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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Judges and Ruth, by Robert A. Watson
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Judges and Ruth
+
+Author: Robert A. Watson
+
+Release Date: May 18, 2012 [EBook #39727]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JUDGES AND RUTH ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Colin Bell, Julia Neufeld and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive)
+
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
+
+Small capital text has been replaced with all capitals.
+
+Variations in spelling have been preserved except in obvious cases of
+typographical error. Hyphenation is inconsistent.
+
+As the oe ligature cannot be included in this format, it has been
+replaced with the separate letters as in "Phoenicia".
+
+
+
+
+               THE EXPOSITOR'S BIBLE
+
+                 EDITED BY THE REV.
+         W. ROBERTSON NICOLL, M.A., LL.D.
+            Editor of "_The Expositor_"
+
+           AUTHORIZED EDITION, COMPLETE
+                  AND UNABRIDGED
+           BOUND IN TWENTY-FIVE VOLUMES
+
+
+
+
+                    NEW YORK
+             FUNK & WAGNALLS COMPANY
+                 LAFAYETTE PLACE
+                      1900
+
+
+
+
+                JUDGES AND RUTH.
+
+                  BY THE REV.
+              ROBERT A. WATSON, D.D.,
+        AUTHOR OF "GOSPELS OF YESTERDAY."
+
+
+
+
+                    NEW YORK
+            FUNK & WAGNALLS COMPANY
+                 LAFAYETTE PLACE
+                      1900
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+  _THE BOOK OF JUDGES._
+
+  I.                                          PAGE
+
+  PROBLEMS OF SETTLEMENT AND WAR                 3
+  JUDGES I. 1-11.
+
+  II.
+
+  THE WAY OF THE SWORD                          18
+  JUDGES I. 12-26.
+
+  III.
+
+  AT BOCHIM: THE FIRST PROPHET VOICE            31
+  JUDGES II. 1-5.
+
+  IV.
+
+  AMONG THE ROCKS OF PAGANISM                   45
+  JUDGES II. 7-23.
+
+  V.
+
+  THE ARM OF ARAM AND OF OTHNIEL                61
+  JUDGES III. 1-11.
+
+  VI.
+
+  THE DAGGER AND THE OX-GOAD                    77
+  JUDGES III. 12-31.
+
+  VII.
+
+  THE SIBYL OF MOUNT EPHRAIM                    91
+  JUDGES IV.
+
+  VIII.
+
+  DEBORAH'S SONG: A DIVINE VISION              106
+  JUDGES V.
+
+  IX.
+
+  DEBORAH'S SONG: A CHANT OF PATRIOTISM        120
+  JUDGES V.
+
+  X.
+
+  THE DESERT HORDES; AND THE MAN AT OPHRAH     135
+  JUDGES VI. 1-14.
+
+  XI.
+
+  GIDEON, ICONOCLAST AND REFORMER              150
+  JUDGES VI. 15-32.
+
+  XII.
+
+  "THE PEOPLE ARE YET TOO MANY"                164
+  JUDGES VI. 33-VII. 7.
+
+  XIII.
+
+  "MIDIAN'S EVIL DAY"                          178
+  JUDGES VII. 8-VIII. 21.
+
+  XIV.
+
+  GIDEON THE ECCLESIASTIC                      195
+  JUDGES VIII. 22-28.
+
+  XV.
+
+  ABIMELECH AND JOTHAM                         209
+  JUDGES VIII. 29-IX. 57.
+
+  XVI.
+
+  GILEAD AND ITS CHIEF                         224
+  JUDGES X. I-XI. 11.
+
+  XVII.
+
+  THE TERRIBLE VOW                             239
+  JUDGES XI. 12-40.
+
+  XVIII.
+
+  SHIBBOLETHS                                  254
+  JUDGES XII. 1-7.
+
+  XIX.
+
+  THE ANGEL IN THE FIELD                       266
+  JUDGES. XIII. 1-18.
+
+  XX.
+
+  SAMSON PLUNGING INTO LIFE                    279
+  JUDGES XIII. 24-XIV. 20.
+
+  XXI.
+
+  DAUNTLESS IN BATTLE, IGNORANTLY BRAVE        293
+  JUDGES XV.
+
+  XXII.
+
+  PLEASURE AND PERIL IN GAZA                   307
+  JUDGES XVI. 1-3.
+
+  XXIII.
+
+  THE VALLEY OF SOREK AND OF DEATH             319
+  JUDGES XVI. 4-31.
+
+  XXIV.
+
+  THE STOLEN GODS                              335
+  JUDGES XVII., XVIII.
+
+  XXV.
+
+  FROM JUSTICE TO WILD REVENGE                 348
+  JUDGES XIX.-XXI.
+
+
+  _THE BOOK OF RUTH._
+
+  I.
+
+  NAOMI'S BURDEN                               363
+  RUTH I. 1-13.
+
+  II.
+
+  THE PARTING OF THE WAYS                      375
+  RUTH I. 14-19.
+
+  III.
+
+  IN THE FIELD OF BOAZ                         386
+  RUTH I. 19-II. 23.
+
+  IV.
+
+  THE HAZARDOUS PLAN                           397
+  RUTH III.
+
+  V.
+
+  THE MARRIAGE AT THE GATE                     408
+  RUTH IV.
+
+  INDEX                                        421
+
+
+
+
+THE BOOK OF JUDGES.
+
+
+
+
+I.
+
+_PROBLEMS OF SETTLEMENT AND WAR._
+
+JUDGES i. 1-11.
+
+
+It was a new hour in the history of Israel. To a lengthened period of
+serfdom there had succeeded a time of sojourn in tents, when the camp of
+the tribes, half-military, half-pastoral, clustering about the
+Tabernacle of Witness, moved with it from point to point through the
+desert. Now the march was over; the nomads had to become settlers, a
+change not easy for them as they expected it to be, full of significance
+for the world. The Book of Judges, therefore, is a second Genesis or
+Chronicle of Beginnings so far as the Hebrew commonwealth is concerned.
+We see the birth-throes of national life, the experiments, struggles,
+errors and disasters out of which the moral force of the people
+gradually rose, growing like a pine tree out of rocky soil.
+
+If we begin our study of the book expecting to find clear evidence of an
+established Theocracy, a spiritual idea of the kingdom of God ever
+present to the mind, ever guiding the hope and effort of the tribes, we
+shall experience that bewilderment which has not seldom fallen upon
+students of Old Testament history. Divide the life of man into two
+parts, the sacred and the secular; regard the latter as of no real value
+compared to the other, as having no relation to that Divine purpose of
+which the Bible is the oracle; then the Book of Judges must appear out
+of place in the sacred canon, for unquestionably its main topics are
+secular from first to last. It preserves the traditions of an age when
+spiritual ideas and aims were frequently out of sight, when a nation was
+struggling for bare existence, or, at best, for a rude kind of unity and
+freedom. But human life, sacred and secular, is one. A single strain of
+moral urgency runs through the epochs of national development from
+barbarism to Christian civilization. A single strain of urgency unites
+the boisterous vigour of the youth and the sagacious spiritual courage
+of the man. It is on the strength first, and then on the discipline and
+purification of the will, that everything depends. There must be energy,
+or there can be no adequate faith, no earnest religion. We trace in the
+Book of Judges the springing up and growth of a collective energy which
+gives power to each separate life. To our amazement we may discover that
+the Mosaic Law and Ordinances are neglected for a time; but there can be
+no doubt of Divine Providence, the activity of the redeeming Spirit.
+Great ends are being served,--a development is proceeding which will
+by-and-by make religious thought strong, obedience and worship zealous.
+It is not for us to say that spiritual evolution ought to proceed in
+this way or that. In the study of natural and supernatural fact our
+business is to observe with all possible care the goings forth of God
+and to find as far as we may their meaning and issue. Faith is a
+profound conviction that the facts of the world justify themselves and
+the wisdom and righteousness of the Eternal; it is the key that makes
+history articulate, no mere tale full of sound and fury signifying
+nothing. And the key of faith which here we are to use in the
+interpretation of Hebrew life has yet to be applied to all peoples and
+times. That this may be done we firmly believe: there is needed only the
+mind broad enough in wisdom and sympathy to gather the annals of the
+world into one great Bible or Book of God.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Opening the story of the Judges, we find ourselves in a keen atmosphere
+of warlike ardour softened by scarcely an air of spiritual grace. At
+once we are plunged into military preparations; councils of war meet and
+the clash of weapons is heard. Battle follows battle. Iron chariots
+hurtle along the valleys, the hillsides bristle with armed men. The
+songs are of strife and conquest; the great heroes are those who smite
+the uncircumcised hip and thigh. It is the story of Jehovah's people;
+but where is Jehovah the merciful? Does He reign among them, or sanction
+their enterprise? Where amid this turmoil and bloodshed is the movement
+towards the far-off Messiah and the holy mountain where nothing shall
+hurt or destroy? Does Israel prepare for blessing all nations by
+crushing those that occupy the land he claims? Problems many meet us in
+Bible history; here surely is one of the gravest. And we cannot go with
+Judah in that first expedition; we must hold back in doubt till clearly
+we understand how these wars of conquest are necessary to the progress
+of the world. Then, even though the tribes are as yet unaware of their
+destiny and how it is to be fulfilled, we may go up with them against
+Adoni-bezek.
+
+Canaan is to be colonised by the seed of Abraham, Canaan and no other
+land. It is not now, as it was in Abraham's time, a sparsely peopled
+country, with room enough for a new race. Canaanites, Hivites,
+Perizzites, Amorites cultivate the plain of Esdraelon and inhabit a
+hundred cities throughout the land. The Hittites are in considerable
+force, a strong people with a civilization of their own. To the north
+Phoenicia is astir with a mercantile and vigorous race. The Philistines
+have settlements southward along the coast. Had Israel sought a region
+comparatively unoccupied, such might, perhaps, have been found on the
+northern coast of Africa. But Syria is the destined home of the tribes.
+
+The old promise to Abraham has been kept before the minds of his
+descendants. The land to which they have moved through the desert is
+that of which he took earnest by the purchase of a grave. But the
+promise of God looks forward to the circumstances that are to accompany
+its fulfilment; and it is justified because the occupation of Canaan is
+the means to a great development of righteousness. For, mark the
+position which the Hebrew nation is to take. It is to be the central
+state of the world, in verity the Mountain of God's House for the world.
+Then observe how the situation of Canaan fits it to be the seat of this
+new progressive power. Egypt, Babylon, Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage,
+lie in a rude circle around it. From its sea-board the way is open to
+the west. Across the valley of Jordan goes the caravan route to the
+East. The Nile, the Orontes, the �gean Sea are not far off. Canaan does
+not confine its inhabitants, scarcely separates them from other peoples.
+It is in the midst of the old world.
+
+Is not this one reason why Israel must inhabit Palestine? Suppose the
+tribes settled in the highlands of Armenia or along the Persian Gulf;
+suppose them to have migrated westward from Egypt instead of eastward,
+and to have found a place of habitation on towards Libya: would the
+history in that case have had the same movement and power? Would the
+theatre of prophecy and the scene of the Messiah's work have set the
+gospel of the ages in the same relief, or the growing City of God on the
+same mountain height? Not only is Canaan accessible to the emigrants
+from Egypt, but it is by position and configuration suited to develop
+the genius of the race. Gennesaret and Asphaltitis; the tortuous Jordan
+and Kishon, that "river of battles"; the cliffs of Engedi, Gerizim and
+Ebal, Carmel and Tabor, Moriah and Olivet,--these are needed as the
+scene of the great Divine revelation. No other rivers, no other lakes
+nor mountains on the surface of the earth will do.
+
+This, however, is but part of the problem which meets us in regard to
+the settlement in Canaan. There are the inhabitants of the land to be
+considered--these Amorites, Hittites, Jebusites, Hivites. How do we
+justify Israel in displacing them, slaying them, absorbing them? Here is
+a question first of evolution, then of the character of God.
+
+Do we justify Saxons in their raid on Britain? History does. They become
+dominant, they rule, they slay, they assimilate; and there grows up
+British nationality strong and trusty, the citadel of freedom and
+religious life. The case is similar, yet there is a difference, strongly
+in favour of Israel as an invading people. For the Israelites have been
+tried by stern discipline: they are held together by a moral law, a
+religion divinely revealed, a faith vigorous though but in germ. The
+Saxons worshipping Thor, Frea and Woden sweep religion before them in
+the first rush of conquest. They begin by destroying Roman civilization
+and Christian culture in the land they ravage. They appear "dogs,"
+"wolves," "whelps from the kennel of barbarism" to the Britons they
+overcome. But the Israelites have learned to fear Jehovah, and they bear
+with them the ark of His covenant.
+
+As for the Canaanitish tribes, compare them now with what they were when
+Abraham and Isaac fed their flocks in the plain of Mamre or about the
+springs of Beersheba. Abraham found in Canaan noble courteous men. Aner,
+Eshcol and Mamre, Amorites, were his trusted confederates; Ephron the
+Hittite matched his magnanimity; Abimelech of Gerar "feared the Lord."
+In Salem reigned a king or royal priest, Melchizedek, unique in ancient
+history, a majestic unsullied figure, who enjoyed the respect and
+tribute of the Hebrew patriarch. Where are the successors of those men?
+Idolatry has corrupted Canaan. The old piety of simple races has died
+away before the hideous worship of Moloch and Ashtoreth. It is over
+degenerate peoples that Israel is to assert its dominance; they must
+learn the way of Jehovah or perish. This conquest is essential to the
+progress of the world. Here in the centre of empires a stronghold of
+pure ideas and commanding morality is to be established, an altar of
+witness for the true God.
+
+So far we move without difficulty towards a justification of the Hebrew
+descent on Canaan. Still, however, when we survey the progress of
+conquest, the idea struggling for confirmation in our minds that God was
+King and Guide of this people, while at the same time we know that all
+nations could equally claim Him as their Origin, marking how on field
+after field thousands were left dying and dead, we have to find an
+answer to the question whether the slaughter and destruction even of
+idolatrous races for the sake of Israel can be explained in harmony with
+Divine justice. And this passes into still wider inquiries. Is there
+intrinsic value in human life? Have men a proper right of existence and
+self-development? Does not Divine Providence imply that the history of
+each people, the life of each person will have its separate end and
+vindication? There is surely a reason in the righteousness and love of
+God for every human experience, and Christian thought cannot explain the
+severity of Old Testament ordinances by assuming that the Supreme has
+made a new dispensation for Himself. The problem is difficult, but we
+dare not evade it nor doubt a full solution to be possible.
+
+We pass here beyond mere "natural evolution." It is not enough to say
+that there had to be a struggle for life among races and individuals. If
+natural forces are held to be the limit and equivalent of God, then
+"survival of the fittest" may become a religious doctrine, but assuredly
+it will introduce us to no God of pardon, no hope of redemption. We must
+discover a Divine end in the life of each person, a member it may be of
+some doomed race, dying on a field of battle in the holocaust of its
+valour and chivalry. Explanation is needed of all slaughtered and
+"waste" lives, untold myriads of lives that never tasted freedom or knew
+holiness.
+
+The explanation we find is this: that for a human life in the present
+stage of existence the opportunity of struggle for moral ends--it may be
+ends of no great dignity, yet really moral, and, as the race advances,
+religious--this makes life worth living and brings to every one the
+means of true and lasting gain. "Where ignorant armies clash by night"
+there may be in the opposing ranks the most various notions of religion
+and of what is morally good. The histories of the nations that meet in
+shock of battle determine largely what hopes and aims guide individual
+lives. But to the thousands who do valiantly this conflict belongs to
+the vital struggle in which some idea of the morally good or of
+religious duty directs and animates the soul. For hearth and home, for
+wife and children, for chief and comrades, for Jehovah or Baal, men
+fight, and around these names there cluster thoughts the sacredest
+possible to the age, dignifying life and war and death. There are better
+kinds of struggle than that which is acted on the bloody field; yet
+struggle of one kind or other there must be. It is the law of existence
+for the barbarian, for the Hebrew, for the Christian. Ever there is a
+necessity for pressing towards the mark, striving to reach and enter the
+gate of higher life. No land flowing with milk and honey to be peaceably
+inherited and enjoyed rewards the generation which has fought its way
+through the desert. No placid possession of cities and vineyards rounds
+off the life of Canaanitish tribe. The gains of endurance are reaped,
+only to be sown again in labour and tears for a further harvest. Here on
+earth this is the plan of God for men; and when another life crowns the
+long effort of this world of change, may it not be with fresh calls to
+more glorious duty and achievement?
+
+But the golden cord of Divine Providence has more than one strand; and
+while the conflicts of life are appointed for the discipline of men and
+nations in moral vigour and in fidelity to such religious ideas as they
+possess, the purer and stronger faith always giving more power to those
+who exercise it, there is also in the course of life, and especially in
+the suffering war entails, a reference to the sins of men. Warfare is a
+sad necessity. Itself often a crime, it issues the judgment of God
+against folly and crime. Now Israel, now the Canaanite becomes a hammer
+of Jehovah. One people has been true to its best, and by that
+faithfulness it gains the victory. Another has been false, cruel,
+treacherous, and the hands of the fighters grow weak, their swords lose
+edge, their chariot-wheels roll heavily, they are swept away by the
+avenging tide. Or the sincere, the good are overcome; the weak who are
+in the right sink before the wicked who are strong. Yet the moral
+triumph is always gained. Even in defeat and death there is victory for
+the faithful.
+
+In these wars of Israel we find many a story of judgment as well as a
+constant proving of the worth of man's religion and virtue. Neither was
+Israel always in the right, nor had those races which Israel overcame
+always a title to the power they held and the land they occupied.
+Jehovah was a stern arbiter among the combatants. When His own people
+failed in the courage and humility of faith, they were chastised. On the
+other hand, there were tyrants and tyrannous races, freebooters and
+banditti, pagan hordes steeped in uncleanness who had to be judged and
+punished. Where we cannot trace the reason of what appears mere waste of
+life or wanton cruelty, there lie behind, in the ken of the All-seeing,
+the need and perfect vindication of all He suffered to be done in the
+ebb and flow of battle, amid the riot of war.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Beginning now with the detailed narrative, we find first a case of
+retribution, in which the Israelites served the justice of God. As yet
+the Canaanite power was unbroken in the central region of Western
+Palestine, where Adoni-bezek ruled over the cities of seventy chiefs. It
+became a question who should lead the tribes against this petty despot,
+and recourse was had to the priests at Gilgal for Divine direction. The
+answer of the oracle was that Judah should head the campaign, the
+warlike vigour and numerical strength of that tribe fitting it to take
+the foremost place. Judah accepting the post of honour invited Simeon,
+closely related by common descent from Leah, to join the expedition; and
+thus began a confederacy of these southern tribes which had the effect
+of separating them from the others throughout the whole period of the
+judges. The locality of Bezek which the king of the Canaanites held as
+his chief fortress is not known. Probably it was near the Jordan valley,
+about half-way between the two greater lakes. From it the tyranny of
+Adoni-bezek extended northward and southward over the cities of the
+seventy, whose submission he had cruelly ensured by rendering them unfit
+for war. Here, in the first struggle, Judah was completely successful.
+The rout of the Canaanites and Perizzites was decisive, and the
+slaughter so great as to send a thrill of terror through the land. And
+now the rude judgment of men works out the decree of God. Adoni-bezek
+suffers the same mutilation as he had inflicted on the captive chiefs
+and in Oriental manner makes acknowledgment of a just fate. There is a
+certain religiousness in his mind, and he sincerely bows himself under
+the judgment of a God against Whom he had tried issues in vain. Had
+these troops of Israel come in the name of Jehovah? Then Jehovah had
+been watching Adoni-bezek in his pride when as he daily feasted in his
+hall the crowd of victims grovelled at his feet like dogs.
