Its object was to hedge Israel off from the nations among whom it was; to find what was peculiar to Israel, and to lay the stress upon this. Some of the prophets of this period, on the other hand, carried out to a still further extent than the earlier prophets had done that universal conception of which we find so large an element in the prophecies of Amos and the first Isaiah. It is the second Isaiah who presents to us in this period the picture of Israel suffering for the salvation of all mankind. But the highest limit of the universal conception is reached in the post-Exilic Book of Jonah, which is a parable of the love of God towards the Gentiles equally with the Jews. With the adoption of the law under Ezra and Nehemiah the particularistic school may be said to have triumphed, but triumphed not at the expense of prophecy only, but also of the priesthood. Gradually, as a result of the dominance of the scribal theory, both priest and prophet were merged in the scribe. The Law took the place of both sacrifice and prophecy, and the entire thought of the nation was concentrated upon the interpretation of that Law and its application to the life of man. The sanctification of the ancient Law led in its turn to the sanctification of the ancient History, and the writings of the ancient Prophets, until the first canon of the Law was supplemented by the second canon of the Prophets, and that in course of time by the third canon, the Hagiographa; and these three canons being established, the same methods of interpretation and enlargement by interpretation were applied to the Prophets and the Hagiographa which had been applied to the Law.

With the time of the Maccabees there comes a revival of prophecy in a new form, looking to the future only; for the apocalyptic literature which was developed at that period, and at the head of which stands the Book of Daniel, was a true descendant of the ancient prophets. Prophetic in its nature also was the Messianic hope, which was re-created at this period; but both the Messianic hope and the Book of Daniel are discussed in later chapters of this work.

CHAPTER VII

THE RISE AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE

MESSIANIC HOPE

T must be borne in mind that nowhere in the Old Testa

in the post-Maccabæan, scribal period of Jewish history. In Leviticus it is applied to the High Priest; in the historical books to Saul, to David, to the patriarchs; in Lamentations to King Hezekiah; in Habakkuk to the people of Israel as a whole; in the Psalms to kings of the Davidic dynasty (and perhaps also to Israelitish kings) indiscriminately; in DeuteroIsaiah to Cyrus; and in the Book of Daniel both to Cyrus and to one of the Seleucids. This variety of use of the word in the Old Testament corresponds in some degree to the variety of simple motives ultimately combined in the grand, many-sided harmony of the Messianic hope realised. In general the word "Messiah" of the Hebrew text has been translated "anointed" in our Bible,1 but in Daniel ix. 25, 26, where the word is used once in reference to Cyrus and once in reference to a Seleucid, the Hebrew "Messiah" is retained.

The Messianic passages of the Old Testament stand in no necessary connexion with the use of the word "Messiah." Broadly speaking, those passages are Messianic which promise a delivery from present distress, either through the direct intervention of Yahaweh, the God and King of Israel, or through a Davidic sovereign (or David himself), the vicegerent of Yahaweh and the representative of His divinity upon earth,

1 Corrected in the Canterbury Revision.

or through a human agent, outside of the Davidic dynasty, anointed by Yahaweh for that purpose; those passages are Messianic which foretell a millennial kingdom over which Yahaweh will reign either mediately or immediately, or which describe the preparation for this millennial kingdom through a Davidic sovereign, or through the people of Israel as specially appointed to that mission by Yahaweh; those passages are Messianic which describe the experiences of the ideally perfect "Servant of Yahaweh."

The prophetic concept of the relation of God, as Yahaweh, to Israel, inherited from Moses, was that of the direct government by God of His people. Moses did not unify the people into a nation, because of his conception of a theocratic empire. God must directly rule over His people. This concept was ideal, impracticable, as the history of Israel proves; but it contained a fruitful germ of heavenward progress, which was the divine essence of the Mosaic concept. After the practical needs of their situation had forced upon the Hebrews centralisation and regal authority, the prophets still adhered to this Mosaic concept, modified and further idealised by the new conditions. It is this which enables them steadfastly to look forward to the Messianic Kingdom of God's rule upon earth. But in order that a conception so ideal and exalted might be effective for the education and development of the people at large, it must operate upon lower and more worldly sentiments. The lower instrument through which it was to act was found in the royal form of government, or perhaps we might say in the person of one of the kings of Israel.

