasts, who had not indeed cast 
 off the worship of Jehovah (see especially verse 26), but had 
 placed other gods beside the true God of Israel. They were 
 among those who had taken the Deuteronomic Torah in its 
 most obvious but not its highest sense. And the consequence of 
 recent events was a strong reaction in their minds against the 
 God who, in His impotence, as it seemed, had let them be 
 driven out of their own land. Jehovah had promised pros- 
 perity, they said, to those who observed the Law ; they had 
 observed it, and see what the result had been. They must 
 now, in common prudence, revert to those old idolatries which 
 Deuteronomy had forbidden, and especially to the worship of 
 that gracious divinity, the "queen of heaven." And who \\;i 
 1 " The Prophecies of Isaiah," i. 186.
 
 196 JEREMIAH. 
 
 the "queen of heaven "? We must first of all see the issue 
 of the controversy. 
 
 As for the word that thon hast spoken unto us in Jehovah's 
 name, we will not hearken tin to thce : but we will perform all our 
 promises to burn incense unto the queen of heaven, and to pour out 
 drink offerings unto her, <ts we did, we andour fathers, our kings 
 and our princes, in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jeru- 
 salem, and so we were satisfied with bread, ami were hitppy, and 
 saw no evil. But since we left off burning incense to the queen 
 of heaven, and pouring out drink offerings unto her, we have 
 wanted all tilings, and have perished by sword and famine. 
 
 Let us not be too severe on these unhappy men. At any rate, 
 they are in some sense patriots ; the fate which lias befallen 
 so many of their countrymen they make, by sympathy, their 
 own. It is probable enough, from the prominence given to the 
 women, that the wives had really been all along hankering 
 after this femim tie cuhus, in the rites of which they were, by old 
 custom, important persons. (Is it not the fact that women 
 are everywhere a conservative religious influence ?) But see, 
 one of the women steps forward to speak to Jeremiah, who 
 may perhaps suppose that they forced their wishes on their 
 unwilling husbands. Not so. If we burn incense to the queen 
 of heaven, and pour out drink offerings unto her, is it without 
 our husbands that we have prepared cakes for her to pour tray 
 her, and poured out drink offerings unto her ? 
 
 Verses 20-23 form the third section of the prophecy. The 
 prophet himself puts his own point as forcibly as possible in v. 
 23. Because ye burned incense . . . therefore this evil happened 
 unto you (v. 23). He admits the facts, but interprets them in 
 a diametrically opposite sense. By so doing, he shows how 
 hopeless it was to make any progress along the traditional 
 lines of Jewish religious thought. That true piety must lead 
 to earthly prosperity, was an illusion which had become posi- 
 tively harmful. Jeremiah knew this, but had not the power to 
 set it forth in a logical manner ; and yet it was a logical 
 explanation which was imperatively called for by the circum- 
 stances. And so in the fourth section (verses 24-28) he 
 endeavours to make up for his logical deficiency by expressing 
 more earnestly than ever his prophetic intuition that Jehovah 
 cannot permit such insults to the higher and the only true 
 view of His " name " or essential nature to pass unpunished.
 
 A PASTOR'S STRANGE FAREWELL. 197 
 
 Behold^ I sicear l>y my great name, no more shall my name be 
 pronounced by the mouth of any man of Judali /hat saith " By 
 the life of the Lord Jehovah." Such is the oracle ; it means 
 that all the Jewish refugees shall perish but a very small 
 number (comp. v. 14), who shall have to take refuge in their 
 old land (v. 28). Never did Jeremiah (if the report be correct) 
 commit himself more definitely to the literal fulfilment of a 
 prediction than now. He knows the Jewish fondness for 
 "signs," and so, that his opponents may recognize him as a true 
 seer of the future, he offers them two " signs." First, those 
 few who do ultimately escape shall know by sad experience 
 ic hose word standetli, mine, or theirs (v.- 28). Next, to quote 
 the prophet's own words in the last section, Behold, I give 
 f'hanwh Ifophra king of Egypt into the hand of his enemies, 
 and into the hand of tJiem that seek his life, as I gave Zedekiali 
 king of Judah into the ha/id of Nebuchadrezzar king oj 
 Babylon, his enemy, and that sought his life (v. 30). 
 