+
+Thus early did ideas of righteousness and of wide authority attach
+themselves in Canaan to the name of Israel's God. It is remarkable how
+on the appearance of a new race the first collision with it on the
+battlefield will produce an impression of its capacity and spirit and of
+unseen powers fighting along with it. Joshua's dash through Canaan
+doubtless struck far and wide a belief that the new comers had a mighty
+God to support them; the belief is reinforced, and there is added a
+thought of Divine justice. The retribution of Jehovah meant Godhead far
+larger and more terrible, and at the same time more august, than the
+religion of Baal had ever presented to the mind. From this point the
+Israelites, if they had been true to their heavenly King, fired with the
+ardour of His name, would have occupied a moral vantage ground and
+proved invincible. The fear of Jehovah would have done more for them
+than their own valour and arms. Had the people of the land seen that a
+power was being established amongst them in the justice and benignity of
+which they could trust, had they learned not only to fear but to adore
+Jehovah, there would have been quick fulfilment of the promise which
+gladdened the large heart of Abraham. The realization, however, had to
+wait for many a century.
+
+It cannot be doubted that Israel had under Moses received such an
+impulse in the direction of faith in the one God, and such a conception
+of His character and will, as declared the spiritual mission of the
+tribes. The people were not all aware of their high destiny, not
+sufficiently instructed to have a competent sense of it; but the chiefs
+of the tribes, the Levites and the heads of households, should have well
+understood the part that fell to Israel among the nations of the world.
+The law in its main outlines was known, and it should have been revered
+as the charter of the commonwealth. Under the banner of Jehovah the
+nation ought to have striven not for its own position alone, the
+enjoyment of fruitful fields and fenced cities, but to raise the
+standard of human morality and enforce the truth of Divine religion. The
+gross idolatry of the peoples around should have been continually
+testified against; the principles of honesty, of domestic purity, of
+regard for human life, of neighbourliness and parental authority, as
+well as the more spiritual ideas expressed in the first table of the
+Decalogue, ought to have been guarded and dispensed as the special
+treasure of the nation. In this way Israel, as it enlarged its
+territory, would from the first have been clearing one space of earth
+for the good customs and holy observances that make for spiritual
+development. The greatest of all trusts is committed to a race when it
+is made capable of this; but here Israel often failed, and the
+reproaches of her prophets had to be poured out from age to age.
+
+The ascendency which Israel secured in Canaan, or that which Britain has
+won in India, is not, to begin with, justified by superior strength, nor
+by higher intelligence, nor even because in practice the religion of the
+conquerors is better than that of the vanquished. It is justified
+because, with all faults and crimes that may for long attend the rule of
+the victorious race, there lie, unrealised at first, in conceptions of
+God and of duty the promise and germ of a higher education of the world.
+Developed in the course of time, the spiritual genius of the conquerors
+vindicates their ambition and their success. The world is to become the
+heritage and domain of those who have the secret of large and ascending
+life.
+
+Judah moving southward from Bezek took Jerusalem, not the stronghold on
+the hill-top, but the city, and smote it with the edge of the sword. Not
+yet did that citadel which has been the scene of so many conflicts
+become a rallying-point for the tribes. The army, leaving Adoni-bezek
+dead in Jerusalem, with many who owned him as chief, swept southward
+still to Hebron and Debir. At Hebron the task was not unlike that which
+had been just accomplished. There reigned three chiefs, Sheshai, Ahiman
+and Talmai, who are mentioned again and again in the annals as if their
+names had been deeply branded on the memory of the age. They were sons
+of Anak, bandit captains, whose rule was a terror to the country side.
+Their power had to be assailed and overthrown, not only for the sake of
+Judah which was to inhabit their stronghold, but for the sake of
+humanity. The law of God was to replace the fierce unregulated sway of
+inhuman violence and cruelty. So the practical duty of the hour carried
+the tribes beyond the citadel where the best national centre would have
+been found to attack another where an evil power sat entrenched.
+
+One moral lies on the surface here. We are naturally anxious to gain a
+good position in life for ourselves, and every consideration is apt to
+be set aside in favour of that. Now, in a sense, it is necessary, one of
+the first duties, that we gain each a citadel for himself. Our influence
+depends to a great extent on the standing we secure, on the courage and
+talent we show in making good our place. Our personality must enlarge
+itself, make itself visible by the conquest we effect and the extent of
+affairs we have a right to control. Effort on this line needs not be
+selfish or egoistic in a bad sense. The higher self or spirit of a good
+man finds in chosen ranges of activity and possession its true
+development and calling. One may not be a worldling by any means while
+he follows the bent of his genius and uses opportunity to become a
+successful merchant, a public administrator, a great artist or man of
+letters. All that he adds to his native inheritance of hand, brain and
+soul should be and often is the means of enriching the world. Against
+the false doctrine of self-suppression, still urged on a perplexed
+generation, stands this true doctrine, by which the generous helper of
+men guides his life so as to become a king and priest unto God. And when
+we turn from persons of highest character and talent to those of smaller
+capacity, we may not alter the principle of judgment. They, too, serve
+the world, in so far as they have good qualities, by conquering citadels
+and reigning where they are fit to reign. If a man is to live to any
+purpose, play must be given to his original vigour, however much or
+little there is of it.
+
+Here, then, we find a necessity belonging to the spiritual no less than
+to the earthly life. But there lies close beside it the shadow of
+temptation and sin. Thousands of people put forth all their strength to
+gain a fortress for themselves, leaving others to fight the sons of
+Anak--the intemperance, the unchastity, the atheism of the time. Instead
+of triumphing over the earthly, they are ensnared and enslaved. The
+truth is, that a safe position for ourselves we cannot have while those
+sons of Anak ravage the country around. The Divine call therefore often
+requires of us that we leave a Jerusalem unconquered for ourselves,
+while we pass on with the hosts of God to do battle with the public
+enemy. Time after time Israel, though successful at Hebron, missed the
+secret and learnt in bitter sadness and loss how near is the shadow to
+the glory.
+
+And for any one to-day, what profits it to be a wealthy man, living in
+state with all the appliances of amusement and luxury, well knowing, but
+not choosing to share the great conflicts between religion and
+ungodliness, between purity and vice? If the ignorance and woe of our
+fellow-creatures do not draw our hearts, if we seek our own things as
+loving our own, if the spiritual does not command us, we shall certainly
+lose all that makes life--enthusiasm, strength, eternal joy.
+
+Give us men who fling themselves into the great struggle, doing what
+they can with Christ-born ardour, foot soldiers if nothing else in the
+army of the Lord of Righteousness.
+
+
+
+
+II.
+
+_THE WAY OF THE SWORD._
+
+JUDGES i. 12-26.
+
+
+The name Kiriath-sepher, that is Book-Town, has been supposed to point
+to the existence of a semi-popular literature among the pre-Jud�an
+inhabitants of Canaan. We cannot build with any certainty upon a name;
+but there are other facts of some significance. Already the Phoenicians,
+the merchants of the age, some of whom no doubt visited Kiriath-sepher
+on their way to Arabia or settled in it, had in their dealings with
+Egypt begun to use that alphabet to which most languages, from Hebrew
+and Aramaic on through Greek and Latin to our own, are indebted for the
+idea and shapes of letters. And it is not improbable that an old-world
+Phoenician library of skins, palm-leaves or inscribed tablets had given
+distinction to this town lying away towards the desert from Hebron.
+Written words were held in half-superstitious veneration, and a very few
+records would greatly impress a district peopled chiefly by wandering
+tribes.
+
+Nothing is insignificant in the pages of the Bible, nothing is to be
+disregarded that throws the least light upon human affairs and Divine
+Providence; and here we have a suggestion of no slight importance. Doubt
+has been cast on the existence of a written language among the Hebrews
+till centuries after the Exodus. It has been denied that the Law could
+have been written out by Moses. The difficulty is now seen to be
+imaginary, like many others that have been raised. It is certain that
+the Phoenicians trading to Egypt in the time of the Hyksos kings had
+settlements quite contiguous to Goshen. What more likely than that the
+Hebrews, who spoke a language akin to the Phoenician, should have shared
+the discovery of letters almost from the first, and practised the art of
+writing in the days of their favour with the monarchs of the Nile
+valley? The oppression of the following period might prevent the spread
+of letters among the people; but a man like Moses must have seen their
+value and made himself familiar with their use. The importance of this
+indication in the study of Hebrew law and faith is very plain. Nor
+should we fail to notice the interesting connection between the Divine
+lawgiving of Moses and the practical invention of a worldly race. There
+is no exclusiveness in the providence of God. The art of a people, acute
+and eager indeed, but without spirituality, is not rejected as profane
+by the inspired leader of Israel. Egyptians and Phoenicians have their
+share in originating that culture which mingles its stream with sacred
+revelation and religion. As, long afterwards, there came the
+printing-press, a product of human skill and science, and by its help
+the Reformation spread and grew and filled Europe with new thought, so
+for the early record of God's work and will human genius furnished the
+fit instrument. Letters and religion, culture and faith must needs go
+hand in hand. The more the minds of men are trained, the more deftly
+they can use literature and science, the more able they should be to
+receive and convey the spiritual message which the Bible contains.
+Culture which does not have this effect betrays its own pettiness and
+parochialism; and when we are provoked to ask whether human learning is
+not a foe to religion, the reason must be that the favourite studies of
+the time are shallow, aimless and ignoble.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Kiriath-sepher has to be taken. Its inhabitants, strongly entrenched,
+threaten the people who are settling about Hebron and must be subdued;
+and Caleb, who has come to his possession, adopts a common expedient for
+rousing the ambitious young men of the tribe. He has a daughter, and
+marriage with her shall reward the man who takes the fortress. It is not
+likely that Achsah objected. A courageous and capable husband was, we
+may say, a necessity, and her father's proposal offered a practical way
+of settling her in safety and comfort. Customs which appear to us
+barbarous and almost insulting have no doubt justified themselves to the
+common-sense, if not fully to the desires of women, because they were
+suited to the exigencies of life in rude and stormy times. There is this
+also, that the conquest of Kiriath-sepher was part of the great task in
+which Israel was engaged, and Achsah, as a patriotic daughter of
+Abraham, would feel the pride of being able to reward a hero of the
+sacred war. To the degree in which she was a woman of character this
+would balance other considerations. Still the custom is not an ideal
+one; there is too much uncertainty. While the rivalry for her hand is
+going on the maiden has to wait at home, wondering what her fate shall
+be, instead of helping to decide it by her own thought and action. The
+young man, again, does not commend himself by honour, but only by
+courage and skill. Yet the test is real, so far as it goes, and fits
+the time.
+
+Achsah, no doubt, had her preference and her hope, though she dared not
+speak of them. As for modern feeling, it is professedly on the side of
+the heart in such a case, and modern literature, with a thousand deft
+illustrations, proclaims the right of the heart to its choice. We call
+it a barbarous custom, the disposition of a woman by her father, apart
+from her preference, to one who does him or the community a service; and
+although Achsah consented, we feel that she was a slave. No doubt the
+Hebrew wife in her home had a place of influence and power, and a woman
+might even come to exercise authority among the tribes; but, to begin
+with, she was under authority and had to subdue her own wishes in a
+manner we consider quite incompatible with the rights of a human being.
+Very slowly do the customs of marriage even in Israel rise from the
+rudeness of savage life. Abraham and Sarah, long before this, lived on
+something like equality, he a prince, she a princess. But what can be
+said of Hagar, a concubine outside the home-circle, who might be sent
+any day into the wilderness? David and Solomon afterwards can marry for
+state reasons, can take, in pure Oriental fashion, the one his tens, the
+other his hundreds of wives and concubines. Polygamy survives for many a
+century. When that is seen to be evil, there remains to men a freedom of
+divorce which of necessity keeps women in a low and unhonoured state.
+
+Yet, thus treated, woman has always duties of the first importance, on
+which the moral health and vigour of the race depend; and right nobly
+must many a Hebrew wife and mother have fulfilled the trust. It is a
+pathetic story; but now, perhaps, we are in sight of an age when the
+injustice done to women may be replaced by an injustice they do to
+themselves. Liberty is their right, but the old duties remain as great
+as ever. If neither patriotism, nor religion, nor the home is to be
+regarded, but mere taste; if freedom becomes license to know and enjoy,
+there will be another slavery worse than the former. Without a very keen
+sense of Christian honour and obligation among women, their
+enfranchisement will be the loss of what has held society together and
+made nations strong. And looking at the way in which marriage is
+frequently arranged by the free consent and determination of women, is
+there much advance on the old barbarism? How often do they sell
+themselves to the fortunate, rather than reserve themselves for the fit;
+how often do they marry not because a helpmeet of the soul has been
+found, but because audacity has won them or jewels have dazzled; because
+a fireside is offered, not because the ideal of life may be realized.
+True, in the worldliness there is a strain of moral effort often
+pathetic enough. Women are skilful at making the best of circumstances,
+and even when the gilding fades from the life they have chosen they will
+struggle on with wonderful resolution to maintain something like order
+and beauty. The Othniel who has gained Achsah by some feat of mercantile
+success or showy talk may turn out a poor pretender to bravery or wit;
+but she will do her best for him, cover up his faults, beg springs of
+water or even dig them with her own hands. Let men thank God that it is
+so, and let them help her to find her right place, her proper kingdom
+and liberty.
+
+There is another aspect of the picture, however, as it unfolds itself.
+The success of Othniel in his attack on Kiriath-sepher gave him at once
+a good place as a leader, and a wife who was ready to make his interests
+her own and help him to social position and wealth. Her first care was
+to acquire a piece of land suitable for the flocks and herds she saw in
+prospect, well watered if possible,--in short, an excellent sheep-farm.
+Returning from the bridal journey, she had her stratagem ready, and when
+she came near her father's tent followed up her husband's request for
+the land by lighting eagerly from her ass, taking for granted the one
+gift, and pressing a further petition--"Give me a blessing, father. A
+south land thou hast bestowed, give me also wells of water." So, without
+more ado, the new Kenazite homestead was secured.
+
+How Jewish, we may be disposed to say. May we not also say, How
+thoroughly British? The virtue of Achsah, is it not the virtue of a true
+British wife? To urge her husband on and up in the social scale, to aid
+him in every point of the contest for wealth and place, to raise him and
+rise with him, what can be more admirable? Are there opportunities of
+gaining the favour of the powerful who have offices to give, the liking
+of the wealthy who have fortunes to bequeath? The managing wife will use
+these opportunities with address and courage. She will light off her ass
+and bow humbly before a flattered great man to whom she prefers a
+request. She can fit her words to the occasion and her smiles to the end
+in view. It is a poor spirit that is content with anything short of all
+that may be had: thus in brief she might express her principle of duty.
+And so in ten thousand homes there is no question whether marriage is a
+failure. It has succeeded. There is a combination of man's strength and
+woman's wit for the great end of "getting on." And in ten thousand
+others there is no thought more constantly present to the minds of
+husband and wife than that marriage is a failure. For restless ingenuity
+and many schemes have yielded nothing. The husband has been too slow or
+too honest, and the wife has been foiled; or, on the other hand, the
+woman has not seconded the man, has not risen with him. She has kept him
+down by her failings; or she is the same simple-minded, homely person he
+wedded long ago, no fit mate, of course, for one who is the companion of
+magnates and rulers. Well may those who long for a reformation begin by
+seeking a return to simplicity of life and the relish for other kinds of
+distinction than lavish outlay and social notoriety can give. Until
+married ambition is fed and hallowed at the Christian altar there will
+be the same failures we see now, and the same successes which are worse
+than "failures."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For a moment the history gives us a glimpse of another domestic
+settlement. "The children of the Kenite went up from the City of Palm
+Trees with the children of Judah," and found a place of abode on the
+southern fringe of Simeon's territory, and there they seem to have
+gradually mingled with the tent-dwellers of the desert. By-and-by we
+shall find one Heber the Kenite in a different part of the land, near
+the Sea of Galilee, still in touch with the Israelites to some extent,
+while his people are scattered. Heber may have felt the power of
+Israel's mission and career and judged it wise to separate from those
+who had no interest in the tribes of Jehovah. The Kenites of the south
+appear in the history like men upon a raft, once borne near shore, who
+fail to seize the hour of deliverance and are carried away again to the
+wastes of sea. They are part of the drifting population that surrounds
+the Hebrew church, type of the drifting multitude who in the nomadism of
+modern society are for a time seen in our Christian assemblies, then
+pass away to mingle with the careless. An innate restlessness and a want
+of serious purpose mark the class. To settle these wanderers in orderly
+religious life seems almost impossible; we can perhaps only expect to
+sow among them seeds of good, and to make them feel a Divine presence
+restraining from evil. The assertion of personal independence in our day
+has no doubt much to do with impatience of church bonds and habits of
+worship; and it must not be forgotten that this is a phase of growing
+life needing forbearance no less than firm example.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Zephath was the next fortress against which Judah and Simeon directed
+their arms. When the tribes were in the desert on their long and
+difficult march they attempted first to enter Canaan from the south, and
+actually reached the neighbourhood of this town. But, as we read in the
+Book of Numbers, Arad the king of Zephath fought against them and took
+some of them prisoners. The defeat appears to have been serious, for,
+arrested and disheartened by it, Israel turned southward again, and
+after a long _d�tour_ reached Canaan another way. In the passage in
+Numbers the overthrow of Zephath is described by anticipation; in Judges
+we have the account in its proper historical place. The people whom Arad
+ruled were, we may suppose, an Edomite clan living partly by
+merchandise, mainly by foray, practised marauders, with difficulty
+guarded against, who having taken their prey disappeared swiftly amongst
+the hills.
+
+In the world of thought and feeling there are many Zephaths, whence
+quick outset is often made upon the faith and hope of men. We are
+pressing towards some end, mastering difficulties, contending with open
+and known enemies. Only a little way remains before us. But invisible
+among the intricacies of experience is this lurking foe who suddenly
+falls upon us. It is a settlement in the faith of God we seek. The onset
+is of doubts we had not imagined, doubts of inspiration, of immortality,
+of the incarnation, truths the most vital. We are repulsed, broken,
+disheartened. There remains a new wilderness journey till we reach by
+the way of Moab the fords of our Jordan and the land of our inheritance.
+Yet there is a way, sure and appointed. The baffled, wounded soul is
+never to despair. And when at length the settlement of faith is won, the
+Zephath of doubt may be assailed from the other side, assailed
+successfully and taken. The experience of some poor victims of what is
+oddly called philosophic doubt need dismay no one. For the resolute
+seeker after God there is always a victory, which in the end may prove
+so easy, so complete, as to amaze him. The captured Zephath is not
+destroyed nor abandoned, but is held as a fortress of faith. It becomes
+Hormah--the Consecrated.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Victories were gained by Judah in the land of the Philistines, partial
+victories, the results of which were not kept. Gaza, Ashkelon, Ekron
+were occupied for a time; but Philistine force and doggedness recovered,
+apparently in a few years, the captured towns. Wherever they had their
+origin, these Philistines were a strong and stubborn race, and so
+different from the Israelites in habit and language that they never
+freely mingled nor even lived peaceably with the tribes. At this time
+they were probably forming their settlements on the Mediterranean
+seaboard, and were scarcely able to resist the men of Judah. But ship
+after ship from over sea, perhaps from Crete, brought new colonists; and
+during the whole period till the Captivity they were a thorn in the side
+of the Hebrews. Beside these, there were other dwellers in the lowlands,
+who were equipped in a way that made it difficult to meet them. The most
+vehement sally of men on foot could not break the line of iron chariots,
+thundering over the plain. It was in the hill districts that the tribes
+gained their surest footing,--a singular fact, for mountain people are
+usually hardest to defeat and dispossess; and we take it as a sign of
+remarkable vigour that the invaders so soon occupied the heights.
