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CHAPTER VI.

BETH-EL, OR BETH-AVEN.

"And he went up from thence unto Beth-el: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, Go up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head. And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the Lord. And there came forth two she bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two children of them. And he went from thence to Mount Carmel, and from thence he returned to Samaria."-2 KINGS ii. 23-25.

THE ministry of Elisha was one of unusual length. It commenced under the reign of Ahab, and extended through those of Ahaziah, of Jehoram, of Jehu, of Jehoahaz, and partly even through that of Joash. Altogether it must have Including his preliminary

occupied more than half a century. service of eight or nine years under Elijah, Elisha saw two generations in Israel coming and going. We have no means of judging how long he may have sojourned at Jericho, nor what his special activity there had been. His first recorded work was one of mercy, and bore some analogy to the miracle at Cana in Galilee, with which our Lord commenced His ministry. Nor does the analogy cease there. For, as our Saviour was immediately afterwards met and assailed by the unbelief of the men of Nazareth, who rejected His mission and derided His claims, so was Elisha at the outset of his public activity, on the way to Samaria, arrested and confronted by the blasphemous opposition of the men of Beth-el. Here, however, the points of resemblance end. Our Lord was the Son of God, and passed unharmed and unharming through the infuriated crowd which had pressed

Him to the edge of the cliff on which Nazareth was built. Elisha was only a prophet; his authority was delegated, not his own, and he had to vindicate it by an act of fearful judgment. It was, indeed, sad and trying, but yet most needful for his future work, that from the outset his authority as the prophet of God should be vindicated against all opponents, at least as publicly as it was challenged. His whole usefulness would depend upon his prophetic office being acknowledged and felt to be real; and hence, however incongruous with the rest of his life, his second public appearance must be in judgment, and not in mercy.

A more terrible illustration could scarcely be found than at Beth-el of the desolating effects of "water that is "naught." It was one of the most sacred spots in the land of Israel. The memory of that vision, embalmed in the new name of. Beth-el (house of God) which the ancient Luz had received, ought to have saved it from profanation. But, when Jeroboam usurped the throne of Israel, this ancient city and Dan, at the extreme northern boundary of the land, were selected as sanctuaries for the worship of the golden calves, in order that the people might be withdrawn from the service of Jehovah at Jerusalem. The place and the object of worship were equally suited to the purpose in view. For the first time in the history of the chosen people, the national establishment of religion was not only perverted from its sacred object, but prostituted to become the instrument of selfish statecraft. State and Church, whose union should be one of affection and free choice, were now wedded for the most sordid ends, and an unholy compact ensued, in which the Church surrendered conviction and freedom of action, yielding an abject obedience in return for worldly support, or from fear of worldly consequences. Jeroboam did not suppress the

religion of Israel; he only sought to divert it into another and more convenient channel, by appealing to the darkest chapter in their religious history. The world does not ask us to surrender religion; it only opposes earnest, genuine religion. It has no objection to an easy, respectable form of worship. So far from this, the world approves, commends, and shares in it. We require the clergyman at baptism, marriage, and burial; we require him on the Sunday; we require him for religious ceremonies which will make life easier and the conscience unruffled; we require him at the sick-bed; we also require him at our entertainments and festivities. To be irreligious, at least outwardly, is nearly as much reprobated by the world as to be spiritually minded, which is always in the way, out of place, and out of season-even at a death-bed, where men are said to require "consolation," not uneasiness and disturbance. Clergymen would be the most respected of persons if they only closely resembled those idyllic personages, described in novels, with a "dear old face," "white hair," and very little religionbut very much tolerance of the devil, the world, and the flesh. In short, it is not religion, but its peculiar forin and mode as spiritual, to which a Jeroboam and his imitators object.

And so Beth-el had, as a prophet describes it (Hos. x. 5), become Beth-aven, and the house of God was turned into a house of vanity. There are testing times in the history of every individual, household, district, and nation professing to be Christian, when the question, if truthfully put, really amounts to this: Shall it be Beth-el or Beth-aven; religion, or spiritual religion; respectability or godliness; the broad, or the narrow way; the world, or the Lord? That religion is not worth anything which is not worth everything, and does not pervade everything. So far as Beth-el was con

cerned, the question had long been decided.

Nor must we

in studying this history forget that, in a certain sense, Beth-el was a representative city, as the place where the idol-worship of Israel was set up and established. Accordingly, the

opposition of its inhabitants to the prophet acquired more than ordinary importance. It may, in fact, be described as substantially the contest between the darkness and the light at that period.

Probably the intended visit of Elisha had previously become known in Beth-el. At any rate, there could be no difficulty in recognising Elijah's successor. Whether these "young men "-as the expression in the original should be translated, rather than "little children," as in our Authorised Version-had been incited to their conduct by the priesthood of Beth-el, or had gone out to meet him of their own accord and bent on evil, or else the meeting was accidental, is comparatively unimportant. Certain it is, that when Elisha reached the dense forest by which, as we know, Beth-el was surrounded, he was immediately recognised by a band of young fellows, and received with the repeated taunt, "Go up, thou bald head!" They had not yet learned the object of his visit, nor even become personally acquainted with him. His appearance among them was sufficient to provoke what we must regard as an insult to Elisha, and a challenge to Elisha's God. Baldness was regarded in the East as a reproach, and "thou bald head" was intended as an expression of contempt and ridicule. The challenge to "go up" referred to Elijah's ascent to heaven in the fiery chariot, and was meant to express their denial and scoff of the miracle by which God had removed him. Thus the taunt was similar in spirit to that addressed to our Lord Himself: "If Thou be the Son of God, come down from the cross." Contempt and ridicule of God's

servant, blasphemy and denial of God's work such then were the weapons employed against Elisha by these young men. And is not the same mode of opposition still employed? The two most powerful instruments which the Enemy wields against the cause of God are ridicule and denial of God's truth.

In general, it may be laid down as a principle, that we ought to distrust those who turn into ridicule that which is sacred to others. If an earnest man be tempted to doubt any of the truths of religion, he will do so with the deepest heart-sorrow. But a habitual scoffer must be destitute of feeling as well as of principle. The chief danger of

ridicule lies in this, that few are proof against its shafts. Not unfrequently a man who could not for a moment sustain a serious argument on religious subjects, nor indeed on any subject, comes out triumphantly by dint, not of wisdom, but of small wit. And here much mischief is also often done thoughtlessly and unintentionally. All men have their foibles; and religious people and clergymen have not only their share of them, but sometimes a more than ordinarily large one. At any rate, their every weakness will certainly be searched out and dragged to public view, and often be grievously exaggerated. Nor do we seek to deny that in our days also not many wise, not many mighty, are found among those who are truly religious. The way is narrow, the company is small, and—be it so, for argument's sake— not always the most agreeable. This is part of the prediction-it may be, part of the cross. Besides, the angularities and oddities of natural character sometimes appear in magnified proportions under the strong light of the Gospel. Accordingly, it is not difficult to make merry at religious people and their supposed ways, as inferred from our partial knowledge of their eccentricities. But the thing ultimately

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