 One cannot but be distressed, first, that Jeremiah in spite of 
 himself accepted the old "tendency argument"; and next, 
 that he staked his prophetic character on the circumstantial 
 fulfilment of certain predictions. The argument was of course 
 inconclusive ; the circumstantial fulfilment, even if it can be 
 proved, cannot now contribute did it indeed ever greatly con- 
 tribute ? to increase the influence of Jeremiah. Granting 
 that we find a prediction in Jeremiah of some event which 
 actually took place, yet how easy it is for a prophet or his 
 editor to manufacture predictions after the event. And how 
 difficult it is to prove such fulfilments. It appears certain 
 that Jeremiah's and Ezekiel's prediction of the Babylonian 
 conquest of Tyre (Jer. xxv. 22, xxvii. 3, xlvii. 4 ; Ezek. xxvi. i- 
 xxviii. 19) was not ratified by the event ; Ezekiel himself seems 
 to say as much (Ezek. xxix. 17-21). Is it probable, so a 
 rationalist might well argue, that the conquest of a country 
 like Egypt should have been really foreseen in its details by 
 Hebrew prophets ? I think that from the highest point of view 
 prophecy neither gains nor loses by having received a circum- 
 stantial fulfilment ; the moral and spiritual clement is that by 
 which alone it lives. Let me not then be thought biassed by 
 theology if I hold,' in opposition to M. Maspero, that in all 
 essential points the prophetic references to a Babylonian con- 
 1 Soc my discussion of tlii^ question in " The Pulpit Commentary."
 
 198 JEREMIAH. 
 
 quest of Egypt are accurate. Putting together two cuneiform 
 records and a hieroglyphic inscription, it appears that in his 
 37th year Nebuchadrezzar penetrated into Egypt as farasSyene. 
 There he was met and repulsed by the Egyptian troops (comp. 
 Ezek. xxix. 10). Two years later the Babylonians renewed the 
 invasion, and by their complete success forced Egypt to pay 
 tribute. It has not however been shown (see Herod, ii. 169) 
 that Hophra (the old ally of Zedekiah) was slain by the Baby- 
 lonians, though this seems almost required, if Jer. xliv. 30 is to 
 have the character of a " sign." 
 
 Certainly Jeremiah and Ezekicl spoke a true " word of the 
 Lord " when they uttered these prophecies. What sufficient 
 moral safeguards had these ancient states ? A temporary 
 exception may be made for Babylon, the religion of which, 
 with all its imperfections, was, as we have seen, a noble one. 
 But -of all the communities of that time the most miserable 
 was this Jewish one in Egypt. Less endowed with physical 
 advantages, it was also, through the operation of causes which 
 we have studied, at a lower moral and spiritual level than any 
 other. In the religion of Babylon at any rate there were 
 elements akin to that of the prophets and psalmists. Even 
 the worship of the " queen of heaven " may in some countries 
 have had a moral tinge ; but it was not so among the Jews of 
 Pathros. The children gathered wood, the fathers kindled the 
 fire, the women kneaded the dough, to make sacrificial cakes, 
 as they had done in Jehoiakim's time (Jer. vii. 18), simply as a 
 propitiatory rite which would keep off sword and pestilence. 
 Who was the " queen of heaven " ? ' Was she the moon ? or 
 the planet known to the Babylonians as I star and to ourselves 
 as Venus (not the masculine deity referred to in Isa. xiv. 12, 
 but the feminine)? Some have preferred the former, remind- 
 ing us that cakes were offered to Artemis at the Eleusinian 
 Mysteries. But Wellhausen has pointed out - that a similar 
 
 1 See Schrader's paper in the "Transactions of the Berlin Academy," 
 1886, pp. 477-491 ; Kuenen, " De Melecheth des Hemels" (Amsterdam, 
 1888) ; and articles by Stade in his " Zeitschrift," 1886, pp. 123-132, 289- 
 339; and comp. Morris, "Assyrian Dictionary," i. 86. "Melecheth" is 
 doubtless wrongly vocalized ; the punctuators explained the whole phrase 
 " (God's) work in the heaven " (comp. Gen. ii. i, 2). They meant the 
 starry host. 
 
 2 " Skizzen und Vorarbeiten," iii. 38, 39. The worship of different 
 planetary divinities was widely spread among the Arabian tribes.
 
 A PASTOR'S STRANGE FAR I:\VKLI.. 199 
 
 rite formed part of the cultus of the Arabian goddess al-Uzza 
 (Venus), and Kuenen that in the Targum of the prophetical 
 books the Hebrew phrase is rendered "star (fcin.) of heaven," 
 i.e. the planet Venus, while Isaac of Antioch, who wrote in the 
 same century (the fifth A.D.) in which that Targum was finally 
 shaped, infers from this passage of Jeremiah that the Jews 
 sacrificed to "the Star" (which he identifies with the Arabian 
 al-Uzza or Venus).' Finally, Schrader has given evidence that 
 the Assyrians called the feminine Istar inulkatu "queen,"' and 
 that in Assurbanipal's reign (i.e. not so long before Jeremiah's 
 prophecy) the northern Arabs worshipped a deity called Atar- 
 samain (i.e. Atar 2 of heaven). 
 