+
+Here the spiritual parallel is instructive. Conversion, it may be said,
+carries the soul with a rush to the high ground of faith. The Great
+Leader has gone before preparing the way. We climb rapidly to fortresses
+from which the enemy has fled, and it would seem that victory is
+complete. But the Christian life is a constant alternation between the
+joy of the conquered height and the stern battles of the foe-infested
+plain. Worldly custom and sensuous desire, greed and envy and base
+appetite have their cities and chariots in the low ground of being. So
+long as one of them remains the victory of faith is unfinished,
+insecure. Piety that believes itself delivered once for all from
+conflict is ever on the verge of disaster. The peace and joy men
+cherish, while as yet the earthly nature is unsubdued, the very citadels
+of it unreconnoitred, are visionary and relaxing. For the soul and for
+society the only salvation lies in mortal combat--life-long, age-long
+combat with the earthly and the false. Nooks enough may be found among
+the hills, pleasant and calm, from which the low ground cannot be seen,
+where the roll of the iron chariots is scarcely heard. It may seem to
+imperil all if we descend from these retreats. But when we have gained
+strength in the mountain air it is for the battle down below, it is that
+we may advance the lines of redeemed life and gain new bases for sacred
+enterprise.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A mark of the humanness and, shall we not also say, the divineness of
+this history is to be found in the frequent notices of other tribes than
+those of Israel. To the inspired writer it is not all the same whether
+Canaanites die or live, what becomes of Phoenicians or Philistines. Of
+this we have two examples, one the case of the Jebusites, the other of
+the people of Luz.
+
+The Jebusites, after the capture of the lower city already recorded,
+appear to have been left in peaceful possession of their citadel and
+accepted as neighbours by the Benjamites. When the Book of Judges was
+written Jebusite families still remained, and in David's time Araunah
+the Jebusite was a conspicuous figure. A series of terrible events
+connected with the history of Benjamin is narrated towards the end of
+the Book. It is impossible to say whether the crime which led to these
+events was in any way due to bad influence exercised by the Jebusites.
+We may charitably doubt whether it was. There is no indication that they
+were a depraved people. If they had been licentious they could scarcely
+have retained till David's time a stronghold so central and of so much
+consequence in the land. They were a mountain clan, and Araunah shows
+himself in contact with David a reverend and kingly person.
+
+As for Bethel or Luz, around which gathered notable associations of
+Jacob's life, Ephraim, in whose territory it lay, adopted a stratagem
+in order to master it, and smote the city. One family alone, the head of
+which had betrayed the place, was allowed to depart in peace, and a new
+Luz was founded "in the land of the Hittites." We are inclined to regard
+the traitor as deserving of death, and Ephraim appears to us disgraced,
+not honoured, by its exploit. There is a fair, straightforward way of
+fighting; but this tribe, one of the strongest, chooses a mean and
+treacherous method of gaining its end. Are we mistaken in thinking that
+the care with which the founding of the new city is described shows the
+writer's sympathy with the Luzzites? At any rate, he does not by one
+word justify Ephraim; and we do not feel called on to restrain our
+indignation.
+
+The high ideal of life, how often it fades from our view! There are
+times when we realize our Divine calling, when the strain of it is felt
+and the soul is on fire with sacred zeal. We press on, fight on, true to
+the highest we know at every step. We are chivalrous, for we see the
+chivalry of Christ; we are tender and faithful, for we see His
+tenderness and faithfulness. Then we make progress; the goal can almost
+be touched. We love, and love bears us on. We aspire, and the world
+glows with light. But there comes a change. The thought of
+self-preservation, of selfish gain, has intruded. On pretext of serving
+God we are hard to man, we keep back the truth, we use compromises, we
+descend even to treachery and do things which in another are abominable
+to us. So the fervour departs, the light fades from the world, the goal
+recedes, becomes invisible. Most strange of all is it that side by side
+with cultured religion there can be proud sophistry and ignorant scorn,
+the very treachery of the intellect towards man. Far away in the
+dimness of Israel's early days we see the beginnings of a pious
+inhumanity, that may well make us stay to fear lest the like should be
+growing among ourselves. It is not what men claim, much less what they
+seize and hold, that does them honour. Here and there a march may be
+stolen on rivals by those who firmly believe they are serving God. But
+the rights of a man, a tribe, a church lie side by side with duties; and
+neglect of duty destroys the claim to what otherwise would be a right.
+Let there be no mistake: power and gain are not allowed in the
+providence of God to anyone that he may grasp them in despite of justice
+or charity.
+
+One thought may link the various episodes we have considered. It is that
+of the end for which individuality exists. The home has its development
+of personality--for service. The peace and joy of religion nourish the
+soul--for service. Life may be conquered in various regions, and a man
+grow fit for ever greater victories, ever nobler service. But with the
+end the means and spirit of each effort are so interwoven that alike in
+home, and church, and society the human soul must move in uttermost
+faithfulness and simplicity or fail from the Divine victory that wins
+the prize.
+
+
+
+
+III.
+
+_AT BOCHIM; THE FIRST PROPHET VOICE._
+
+JUDGES ii. 1-5.
+
+
+From the time of Abraham on to the settlement in Canaan the Israelites
+had kept the faith of the one God. They had their origin as a people in
+a decisive revolt against polytheism. Of the great Semite forefather of
+the Jewish people, it has been finely said, "He bore upon his forehead
+the seal of the Absolute God, upon which was written, This race will rid
+the earth of superstition." The character and structure of the Hebrew
+tongue resisted idolatry. It was not an imaginative language; it had no
+mythological colour. We who have inherited an ancient culture of quite
+another kind do not think it strange to read or sing:
+
+  "Hail, smiling morn, that tip'st the hills with gold,
+    Whose rosy fingers ope the gates of day,
+  Who the gay face of nature dost unfold,
+    At whose bright presence darkness flies away."
+
+These lines, however, are full of latent mythology. The "smiling morn"
+is Aurora, the darkness that flies away before the dawn is the Erebus of
+the Greeks. Nothing of this sort was possible in Hebrew literature. In
+it all change, all life, every natural incident are ascribed to the will
+and power of one Supreme Being. "Jehovah thundered in the heavens and
+the Highest gave His voice, hailstones and coals of fire." "By the
+breath of God ice is given, and the breadth of the waters is
+straitened." "Behold, He spreadeth His light around Him; ... He covereth
+His hands with the lightning." "Thou makest darkness and it is night."
+Always in forms like these Hebrew poetry sets forth the control of
+nature by its invisible King. The pious word of F�nelon, "What do I see
+in nature? God; God everywhere; God alone," had its germ, its very
+substance, in the faith and language of patriarchal times.
+
+There are some who allege that this simple faith in one God, sole Origin
+and Ruler of nature and life, impoverished the thought and speech of the
+Hebrews. It was in reality the spring and safeguard of their spiritual
+destiny. Their very language was a sacred inheritance and preparation.
+From age to age it served a Divine purpose in maintaining the idea of
+the unity of God; and the power of that idea never failed their prophets
+nor passed from the soul of the race. The whole of Israel's literature
+sets forth the universal sway and eternal righteousness of Him who
+dwells in the high and lofty place, Whose name is Holy. In canto and
+strophe of the great Divine Poem, the glory of the One Supreme burns
+with increasing clearness, till in Christ its finest radiance flashes
+upon the world.
+
+While the Hebrews were in Egypt, the faith inherited from patriarchal
+times must have been sorely tried, and, all circumstances considered, it
+came forth wonderfully pure. "The Israelites saw Egypt as the Mussulman
+Arab sees pagan countries, entirely from the outside, perceiving only
+the surface and external things." They indeed carried with them into the
+desert the recollection of the sacred bulls or calves of which they had
+seen images at Hathor and Memphis. But the idol they made at Horeb was
+intended to represent their Deliverer, the true God, and the swift and
+stern repression by Moses of that symbolism and its pagan incidents
+appears to have been effectual. The tribes reached Canaan substantially
+free from idolatry, though teraphim or fetishes may have been used in
+secret with magical ceremonies. The religion of the people generally was
+far from spiritual, yet there was a real faith in Jehovah as the
+protector of the national life, the guardian of justice and truth. From
+this there was no falling away when the Reubenites and Gadites on the
+east of Jordan erected an altar for themselves. "The Lord God of gods,"
+they said, "He knoweth, and Israel he shall know if it be in rebellion,
+or if in transgression against the Lord." The altar was called _Ed_, a
+witness between east and west that the faith of the one Living God was
+still to unite the tribes.
+
+But the danger to Israel's fidelity came when there began to be
+intercourse with the people of Canaan, now sunk from the purer thought
+of early times. Everywhere in the land of the Hittites and Amorites,
+Hivites and Jebusites, there were altars and sacred trees, pillars and
+images used in idolatrous worship. The ark and the altar of Divine
+religion, established first at Gilgal near Jericho, afterwards at Bethel
+and then at Shiloh, could not be frequently visited, especially by those
+who settled towards the southern desert and in the far north. Yet the
+necessity for religious worship of some kind was constantly felt; and as
+afterwards the synagogues gave opportunity for devotional gatherings
+when the Temple could not be reached, so in the earlier time there came
+to be sacred observances on elevated places, a windy threshing-floor,
+or a hill-top already used for heathen sacrifice. Hence, on the one
+hand, there was the danger that worship might be entirely neglected, on
+the other hand the grave risk that the use of heathen occasions and
+meeting-places should lead to heathen ritual, and those who came
+together on the hill of Baal should forget Jehovah. It was the latter
+evil that grew; and while as yet only a few Hebrews easily led astray
+had approached with kid or lamb a pagan altar, the alarm was raised. At
+Bochim a Divine warning was uttered which found echo in the hearts of
+the people.
+
+There appears to have been a great gathering of the tribes at some spot
+near Bethel. We see the elders and heads of families holding council of
+war and administration, the thoughts of all bent on conquest and family
+settlement. Religion, the purity of Jehovah's worship, are forgotten in
+the business of the hour. How shall the tribes best help each other in
+the struggle that is already proving more arduous than they expected?
+Dan is sorely pressed by the Amorites. The chiefs of the tribe are here
+telling their story of hardship among the mountains. The Asherites have
+failed in their attack upon the sea-board towns Accho and Achzib; in
+vain have they pressed towards Zidon. They are dwelling among the
+Canaanites and may soon be reduced to slavery. The reports from other
+tribes are more hopeful; but everywhere the people of the land are hard
+to overcome. Should Israel not remain content for a time, make the best
+of circumstances, cultivate friendly intercourse with the population it
+cannot dispossess? Such a policy often commends itself to those who
+would be thought prudent; it is apt to prove a fatal policy.
+
+Suddenly a spiritual voice is heard, clear and intense, and all others
+are silent. From the sanctuary of God at Gilgal one comes whom the
+people have not expected; he comes with a message they cannot choose but
+hear. It is a prophet with the burden of reproof and warning. Jehovah's
+goodness, Jehovah's claim are declared with Divine ardour; with Divine
+severity the neglect of the covenant is condemned. Have the tribes of
+God begun to consort with the people of the land? Are they already
+dwelling content under the shadow of idolatrous groves, in sight of the
+symbols of Ashtoreth? Are they learning to swear by Baal and Melcarth
+and looking on while sacrifices are offered to these vile masters? Then
+they can no longer hope that Jehovah will give them the country to
+enjoy; the heathen shall remain as thorns in the side of Israel and
+their gods shall be a snare. It is a message of startling power. From
+the hopes of dominion and the plans of worldly gain the people pass to
+spiritual concern. They have offended their Lord; His countenance is
+turned from them. A feeling of guilt falls on the assembly. "It came to
+pass that the people lifted up their voice and wept."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+This lamentation at Bochim is the second note of religious feeling and
+faith in the Book of Judges. The first is the consultation of the
+priests and the oracle referred to in the opening sentence of the book.
+Jehovah Who had led them through the wilderness was their King, and
+unless He went forth as the unseen Captain of the host no success could
+be looked for. "They asked of Jehovah, saying, Who shall go up for us
+first against the Canaanites, to fight against them?" In this appeal
+there was a measure of faith which is neither to be scorned nor
+suspected. The question indeed was not whether they should fight at
+all, but how they should fight so as to succeed, and their trust was in
+a God thought of as pledged to them, solely concerned for them. So far
+accordingly there is nothing exemplary in the circumstances. Yet we find
+a lesson for Christian nations. There are many in our modern parliaments
+who are quite ready to vote national prayer in war-time and thanksgiving
+for victories, who yet would never think, before undertaking a war, of
+consulting those best qualified to interpret the Divine will. The
+relation between religion and the state has this fatal hitch, that
+however Christian our governments profess to be, the Christian thinkers
+of the country are not consulted on moral questions, not even on a
+question so momentous as that of war. It is passion, pride, or
+diplomacy, never the wisdom of Christ, that leads nations in the
+critical moments of their history. Who then scorn, who suspect the early
+Hebrew belief? Those only who have no right; those who as they laugh at
+God and faith shut themselves from the knowledge by which alone his can
+be understood; and, again, those who in their own ignorance and pride
+unsheathe the sword without reference to Him in Whom they profess to
+believe. We admit none of these to criticise Israel and its faith.
+
+At Bochim, where the second note of religious feeling is struck, a
+deeper and clearer note, we find the prophet listened to. He revives the
+sense of duty, he kindles a Divine sorrow in the hearts of the people.
+The national assembly is conscience-stricken. Let us allow this quick
+contrition to be the result, in part, of superstitious fear. Very rarely
+is spiritual concern quite pure. In general it is the consequences of
+transgression rather than the evil of it that press on the minds of
+men. Forebodings of trouble and calamity are more commonly causes of
+sorrow than the loss of fellowship with God; and if we know this to be
+the case with many who are convicted of sin under the preaching of the
+gospel, we cannot wonder to find the penitence of old Hebrew times
+mingled with superstition. Nevertheless, the people are aware of the
+broken covenant, burdened with a sense that they have lost the favour of
+their unseen Guide. There can be no doubt that the realization of sin
+and of justice turned against them is one cause of their tears.
+
+Here, again, if there is a difference between Israel and Christian
+nations, it is not in favour of the latter. Are modern senates ever
+overcome by conviction of sin? Those who are in power seem to have no
+fear that they may do wrong. Glorifying their blunders and forgetting
+their errors, they find no occasion for self-reproach, no need to sit in
+sackcloth and ashes. Now and then, indeed, a day of fasting and
+humiliation is ordered and observed in state; the sincere Christian for
+his part feeling how miserably formal it is, how far from the
+spontaneous expression of abasement and remorse. God is called upon to
+help a people who have not considered their ways, who design no
+amendment, who have not even suspected that the Divine blessing may come
+in still further humbling. And turning to private life, is there not as
+much of self-justification, as little of real humility and faith? The
+shallow nature of popular Christianity is seen here, that so few can
+read in disappointment and privation anything but disaster, or submit
+without disgust and rebellion to take a lower place at the table of
+Providence. Our weeping is so often for what we longed to gain or wished
+to keep in the earthly and temporal region, so seldom for what we have
+lost or should fear to lose in the spiritual. We grieve when we should
+rather rejoice that God has made us feel our need of Him, and called us
+again to our true blessedness.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The scene at Bochim connects itself very notably with one nine hundred
+and fifty years later. The poor fragments of the exiled tribes have been
+gathered again in the land of their fathers. They are rebuilding
+Jerusalem and the Temple. Ezra has led back a company from Babylon and
+has brought with him, by the favour of Artaxerxes, no small treasure of
+silver and gold for the house of God. To his astonishment and grief he
+hears the old tale of alliance with the inhabitants of the land,
+intermarriage even of Levites, priests and princes of Israel with women
+of the Canaanite races. In the new settlement of Palestine the error of
+the first is repeated. Ezra calls a solemn assembly in the Temple
+court--"every one that trembles at the words of the God of Israel." Till
+the evening sacrifice he sits prostrate with grief, his garment rent,
+his hair torn and dishevelled. Then on his knees before the Lord he
+spreads forth his hands in prayer. The trespasses of a thousand years
+afflict him, afflict the faithful. "After all that is come upon us for
+our evil deeds, shall we again break Thy commandments, and join in
+affinity with the peoples that do these abominations? wouldest not Thou
+be angry with us till Thou hadst consumed us so that there should be no
+remnant nor any to escape?... Behold we are before Thee in our
+guiltiness; for none can stand before Thee because of this." The
+impressive lament of Ezra and those who join in his confessions draws
+together a great congregation, and the people weep very sore.
+
+Nine centuries and a half appear a long time in the history of a nation.
+What has been gained during the period? Is the weeping at Jerusalem in
+Ezra's time, like the weeping at Bochim, a mark of no deeper feeling, no
+keener penitence? Has there been religious advance commensurate with the
+discipline of suffering, defeat, slaughter and exile, dishonoured kings,
+a wasted land? Have the prophets not achieved anything? Has not the
+Temple in its glory, in its desolation, spoken of a Heavenly power, a
+Divine rule, the sense of which entering the souls of the people has
+established piety, or at least a habit of separateness from heathen
+manners and life? It may be hard to distinguish and set forth the gain
+of those centuries. But it is certain that while the weeping at Bochim
+was the sign of a fear that soon passed away, the weeping in the Temple
+court marked a new beginning in Hebrew history. By the strong action of
+Ezra and Nehemiah the mixed marriages were dissolved, and from that time
+the Jewish people became, as they never were before, exclusive and
+separate. Where nature would have led the nation ceased to go. More and
+more strictly the law was enforced; the age of puritanism began. So, let
+us say, the sore discipline had its fruit.
+
+And yet it is with a reservation only we can enjoy the success of those
+reformers who drew the sharp line between Israel and his heathen
+neighbours, between Jew and Gentile. The vehemence of reaction urged the
+nation towards another error--Pharisaism. Nothing could be purer,
+nothing nobler than the desire to make Israel a holy people. But to
+inspire men with religious zeal and yet preserve them from spiritual
+pride is always difficult, and in truth those Hebrew reformers did not
+see the danger. There came to be, in the new development of faith, zeal
+enough, jealousy enough, for the purity of religion and life, but along
+with these a contempt for the heathen, a fierce enmity towards the
+uncircumcised, which made the interval till Christ appeared a time of
+strife and bloodshed worse than any that had been before. From the
+beginning the Hebrews were called with a holy calling, and their future
+was bound up with their faithfulness to it. Their ideal was to be
+earnest and pure, without bitterness or vainglory; and that is still the
+ideal of faith. But the Jewish people like ourselves, weak through the
+flesh, came short of the mark on one side or passed beyond it on the
+other. During the long period from Joshua to Nehemiah there was too
+little heat, and then a fire was kindled which burned a sharp narrow
+path, along which the life of Israel has gone with ever-lessening
+spiritual force. The unfulfilled ideal still waits, the unique destiny
+of this people of God still bears them on.
+
+Bochim is a symbol. There the people wept for a transgression but half
+understood and a peril they could not rightly dread. There was genuine
+sorrow, there was genuine alarm. But it was the prophetic word, not
+personal experience, that moved the assembly. And as at Florence, when
+Savonarola's word, shaking with alarm a people who had no vision of
+holiness, left them morally weaker as it fell into silence, so the
+weeping at Bochim passed like a tempest that has bowed and broken the
+forest trees. The chiefs of Israel returned to their settlements with a
+new sense of duty and peril; but Canaanite civilization had attractions,
+Canaanite women a refinement which captivated the heart. And the
+civilization, the refinement, were associated with idolatry. The myths
+of Canaan, the poetry of Tammuz and Astarte, were fascinating and
+seductive. We wonder not that the pure faith of God was corrupted, but
+that it survived. In Egypt the heathen worship was in a foreign tongue,
+but in Canaan the stories of the gods were whispered to Israelites in a
+language they knew, by their own kith and kin. In many a home among the
+mountains of Ephraim or the skirts of Lebanon the pagan wife, with her
+superstitious fears, her dread of the anger of this god or that goddess,
+wrought so on the mind of the Jewish husband that he began to feel her
+dread and then to permit and share her sacrifices. Thus idolatry invaded
+Israel, and the long and weary struggle between truth and falsehood
+began.
