Afterward he brought me to the gate, even the gate that looketh toward the east: and, behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east: and his voice was like a noise of many waters: and the earth shined with his glory. And it was according to the appearance of the vision which I saw, even according to the vision that I saw when I came to destroy the city: and the visions were like the vision that I saw by the river Chebar; and I fell upon my face. And the glory of the Lord came into the house by the way of the gate whose prospect is toward the east. So the spirit took me up, and brought me into the inner court; and, behold, the glory of the Lord filled the house.

Ezekiel so repeated and elaborated the metaphor of Hosea, which described unfaithfulness to God in terms of adultery, that some of his chapters are unpleasant and repellent reading. His suggestions of new canons and rubrics for the conduct of worship in the restored temple are as remote from our present interest as the book of Leviticus; the spirit and manner of which are so akin to the style and mind of Ezekiel as to suggest the doubtful theory that he was its author. But the importance of the priest-prophet in the history of religion is very great. He it was, with like-minded persons who gathered about him, who when the Jewish people ceased to be a nation transformed them into a church. It was Ezekiel who led them out of destruction into that marvelously continuing life which they have since lived to this day, a people without political independence, then without a country, maintaining in the face of oppression and persecution their race and their religion.

3. The supreme consolation of the people of the

exile is contained in II Isaiah. The closing chapters (56-66) seem to be addressed to those who having returned from their captivity are enduring the hardships of poverty and misrule in their own land; but earlier chapters (40-55) are filled with assurances of release. The Chaldeans are already beset by the enemies who eventually conquered them: Cyrus, who took Babylon in 538, is hailed as the coming deliverer of the Jews. The prophet, whose eloquence is as lofty as his faith, declares that the long and bitter punishment of the exile is almost ended.

Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath received of the Lord's hand double for all her sins.

The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness:-"Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God." Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain: and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it. The voice said:-"Cry." And he said:"What shall I cry?" All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field: the grass withereth, the flower fadeth: because the spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it: surely the people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever.

O Zion, that bringest good tidings, get thee up into the high mountain; Ō Jerusalem, that bringest good tidings, lift up thy voice with strength; lift it up, be not afraid; say unto the cities of Judah:-"Behold your God!" Behold, the Lord God will come with strong hand, and his arm shall rule for him: behold, his wage

is with him, and his recompence before him. He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young.

Awake, awake, stand up, O Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the hand of the Lord the cup of his fury; thou hast drunken the dregs of the cup of trembling, and wrung them out. There is none to guide her among all the sons whom she hath brought forth; neither is there any that taketh her by the hand of all the sons that she hath brought up. These two things are come unto thee; who shall be sorry for thee? desolation, and destruction, and the famine, and the sword: by whom shall I comfort thee? Thy sons have fainted, they lie at the head of all the streets, as a wild bull in a net: they are full of the fury of the Lord, the rebuke of thy God. Therefore hear now this, thou afflicted, and drunken, but not with wine: thus saith thy Lord the Lord, and thy God that pleadeth the cause of his people:-"Behold, I have taken out of thine hand the cup of trembling, even the dregs of the cup of my fury; thou shalt no more drink it again: but I will put it into the hand of them that afflict thee; which have said to thy soul, Bow down, that we may go over: and thou hast laid thy body as the ground, and as the street, to them that went over."

Awake, awake; put on thy strength, O Zion; put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city: for henceforth there shall no more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean. Shake thyself from the dust; arise, and sit down, O Jerusalem: loose thyself from the bands of thy neck, O captive daughter of Zion.

How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace; that bringeth good tidings of good, that publisheth salvation; that saith unto Zion:-"Thy God reigneth!" Thy watchmen shall lift up the voice; with the voice together shall they sing: for they shall see eye to eye, when the Lord shall bring again Zion. Break forth into joy, sing together, ye waste places of Jerusalem: for the Lord hath comforted his people, he hath redeemed Jerusalem. The

Lord hath made bare his holy arm in the eyes of all the nations; and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.

O thou afflicted, tossed with tempest, and not comforted, behold, I will lay thy stones with fair colours, and lay thy foundations with sapphires. And I will make thy windows of agates, and thy gates of carbuncles, and all thy borders of pleasant stones. And all thy children shall be taught of the Lord; and great shall be the peace of thy children.

Seek ye the Lord while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near: let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater: so shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it. For ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace: the mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree: and it shall be to the Lord for a name, for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.

X

THE PROPHETS: AFTER THE EXILE

TH

I

HREE prophets,-Haggai, Malachi and Zechariah-dealt with the conditions of life in Jerusalem after the return from the exile. The situation was discouraging. Many of the Jews preferred to stay in Babylon, finding business good there, and the way to preferment open. The accounts of the high position gained by Daniel and by Mordecai at the Persian court probably belong more to the literature of imagination than to the literature of history, but they indicate a general acceptance of the fact that there were Jews of great renown who did not go back to Jerusalem. Even a hundred years after the return under Zerubbabel and Joshua, men of such devotion as Ezra the scribe, and of such wealth and ability of leadership as Nehemiah, were still resident among the Gentiles. The exile was the beginning of that dispersion of the Jews in foreign lands which has ever since been one of the most notable facts in their history. The people to whom the three prophets spoke were some of them descendants of those who had been carried into exile, but many were descended from those who had