 It is a tempting theme which Jeremiah's last prophecy suggests 
 to us. Many writers have dealt already with the " vestiges of 
 ancient manners and customs discoverable " 3 in Christen- 
 dom. The phrase " Regina Cocli" can now be dealt with as 
 one of these "vestiges" with more fulness than before. It 
 belongs not only to the Virgin Mary, and to the Ephesian 
 Artemis, but in the Semitic countries (probably) to the goddess 
 of the Moon and of Venus. Yes ; it is a tempting study, and 
 if pursued a little farther, might lead us to sympathize in some 
 sense with the myth-makers. Why, then, did Jeremiah hate 
 the "queen of heaven"? Because these fair but inwardly 
 exhausted mythologies did dishonour to Him who is the true 
 "king of heaven" (Dan. iv. 37), and of whom it was said, 
 /fair, O Israel : Jehovah our God is one Jehovah (Ueut. 
 vi. 4). 
 
 1 To the passages from St. Isaac cited by Kuenen, add Carm. x. v. 343 
 (Bickell i. 220, 221), where boys and girls are said to have been sacrificed 
 to "the Star." 
 
 - Atar is the Assyrian Istar. See Schrader' s note on Jer. vii. 18. 
 
 3 I quote from the title of an early work by Prof. J. J. Blunt, of Cam- 
 bridge.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 PER CRUCEM AD LUCEM. 
 
 Legendary accounts of Jeremiah's death His sufferings and compensa- 
 tions Jeremiah compared with Milton and Savonarola The spring 
 foreseen by the Israelite and the Italian still future. 
 
 THE heathen festival proceeds. But where is the grieved, the 
 broken-hearted protester? What was the prophet's subse- 
 quent history ? When Nebuchadrezzar conquered Egypt, did 
 he, as some later Jewish writers say, carry Jeremiah and 
 Baruch with him to Babylon ? Or, as a Christian legend, 
 possibly referred to in Heb. xi. 37, asserts, was he stoned to 
 death at Tahpanhes by his unbelieving people ? Certainly the 
 latter is psychologically a probable view of Jeremiah's closing 
 scene. Once and again, when death stared him in the face, 
 Jehovah had " hidden " Jeremiah ; but why should Providence 
 baffle the designs of his persecutors, now that his work was 
 done, and their malice could but add fresh flowers to the faith- 
 ful servant's crown? His God "hid" him this time in a far 
 more secret place, if we may trust our sense of the fitness of 
 things. Already (see p. 112) I have invited my readers to 
 follow this legend. Already the narrative of St. Stephen's 
 martyrdom has helped us to imagine how 
 
 " . . . . some strong pathetic 
 Face of a wounded prophet gazed, and then 
 
 Sank in God's darkness grandly 
 From out the infinite littleness of men," * 
 
 1 Alexander, " Death of the Earl of Derby.
 
 PER CRUCEM AD LUCKM. 2OI 
 
 and to infer the feelings of Jeremiah. May we venture on a 
 still bolder step, and, with the great Jewish scholar Saadya 
 (who died 942 A.D.) and with the versatile statesman-critic 
 Bunsen, consider Isa. lii. ij-liii. Israel's penitent confession of 
 its guilt in having slain this great teacher? Certainly Jeremiah 
 likens himself to the gentle lamb tltat is led to the slaughter 
 (xi. 19), and might, even by one who knew his slight regard 
 for the sacrificial system, have been called metaphorically a 
 sacrifice for his people. But to me it seems clear that if a 
 historical martyr is referred to in that great monologue, it must 
 be some one who was judicially murdered, and whose death 
 was remembered afterwards. Jeremiah's, death was forgotten; 
 so indeed Isaiah's had been. At an earlier age some prose- 
 poet might have projected from his divinely illumined imagina- 
 tion chariots and horses of fire to carry them up to heaven ; 
 and at a later period the rising Church would have chronicled 
 the minutest facts of the " new births " of such heroes of faith. 
 Their earthly fame suffers ; but dear sJiall their blood be in 
 lus siglit. 
 