+
+We have spoken of Bochim as a symbol, and to us it may be the symbol of
+this, that the very thing which men put from them in horror and with
+tears, seeing the evil, the danger of it, does often insinuate itself
+into their lives. The messenger is heard, and while he speaks how near
+God is, how awful is the sense of His being! A thrill of keen feeling
+passes from soul to soul. There are some in the gathering who have more
+spiritual insight than the rest, and their presence raises the heat of
+emotion. But the moment of revelation and of fervour passes, the company
+breaks up, and very soon those who have won no vision of holiness, who
+have only feared as they entered into the cloud, are in the common world
+again. The finer strings of the soul were made to thrill, the conscience
+was touched; but if the will has not been braced, if the man's reason
+and resoluteness are not engaged by a new conception of life, the
+earthly will resume control and God will be less known than before. So
+there are many cast down to-day, crying to God in trouble of soul for
+evil done or evil which they are tempted to do, who to-morrow among the
+Canaanites will see things in another light. A man cannot be a recluse.
+He must mingle in business and in society with those who deride the
+thoughts that have moved him and laugh at his seriousness. The impulse
+to something better soon exhausts itself in this cold atmosphere. He
+turns upon his own emotion with contempt. The words that came with
+Divine urgency, the man whose face was like that of an angel of God, are
+already subjects of uneasy jesting, will soon be thrust from memory.
+Over the interlude of superficial anxiety the mind goes back to its old
+haunts, its old plans and cravings. The religious teacher, while he is
+often in no way responsible for this sad recoil, should yet be ever on
+his guard against the risk of weakening the moral fibre, of leaving men
+as Christ never left them, flaccid and infirm.
+
+Again, there are cases that belong not to the history of a day, but to
+the history of a life. One may say, when he hears the strangely tempting
+voices that whisper in the twilight streets, "Am I a dog that from the
+holy traditions of my people and country I should fall away to these?"
+At first he flies the distasteful entreaty of the new nature-cult, its
+fleshly art and song, its nefarious science. But the voices are
+persistent. It is the perfecting of man and woman to which they invite.
+It is not vice but freedom, brightness, life and the courage to enjoy it
+they cunningly propose. There is not much of sweetness; the voices rise,
+they become stringent and overbearing. If the man would not be a fool,
+would not lose the good of the age into which he is born, he will be
+done with unnatural restraints, the bondage of purity. Thus entreaty
+passes into mastery. Here is truth; there also seems to be fact. Little
+by little the subtle argument is so advanced that the degradation once
+feared is no longer to be seen. It is progress now; it is full
+development, the assertion of power and privilege, that the soul
+anticipates. How fatal is the lure, how treacherous the vision, the man
+discovers when he has parted with that which even through deepest
+penitence he may never regain. People are denying, and it has to be
+reasserted that there is a covenant which the soul of man has to keep
+with God. The thought is "archaic," and they would banish it. But it
+stands the great reality for man; and to keep that covenant in the grace
+of the Divine Spirit, in the love of the holiest, in the sacred
+manliness learned of Christ, is the only way to the broad daylight and
+the free summits of life. How can nature be a saviour? The suggestion is
+childish. Nature, as we all know, allows the hypocrite, the swindler,
+the traitor, as well as the brave, honest man, the pure, sweet woman. Is
+it said that man has a covenant with nature? On the temporal and
+prudential side of his activities that is true. He has relations with
+nature which must be apprehended, must be wisely realised. But the
+spiritual kingdom to which he belongs requires a wider outlook, loftier
+aims and hopes. The efforts demanded by nature have to be brought into
+harmony with those diviner aspirations. Man is bound to be prudent,
+brave, wise for eternity. He is warned of his own sin and urged to fly
+from it. This is the covenant with God which is wrought into the very
+constitution of his moral being.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It would be a mistake to suppose that the scene at Bochim and the words
+which moved the assembly to tears had no lasting effect whatever. The
+history deals with outstanding facts of the national development. We
+hear chiefly of heroes and their deeds, but we shall not doubt that
+there were minds which kept the glow of truth and the consecration of
+penitential tears. The best lives of the people moved quietly on, apart
+from the commotions and strifes of the time. Rarely are the great
+political names even of a religious community those of holy and devout
+men, and, undoubtedly, this was true of Israel in the time of the
+judges. If we were to reckon only by those who appear conspicuously in
+these pages, we should have to wonder how the spiritual strain of
+thought and feeling survived. But it did survive; it gained in clearness
+and force. There were those in every tribe who kept alive the sacred
+traditions of Sinai and the desert, and Levites throughout the land did
+much to maintain among the people the worship of God. The great names of
+Abraham and Moses, the story of their faith and deeds, were the text of
+many an impressive lesson. So the light of piety did not go out; Jehovah
+was ever the Friend of Israel, even in its darkest day, for in the heart
+of the nation there never ceased to be a faithful remnant maintaining
+the fear and obedience of the Holy Name.
+
+
+
+
+IV.
+
+_AMONG THE ROCKS OF PAGANISM._
+
+JUDGES ii. 7-23.
+
+
+"And Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died, being an
+hundred and ten years old. And they buried him in the border of his
+inheritance in Timnath-heres, in the hill country of Ephraim, on the
+north of the mountain of Gaash." So, long after the age of Joshua, the
+historian tells again how Israel lamented its great chief, and he seems
+to feel even more than did the people of the time the pathos and
+significance of the event. How much a man of God has been to his
+generation those rarely know who stand beside his grave. Through faith
+in him faith in the Eternal has been sustained, many who have a certain
+piety of their own depending, more than they have been aware, upon their
+contact with him. A glow went from him which insensibly raised to
+something like religious warmth souls that apart from such an influence
+would have been of the world worldly. Joshua succeeded Moses as the
+mediator of the covenant. He was the living witness of all that had been
+done in the Exodus and at Sinai. So long as he continued with Israel,
+even in the feebleness of old age, appearing, and no more, a venerable
+figure in the council of the tribes, there was a representative of
+Divine order, one who testified to the promises of God and the duty of
+His people. The elders who outlived him were not men like himself, for
+they added nothing to faith; yet they preserved the idea at least of the
+theocracy, and when they passed away the period of Israel's robust youth
+was at an end. It is this the historian perceives, and his review of the
+following age in the passage we are now to consider is darkened
+throughout by the cloudy and troubled atmosphere that overcame the fresh
+morning of faith.
+
+We know the great design that should have made Israel a singular and
+triumphant example to the nations of the world. The body politic was to
+have its unity in no elected government, in no hereditary ruler, but in
+the law and worship of its Divine King, sustained by the ministry of
+priest and prophet. Every tribe, every family, every soul was to be
+equally and directly subject to the Holy Will as expressed in the law
+and by the oracles of the sanctuary. The idea was that order should be
+maintained and the life of the tribes should go on under the pressure of
+the unseen Hand, never resisted, never shaken off, and full of bounty
+always to a trustful and obedient people. There might be times when the
+head men of tribes and families should have to come together in council,
+but it would be only to discover speedily and carry out with one accord
+the purpose of Jehovah. Rightly do we regard this as an inspired vision;
+it is at once simple and majestic. When a nation can so live and order
+its affairs it will have solved the great problem of government still
+exercising every civilized community. The Hebrews never realized the
+theocracy, and at the time of the settlement in Canaan they came far
+short of understanding it. "Israel had as yet scarcely found time to
+imbue its spirit deeply with the great truths which had been awakened
+into life in it, and thus to appropriate them as an invaluable
+possession: the vital principle of that religion and nationality by
+which it had so wondrously triumphed was still scarcely understood when
+it was led into manifold severe trials."[1] Thus, while Hebrew history
+presents for the most part the aspect of an impetuous river broken and
+jarred by rocks and boulders, rarely settling into a calm expanse of
+mirror-like water, during the period of the judges the stream is seen
+almost arrested in the difficult country through which it has to force
+its way. It is divided by many a crag and often hidden for considerable
+stretches by overhanging cliffs. It plunges in cataracts and foams hotly
+in cauldrons of hollowed rock. Not till Samuel appears is there anything
+like success for this nation, which is of no account if not earnestly
+religious, and never is religious without a stern and capable chief, at
+once prophet and judge, a leader in worship and a restorer of order and
+unity among the tribes.
+
+  [1] Ewald.
+
+The general survey or preface which we have before us gives but one
+account of the disasters that befell the Hebrew people--they "followed
+other gods, and provoked the Lord to anger." And the reason of this has
+to be considered. Taking a natural view of the circumstances we might
+pronounce it almost impossible for the tribes to maintain their unity
+when they were fighting, each in its own district, against powerful
+enemies. It seems by no means wonderful that nature had its way, and
+that, weary of war, the people tended to seek rest in friendly
+intercourse and alliance with their neighbours. Were Judah and Simeon
+always to fight, though their own territory was secure? Was Ephraim to
+be the constant champion of the weaker tribes and never settle down to
+till the land? It was almost more than could be expected of men who had
+the common amount of selfishness. Occasionally, when all were
+threatened, there was a combination of the scattered clans, but for the
+most part each had to fight its own battle, and so the unity of life and
+faith was broken. Nor can we marvel at the neglect of worship and the
+falling away from Jehovah when we find so many who have been always
+surrounded by Christian influences drifting into a strange unconcern as
+to religious obligation and privilege. The writer of the Book of Judges,
+however, regards things from the standpoint of a high Divine ideal--the
+calling and duty of a God-made nation. Men are apt to frame excuses for
+themselves and each other; this historian makes no excuses. Where we
+might speak compassionately he speaks in sternness. He is bound to tell
+the story from God's side, and from God's side he tells it with puritan
+directness. In a sense it might go sorely against the grain to speak of
+his ancestors as sinning grievously and meriting condign punishment. But
+later generations needed to hear the truth, and he would utter it
+without evasion. It is surely Nathan, or some other prophet of Samuel's
+line, who lays bare with such faithfulness the infidelity of Israel. He
+is writing for the men of his own time and also for men who are to come;
+he is writing for us, and his main theme is the stern justice of
+Jehovah's government. God bestows privileges which men must value and
+use, or they shall suffer. When He declares Himself and gives His law,
+let the people see to it; let them encourage and constrain each other to
+obey. Disobedience brings unfailing penalty. This is the spirit of the
+passage we are considering. Israel is God's possession, and is bound to
+be faithful. There is no Lord but Jehovah, and it is unpardonable for
+any Israelite to turn aside and worship a false God. The pressure of
+circumstances, often made much of, is not considered for a moment. The
+weakness of human nature, the temptations to which men and women are
+exposed, are not taken into account. Was there little faith, little
+spirituality? Every soul had its own responsibility for the decay, since
+to every Israelite Jehovah had revealed His love and addressed His call.
+Inexorable therefore was the demand for obedience. Religion is stern
+because reasonable, not an impossible service as easy human nature would
+fain prove it. If men disbelieve they incur doom, and it must fall upon
+them.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Joshua and his generation having been gathered unto their fathers,
+"there arose another generation which knew not the Lord, nor yet the
+work which He had wrought for Israel. And the children of Israel did
+that which was evil in the sight of the Lord, and served the Baalim."
+How common is the fall traced in these brief, stern words, the wasting
+of a sacred testimony that seemed to be deeply graven upon the heart of
+a race! The fathers felt and knew; the sons have only traditional
+knowledge and it never takes hold of them. The link of faith between one
+generation and another is not strongly forged; the most convincing
+proofs of God are not recounted. Here is a man who has learned his own
+weakness, who has drained a bitter cup of discipline--how can he better
+serve his sons than by telling them the story of his own mistakes and
+sins, his own suffering and repentance? Here is one who in dark and
+trying times has found solace and strength and has been lifted out of
+horror and despair by the merciful hand of God--how can he do a father's
+part without telling his children of his defeats and deliverance, the
+extremity to which he was reduced and the restoring grace of Christ? But
+men hide their weaknesses, and are ashamed to confess that they ever
+passed through the Valley of Humiliation. They leave their own children
+unwarned to fall into the sloughs in which themselves were well-nigh
+swallowed up. Even when they have erected some Ebenezer, some monument
+of Divine succour, they often fail to bring their children to the spot,
+and speak to them there with fervent recollection of the goodness of the
+Lord. Was Solomon when a boy led by David to the town of Gath, and told
+by him the story of his cowardly fear, and how he fled from the face of
+Saul to seek refuge among Philistines? Was Absalom in his youth ever
+taken to the plains of Bethlehem and shown where his father fed the
+flocks, a poor shepherd lad, when the prophet sent for him to be
+anointed the coming King of Israel? Had these young princes learned in
+frank conversation with their father all he had to tell of temptation
+and transgression, of danger and redemption, perhaps the one would never
+have gone astray in his pride nor the other died a rebel in that wood of
+Ephraim. The Israelitish fathers were like many fathers still, they left
+the minds of their boys and girls uninstructed in life, uninstructed in
+the providence of God, and this in open neglect of the law which marked
+out their duty for them with clear injunction, recalling the themes and
+incidents on which they were to dwell.
+
+One passage in the history of the past must have been vividly before
+the minds of those who crossed the Jordan under Joshua, and should have
+stood a protest and warning against the idolatry into which families so
+easily lapsed throughout the land. Over at Shittim, when Israel lay
+encamped on the skirts of the mountains of Moab, a terrible sentence of
+Moses had fallen like a thunderbolt. On some high place near the camp a
+festival of Midianitish idolatry, licentious in the extreme, attracted
+great numbers of Hebrews; they went astray after the worst fashion of
+paganism, and the nation was polluted in the idolatrous orgies. Then
+Moses gave judgment--"Take the heads of the people and hang them up
+before the Lord, against the sun." And while that hideous row of stakes,
+each bearing the transfixed body of a guilty chief, witnessed in the
+face of the sun for the Divine ordinance of purity, there fell a plague
+that carried off twenty-four thousand of the transgressors. Was that
+forgotten? Did the terrible punishment of those who sinned in the matter
+of Baal-peor not haunt the memories of men when they entered the land of
+Baal-worship? No: like others, they were able to forget. Human nature is
+facile, and from a great horror of judgment can turn in quick recovery
+of the usual ease and confidence. Men have been in the valley of the
+shadow of death, where the mouth of hell is; they have barely escaped;
+but when they return upon it from another side they do not recognize the
+landmarks nor feel the need of being on their guard. They teach their
+children many things, but neglect to make them aware of that
+right-seeming way the end whereof are the ways of death.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The worship of the Baalim and Ashtaroth and the place which this came to
+have in Hebrew life require our attention here. Canaan had for long
+been more or less subject to the influence of Chaldea and Egypt, and
+"had received the imprint of their religious ideas. The fish-god of
+Babylon reappears at Ascalon in the form of Dagon, the name of the
+goddess Astarte and her character seem to be adapted from the Babylonian
+Ishtar. Perhaps these divinities were introduced at a time when part of
+the Canaanite tribes lived on the borders of the Persian Gulf, in daily
+contact with the inhabitants of Chaldea."[2] The Egyptian Isis and
+Osiris, again, are closely connected with the Tammuz and Astarte
+worshipped in Phoenicia. In a general way it may be said that all the
+races inhabiting Syria had the same religion, but "each tribe, each
+people, each town had its Lord, its Master, its Baal, designated by a
+particular title for distinction from the masters or Baals of
+neighbouring cities. The gods adored at Tyre and Sidon were called
+Baal-Sur, the Master of Tyre; Baal-Sidon, the Master of Sidon. The
+highest among them, those that impersonated in its purity the conception
+of heavenly fire, were called kings of the gods. El or Kronos reigned at
+Byblos; Chemosh among the Moabites; Amman among the children of Ammon;
+Soutkhu among the Hittites." Melcarth, the Baal of the world of death,
+was the Master of Tyre. Each Baal was associated with a female divinity,
+who was the mistress of the town, the queen of the heavens. The common
+name of these goddesses was Astarte. There was an Ashtoreth of Chemosh
+among the Moabites. The Ashtoreth of the Hittites was called Tanit.
+There was an Ashtoreth Karnaim or Horned, so called with reference to
+the crescent moon; and another was Ashtoreth Naamah, the good Astarte.
+In short, a special Astarte could be created by any town and named by
+any fancy, and Baals were multiplied in the same way. It is, therefore,
+impossible to assign any distinct character to these inventions. The
+Baalim mostly represented forces of nature--the sun, the stars. The
+Astartes presided over love, birth, the different seasons of the year,
+and--war. "The multitude of secondary Baalim and Ashtaroth tended to
+resolve themselves into a single supreme pair, in comparison with whom
+the others had little more than a shadowy existence." As the sun and
+moon outshine all the other heavenly bodies, so two principal deities
+representing them were supreme.
+
+  [2] Maspero.
+
+The worship connected with this horde of fanciful beings is well known
+to have merited the strongest language of detestation applied to it by
+the Hebrew prophets. The ceremonies were a strange and degrading blend
+of the licentious and the cruel, notorious even in a time of gross and
+hideous rites. The Baalim were supposed to have a fierce and envious
+disposition, imperiously demanding the torture and death not only of
+animals but of men. The horrible notion had taken root that in times of
+public danger king and nobles must sacrifice their children in fire for
+the pleasure of the god. And while nothing of this sort was done for the
+Ashtaroth their demands were in one aspect even more vile.
+Self-mutilation, self-defilement were acts of worship, and in the great
+festivals men and women gave themselves up to debauchery which cannot be
+described. No doubt some of the observances of this paganism were mild
+and simple. Feasts there were at the seasons of reaping and vintage
+which were of a bright and comparatively harmless character; and it was
+by taking part in these that Hebrew families began their acquaintance
+with the heathenism of the country. But the tendency of polytheism is
+ever downward. It springs from a curious and ignorant dwelling on the
+mysterious processes of nature, untamed fancy personifying the causes of
+all that is strange and horrible, constantly wandering therefore into
+more grotesque and lawless dreams of unseen powers and their claims on
+man. The imagination of the worshipper, which passes beyond his power of
+action, attributes to the gods energy more vehement, desires more
+sweeping, anger more dreadful than he finds in himself. He thinks of
+beings who are strong in appetite and will and yet under no restraint or
+responsibility. In the beginning polytheism is not necessarily vile and
+cruel; but it must become so as it develops. The minds by whose fancies
+the gods are created and furnished with adventures are able to conceive
+characters vehemently cruel, wildly capricious and impure. But how can
+they imagine a character great in wisdom, holiness and justice? The
+additions of fable and belief made from age to age may hold in solution
+some elements that are good, some of man's yearning for the noble and
+true beyond him. The better strain, however, is overborne in popular
+talk and custom by the tendency to fear rather than to hope in presence
+of unknown powers, the necessity which is felt to avert possible anger
+of the gods or make sure of their patronage. Sacrifices are multiplied,
+the offerer exerting himself more and more to gain his main point at
+whatever expense; while he thinks of the world of gods as a region in
+which there is jealousy of man's respect and a multitude of rival claims
+all of which must be met. Thus the whole moral atmosphere is thrown into
+confusion.