Anyone who has considered those Messianic passages which are concerned with a personal, human Messiah must, I think, have observed this phenomenon-that this phase of the Messianic hope emanates from the person of David. He is the great Messiah of God in the past to whom the people longingly look back. It is his glory, like the glory of the Roman Cæsar, which in each new age is reflected over his descendants. It is a return of the Davidic greatness which is looked for in the future. An idealised David is the

type of the royal human Messiah. In seeking a human basis for the Messianic hope we must begin here. This basis is one common to the Israelites with other people. It is that longing for the glory of the past, which is driven by the utter lack of its realisation in the present first into hope, and then into belief, in its restoration in the future. The British belief in the return of an Arthur, or the German hope of the reappearance of a Charlemagne or Frederick Barbarossa, were in origin the same as the Israelitish expectation of the second David, a longing for the glory of the past, metamorphosed through much meditation on its happiness in time of present distress into the hope of its restoration in the future.

Anyone who has studied, with any sort of appreciation, popular beliefs and myths and legends, realises that such a belief as this is neither quite literal nor altogether ideal. It connects itself literally with the name, the place, the family of David, and yet what it looks for is not David, but the kingdom and glory of David; so that at times it even seems ready, under peculiar circumstances, to loose its hold on the Davidic personality, and to look for the royal deliverer in a Cyrus or a Maccabæus. It is the popular mind, in distinction from the thoughtful leaders, to which the Davidic idea is most essential; which connects its hopes most closely with a literal descendant of David, in whom he shall be repersonified in all his ideal glory. Of course, this hope of a Davidic Messiah who shall restore the Davidic glory must result in the idealisation of its hero in the past as well as in the future, and hence we have the phenomenon of a double David in the Bible -the historical, actual David, and the mythical, ideal David. This idealisation the prophets make a fulcrum for their lever, their function being to lift the Messianic hope of a second kingdom of David into spiritual realms. The part which this Davidic hope played in moulding the history and character of the Jewish people and maintaining their nationality intact was enormous. The strength of that hope in Old Testament times is evidenced by psalmody and prophecy, and in a later age both by the apocalyptic literature which it called forth and

by the insurrections to which it gave rise. Even the hatred which the oppression, immorality, and idolatry of Solomon and his son aroused in the hearts of the Israelites of the northern kingdom did not quench the pride in David and his glory, so that Amos could say to them (ix. 11), "In that day will I raise up the tabernacle of David that is fallen, and close up the breaches thereof; and I will raise up his ruins, and I will build it as in the days of old"; while Hosea, one of their number, prophesies (iii. 4, 5), “For the children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without teraphim: afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek Yahaweh their God, and David their king; and shall fear Yahaweh and His goodness in the latter days."

Psychologically we are led to expect, from the origin and nature of this hope, that which we also find to be true regarding it that it is most vividly pictured in the times of greatest distress. Passing over such passages as 2 Samuel vii. 16, where David is told, "Thine house and thy kingdom shall be established for ever before thee; thy throne shall be set up for ever," and the numerous similar passages in the Psalms concerning the glory and perpetuity of his kingdom, let us take up the still more minute and definite passages in the Prophets; as when Isaiah, crying out of the deepest humiliation of the kingdom of Judah, yet promises the people deliverance at the hand of a Davidic ruler, who shall restore a spiritualised kingdom of David. Such is that famous 'prophecy (ix. 1-7) which ends, "For increase of the government and for peace without end, upon David's throne, and upon his kingdom, to establish it, and to order it with judgment and with righteousness from henceforth and for ever. The zeal of Yahaweh Zebaoth will perform this"; or that prophecy which begins (xi. 1), "And there cometh forth a rod from Jesse's stem, and a Branch groweth from his roots." Micah sees in the sore misery of Jerusalem the deep darkness that heralds the glorious morn. The woes of Judah are the birth-pangs