 " In Jeremiah," as the most sympathetic of critical inter- 
 preters has said, " the kingdom lost the most human prophet 
 it ever possessed. His heavy sorrows and despair, his noble 
 yet fruitless struggles, and his fall, were those of prophetism, 
 and, so far as prophetism constituted the inmost life of the 
 ancient state, of the state itself. If any pure soul could still 
 save the state, that soul was Jeremiah's, whose period of 
 greatest vigour fell in these three and twenty years of its dying 
 agony : but even for the noblest of the prophets the time 
 was now gone by ; and the last great prophet, and all the 
 remains of the ancient kingdom of Israel, which had been 
 preserved amid the storms of centuries, were engulfed in a 
 common ruin." ' Three and twenty years, however, is not the 
 whole duration of Jeremiah's career. He saw not only the 
 dying agony, but the last stage of the disease which prepared 
 that agony. If he was martyred five years after the fall of 
 Jerusalem, and if he began to prophesy in the thirteenth year 
 of Josiah's reign, we get forty-four years as the duration of his 
 ministry, so that his age at his death cannot be less (comp. 
 Jer. i. 6) than sixty-four. He was therefore an old man, and my 
 comparison of his glimpse of the " new covenant " to the prospect 
 1 Ewuld, " History of Israel,'' iv. 249.
 
 202 JEREMIAH. 
 
 which Moses enjoyed upon Nebo is justified. " Few and evil " 
 were his days. Nor had he the blessing which Israelites prized 
 so dearly a wife and children (Jer. xvi. 2), in this respect less 
 favoured than Moses. But can we say that his sun went down 
 in unmitigated gloom ? Had he no compensations but his post- 
 humous influence and his early friendships ? Surely he had, if, 
 " speaking as a man," the Saviour had any. Jesus, too, was old 
 in experience and perhaps in countenance (John viii. 57), and 
 was without the closest of earthly ties. Jesus, too, was, except 
 by a few friends, "despised and rejected." Still the Saviour 
 had not only "unknown griefs," but unknown comforts 
 the joy that was set before him, and Jeremiah, I think, 
 must in some dim way have enjoyed a similar spiritual 
 happiness. Yes ; Jeremiah is not unfitly called a " type," an 
 unfinished sketch as it were, of the unique, the incomparable 
 One. It is true that only once ' does he (perhaps) refer to a 
 personal Saviour of Israel, and even then he uses a symbolic 
 expression which circumstances were proving to be wholly inade- 
 quate to its object. But if he did not predict the true Christ 
 in words, he did so by his life. Rightly did the Crusaders 
 erect a church at their Anathoth dedicated to Saint Jeremiah.-' 
 It is true the later Jews had in their fashion already canonized 
 him (see the touching narrative in 2 Mace, xv., and notice the 
 homage paid to him in the land of his martyrdom by Philo 3 ). 
 
 A long characterization of our prophet is needless. If this 
 book does not present a living, growing character, it has missed 
 its aim. I have no space to speak of his literary merits, which 
 have been depreciated perhaps somewhat too much. He was 
 not an artist in words ; he is given to repetition and the use of 
 stereotyped formula: ; he is too often diffuse and always imita- 
 
 1 Jeremhih has but one undoubted reference (xxiii. 5) to royalty as the 
 organ of God's future government of His people it is the famous prophecy 
 of the "Shoot" or perhaps "Shoots" (i.e., either a Davidic king or a 
 succession of Davidic kings). This shows that, while on the one hand 
 Jeremiah will not neglect the symbol of his gifted predecessor, he is fully 
 conscious of its inadequacy in the decadence of the royal house. As for 
 Jer. xxxiii. 14-26, it is extremely probable that it is an accretion on the 
 text. It is not contained in the Septuagint. 
 
 2 Their Anathoth was Karyet el-'Enab (on which see p. 121, note 2). 
 The church (now in the possession of the French) is one of the most 
 interesting in Palestine. 
 
 ' See Diummond, " 1'hilo Judaeus," i. 16.
 
 PER CRUCEM AD LUCEI^. 203 
 
 tive. But how could he soar, when there was so much to 
 depress his imagination ? He at any rate can touch the heart, 
 and is free from affectation. His greatest poem is his own 
 fascinating character. In the earlier chapters I have taken 
 much pains to detect the germs of subsequent developments ; 
 I must not repeat myself. Suffice it here to mention two persons 
 with whom Jeremiah may be profitably compared. 
 
 The first is our own Milton, whose greatness both as a poet 
 and as a public man is so inextricably connected with his 
 fervent spiritual religion. There have been few who could 
 more fully enter into Jeremiah's first chapter than Milton (from 
 whom the motto for my own opening chapter is taken), or who 
 have equally experienced that loneliness which fell upon Jere- 
 miah when, as Wellhausen puts it, "the true Israel was nar- 
 rowed to himself." ' Neither was wholly free from the bitterness 
 of strife, but to neither was refused an emancipating heavenly 
 vision. A literary critic has recently said that " the love of 
 country in its most creative and passionate form was the out- 
 come of Puritanism;"- but the same passionate spiritual 
 ardour which we find in the patriotism of the Puritans existed 
 long before in that of Jeremiah. 
 
 lint at the close of his ministry I would rather compare 
 Jeremiah with one who was minify both in words and in deeds 
 (Acts vii. 22), and whom a sympathetic poetess has painted 
 perhaps more truly than her sister-artist in prose.' Need I 
 
 mention his name ? 
 