+
+Into a polytheism of this kind came Israel, to whom had been committed a
+revelation of the one true God, and in the first moment of homage at
+heathen altars the people lost the secret of its strength. Certainly
+Jehovah was not abandoned; He was thought of still as the Lord of
+Israel. But He was now one among many who had their rights and could
+repay the fervent worshipper. At one high-place it was Jehovah men
+sought, at another the Baal of the hill and his Ashtoreth. Yet Jehovah
+was still the special patron of the Hebrew tribes and of no others, and
+in trouble they turned to Him for relief. So in the midst of mythology
+Divine faith had to struggle for existence. The stone pillars which the
+Israelites erected were mostly to the name of God, but Hebrews danced
+with Hittite and Jebusite around the poles of Astarte, and in revels of
+nature-worship they forgot their holy traditions, lost their vigour of
+body and soul. The doom of apostasy fulfilled itself. They were unable
+to stand before their enemies. "The hand of the Lord was against them
+for evil, and they were greatly distressed."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+And why could not Israel rest in the debasement of idolatry? Why did not
+the Hebrews abandon their distinct mission as a nation and mingle with
+the races they came to convert or drive away? They could not rest; they
+could not mingle and forget. Is there ever peace in the soul of a man
+who falls from early impressions of good to join the licentious and the
+profane? He has still his own personality, shot through with
+recollections of youth and traits inherited from godly ancestors. It is
+impossible for him to be at one with his new companions in their revelry
+and vice. He finds that from which his souls revolts, he feels disgust
+which he has to overcome by a strong effort of perverted will. He
+despises his associates and knows in his inmost heart that he is of a
+different race. Worse he may become than they, but he is never the same.
+So was it in the degradation of the Israelites, both individually and as
+a nation. From complete absorption among the peoples of Canaan they were
+preserved by hereditary influences which were part of their very life,
+by holy thoughts and hopes embodied in their national history, by the
+rags of that conscience which remained from the law-giving of Moses and
+the discipline of the wilderness. Moreover, akin as they were to the
+idolatrous races, they had a feeling of closer kinship with each other,
+tribe with tribe, family with family; and the worship of God at the
+little-frequented shrine still maintained the shadow at least of the
+national consecration. They were a people apart, these Beni-Israel, a
+people of higher rank than Amorites or Perizzites, Hittites or
+Phoenicians. Even when least alive to their destiny they were still held
+by it, led on secretly by that heavenly hand which never let them go.
+From time to time souls were born among them aglow with devout
+eagerness, confident in the faith of God. The tribes were roused out of
+lethargy by voices that woke many recollections of half-forgotten
+purpose and hope. Now from Judah in the south, now from Ephraim in the
+centre, now from Dan or Gilead a cry was raised. For a time at least
+manhood was quickened, national feeling became keen, the old faith was
+partly revived, and God had again a witness in His people.
+
+We have found the writer of the Book of Judges consistent and
+unfaltering in his condemnation of Israel; he is equally consistent and
+eager in his vindication of God. It is to him no doubtful thing, but an
+assured fact, that the Holy One came with Israel from Paran and marched
+with the people from Seir. He has no hesitation in ascribing to Divine
+providence and grace the deeds of those men who go by the name of
+judges. It startles and even confounds some to note the plain direct
+terms in which God is made, so to speak, responsible for those rude
+warriors whose exploits we are to review,--for Ehud, for Jephthah, for
+Samson. The men are children of their age, vehement, often reckless, not
+answering to the Christian ideal of heroism. They do rough work in a
+rough way. If we found their history elsewhere than in the Bible we
+should be disposed to class them with the Roman Horatius, the Saxon
+Hereward, the Jutes Hengest and Horsa and hardly dare to call them men
+of God's hand. But here they are presented bearing the stamp of a Divine
+vocation; and in the New Testament it is emphatically reaffirmed. "What
+shall I more say? for the time will fail me if I tell of Gideon, Barak,
+Samson, Jephthah; ... who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought
+righteousness, obtained promises, ... waxed mighty in war, turned to
+flight armies of aliens."
+
+There is a crude religious sentimentalism to which the Bible gives no
+countenance. Where we, mistaking the meaning of providence because we do
+not rightly believe in immortality, are apt to think with horror of the
+miseries of men, the vigorous veracity of sacred writers directs our
+thought to the moral issues of life and the vast movements of God's
+purifying design. Where we, ignorant of much that goes to the making of
+a world, lament the seeming confusion and the errors, the Bible seer
+discerns that the cup of red wine poured out is in the hand of Almighty
+Justice and Wisdom. It is of a piece with the superficial feeling of
+modern society to doubt whether God could have any share in the deeds of
+Jephthah and the career of Samson, whether these could have any place in
+the Divine order. Look at Christ and His infinite compassion, it is
+said; read that God is love, and then reconcile if you can this view of
+His character with the idea which makes Barak and Gideon His ministers.
+Out of all such perplexities there is a straight way. You make light of
+moral evil and individual responsibility when you say that this war or
+that pestilence has no Divine mission. You deny eternal righteousness
+when you question whether a man, vindicating it in the time-sphere, can
+have a Divine vocation. The man is but a human instrument. True. He is
+not perfect, he is not even spiritual. True. Yet if there is in him a
+gleam of right and earnest purpose, if he stands above his time in
+virtue of an inward light which shows him but a single truth, and in the
+spirit of that strikes his blow--is it to be denied that within his
+limits he is a weapon of the holiest Providence, a helper of eternal
+grace?
+
+The storm, the pestilence have a providential errand. They urge men to
+prudence and effort; they prevent communities from settling on their
+lees. But the hero has a higher range of usefulness. It is not mere
+prudence he represents, but the passion for justice. For right against
+might, for liberty against oppression he contends, and in striking his
+blow he compels his generation to take into account morality and the
+will of God. He may not see far, but at least he stirs inquiry as to the
+right way, and though thousands die in the conflict he awakens there is
+a real gain which the coming age inherits. Such a one, however faulty
+however, as we may say, earthly, is yet far above mere earthly levels.
+His moral concepts may be poor and low compared with ours; but the heat
+that moves him is not of sense, not of clay. Obstructed it is by the
+ignorance and sin of our human estate, nevertheless it is a supernatural
+power, and so far as it works in any degree for righteousness, freedom,
+the realization of God, the man is a hero of faith.
+
+We do not affirm here that God approves or inspires all that is done by
+the leaders of a suffering people in the way of vindicating what they
+deem their rights. Moreover, there are claims and rights so-called for
+which it is impious to shed a drop of blood. But if the state of
+humanity is such that the Son of God must die for it, is there any room
+to wonder that men have to die for it? Given a cause like that of
+Israel, a need of the whole world which Israel only could meet, and the
+men who unselfishly, at the risk of death, did their part in the front
+of the struggle which that cause and that need demanded, though they
+slew their thousands, were not men of whom the Christian teacher needs
+be afraid to speak. And there have been many such in all nations, for
+the principle by which we judge is of the broadest application,--men who
+have led the forlorn hopes of nations, driven back the march of tyrants,
+given law and order to an unsettled land.
+
+Judge after judge was "raised up"--the word is true--and rallied the
+tribes of Israel, and while each lived there were renewed energy and
+prosperity. But the moral revival was never in the deeps of life and no
+deliverance was permanent. It is only a faithful nation that can use
+freedom. Neither trouble nor release from trouble will certainly make
+either a man or a people steadily true to the best. Unless there is
+along with trouble a conviction of spiritual need and failure, men will
+forget the prayers and vows they made in their extremity. Thus in the
+history of Israel, as in the history of many a soul, periods of
+suffering and of prosperity succeed each other and there is no distinct
+growth of the religious life. All these experiences are meant to throw
+men back upon the seriousness of duty, and the great purpose God has in
+their existence. We must repent not because we are in pain or grief, but
+because we are estranged from the Holy One and have denied the God of
+Salvation. Until the soul comes to this it only struggles out of one pit
+to fall into another.
+
+
+
+
+V.
+
+_THE ARM OF ARAM AND OF OTHNIEL._
+
+JUDGES iii. 1-11.
+
+
+We come now to a statement of no small importance, which may be the
+cause of some perplexity. It is emphatically affirmed that God fulfilled
+His design for Israel by leaving around it in Canaan a circle of
+vigorous tribes very unlike each other, but alike in this, that each
+presented to the Hebrews a civilisation from which something might be
+learned but much had to be dreaded, a seductive form of paganism which
+ought to have been entirely resisted, an aggressive energy fitted to
+rouse their national feeling. We learn that Israel was led along a
+course of development resembling that by which other nations have
+advanced to unity and strength. As the Divine plan is unfolded, it is
+seen that not by undivided possession of the Promised Land, not by swift
+and fierce clearing away of opponents, was Israel to reach its glory and
+become Jehovah's witness, but in the way of patient fidelity amidst
+temptations, by long struggle and arduous discipline. And why should
+this cause perplexity? If moral education did not move on the same line
+for all peoples in every age, then indeed mankind would be put to
+intellectual confusion. There was never any other way for Israel than
+for the rest of the world.
+
+"These are the nations which the Lord left to prove Israel by them, to
+know whether they would hearken unto the commandments of the Lord." The
+first-named are the Philistines, whose settlements on the coast-plain
+toward Egypt were growing in power. They were a maritime race,
+apparently much like the Danish invaders of Saxon England, sea-rovers or
+pirates, ready for any fray that promised spoil. In the great coalition
+of peoples that fell on Egypt during the reign of Ramses III., about the
+year 1260 B.C., Philistines were conspicuous, and after the crushing
+defeat of the expedition they appear in larger numbers on the coast of
+Canaan. Their cities were military republics skilfully organized, each
+with a _seren_ or war-chief, the chiefs of the hundred cities forming a
+council of federation. Their origin is not known; but we may suppose
+them to have been a branch of the Amorite family, who after a time of
+adventure were returning to their early haunts. It may be reckoned
+certain that in wealth and civilization they presented a marked contrast
+to the Israelites, and their equipments of all kinds gave them great
+advantage in the arts of war and peace. Even in the period of the Judges
+there were imposing temples in the Philistine cities and the worship
+must have been carefully ordered. How they compared with the Hebrews in
+domestic life we have no means of judging, but there was certainly some
+barrier of race, language, or custom between the peoples which made
+intermarriage very rare. We can suppose that they looked upon the
+Hebrews from their higher worldly level as rude and slavish. Military
+adventurers not unwilling to sell their services for gold would be apt
+to despise a race half-nomad, half-rural. It was in war, not in peace,
+that Philistine and Hebrew met, contempt on either side gradually
+changing into keenest hatred as century after century the issue of
+battle was tried with varying success. And it must be said that it was
+well for the tribes of Jehovah rather to be in occasional subjection to
+the Philistines, and so learn to dread them, than to mix freely with
+those by whom the great ideas of Hebrew life were despised.
+
+On the northward sea-board a quite different race, the Zidonians, or
+Phoenicians, were in one sense better neighbours to the Israelites, in
+another sense no better friends. While the Philistines were haughty,
+aristocratic, military, the Phoenicians were the great _bourgeoisie_ of
+the period, clever, enterprising, eminently successful in trade. Like
+the other Canaanites and the ancestors of the Jews, they were probably
+immigrants from the lower Euphrates valley; unlike the others, they
+brought with them habits of commerce and skill in manufacture, for which
+they became famous along the Mediterranean shores and beyond the Pillars
+of Hercules. Between Philistine and Phoenician the Hebrew was mercifully
+protected from the absorbing interests of commercial life and the
+disgrace of prosperous piracy. The conscious superiority of the coast
+peoples in wealth and influence and the material elements of
+civilisation was itself a guard to the Jews, who had their own sense of
+dignity, their own claim to assert. The configuration of the country
+helped the separateness of Israel, especially so far as Phoenicia was
+concerned, which lay mainly beyond the rampart of Lebanon and the gorge
+of the Lit�ny; while with the fortress of Tyre on the hither side of the
+natural frontier there appears to have been for a long time no
+intercourse, probably on account of its peculiar position. But the
+spirit of Phoenicia was the great barrier. Along the crowded wharves of
+Tyre and Zidon, in warehouses and markets, factories and workshops, a
+hundred industries were in full play, and in their luxurious dwellings
+the busy prosperous traders, with their silk-clad wives, enjoyed the
+pleasures of the age. From all this the Hebrew, rough and unkempt, felt
+himself shut out, perhaps with a touch of regret, perhaps with scorn
+equal to that on the other side. He had to live his life apart from that
+busy race, apart from its vivacity and enterprise, apart from its
+lubricity and worldliness. The contempt of the world is ill to bear, and
+the Jew no doubt found it so. But it was good for him. The tribes had
+time to consolidate, the religion of Jehovah became established before
+Phoenicia thought it worth while to court her neighbour. Early indeed
+the idolatry of the one people infected the other and there were the
+beginnings of trade, yet on the whole for many centuries they kept
+apart. Not till a king throned in Jerusalem could enter into alliance
+with a king of Tyre, crown with crown, did there come to be that
+intimacy which had so much risk for the Hebrew. The humbleness and
+poverty of Israel during the early centuries of its history in Canaan
+was a providential safeguard. God would not lose His people, nor suffer
+it to forget its mission.
+
+Among the inland races with whom the Israelites are said to have dwelt,
+the Amorites, though mentioned along with Perizzites and Hivites, had
+very distinct characteristics. They were a mountain people like the
+Scottish Highlanders, even in physiognomy much resembling them, a tall,
+white-skinned, blue-eyed race. Warlike we know they were, and the
+Egyptian representation of the siege of Dapur by Ramses II. shows what
+is supposed to be the standard of the Amorites on the highest tower, a
+shield pierced by three arrows surmounted by another arrow fastened
+across the top of the staff. On the east of Jordan they were defeated by
+the Israelites and their land between Arnon and Jabbok was allotted to
+Reuben and Gad. In the west they seem to have held their ground in
+isolated fortresses or small clans, so energetic and troublesome that it
+is specially noted in Samuel's time that a great defeat of the
+Philistines brought peace between Israel and the Amorites. A significant
+reference in the description of Ahab's idolatry--"he did very abominably
+in following idols according to all things as did the Amorites"--shows
+the religion of these people to have been Baal-worship of the grossest
+kind; and we may well suppose that by intermixture with them especially
+the faith of Israel was debased. Even now, it may be said, the Amorite
+is still in the land; a blue-eyed, fair-complexioned type survives,
+representing that ancient stock.
+
+Passing some tribes whose names imply rather geographical than ethnical
+distinctions, we come to the Hittites, the powerful people of whom in
+recent years we have learned something. At one time these Hittites were
+practically masters of the wide region from Ephesus in the west of Asia
+Minor to Carchemish on the Euphrates, and from the shores of the Black
+Sea to the south of Palestine. They appear to us in the archives of
+Thebes and the poem of the Laureate, Pentaur, as the great adversaries
+of Egypt in the days of Ramses I. and his successors; and one of the
+most interesting records is of the battle fought about 1383 B.C. at
+Kadesh on the Orontes, between the immense armies of the two nations,
+the Egyptians being led by Ramses II. Amazing feats were attributed to
+Ramses, but he was compelled to treat on equal terms with the "great
+king of Kheta," and the war was followed by a marriage between the
+Pharaoh and the daughter of the Hittite prince. Syria too was given up
+to the latter as his legitimate possession. The treaty of peace drawn up
+on the occasion, in the name of the chief gods of Egypt and of the
+Hittites, included a compact of offensive and defensive alliance and
+careful provisions for extradition of fugitives and criminals.
+Throughout it there is evident a great dependence upon the company of
+gods of either land, who are largely invoked to punish those who break
+and reward those who keep its terms. "He who shall observe these
+commandments which the silver tablet contains, whether he be of the
+people of Kheta or of the people of Egypt, because he has not neglected
+them, the company of the gods of the land of Kheta and the company of
+the gods of the land of Egypt shall secure his reward and preserve life
+for him and his servants."[3] From this time the Amorites of southern
+Palestine and the minor Canaanite peoples submitted to the Hittite
+dominion, and it was while this subjection lasted that the Israelites
+under Joshua appeared on the scene. There can be no doubt that the
+tremendous conflict with Egypt had exhausted the population of Canaan
+and wasted the country, and so prepared the way for the success of
+Israel. The Hittites indeed were strong enough had they seen fit to
+oppose with great armies the new comers into Syria. But the centre of
+their power lay far to the north, perhaps in Cappadocia; and on the
+frontier towards Nineveh they were engaged with more formidable
+opponents. We may also surmise that the Hittites, whose alliance with
+Egypt was by Joshua's time somewhat decayed, would look upon the
+Hebrews, to begin with, as fugitives from the misrule of the Pharaoh who
+might be counted upon to take arms against their former oppressors. This
+would account, in part at least, for the indifference with which the
+Israelite settlement in Canaan was regarded; it explains why no vigorous
+attempt was made to drive back the tribes.
+
+  [3] "The Hittites," by A. H. Sayce, LL.D., p. 36.
+
+For the characteristics of the Hittites, whose appearance and dress
+constantly suggest a Mongolian origin, we can now consult their
+monuments. A vigorous people they must have been, capable of government,
+of extensive organization, concerned to perfect their arts as well as to
+increase their power. Original contributors to civilization they
+probably were not, but they had skill to use what they found and spread
+it widely. Their worship of Sutekh or Soutkhu, and especially of Astarte
+under the name of Ma, who reappears in the Great Diana of Ephesus, must
+have been very elaborate. A single Cappadocian city is reported to have
+had at one time six thousand armed priestesses and eunuchs of that
+goddess. In Palestine there were not many of this distinct and energetic
+people when the Hebrews crossed the Jordan. A settlement seems to have
+remained about Hebron, but the armies had withdrawn; Kadesh on the
+Orontes was the nearest garrison. One peculiar institution of Hittite
+religion was the holy city, which afforded sanctuary to fugitives; and
+it is notable that some of these cities in Canaan, such as
+Kadesh-Naphtali and Hebron, are found among the Hebrew cities of refuge.
+
+It was as a people at once enticed and threatened, invited to peace and
+constantly provoked to war, that Israel settled in the circle of Syrian
+nations. After the first conflicts, ending in the defeat of Adoni-bezek
+and the capture of Hebron and Kiriath-sepher, the Hebrews had an
+acknowledged place, partly won by their prowess, partly by the terror of
+Jehovah which accompanied their arms. To Philistines, Phoenicians and
+Hittites, as we have seen, their coming mattered little, and the other
+races had to make the best of affairs, sometimes able to hold their
+ground, sometimes forced to give way. The Hebrew tribes, for their part,
+were, on the whole, too ready to live at peace and to yield not a little
+for the sake of peace. Intermarriages made their position safer, and
+they intermarried with Amorites, Hivites, Perizzites. Interchange of
+goods was profitable, and they engaged in barter. The observance of
+frontiers and covenants helped to make things smooth, and they agreed on
+boundary lines of territory and terms of fraternal intercourse. The
+acknowledgment of their neighbours' religion was the next thing, and
+from that they did not shrink. The new neighbours were practically
+superior to themselves in many ways, well-informed as to the soil, the
+climate, the methods of tillage necessary in the land, well able to
+teach useful arts and simple manufactures. Little by little the debasing
+notions and bad customs that infest pagan society entered Hebrew homes.
+Comfort and prosperity came; but comfort was dearly bought with loss of
+pureness, and prosperity with loss of faith. The watchwords of unity
+were forgotten by many. But for the sore oppressions of which the
+Mesopotamian was the first the tribes would have gradually lost all
+coherence and vigour and become like those poor tatters of races that
+dragged out an inglorious existence between Jordan and the Mediterranean
+plain.
+
+Yet it is with nations as with men; those that have a reason of
+existence and the desire to realize it, even at intervals, may fall away
+into pitiful languor if corrupted by prosperity, but when the need comes
+their spirit will be renewed. While Hivites, Perizzites and even
+Amorites had practically nothing to live for, but only cared to live,
+the Hebrews felt oppression and restraint in their inmost marrow. What
+the faithful servants of God among them urged in vain the iron heel of
+Cushan-rishathaim made them remember and realize that they had a God
+from Whom they were basely departing, a birthright they were selling for
+pottage. In Doubting Castle, under the chains of Despair, they bethought
+them of the Almighty and His ancient promises, they cried unto the Lord.
+And it was not the cry of an afflicted church; Israel was far from
+deserving that name. Rather was it the cry of a prodigal people scarcely
+daring to hope that the Father would forgive and save.
+
+Nothing yet found in the records of Babylon or Assyria throws any light
+on the invasion of Cushan-rishathaim, whose name, which seems to mean
+Cushan of the Two Evil Deeds, may be taken to represent his character as
+the Hebrews viewed it. He was a king one of whose predecessors a few
+centuries before had given a daughter in marriage to the third Amenophis
+of Egypt, and with her the Aram�an religion to the Nile valley. At that
+time Mesopotamia, or Aram-Naharaim, was one of the greatest monarchies
+of western Asia. Stretching along the Euphrates from the Khabour river
+towards Carchemish and away to the highlands of Armenia, it embraced the
+district in which Terah and Abram first settled when the family migrated
+from Ur of the Chaldees. In the days of the judges of Israel, however,
+the glory of Aram had faded. The Assyrians threatened its eastern
+frontier, and about 1325 B.C., the date at which we have now arrived,
+they laid waste the valley of the Khabour. We can suppose that the
+pressure of this rising empire was one cause of the expedition of Cushan
+towards the western sea.
+
+It remains a question, however, why the Mesopotamian king should have
+been allowed to traverse the land of the Hittites, either by way of
+Damascus or the desert route that led past Tadmor, in order to fall on
+the Israelites; and there is this other question, What led him to think
+of attacking Israel especially among the dwellers in Canaan? In pursuing
+these inquiries we have at least presumption to guide us. Carchemish on
+the Euphrates was a great Hittite fortress commanding the fords of that
+deep and treacherous river. Not far from it, within the Mesopotamian
+country, was Pethor, which was at once a Hittite and an Aram�an
+town--Pethor the city of Balaam with whom the Hebrews had had to reckon
+shortly before they entered Canaan. Now Cushan-rishathaim, reigning in
+this region, occupied the middle ground between the Hittites and Assyria
+on the east, also between them and Babylon on the south-east; and it is
+probable that he was in close alliance with the Hittites. Suppose then
+that the Hittite king, who at first regarded the Hebrews with
+indifference, was now beginning to view them with distrust or to fear
+them as a people bent on their own ends, not to be reckoned on for help
+against Egypt, and we can easily see that he might be more than ready to
+assist the Mesopotamians in their attack on the tribes. To this we may
+add a hint which is derived from Balaam's connection with Pethor, and
+the kind of advice he was in the way of giving to those who consulted
+him. Does it not seem probable enough that some counsel of his survived
+his death and now guided the action of the king of Aram? Balaam, by
+profession a soothsayer, was evidently a great political personage of
+his time, foreseeing, crafty and vindictive. Methods of his for
+suppressing Israel, the force of whose genius he fully recognised, were
+perhaps sold to more than one kingly employer. "The land of the children
+of his people" would almost certainly keep his counsel in mind and seek
+to avenge his death. Thus against Israel particularly among the dwellers
+in Canaan the arms of Cushan-rishathaim would be directed, and the
+Hittites, who scarcely found it needful to attack Israel for their own
+safety, would facilitate his march.
+
+Here then we may trace the revival of a feud which seemed to have died
+away fifty years before. Neither nations nor men can easily escape from
+the enmity they have incurred and the entanglements of their history.
+When years have elapsed and strifes appear to have been buried in
+oblivion, suddenly, as if out of the grave, the past is apt to arise and
+confront us, sternly demanding the payment of its reckoning. We once did
+another grievous wrong, and now our fondly cherished belief that the man
+we injured had forgotten our injustice is completely dispelled. The old
+anxiety, the old terror breaks in afresh upon our lives. Or it was in
+doing our duty that we braved the enmity of evil-minded men and punished
+their crimes. But though they have passed away their bitter hatred
+bequeathed to others still survives. Now the battle of justice and
+fidelity has to be fought over again, and well is it for us if we are
+found ready in the strength of God.
+
+And, in another aspect, how futile is the dream some indulge of getting
+rid of their history, passing beyond the memory or resurrection of what
+has been. Shall Divine forgiveness obliterate those deeds of which we
+have repented? Then the deeds being forgotten the forgiveness too would
+pass into oblivion and all the gain of faith and gratitude it brought
+would be lost. Do we expect never to retrace in memory the way we have
+travelled? As well might we hope, retaining our personality, to become
+other men than we are. The past, good and evil, remains and will remain,
+that we may be kept humble and moved to ever-increasing thankfulness and
+fervour of soul. We rise "on stepping-stones of our dead selves to
+higher things," and every forgotten incident by which moral education
+has been provided for must return to light. The heaven we hope for is
+not to be one of forgetfulness, but a state bright and free through
+remembrance of the grace that saved us at every stage and the
+circumstances of our salvation. As yet we do not half know what God has
+done for us, what His providence has been. There must be a resurrection
+of old conflicts, strifes, defeats and victories in order that we may
+understand the grace which is to keep us safe for ever.
+
+Attacked by Cushan of the Two Crimes the Israelites were in evil case.
+They had not the consciousness of Divine support which sustained them
+once. They had forsaken Him whose presence in the camp made their arms
+victorious. Now they must face the consequences of their fathers' deeds
+without their fathers' heavenly courage. Had they still been a united
+nation full of faith and hope, the armies of Aram would have assailed
+them in vain. But they were without the spirit which the crisis
+required. For eight years the northern tribes had to bear a sore
+oppression, soldiers quartered in their cities, tribute exacted at the
+point of the sword, their harvests enjoyed by others. The stern lesson
+was taught them that Canaan was to be no peaceful habitation for a
+people that renounced the purpose of its existence. The struggle became
+more hopeless year by year, the state of affairs more wretched. So at
+last the tribes were driven by stress of persecution and calamity to
+call again on the name of God, and some faint hope of succour broke like
+a misty morning over the land.
+
+It was from the far south that help came in response to the piteous cry
+of the oppressed in the north; the deliverer was Othniel, who has
+already appeared in the history. After his marriage with Achsah,
+daughter of Caleb, we must suppose him living as quietly as possible in
+his south-lying farm, there increasing in importance year by year till
+now he is a respected chief of the tribe of Judah. In frequent
+skirmishes with Arab marauders from the wilderness he has distinguished
+himself, maintaining the fame of his early exploit. Better still, he is
+one of those who have kept the great traditions of the nation, a man
+mindful of the law of God, deriving strength of character from
+fellowship with the Almighty. "The Spirit of Jehovah came upon him and
+he judged Israel; and he went out to war, and Jehovah delivered
+Cushan-rishathaim king of Mesopotamia into his hand."
+
+"He judged Israel and went out to war." Significant is the order of
+these statements. The judging of Israel by this man, on whom the Spirit
+of Jehovah was, meant no doubt inquisition into the religious and moral
+state, condemnation of the idolatry of the tribes and a restoration to
+some extent of the worship of God. In no other way could the strength of
+Israel be revived. The people had to be healed before they could fight,
+and the needed cure was spiritual. Hopeless invariably have been the
+efforts of oppressed peoples to deliver themselves unless some trust in
+a divine power has given them heart for the struggle. When we see an
+army bow in prayer as one man before joining battle, as the Swiss did at
+Morat and the Scots at Bannockburn, we have faith in their spirit and
+courage, for they are feeling their dependence in the Supernatural.
+Othniel's first care was to suppress idolatry, to teach Israelites anew
+the forgotten name and law of God and their destiny as a nation. Well
+did he know that this alone would prepare the way for success. Then,
+having gathered an army fit for his purpose, he was not long in sweeping
+the garrisons of Cushan out of the land.
+
+Judgment and then deliverance; judgment of the mistakes and sins men
+have committed, thereby bringing themselves into trouble; conviction of
+sin and righteousness; thereafter guidance and help that their feet may
+be set on a rock and their goings established--this is the right
+sequence. That God should help the proud, the self-sufficient out of
+their troubles in order that they may go on in pride and vainglory, or
+that He should save the vicious from the consequences of their vice and
+leave them to persist in their iniquity, would be no Divine work. The
+new mind and the right spirit must be put in men, they must hear their
+condemnation, lay it to heart and repent, there must be a revival of
+holy purpose and aspiration first. Then the oppressors will be driven
+from the land, the weight of trouble lifted from the soul.
+
+Othniel the first of the judges seems one of the best. He is not a man
+of mere rude strength and dashing enterprise. Nor is he one who runs the
+risk of sudden elevation to power, which few can stand. A person of
+acknowledged honour and sagacity, he sees the problem of the time and
+does his best to solve it. He is almost unique in this, that he appears
+without offence, without shame. And his judgeship is honourable to
+Israel. It points to a higher level of thought and greater seriousness
+among the tribes than in the century when Jephthah and Samson were the
+acknowledged heroes. The nation had not lost its reverence for the great
+names and hopes of the exodus when it obeyed Othniel and followed him to
+battle.
+
+In modern times there would seem to be scarcely any understanding of the
+fact that no man can do real service as a political leader unless he is
+a fearer of God, one who loves righteousness more than country, and
+serves the Eternal before any constituency. Sometimes a nation low
+enough in morality has been so far awake to its need and danger as to
+give the helm, at least for a time, to a servant of truth and
+righteousness and to follow where he leads. But more commonly is it the
+case that political leaders are chosen anywhere rather than from the
+ranks of the spiritually earnest. It is oratorical dash now, and now the
+cleverness of the intriguer, or the power of rank and wealth, that
+catches popular favour and exalts a man in the state. Members of
+parliament, cabinet ministers, high officials need have no devoutness,
+no spiritual seriousness or insight. A nation generally seeks no such
+character in its legislators and is often content with less than decent
+morality. Is it then any wonder that politics are arid and government a
+series of errors? We need men who have the true idea of liberty and will
+set nations nominally Christian on the way of fulfilling their mission
+to the world. When the people want a spiritual leader he will appear;
+when they are ready to follow one of high and pure temper he will arise
+and show the way. But the plain truth is that our chiefs in the state,
+in society and business must be the men who represent the general
+opinion, the general aim. While we are in the main a worldly people, the
+best guides, those of spiritual mind, will never be allowed to carry
+their plans. And so we come back to the main lesson of the whole
+history, that only as each citizen is thoughtful of God and of duty,
+redeemed from selfishness and the world, can there be a true
+commonwealth, honourable government, beneficent civilization.
+
+
+
+
+VI.
+
+_THE DAGGER AND THE OX-GOAD._
+
+JUDGES iii. 12-31.
+
+
+The world is served by men of very diverse kinds, and we pass now to one
+who is in strong contrast to Israel's first deliverer. Othniel the judge
+without reproach is followed by Ehud the regicide. The long peace which
+the country enjoyed after the Mesopotamian army was driven out allowed a
+return of prosperity and with it a relaxing of spiritual tone. Again
+there was disorganization; again the Hebrew strength decayed and
+watchful enemies found an opportunity. The Moabites led the attack, and
+their king was at the head of a federation including the Ammonites and
+the Amalekites. It was this coalition the power of which Ehud had to
+break.
+
+We can only surmise the causes of the assault made on the Hebrews west
+of Jordan by those peoples on the east. When the Israelites first
+appeared on the plains of the Jordan under the shadow of the mountains
+of Moab, before crossing into Palestine proper, Balak king of Moab
+viewed with alarm this new nation which was advancing to seek a
+settlement so near his territory. It was then he sent to Pethor for
+Balaam, in the hope that by a powerful incantation or curse the great
+diviner would blight the Hebrew armies and make them an easy prey.
+Notwithstanding this scheme, which even to the Israelites did not appear
+contemptible, Moses so far respected the relationship between Moab and
+Israel that he did not attack Balak's kingdom, although at the time it
+had been weakened by an unsuccessful contest with the Amorites from
+Gilead. Moab to the south and Ammon to the north were both left
+unharmed.
+
+But to Reuben, Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh was allotted the land
+from which the Amorites had been completely driven, a region extending
+from the frontier of Moab on the south away towards Hermon and the
+Argob; and these tribes entering vigorously on their possession could
+not long remain at peace with the bordering races. We can easily see how
+their encroachments, their growing strength would vex Moab and Ammon and
+drive them to plans of retaliation. Balaam had not cursed Israel; he had
+blessed it, and the blessing was being fulfilled. It seemed to be
+decreed that all other peoples east of Jordan were to be overborne by
+the descendants of Abraham; yet one fear wrought against another, and
+the hour of Israel's security was seized as a fit occasion for a
+vigorous sally across the river. A desperate effort was made to strike
+at the heart of the Hebrew power and assert the claims of Chemosh to be
+a greater god than He Who was reverenced at the sanctuary of the ark.
+
+Or Amalek may have instigated the attack. Away in the Sinaitic
+wilderness there stood an altar which Moses had named Jehovah-Nissi,
+Jehovah is my banner, and that altar commemorated a great victory gained
+by Israel over the Amalekites. The greater part of a century had gone by
+since the battle, but the memory of defeat lingers long with the
+Arab--and these Amalekites were pure Arabs, savage, vindictive,
+cherishing their cause of war, waiting their revenge. We know the
+command in Deuteronomy, "Remember what Amalek did unto thee by the way,
+when ye were come forth out of Egypt. How he met thee by the way and
+smote the hindmost of thee, even all that were feeble behind thee. Thou
+shalt blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven. Thou shalt
+not forget it." We may be sure that Reuben and Gad did not forget the
+dastardly attack; we may be sure that Amalek did not forget the day of
+Rephidim. If Moab was not of itself disposed to cross the Jordan and
+fall on Benjamin and Ephraim, there was the urgency of Amalek, the
+proffered help of that fiery people to ripen decision. The ferment of
+war rose. Moab, having walled cities to form a basis of operations, took
+the lead. The confederates marched northward along the Dead Sea, seized
+the ford near Gilgal and mastering the plain of Jericho pushed their
+conquest beyond the hills. Nor was it a temporary advance. They
+established themselves. Eighteen years afterwards we find Eglon, in his
+palace or castle near the City of Palm Trees, claiming authority over
+all Israel.
+
+So the Hebrew tribes, partly by reason of an old strife not forgotten,
+partly because they have gone on vigorously adding to their territory,
+again suffer assault and are brought under oppression, and the coalition
+against them reminds us of confederacies that are in full force to-day.
+Ammon and Moab are united against the church of Christ, and Amalek joins
+in the attack. The parable is one, we shall say, of the opposition the
+church is constantly provoking, constantly experiencing, not entirely to
+its own credit. Allowing that, in the main, Christianity is truly and
+honestly aggressive, that on its march to the heights it does straight
+battle with the enemies of mankind and thus awakens the hatred of bandit
+Amaleks, yet this is not a complete account of the assaults which are
+renewed century after century. Must it not be owned that those who pass
+for Christians often go beyond the lines and methods of their proper
+warfare and are found on fields where the weapons are carnal and the
+fight is not "the good fight of faith"? There is a strain of modern talk
+which defends the worldly ambition of Christian men, sounding very
+hollow and insincere to all excepting those whose interest and illusion
+it is to think it heavenly. We hear from a thousand tongues the gospel
+of Christianized commerce, of sanctified success, of making business a
+religion. In the press and hurry of competition there is a less and a
+greater conscientiousness. Let men have it in the greater degree, let
+them be less anxious for speedy success than some they know, not quite
+so eager to add factory to factory and field to field, more careful to
+interpret bargains fairly and do good work; let them figure often as
+benefactors and be free with their money to the church, and the residue
+of worldly ambition is glorified, being sufficient, perhaps, to develop
+a merchant prince, a railway king, a "millionaire" of the kind the age
+adores. Thus it comes to pass that the domain which appeared safe enough
+from the followers of Him who sought no power in the earthly range is
+invaded by men who reckon all their business efforts privileged under
+the laws of heaven, and every advantage they win a Divine plan for
+wresting money from the hands of the devil.
+
+Now it is upon Christianity as approving all this that the Moabites and
+Ammonites of our day are falling. They are frankly worshippers of
+Chemosh and Milcom, not of Jehovah; they believe in wealth, their all
+is staked on the earthly prosperity and enjoyment for which they strive.
+It is too bad, they feel, to have their sphere and hopes curtailed by
+men who profess no respect for the world, no desire for its glory but a
+constant preference for things unseen; they writhe when they consider
+the triumphs wrested from them by rivals who count success an answer to
+prayer and believe themselves favourites of God. Or the frank heathen
+finds that in business a man professing Christianity in the customary
+way is as little cumbered as himself by any disdain of tarnished profits
+and "smart" devices. What else can be expected but that, driven back and
+back by the energy of Christians so called, the others shall begin to
+think Christianity itself largely a pretence? Do we wonder to see the
+revolution in France hurling its forces not only against wealth and
+rank, but also against the religion identified with wealth and rank? Do
+we wonder to see in our day socialism, which girds at great fortunes as
+an insult to humanity, joining hands with agnosticism and secularism to
+make assault on the church? It is precisely what might be looked for;
+nay, more, the opposition will go on till Christian profession is purged
+of hypocrisy and Christian practice is harmonized with the law of
+Christ. Not the push, not the equivocal success of one person here and
+there is it that creates doubt of Christianity and provokes antagonism,
+but the whole systems of society and business in so-called Christian
+lands, and even the conduct of affairs within the church, the strain of
+feeling there. For in the church as without it wealth and rank are
+important in themselves, and make some important who have little or no
+other claim to respect. In the church as without it methods are adopted
+that involve large outlay and a constant need for the support of the
+wealthy; in the church as without it life depends too much on the
+abundance of the things that are possessed. And, in the not unfair
+judgment of those who stand outside, all this proceeds from a secret
+doubt of Christ's law and authority, which more than excuses their own
+denial. The strifes of the day, even those that turn on the Godhead of
+Christ and the inspiration of the Bible, as well as on the divine claim
+of the church, are not due solely to hatred of truth and the depravity
+of the human heart. They have more reason than the church has yet
+confessed. Christianity in its practical and speculative aspects is one;
+it cannot be a creed unless it is a life. It is essentially a life not
+conformed to this world, but transformed, redeemed. Our faith will stand
+secure from all attacks, vindicated as a supernatural revelation and
+inspiration, when the whole of church life and Christian endeavour shall
+rise above the earthly and be manifest everywhere as a fervent striving
+for the spiritual and eternal.
+
+We have been assuming the unfaithfulness of Israel to its duty and
+vocation. The people of God, instead of commending His faith by their
+neighbourliness and generosity, were, we fear, too often proud and
+selfish, seeking their own things not the well-being of others, sending
+no attractive light into the heathenism around. Moab was akin to the
+Hebrews and in many respects similar in character. When we come to the
+Book of Ruth we find a certain intercourse between the two. Ammon, more
+unsettled and barbarous, was of the same stock. Israel, giving nothing
+to these peoples, but taking all she could from them, provoked
+antagonism all the more bitter that they were of kin to her, and they
+felt no scruple when their opportunity came. Not only had the
+Israelites to suffer for their failure, but Moab and Ammon also. The
+wrong beginning of the relations between them was never undone. Moab and
+Ammon went on worshipping their own gods, enemies of Israel to the last.