 ". . . . This was he, 
 Savonarola, who, while Peter sank 
 With his whole boat-load, cried courageously, 
 ' Wake, Christ ; wake, Christ ! ' 
 Who also by a princely deathbed cried, 
 1 Loose Florence, or God will not loose thy soul !' 
 Then fell back the Magnificent and died 
 Beneath the star-look shooting from the cowl, 
 Which turned to wormwood-bitterness the wide 
 Deep sea of his ambitions." 
 
 1 " Encyclopaedia Britannica," xiii. 
 
 2 Spectator, June 16, 1888 (review of Mr. Harrison's " Cromwell "). 
 
 ' Mr. G. W. Cooke well remarks that George Eliot's Savonarola is 
 "always much more of an altruist than of a Christian." Prof. Creighton, 
 I think, would reject the version of Lorenzo de' Medici's death accepted by 
 Mrs. Browning. But the general impression given by the above lines is, I 
 hope, correct.
 
 204 JERElVflAH. 
 
 I admit that Jeremiah had not the hopefulness described in 
 the opening lines ; Jerusalem was a less promising field of 
 work than, with all its faults, Florence was in the age of 
 Lorenzo. But do not the closing lines give almost a reflexion 
 of Jeremiah's attitude towards Jehoiakim ? Savonarola had, I 
 suppose, a richer nature than Jeremiah. In him several of the 
 old Hebrew prophets seemed united. He had the scathing 
 indignation of Amos, and the versatility of Isaiah, as well as 
 the tenderness of Jeremiah. He differs most from the latter in 
 two respects in his emphatic reassertion of the principle of 
 theocratic legislation, and in his ultra-supernaturalistic theory 
 of prophecy, which disturbed the simplicity of his faith in his 
 own inspiration. Again and again, however, in his latter days, 
 his preaching reminds us of Jeremiah's. " Your sins," he cries 
 to the Florentines, "make me a prophet. . . . And if ye will 
 not hear my words, I say unto you that I will be the prophet 
 Jeremiah, who foretold the destruction of Jerusalem, and 
 bewailed it when destroyed." Like Jeremiah, he had many a 
 sore inward struggle ; " an inward fire," he says, " consumeth 
 my bones (comp. Jer. xx. 9), and compelleth me to speak." 
 Like Jeremiah, he was no respecter of persons ; he fought 
 bravely, and outwardly at least was defeated. Like Jeremiah, 
 he foresaw the end of the struggle. " If you ask me in 
 general " so he said, shortly before he was burned at the 
 stake, in the convent-church of St. Mark's " as to the issue of 
 this struggle, I reply, Victory. If you ask me in a particular 
 sense, I reply, Death. For the master who wields the hammer, 
 when he has used it, throws it away. So He did with Jeremiah, 
 ~a'/n>i>i He caused to be stoned at the end of his ministry. But 
 Rome will not put out this fire, and if this be put out, God will 
 light another, and indeed it is already lighted everywhere, only 
 they perceive it not." 
 
 It was winter both in Jeremiah's time and in Savonarola's. 
 Which was the more favoured of these two heralds of spring ? 
 / think, Jeremiah, because his prophecy of spring was fulfilled, 
 after a brief interval, to his own people. Not so fortunate was 
 Savonarola. Germany, France, and England not Italy 
 were the theatre of the promised Reformation. Italy still 
 waits. Still Jeremiah's advantage was not so great as it might 
 seem. Israel had indeed its bright spring (thanks to the 
 Second Isaiah), and its disappointing but still brilliant summer
 
 PER CRUCEM AD LUCEM. 2O5 
 
 (thanks to Ezra), but it passed only too quickly into another 
 winter. Israel waits again, and seems to say, How lonif, 
 Jclioi'aJi, wilt thou forget me for ever? But why be im- 
 patient ? Winter is not death. We know that there is a real 
 though concealed life around us in the winter-time, and that 
 mighty forces are at work, which will restore to us first, spring's 
 fair promise, then summer's fulness of growth, and then 
 autumn's golden fruitage. And we know that mighty spiritual 
 forces are at work in Israel and among the Italians, and that, 
 though not with the voice of Jeremiah or of Savonarola, yet 
 with such power as God has given them Israelitish and 
 Italian reformers are continuing the work of those prophets in 
 Italy and Israel. True sons of the prophets are they 
 
 ".. . men, whose spirit-sharpened sight 
 Foreknows the advent of the liirht."
 
 UNWIN BROTHERS, 
 CHILWORTH AND LONDON.
 