+
+Ehud appears a deliverer. He was a Benjamite, a man left-handed; he
+chose his own method of action, and it was to strike directly at the
+Moabite king. Eager words regarding the shamefulness of Israel's
+subjection had perhaps already marked him as a leader, and it may have
+been with the expectation that he would do a bold deed that he was
+chosen to bear the periodical tribute on this occasion to Eglon's
+palace. Girding a long dagger under his garment on his right thigh,
+where if found it might appear to be worn without evil intent, he set
+out with some attendants to the Moabite head-quarters. The narrative is
+so vivid that we seem able to follow Ehud step by step. He has gone from
+the neighbourhood of Jebus to Jericho, perhaps by the road in which the
+scene of our Lord's parable of the Good Samaritan was long afterwards
+laid. Having delivered the tribute into the hands of Eglon he goes
+southward a few miles to the sculptured stones at Gilgal, where possibly
+some outpost of the Moabites kept guard. There he leaves his attendants,
+and swiftly retracing his steps to the palace craves a private interview
+with the king and announces a message from God, at Whose name Eglon
+respectfully rises from his seat. One flash of the dagger and the bloody
+deed is done. Leaving the king's dead body there in the chamber, Ehud
+bolts the door and boldly passes the attendants, then quickening his
+pace is soon beyond Gilgal and away by another route through the steep
+hills to the mountains of Ephraim. Meanwhile the murder is discovered
+and there is confusion at the palace. No one being at hand to give
+orders, the garrison is unprepared to act, and as Ehud loses no time in
+gathering a band and returning to finish his work, the fords of Jordan
+are taken before the Moabites can cross to the eastern side. They are
+caught, and the defeat is so decisive that Israel is free again for
+fourscore years.
+
+Now this deed of Ehud's was clearly a case of assassination, and as such
+we have to consider it. The crime is one which stinks in our nostrils
+because it is associated with treachery and cowardice, the basest
+revenge or the most undisciplined passion. But if we go back to times of
+ruder morality and regard the circumstances of such a people as Israel,
+scattered and oppressed, waiting for a sign of bold energy that may give
+it new heart, we can easily see that one who chose to act as Ehud did
+would by no means incur the reprobation we now attach to the assassin.
+To go no farther back than the French Revolution and the deed of
+Charlotte Corday, we cannot reckon her among the basest--that woman of
+"the beautiful still countenance" who believed her task to be the duty
+of a patriot. Nevertheless, it is not possible to make a complete
+defence of Ehud. His act was treacherous. The man he slew was a
+legitimate king, and is not said to have done his ruling ill. Even
+allowing for the period, there was something peculiarly detestable in
+striking one to death who stood up reverently expecting a message from
+God. Yet Ehud may have thoroughly believed himself to be a Divine
+instrument.
+
+This too we see, that the great just providence of the Almighty is not
+impeached by such an act. No word in the narrative justifies
+assassination; but, being done, place is found for it as a thing
+overruled for good in the development of Israel's history. Man has no
+defence for his treachery and violence, yet in the process of events the
+barbarous deed, the fierce crime, are shown to be under the control of
+the Wisdom that guides all men and things. And here the issue which
+justifies Divine providence, though it does not purge the criminal, is
+clear. For through Ehud a genuine deliverance was wrought for Israel.
+The nation, curbed by aliens, overborne by an idolatrous power, was free
+once more to move toward the great spiritual end for which it had been
+created. We might be disposed to say that on the whole Israel made
+nothing of freedom, that the faith of God revived and the heart of the
+people became devout in times of oppression rather than of liberty. In a
+sense it was so, and the story of this people is the story of all, for
+men go to sleep over their best, they misuse freedom, they forget why
+they are free. Yet every eulogy of freedom is true. Man must even have
+the power of misusing it if he is to arrive at the best. It is in
+liberty that manhood is nursed, and therefore in liberty that religion
+matures. Autocratic laws mean tyranny, and tyranny denies the soul its
+responsibility to justice, truth, and God. Mind and conscience held from
+their high office, responsibility to the greatest overborne by some
+tyrant hand that may seem beneficent, the soul has no space, faith no
+room to breathe; man is kept from the spontaneity and gladness of his
+proper life. So we have to win liberty in hard struggle and know
+ourselves free in order that we may belong completely to God.
+
+See how life advances! God deals with the human race according to a vast
+plan of discipline leading to heights which at first appear
+inaccessible. Freedom is one of the first of these, and only by way of
+it are the higher summits reached. During the long ages of dark and
+weary struggle, which seem to many but a fruitless martyrdom, the Divine
+idea was interfused with all the strife. Not one blind stroke, not one
+agony of the craving soul was wasted. In all the wisdom of God wrought
+for man, through man's pathetic feebleness or most daring achievement.
+So out of the chaos of the gloomy valleys a highway of order was raised
+by which the race should mount to Freedom and thence to Faith.
+
+We see it in the history of nations, those that have led the way and
+those that are following. The possessors of clear faith have won it in
+liberty. In Switzerland, in Scotland, in England, the order has been,
+first civil freedom, then Christian thought and vigour. Wallace and
+Bruce prepare the way for Knox; Boadicea, Hereward, the Barons of Magna
+Charta for Wycliffe and the Reformation; the men of the Swiss Cantons
+who won Morgarten and routed Charles the Bold were the forerunners of
+Zwingli and Farel. Israel, too, had its heroes of freedom; and even
+those who, like Ehud and Samson, did little or nothing for faith and
+struck wildly, wrongly for their country, did yet choose consciously to
+serve their people and were helpers of a righteousness and a holy
+purpose they did not know. When all has been said against them it
+remains true that the freedom they brought to Israel was a Divine gift.
+
+It is to be remarked that Ehud did not judge Israel. He was a deliverer,
+but nowise fitted to exercise high office in the name of God. In some
+way not made clear in the narrative he had become the centre of the
+resolute spirits of Benjamin and was looked to by them to find an
+opportunity of striking at the oppressors. His calling, we may say, was
+human, not Divine; it was limited, not national; and he was not a man
+who could rise to any high thought of leadership. The heads of tribes,
+ingloriously paying tribute to the Moabites, may have scoffed at him as
+of no account. Yet he did what they supposed impossible. The little
+rising grew with the rapidity of a thunder-cloud, and, when it passed,
+Moab, smitten as by a lightning flash, no longer overshadowed Israel. As
+for the deliverer, his work having been done apparently in the course of
+a few days, he is seen no more in the history. While he lived, however,
+his name was a terror to the enemies of Israel, for what he had effected
+once he might be depended upon to do again if necessity arose. And the
+land had rest.
+
+Here is an example of what is possible to the obscure whose
+qualifications are not great, but who have spirit and firmness, who are
+not afraid of dangers and privations on the way to an end worth gaining,
+be it the deliverance of their country, the freedom or purity of their
+church, or the rousing of society against a flagrant wrong. Do the rich
+and powerful angrily refuse their patronage? Do they find much to say
+about the impossibility of doing anything, the evil of disturbing
+people's minds, the duty of submission to Providence and to the advice
+of wise and learned persons? Those who see the time and place for
+acting, who hear the clarion-call of duty, will not be deterred. Armed
+for their task with fit weapons--the two-edged dagger of truth for the
+corpulent lie, the penetrating stone of a just scorn for the forehead of
+arrogance, they have the right to go forth, the right to succeed, though
+probably when the stroke has told many will be heard lamenting its
+untimeliness and proving the dangerous indiscretion of Ehud and all who
+followed him.
+
+In the same line another type is represented by Shamgar, son of Anath,
+the man of the ox-goad, who considered not whether he was equipped for
+attacking Philistines, but turned on them from the plough, his blood
+leaping in him with swift indignation. The instrument of his assault was
+not made for the use to which it was put: the power lay in the arm that
+wielded the goad and the fearless will of the man who struck for his own
+birthright, freedom,--for Israel's birthright, to be the servant of no
+other race. Undoubtedly it is well that, in any efforts made for the
+church or for society, men should consider how they are to act and
+should furnish themselves in the best manner for the work that is to be
+done. No outfit of knowledge, skill, experience is to be despised. A man
+does not serve the world better in ignorance than in learning, in
+bluntness than in refinement. But the serious danger for such an age as
+our own is that strength may be frittered away and zeal expended in the
+mere preparation of weapons, in the mere exercise before the war begins.
+The important points at issue are apt to be lost sight of, and the vital
+distinctions on which the whole battle turns to fade away in an
+atmosphere of compromise. There are those who, to begin, are Israelites
+indeed, with a keen sense of their nationality, of the urgency of
+certain great thoughts and the example of heroes. Their nationality
+becomes less and less to them as they touch the world; the great
+thoughts begin to seem parochial and antiquated; the heroes are found to
+have been mistaken, their names cease to thrill. The man now sees
+nothing to fight for, he cares only to go on perfecting his equipment.
+Let us do him justice. It is not the toil of the conflict he shrinks
+from, but the rudeness of it, the dust and heat of warfare. He is no
+voluntary now, for he values the dignity of a State Church and feels the
+charm of ancient traditions. He is not a good churchman, for he will not
+be pledged to any creed or opposed to any school. He is rarely seen on
+any political platform, for he hates the watchwords of party. And this
+is the least of it. He is a man without a cause, a believer without a
+faith, a Christian without a stroke of brave work to do in the world. We
+love his mildness; we admire his mental possessions, his broad
+sympathies. But when we are throbbing with indignation he is too calm;
+when we catch at the ox-goad and fly at the enemy we know that he
+disdains our weapon and is affronted by our fire. Better, if it must be
+so, the rustic from the plough, the herdsman from the hill-side; better
+far he of the camel's hair garment and the keen cry, Repent, repent!
+
+Israel, then, appears in these stories of her iron age as the cradle of
+the manhood of the modern world; in Israel the true standard was lifted
+up for the people. It is liberty put to a noble use that is the mark of
+manhood, and in Israel's history the idea of responsibility to the one
+living and true God takes form and clearness as that alone which fulfils
+and justifies liberty. Israel has a God Whose will man must do, and for
+the doing of it he is free. If at the outset the vigour which this
+thought of God infused into the Hebrew struggle for independence was
+tempestuous; if Jehovah was seen not in the majesty of eternal justice
+and sublime magnanimity, not as the Friend of all, but as the unseen
+King of a favoured people,--still, as freedom came, there came with it
+always, in some prophetic word, some Divine psalm, a more living
+conception of God as gracious, merciful, holy, unchangeable; and
+notwithstanding all lapses the Hebrew was a man of higher quality than
+those about him. You stand by the cradle and see no promise, nothing to
+attract. But give the faith which is here in infancy time to assert
+itself, give time for the vision of God to enlarge, and the finest type
+of human life will arise and establish itself, a type possible in no
+other way. Egypt with its long and wonderful history gives nothing to
+the moral life of the new world, for it produces no men. Its kings are
+despots, tomb-builders, its people contented or discontented slaves.
+Babylon and Nineveh are names that dwarf Israel's into insignificance,
+but their power passes and leaves only some monuments for the
+antiquarian, some corroborations of a Hebrew record. Egypt and Chaldea,
+Assyria and Persia never reached through freedom the idea of man's
+proper life, never rose to the sense of that sublime calling or bowed in
+that profound adoration of the Holy One which made the Israelite, rude
+fanatic as he often was, a man and a father of men. From Egypt, from
+Babylon,--yea, from Greece and Rome came no redeemer of mankind, for
+they grew bewildered in the search after the chief end of existence and
+fell before they found it. In the prepared people it was, the people
+cramped in the narrow land between the Syrian desert and the sea, that
+the form of the future Man was seen, and there, where the human spirit
+felt at least, if it did not realise its dignity and place, the Messiah
+was born.
+
+
+
+
+VII.
+
+_THE SIBYL OF MOUNT EPHRAIM._
+
+JUDGES iv.
+
+
+There arises now in Israel a prophetess, one of those rare women whose
+souls burn with enthusiasm and holy purpose when the hearts of men are
+abject and despondent; and to Deborah it is given to make a nation hear
+her call. Of prophetesses the world has seen but few; generally the
+woman has her work of teaching and administering justice in the name of
+God within a domestic circle and finds all her energy needed there. But
+queens have reigned with firm nerve and clear sagacity in many a land,
+and now and again a woman's voice has struck the deep note which has
+roused a nation to its duty. Such in the old Hebrew days was Deborah,
+wife of Lappidoth.
+
+It was a time of miserable thraldom in Israel when she became aware of
+her destiny and began the sacred enterprise of her life. From Hazor in
+the north near the waters of Merom Israel was ruled by Jabin, king of
+the Canaanites--not the first of the name, for Joshua had before
+defeated one Jabin king of Hazor, and slain him. During the peace that
+followed Ehud's triumph over Moab the Hebrews, busy with worldly
+affairs, failed to estimate a danger which year by year became more
+definite and pressing--the rise of the ancient strongholds of Canaan
+and their chiefs to new activity and power. Little by little the cities
+Joshua destroyed were rebuilt, re-fortified and made centres of warlike
+preparation. The old inhabitants of the land recovered spirit, while
+Israel lapsed into foolish confidence. At Harosheth of the Gentiles,
+under the shadow of Carmel, near the mouth of the Kishon, armourers were
+busy forging weapons and building chariots of iron. The Hebrews did not
+know what was going on, or missed the purpose that should have thrust
+itself on their notice. Then came the sudden rush of the chariots and
+the onset of the Canaanite troops, fierce, irresistible. Israel was
+subdued and bowed to a yoke all the more galling that it was a people
+they had conquered and perhaps despised that now rode over them. In the
+north at least the Hebrews were kept in servitude for twenty years,
+suffered to remain in the land but compelled to pay heavy tribute, many
+of them, it is likely, enslaved or allowed but a nominal independence.
+Deborah's song vividly describes the condition of things in her country.
+Shamgar had made a clearance on the Philistine border and kept his
+footing as a leader, but elsewhere the land was so swept by Canaanite
+spoilers that the highways were unused and Hebrew travellers kept to the
+tortuous and difficult by-paths down in the glens or among the
+mountains. There was war in all the gates, but in Israelite dwellings
+neither shield nor spear. Defenceless and crushed the people lay crying
+to gods that could not save, turning ever to new gods in strange
+despair, the national state far worse than when Cushan's army held the
+land or when Eglon ruled from the City of Palm Trees.
+
+Born before this time of oppression Deborah spent her childhood and
+youth in some village of Issachar, her home a rude hut covered with
+brushwood and clay, like those which are still seen by travellers. Her
+parents, we must believe, had more religious feeling than was common
+among Hebrews of the time. They would speak to her of the name and law
+of Jehovah, and she, we doubt not, loved to hear. But with the exception
+of brief oral traditions fitfully repeated and an example of reverence
+for sacred times and duties, a mere girl would have no advantages. Even
+if her father was chief of a village her lot would be hard and
+monotonous, as she aided in the work of the household and went morning
+and evening to fetch water from the spring or tended a few sheep on the
+hill-side. While she was yet young the Canaanite oppression began, and
+she with others felt the tyranny and the shame. The soldiers of Jabin
+came and lived at free quarters among the villagers, wasting their
+property. The crops were perhaps assessed, as they are at the present
+day in Syria, before they were reaped, and sometimes half or even more
+would be swept away by the remorseless collector of tribute. The people
+turned thriftless and sullen. They had nothing to gain by exerting
+themselves when the soldiers and the tax-gatherer were ready to exact so
+much the more, leaving them still in poverty. Now and again there might
+be a riot. Maddened by insults and extortion the men of the village
+would make a stand. But without weapons, without a leader, what could
+they effect? The Canaanite troops were upon them; some were killed,
+others carried away, and things became worse than before.
+
+There was not much prospect at such a time for a Hebrew maiden whose lot
+it seemed to be, while yet scarcely out of her childhood, to be married
+like the rest and sink into a household drudge, toiling for a husband
+who in his turn laboured for the oppressor. But there was a way then, as
+there is always a way for the high-spirited to save life from bareness
+and desolation; and Deborah found her path. Her soul went forth to her
+people, and their sad state moved her to something more than a woman's
+grief and rebellion. As years went by the traditions of the past
+revealed their meaning to her, deeper and larger thoughts came, a
+beginning of hope for the tribes so downcast and weary. Once they had
+swept victoriously through the land and smitten that very fortress which
+again overshadowed all the north. It was in the name of Jehovah and by
+His help that Israel then triumphed. Clearly the need was for a new
+covenant with Him; the people must repent and return to the Lord. Did
+Deborah put this before her parents, her husband? Doubtless they agreed
+with her, but could see no way of action, no opportunity for such as
+they. As she spoke more and more eagerly, as she ventured to urge the
+men of her village to bestir themselves, perhaps a few were moved, but
+the rest heard carelessly or derided her. We can imagine Deborah in that
+time of trial growing up into tall and striking womanhood, watching with
+indignation many a scene in which her people showed a craven fear or
+joined slavishly in heathen revels. As she spoke and saw her words burn
+the hearts of some to whom they were spoken, the sense of power and duty
+came. In vain she looked for a prophet, a leader, a man of Jehovah to
+rekindle a flame in the nation's heart. A flame! It was in her own soul,
+she might wake it in other souls; Jehovah helping her she would.
+
+But when in her native tribe the brave woman began to urge with
+prophetic eloquence the return to God and to preach a holy war her time
+of peril came. Issachar lay completely under the survey of Jabin's
+officers, overawed by his chariots. And one who would deliver a servile
+people had need to fear treachery. Issachar was "a strong ass couching
+down between the sheepfolds"; he had "bowed his shoulder to bear" and
+become "a servant under task-work." As her purpose matured she had to
+seek a place of safety and influence, and passing southward she found it
+in some retired spot among the hills between Bethel and Ramah, some nook
+of that valley which, beginning near Ai, curves eastward and narrows at
+Geba to a rocky gorge with precipices eight hundred feet high,--the
+Valley of Achor, of which Hosea long afterwards said that it should be a
+door of hope. Here, under a palm tree, the landmark of her tent, she
+began to prophesy and judge and grow to spiritual power among the
+tribes. It was a new thing in Israel for a woman to speak in the name of
+God. Her utterances had no doubt something of a sibyllic strain, and the
+deep or wild notes of her voice pleading for Jehovah or raised in
+passionate warning against idolatry touched the finest chords of the
+Hebrew soul. In her rapture she saw the Holy One coming in majesty from
+the southern desert where Horeb reared its sacred peak; or again,
+looking into the future, foretold His exaltation in proud triumph over
+the gods of Canaan, His people free once more, their land purged of
+every heathen taint. So gradually her place of abode became a rendezvous
+of the tribes, a seat of justice, a shrine of reviving hope. Those who
+longed for righteous administration came to her; those who were fearers
+of Jehovah gathered about her. Gaining wisdom she was able to represent
+to a rude age the majesty as well as the purity of Divine law, to
+establish order as well as to communicate enthusiasm. The people felt
+that sagacity like hers and a spirit so sanguine and fearless must be
+the gift of Jehovah; it was the inspiration of the Almighty that gave
+her understanding.
+
+Deborah's prophetical utterances are not to be tried by the standard of
+the Isaian age. So tested some of her judgments might fail, some of her
+visions lose their charm. She had no clear outlook to those great
+principles which the later prophets more or less fully proclaimed. Her
+education and circumstances and her intellectual power determined the
+degree in which she could receive Divine illumination. One woman before
+her is honoured with the name of prophetess, Miriam, the sister of Moses
+and Aaron, who led the refrain of the song of triumph at the Red Sea.
+Miriam's gift appears limited to the gratitude and ecstasy of one day of
+deliverance; and when afterwards on the strength of her share in the
+enthusiasm of the Exodus she ventured along with Aaron to claim equality
+with Moses, a terrible rebuke checked her presumption. Comparing Miriam
+and Deborah, we find as great an advance from the one to the other as
+from Deborah to Amos or Hosea. But this only shows that the inspiration
+of one mind, intense and ample for that mind, may come far short of the
+inspiration of another. God does not give every prophet the same insight
+as Moses, for the rare and splendid genius of Moses was capable of an
+illumination which very few in any following age have been able to
+receive. Even as among the Apostles of Christ St. Peter shows
+occasionally a lapse from the highest Christian judgment for which St.