 Now Complete, with Full Index, in Six Volumes, 
 Price i6s. each Volume. 
 
 THIRTY THOUSAND THOUGHTS. 
 
 On all Subjects : from all Sourcei : 
 
 Theological, Patristic, 
 
 Philosophical, Mediaeval, 
 
 Biographical, Puritanic, 
 
 Practical, Modern, 
 
 Ethical, Foreign, 
 
 Biblical, Scientific, 
 
 Ecclesiastical. , Classical, 
 
 Welsh. 
 
 EDJTED BY THE 
 
 VERY REV. DK. SPENCE, M.A., REV. JOSEPH S. 
 EXELL, M.A., REV. CHARLES NEU,, M.A. 
 
 WITH INTRODUCTION BY 
 
 VKRY REV. DEAN HOWSON, D.D. 
 
 CHARACTER OF THE WORK. 
 
 IN order to place the entire range of literature under con- 
 tribution, scores of workers have searched thousands of 
 volumes ; especially of the Fathers and the Puritans ; Books of 
 Biography, Books Scientific, Classical, Philosophical, Foreign ; 
 University Lectures, and all the great Reviews of the age. The 
 volumes contain illustrative extracts and quotations, choice and 
 carefully selected literary gleanings of the highest order, anec- 
 dotes aiding to define moral and religious truths, historical 
 parallels, similitudes in brief, useful and suggestive thoughts, 
 gathered from the best available sources, on all subjects. 
 
 The Rev. J. S. Exell, Dartmouth, will cause VOLUME I. 
 of the above work to be sent as a SPECIMEN on receipt 
 of Six Shillings and Sixpence.
 
 CRITICAL NOTICES OF THE ENGLISH AND 
 AMERICAN PRESS. 
 
 THE SCOTSMAN, Edinburgh: 
 
 "Under the title 'THIRTY THOUSAND THOUGHTS,' we have the 
 first volume of a work which, if the design of the compilers be 
 carried out in its integrity, will be at once the largest, the most com- 
 prehensive, and the most scientifically arranged epitome of ideas on 
 theology, scriptural and ecclesiastical history, and Christian ethics, tc 
 be found in our language. With regard to the method of classifica- 
 tion and arrangement adopted, it has the merit of comprehensiveness 
 and logical sequence : and, when once mastered, will give the student 
 access to any point to which he may have occasion to refer. It is not 
 easy to perceive how the systematization could be more thorough. " 
 
 THE LITERARY WORLD, London : 
 
 " We doubt not the work will be esteemed the greatest treasure he 
 possesses by many a country minister who is fortunate enough to ob- 
 tain it ; and even the City preacher, to whom the vast libraries of the 
 metropolis are open, need not despise this aid to his memory and 
 guide to the best literature on certain subjects. Further volumes will 
 be eagerly looked for. " 
 
 THE LITERARY CHURCHMAN, London: 
 
 " As a guide to what we read, as suggestive of thought; and as 
 affording valuable data on subjects of the highest importance, it will 
 prove a valuable addition to the theological library, and also an 
 equally valuable help in the direction of homiletics." 
 
 THE CHURCH TIMES : 
 
 " As an illustrative dictionary or common-place book, it will prob 
 ably begin at once to secure a first position amongst the works of ihib 
 class. Its homiletical use will soon be discovered, and the skill of its 
 arrangement utilized by many who are brought to face the controver- 
 sies of the day. We must not forget to mention the value of the 
 sectional indices, which will be supplemented by a general alpha- 
 betical index, upon the execution of which will greatly depend the 
 practical value of the work." 
 
 THE LUTHERAN REVIEW, Philadelphia : 
 
 "This great work is virtually a library upon each subject pre- 
 sented. . . . The extracts are short and pointed, and every page 
 affords rich and interesting reading, while the arrangement is so 
 complete that no difficulty is experienced in at once turning to any 
 point one may desire to find It is a masterpiece of order and a mine 
 of thought." 
 
 LONDON : JAMES NISBET & CO., 21, BERNERS STREET, W.
 
 Now Ready. Price 2s. 6d. each 
 
 Cf)e Jften of tlje 
 
 ABRAHAM : His Life and Times. P,y Rev. W. 
 J. DEANE, M.A. Fifth Thousand. 
 
 " As the first volume of a scries entitled ' Men of the Bible,' we have an 
 interesting and carefully-written account of ' Abraham ; his Life and Times' 
 (James Nisbet and Co.), by the Rev. W. J. Deane, M.A., Rector of Ashen, 
 Essex. The Biblical record of the career of the patriarch is faithfully fol- 
 lowed, but is elucidated by Mr. Deane from the results of modern scientific 
 research and archaeological discovery, and the book embodies a great 
 ;iin"imt of instructive information in an acceptable form." The Scotsman, 
 
 MOSES : His Life and Times. By Rev. Canon G. 
 RAWLINSON, M.A. Fifth Thousand. 
 
 " As easy to read as a story-book. Its information is wonderful. Our 
 author makes Moses live before your eyes. Such is the writer's acquaintance 
 with Eastern history, manners, and scenery, that he becomes the Macaulay 
 of Moses, only without the inaccuracy of our English historian. This is 
 a grand chance for half-a-crown. It the other ' Men of the Bible' find such 
 biographers, tin: publishers will have to enlarge their premises. Friend, 
 1'ity this book. We believe yon will thank us for the advice when you find 
 yourself fairly fascinated by it." Sword and Trowel. 
 
 "A work of great merit." The Clergyman's Magazine. 
 
 ' ' \V< irks of this description are invaluable to diligent readers of the 
 sacred text." Glasgow Herald. 
 
 SOLOMON : His Life and Times. By Yen. Arch- 
 deacon F. W. FARRAR, D.D. Fifth Thousand. 
 
 "An excellent history, and very readable, conveying a proper estimate of 
 this magnificent, though criminal, prince." 'J he Clergyman's M^azine. 
 
 "Yet, with every discount, Farrar's 'Solomon' is well worth readin;;, 
 and it constitutes such a magnificent word-picture of the great king that 
 one rises from it with a more vivid idea of the royal preacher than 01 
 likely to obtain by other means. The cost is only half-a-cmua : the literan- 
 taste, and skill, and leaining are worth a thousand crowns at the least.' 
 Sword and Trowel. 
 
 " This is in every way a satisfactory sketch of the wonderful career of the 
 great Suleimaun ben Daoud." Literary Churchman,
 
 THE MEN OF THE BIBLE 
 
 (Continued} 
 
 ELIJAH : His Life and Times. By Rev. Prof. W. 
 
 MILLIGAN, D.D. Third Thousand. 
 
 ISAIAH : His Life and Times. By Rev. Canon 
 DRIVER, M.A. Third Thousand. 
 
 SAMUEL and SAUL. By Rev. VV. J. DEANE, M.A. 
 
 JEREMIAH : His Life and Times. By Rev. Canon 
 T. K. CIIEVNK, D.D. 
 
 PREPARING FOR PUBLICATION, 
 
 READY IN NOVEMBER. 
 
 JESUS THE DIVINE MAN. By Rev. F. J. 
 VAI.LINGS, M.A. 
 
 READY IN DECEMBER. 
 
 DANIEL : His Life and Times. By Rev. H. 
 DEANE, B.D. 
 
 GIDEON : His Life and Times. By Rev. J. M. 
 LANG, D.D. 
 
 JOSHUA AND THE JUDGES. By the Rev. 
 
 W. J. DEANE, M.A. 
 
 JOSEPH : His Life and Times. By Rev. H. G. 
 
 TOMKINS. 
 
 THE KINGS OF ISRAEL AND JUDAH. By 
 
 Rev. Canon RAWLINSON. 
 
 DAVID: His Life and Times. By Rev. W. J. 
 
 DEANE, M.A. 
 
 LONDON : JAMES NISBET & CO., 21, BEP.NERS STREET, W.
 
 " A wonderful (ampliation of valuable thought." 
 
 CHRISTIAN UNION. 
 
 THE BEST EXPOSITORY, SERMONIC, AND ILLUSTRA- 
 TIVE BIBLE FOR PREACHERS AND TEACHERS. 
 
 THE 
 
 BIBLICAL ILLUSTRATOR, 
 
 Or ANECDOTES, SIMILES, EMBLEMS, ILLUS- 
 TRATIONS, and SERMON OUTLINES on the 
 VERSES of the BIBLE, gathered from the entire range 
 of Home and Foreign Literature of the past and present. 
 
 The Volume containing ST. MATTHEW (Fifth 
 Thousand) is now ready, price 73. 6d. Also the Volume 
 on ST. MARK, price 73. 6d. Each Volume contains 
 700 closely-printed pages, and about 4,000 Sermon Out- 
 lines and Similes. 
 
 ST. LUKE commences in Sevenpenny Monthly 
 Parts with October, 1888. 
 
 "And we are sure that the present work will be a very useful one, especially to 
 those who have small libraries. Mr. Exell is a man of wide reading, and has a good 
 deal of practical skill in the compiling and editing of books, and it would be very 
 difficult to find work more satisfactory of its kind than we have in this volume. It 
 is, indeed, a very good, practical, and devotional commentary on the Gospel accord- 
 ing to St. Mark, and the reader may safely open it anywhere with the assurance that 
 lie will alight upon good things. "Church Bells. 
 
 " In the shape of illustration of the text there is an amazing amount of matter in 
 the volume." Aberdeen Journal. 
 
 " Preachers and teachers should find the volume of 'The Biblical Illustrator ' on 
 St. Mark, which the Rev. I. S. Exell has just issued through Messrs. Nisbet, very 
 useful. The references are taken from widely different sources, and it is evident that 
 their collection must have been the cause of many years' arduous work." The 
 Quiver. 
 
 " But anything in which the Rev. J. S. Exell has had a hand is usually well done, 
 and ' The Biblical Illustrator ' is no exception to the rule. The volume just issued on 
 the Gospel according to St. Mark contains a remarkable collection of anecdotes, 
 similes, expository and homiletic matter not, of course, equal in merit, but nearly 
 always yielding some useful thought." Yorkshire Post. 
 
 " Though not actually a commentary, the matter it contains might well form part 
 of a commentary, and will be found a very useful aid in studying and expounding the 
 Bible. "-John Bn.
 
 " The book, from its wealth of anecdote, exposition, similes, and geographical, 
 scientific, historical, and homiletical notes, is one that will prove of great advantage 
 to clergymen and teachers who wish to study and expound clearly the Evangelist's 
 gospel. " Liverpool Courier. 
 
 "The volume on the Gospel according to St. M ark contains an extraordinary series 
 of extracts, homiletical, expository, and illustrative, drawn from many widely diffe- 
 rent sources. Mr. Exell has done his work in a most thorough and careful manner." 
 Record. 
 
 " Indeed there is an embarras de ricjiesse, and one is bewildered amid the variety 
 exhibited.' 1 Aberdeen Free Press. 
 
 " For variety and fulness of material to suit preachers and teachers, and to aid 
 them in their work, it would be difficult to find a book that surpasses this."- -Priniiti; e 
 Methodist Magazine. 
 
 " Plenty of matter for your money. We never remember to have seen such solid 
 pages ; and in small type, too ! When compositors get blank spaces, and halt i 
 without type, they call them fat: the books are leanness itself. They are litn;ill\ 
 crammed. They remind us of trusses of compressed hay. Portions from sermons, 
 commentaries, and all sorts of books are used as expositions on the various verses ut 
 these two Gospels ; and they have been, upon the whole, right well selected and ar- 
 ranged. Mr. Exell has a great gift in that direction, and he uses it with marvrll.>us 
 diligence. This begging, borrowing, and stealing of the thoughts of authors has be- 
 come quite an art. We feel that the price of these books 75. 6d. each is very low, 
 even for material which has been all of it gathered from others. A preacher with 
 better eyes than ours will exult over this volume as one that findeth great spoil : for 
 our optics the type is a little too small. Some persons would have made three 
 volumes of each of these, but Mr. Exell has rammed it down and squeezed it in as if 
 he had used hydraulics. Mark is so graphic and picturesque that he affords a fine 
 field for the use of emblems and other illustrations ; and as the editor has carefully 
 collected these, he has made up a very rich volume, which we gratefully place among 
 our expositions of Mark. Of Mattliew we can also speak most heartily." C. 11. 
 Spnrgeon. 
 
 " It certainly shows a great deal of painstaking, and has cost a vast amount of 
 labour. ' ' Christian Commonwealth. 
 
 "This is the second volume of a most useful work. Sunday School teachers, 
 preachers, and occasional speakers, will find it of great value. It is very rich in f.\|>. > 
 sition, anecdotes, similes, varied illustrations ; and gives precious results of diligent 
 gleaning from many fields, both English and foreign." Methodist Sunday School 
 ^Record. 
 
 " It is a library in itself. It contains the freshest possible information ; the cream 
 of the richest minds of the nineteenth century that have made St. Mark a study." 
 Christian Leader. 
 
 "There is a perfect mine of wealth in this volume." Perthshire Advertiser. 
 
 " For preachers and teachers there is no volume on this gospel so full of usable 
 passages." Sunday School Chronicle. 
 
 " It is, in a word, an encyclopaedia of scholarly thought and research of the most 
 able living theologians and preachers. The editor has brought together in one volume 
 the best thought of the best writers and thinkers who have adorned every section of 
 the Christian Church." Christian Union. 
 
 "This is a remarkably complete repertory of anecdotes, similes, emblems, and 
 illustrations on the verses of Mark's gospel." The Christian. 
 
 " No writer, either of note or of worth, seems to have 1 <-cn overlooked, and all the- 
 best things have been laid under contribution. "Hafitist Union. 
 
 LONDON : JAMES NISBET & Co., BERNERS STREET, W.
 
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