+Paul has to take him to task, and yet does not cease to be inspired, so
+Deborah is not to be denied the Divine gift though her song is coloured
+by an all too human exultation over a fallen enemy.
+
+It is simply impossible to account for this new beginning in Israel's
+history without a heavenly impulse; and through Deborah unquestionably
+that impulse came. Others were turning to God, but she broke the dark
+spell which held the tribes and taught them afresh how to believe and
+pray. Under her palm tree there were solemn searchings of heart, and
+when the head men of the clans gathered there, travelling across the
+mountains of Ephraim or up the wadies from the fords of Jordan, it was
+first to humble themselves for the sin of idolatry, and then to
+undertake with sacred oaths and vows the serious work which fell to them
+in Israel's time of need. Not all came to that solemn rendezvous. When
+is such a gathering completely representative? Of Judah and Simeon we
+hear nothing. Perhaps they had their own troubles with the wandering
+tribes of the desert; perhaps they did not suffer as the others from
+Canaanite tyranny and therefore kept aloof. Reuben on the other side
+Jordan wavered, Manasseh made no sign of sympathy; Asher, held in check
+by the fortress of Hazor and the garrison of Harosheth, chose the safe
+part of inaction. Dan was busy trying to establish a maritime trade. But
+Ephraim and Benjamin, Zebulun and Naphtali were forward in the revival,
+and proudly the record is made on behalf of her native tribe, "the
+princes of Issachar were with Deborah." Months passed; the movement grew
+steadily, there was a stirring among the dry bones, a resurrection of
+hope and purpose.
+
+And with all the care used this could not be hid from the Canaanites.
+For doubtless in not a few Israelite homes heathen wives and
+half-heathen children would be apt to spy and betray. It goes hardly
+with men if they have bound themselves by any tie to those who will not
+only fail in sympathy when religion makes demands, but will do their
+utmost to thwart serious ambitions and resolves. A man is terribly
+compromised who has pledged himself to a woman of earthly mind, ruled by
+idolatries of time and sense. He has undertaken duties to her which a
+quickened sense of Divine law will make him feel the more; she has her
+claim upon his life, and there is nothing to wonder at if she insists
+upon her view, to his spiritual disadvantage and peril. In the time of
+national quickening and renewed thoughtfulness many a Hebrew discovered
+the folly of which he had been guilty in joining hands with women who
+were on the side of the Baalim and resented any sacrifice made for
+Jehovah. Here we find the explanation of much lukewarmness, indifference
+to the great enterprises of the church and withholding of service by
+those who make some profession of being on the Lord's side. The
+entanglements of domestic relationship have far more to do with failure
+in religious duty than is commonly supposed.
+
+Amid difficulty and discouragement enough, with slender resources, the
+hope of Israel resting upon her, Deborah's heart did not fail nor her
+head for affairs. When the critical point was reached of requiring a
+general for the war she had already fixed upon the man. At
+Kadesh-Naphtali, almost in sight of Jabin's fortress, on a hill
+overlooking the waters of Merom, ninety miles to the north, dwelt Barak
+the son of Abinoam. The neighbourhood of the Canaanite capital and daily
+evidence of its growing power made Barak ready for any enterprise which
+had in it good promise of success, and he had better qualifications
+than mere resentment against injustice and eager hatred of the Canaanite
+oppression. Already known in Zebulun and Naphtali as a man of bold
+temper and sagacity, he was in a position to gather an army corps out of
+those tribes--the main strength of the force on which Deborah relied for
+the approaching struggle. Better still, he was a fearer of God. To
+Kadesh-Naphtali the prophetess sent for the chosen leader of the troops
+of Israel, addressing to him the call of Jehovah: "Hath not the Lord
+commanded thee saying, Go and draw towards Mount Tabor"--that is, Bring
+by detachments quietly from the different cities towards Mount
+Tabor--"ten thousand men of Naphtali and Zebulun?" The rendezvous of
+Sisera's host was Harosheth of the Gentiles, in the defile at the
+western extremity of the valley of Megiddo, where Kishon breaks through
+to the plain of Acre. Tabor overlooked from the north-east the same wide
+strath which was to be the field where the chariots and the multitude
+should be delivered into Barak's hand.
+
+Not doubting the word of God, Barak sees a difficulty. For himself he
+has no prophetic gift; he is ready to fight, but this is to be a sacred
+war. From the very first he would have the men gather with the clear
+understanding that it is for religion as much as for freedom they are
+taking arms; and how may this be secured? Only if Deborah will go with
+him through the country proclaiming the Divine summons and promise of
+victory. He is very decided on the point. "If thou wilt go with me, then
+I will go: but if thou wilt not go with me, I will not go." Deborah
+agrees, though she would fain have left this matter entirely to men. She
+warns him that the expedition will not be to his honour, since Jehovah
+will give Sisera into the hand of a woman. Against her will she takes
+part in the military preparations. There is no need to find in Deborah's
+words a prophecy of the deed of Jael. It is a grossly untrue taunt that
+the murder of Sisera is the central point of the whole narrative. When
+Deborah says, "The Lord shall sell Sisera into the hand of a woman," the
+reference plainly is, as Josephus makes it, to the position into which
+Deborah herself was forced as the chief person in the campaign. With
+great wisdom and the truest courage she would have limited her own
+sphere. With equal wisdom and equal courage Barak understood how the
+zeal of the people was to be maintained. There was a friendly contest,
+and in the end the right way was found, for unquestionably Deborah was
+the genius of the movement. Together they went to Kedesh,--not
+Kadesh-Naphtali in the far north, but Kedesh on the shore of the Sea of
+Galilee, some twelve miles from Tabor.[4] From that as a centre,
+journeying by secluded ways through the northern districts, often
+perhaps by night, Deborah and Barak went together rousing the enthusiasm
+of the people, until the shores of the lake and the valleys running down
+to it were quietly occupied by thousands of armed men.
+
+  [4] See Conder's _Tent Work in Palestine_.
+
+The clans are at length gathered; the whole force marches from Kedesh to
+the foot of Tabor to give battle. And now Sisera, fully equipped, moves
+out of Harosheth along the course of the Kishon, marching well beneath
+the ridge of Carmel, his chariots thundering in the van. Near Taanach he
+orders his front to be formed to the north, crosses the Kishon and
+advances on the Hebrews who by this time are visible beyond the slope
+of Moreh. The tremendous moment has come. "Up," cries Deborah, "for this
+is the day in which the Lord hath delivered Sisera into thine hand. Is
+not the Lord gone out before thee?" She has waited till the troops of
+Sisera are entangled among the streams which here, from various
+directions, converge to the river Kishon, now swollen with rain and
+difficult to cross. Barak, the Lightning Chief, leads his men
+impetuously down into the plain, keeping near the shoulder of Moreh
+where the ground is not broken by the streams; and with the fall of
+evening he begins the attack. The chariots have crossed the Kishon but
+are still struggling in the swamps and marshes. They are assailed with
+vehemence and forced back, and in the waning light all is confusion. The
+Kishon sweeps away many of the Canaanite host, the rest make a stand by
+Taanach and further on by the waters of Megiddo. The Hebrews find a
+higher ford and following the south bank of the river are upon the foe
+again. It is a November night and meteors are flashing through the sky.
+They are an omen of evil to the disheartened half-defeated army. Do not
+the stars in their courses fight against Sisera? The rout becomes
+complete; Barak pursues the scattered force towards Harosheth, and at
+the ford near the city there is terrible loss. Only the fragments of a
+ruined army find shelter within the gates.
+
+Meanwhile Sisera, a coward at heart, more familiar with the parade
+ground than fit for the stern necessities of war, leaves his chariot and
+abandons his men to their fate, his own safety all his care. Seeking
+that, it is not to Harosheth he turns. He takes his way across Gilboa
+toward the very region which Barak has left. On a little plateau
+overlooking the Sea of Galilee, near Kedesh, there is a settlement of
+Kenites whom Sisera thinks he can trust. Like a hunted animal he presses
+on over ridge and through defile till he reaches the black tents and
+receives from Jael the treacherous welcome, "Turn in, my lord, turn in
+to me; fear not." The pitiful tragedy follows. The coward meets at the
+hand of a woman the death from which he has fled. Jael gives him
+fermented milk to drink which, exhausted as he is, sends him into a deep
+sleep. Then, as he lies helpless, she smites the tent-pin through his
+temples.
+
+In her song Deborah describes and glories over the execution of her
+country's enemy. "Blessed among women shall Jael, the wife of Heber be;
+with the hammer she smote Sisera; at her feet he curled up, he fell."
+Exulting in every circumstance of the tragedy, she adds a description of
+Sisera's mother and her ladies expecting his return as a victor laden
+with spoil, and listening eagerly for the wheels of that chariot which
+never again should roll through the streets of Harosheth. As to the
+whole of this passage, our estimate of Deborah's knowledge and spiritual
+insight does not require us to regard her praise and her judgment as
+absolute. She rejoices in a deed which has crowned the great victory
+over the master of nine hundred chariots, the terror of Israel; she
+glories in the courage of another woman, who single-handed finished that
+tyrant's career; she does not make God responsible for the deed. Let the
+outburst of her enthusiastic relief stand as the expression of intense
+feeling, the rebound from fear and anxiety of the patriotic heart. We
+need not weight ourselves with the suspicion that the prophetess
+reckoned Jael's deed the outcome of a Divine thought. No: but we may
+believe this of Jael, that she is on the side of Israel, her sympathy
+so far repressed by the league of her people with Jabin, yet prompting
+her to use every opportunity of serving the Hebrew cause. It is clear
+that if the Kenite treaty had meant very much and Jael had felt herself
+bound by it, her tent would have been an asylum for the fugitive. But
+she is against the enemies of Israel; her heart is with the people of
+Jehovah in the battle and she is watching eagerly for signs of the
+victory she desires them to win. Unexpected, startling, the sign appears
+in the fleeing captain of Jabin's host, alone, looking wildly for
+shelter. "Turn in, my lord; turn in." Will he enter? Will he hide
+himself in a woman's tent? Then to her will be committed vengeance. It
+will be an omen that the hour of Sisera's fate has come. Hospitality
+itself must yield; she will break even that sacred law to do stern
+justice on a coward, a tyrant, and an enemy of God.
+
+A line of thought like this is entirely in harmony with the Arab
+character. The moral ideas of the desert are rigorous, and contempt
+rapidly becomes cruel. A tent woman has few elements of judgment, and,
+the balance turning, her conclusion will be quick, remorseless. Jael is
+no blameless heroine; neither is she a demon. Deborah, who understands
+her, reads clearly the rapid thoughts, the swift decision, the
+unscrupulous act and sees, behind all, the purpose of serving Israel.
+Her praise of Jael is therefore with knowledge; but she herself would
+not have done the thing she praises. All possible explanations made, it
+remains a murder, a wild savage thing for a woman to do, and we may ask
+whether among the tents of Zaanannim Jael was not looked on from that
+day as a woman stained and shadowed,--one who had been treacherous to a
+guest.
+
+Not here can the moral be found that the end justifies the means, or
+that we may do evil with good intent; which never was a Bible doctrine
+and never can be. On the contrary, we find it written clear that the end
+does not justify the means. Sisera must live on and do the worst he may
+rather than any soul should be soiled with treachery or any hand defiled
+by murder. There are human vermin, human scorpions and vipers. Is
+Christian society to regard them, to care for them? The answer is that
+Providence regards them and cares for them. They are human after all,
+men whom God has made, for whom there are yet hopes, who are no worse
+than others would be if Divine grace did not guard and deliver. Rightly
+does Christian society affirm that a human being in peril, in suffering,
+in any extremity common to men is to be succoured as a man, without
+inquiry whether he is good or vile. What then of justice and man's
+administration of justice? This, that they demand a sacred calm,
+elevation above the levels of personal feeling, mortal passion and
+ignorance. Law is to be of no private, sudden, unconsidered
+administration. Only in the most solemn and orderly way is the trial of
+the worst malefactor to be gone about, sentence passed, justice
+executed. To have reached this understanding of law with regard to all
+accused and suspected persons and all evildoers is one of the great
+gains of the Christian period. We need not look for anything like the
+ideal of justice in the age of the judges; deeds were done then and
+zealously and honestly praised which we must condemn. They were meant to
+bring about good, but the sum of human violence was increased by them
+and more work made for the moral reformer of after times. And going back
+to Jael's deed we see that it gave Israel little more than vengeance.
+In point of fact the crushing defeat of the army left Sisera powerless,
+discredited, open to the displeasure of his master. He could have done
+Israel no more harm.
+
+One point remains. Emphatically are we reminded that life continually
+brings us to sudden moments in which we must act without time for
+careful reflection, the spirit of our past flashing out in some quick
+deed or word of fate. Sisera's past drove him in panic over the hills to
+Zaanannim. Jael's past came with her to the door of the tent; and the
+two as they looked at each other in that tragic moment were at once,
+without warning, in a crisis for which every thought and passion of
+years had made a way. Here the self-pampering of a vain man had its
+issue. Here the woman, undisciplined, impetuous, catching sight of the
+means to do a deed, moves to the fatal stroke like one possessed. It is
+the sort of thing we often call madness, and yet such insanity is but
+the expression of what men and women choose to be capable of. The casual
+allowance of an impulse here, a craving there, seems to mean little
+until the occasion comes when their accumulated force is sharply or
+terribly revealed. The laxity of the past thus declares itself; and on
+the other hand there is often a gathering of good to a moment of
+revelation. The soul that has for long years fortified itself in pious
+courage, in patient well-doing, in high and noble thought, leaps one
+day, to its own surprise, to the height of generous daring or heroic
+truth. We determine the issue of crises which we cannot foresee.
+
+
+
+
+VIII.
+
+_DEBORAH'S SONG: A DIVINE VISION._
+
+JUDGES v.
+
+
+The song of Deborah and Barak is twofold, the first portion, ending with
+the eleventh verse, a chant of rising hope and pious encouragement
+during the time of preparation and revival, the other a song of battle
+and victory throbbing with eager patriotism and the hot breath of
+martial excitement. In the former part God is celebrated as the Helper
+of Israel from of old and from afar; He is the spring of the movement in
+which the singer rejoices, and in His praise the strophes culminate. But
+human nature asserts itself after the great and decisive triumph in the
+vivid touches of the latter canto. In it more is told of the doings of
+men, and there is picturesque fiery exultation over the fallen. One
+might almost think that Deborah, herself childless, glories over the
+mother of Sisera in the utter desolation which falls on her when she
+hears the tidings of her son's defeat and death. Yet this mood ceases
+abruptly, and the song returns to Jehovah, Whose friends are lifted up
+to joy and strength by His availing help.
+
+The main interest of the twofold song lies in its religious colour, for
+here the pious ardour of the Israel of the judges comes to finest
+expression. As a whole it is more patriotic than moral, more warlike
+than religious, and thus unquestionably reflects the temper of the time.
+What ideas do we find in it of the relation of Israel to God and of God
+to Israel, what conceptions of the Divine character? Jehovah is invoked
+and praised as the God of the Hebrews alone. He seems to have no
+interest in the Canaanites, nor compassion towards them. Yet the
+grandeur of the Divine forthgoing is declared in bold and striking
+imagery, and the high resolves of men are clearly traced to the Spirit
+of the Almighty. Duty to God is linked with duty to country, and it is
+at least suggested that Israel without Jehovah is nothing and has no
+right to a place among the peoples. The nation exists for the glory of
+its Heavenly King, to make known His power and His righteous acts. A
+strain like this in a war-song belonging to the time of Israel's
+semi-barbarism bears no uncertain promise. From the well-spring out of
+which it flows clear and sparkling there will come other songs, with
+tenderer music and holier longing,--songs of spiritual hope and generous
+desire for Messianic peace.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+1. The first religious note is struck in what may be called the opening
+Hallelujah, although the ejaculation, "Bless the Lord," is not, in
+Hebrew, that which afterwards became the great refrain of sacred song.
+
+  "For that leaders led in Israel,
+  For that the people offered themselves willingly:
+  Bless ye Jehovah."
+
+Here is more than belief in Providence. It is faith in the spiritual
+presence and power of God swaying the souls of men. Has Deborah seen at
+last, after long efforts to rouse the careless people, one and another
+responding to her appeals and seeking her tent among the hills? Has she
+witnessed the vows of the chiefs of Issachar and Zebulun that they would
+not be wanting in the day of battle? Not to herself but to the God of
+Israel is the new temper ascribed. Jehovah, Who touched her own heart,
+has now touched many another. For years she had been aware of holier
+influences than came to her from the people among whom she lived. In
+secret, in the silence of the heart, she had found herself mastered by
+thoughts that none around her shared. She has well accounted for them.
+Jehovah has spoken to her, Jehovah caring still for His people, waiting
+to redeem them from bondage. And now, when her prophetic cry finds echo
+in other souls, when men who were asleep rise up and declare their
+purpose, especially when from this side and that companies of brave
+youths and resolute elders come to her--from the slopes of Carmel, from
+the hills of Gilead--the fire of hope in their eyes, how otherwise
+explain the upspringing of energy and devotion than as the work of the
+Spirit that has moved her own soul? To Jehovah is all the praise.
+
+Common enough in our day is a profession of belief in God as the source
+of every good desire and right effort, as inspiring the charity of the
+generous, the affection of the loving, the fidelity of the true. But if
+our faith is deep and real it brings us much nearer than we usually feel
+ourselves to be to Him Who is the Life indeed. The existence and energy
+of God are assured to those who have this insight. Every kindness done
+by man to man is a testimony against which denial of the Divine life has
+no power. Though the intellect searching far afield makes out only as
+it were some few dim and indistinct footprints of a Mighty Being Who has
+passed by, seen at intervals on the plains of history, then lost in the
+morasses or on the rocky ground, there ought to be found in every human
+life daily evidence of Divine grace and wisdom. The good, the true, the
+noble constantly appeal to men, find men; and through these God finds
+them. When a magnanimous word is spoken, God is heard. When a deed is
+done in love, in purity, in courage or pity, God is seen. When out of
+languor and corruption and self-indulgence men arise and set their faces
+to the steep of duty, God is revealed. He in Whom we trust for the
+redemption of the world never leaves Himself without a witness, whether
+faith perceives or unbelief denies. The human story unfolds a Divine
+urgency by which the progress, the evolution of all that is good proceed
+from age to age. Man has never been left to nature alone nor to himself
+alone. The supernatural has always mingled with his life. He has
+resisted often, he has rebelled; yet conscience has not ceased, God has
+not withdrawn. This living energy of Jehovah, not only as belonging to
+the past but discovered in the new zeal of Israel, Deborah saw, and in
+virtue of the revelation she was far before her time. For the fresh life
+of the people, for the willing self-devotion of so many to the great
+cause, she lifted her voice in praise to Israel's Eternal Friend.
+
+2. The next passage may be called a prologue in the heavens. Partly
+historical, it is chiefly a vision of Jehovah's age-long work for His
+people. In words that flash and roll the song describes the glorious
+advent of the Most High, nature astir with His presence, the mountains
+shaking under His tread.
+
+The seat of the Divine Majesty appears to the prophetess to be in Seir.
+She looks across the hills of the south and passes beyond the desert to
+that place of mystery where God spoke in thunder and proclaimed Himself
+in the Law. The imagery points to the phenomena of earthquake and a
+fearful lightning storm accompanied with heavy rain. These, the most
+striking natural symbols of the supernatural, form the materials of the
+strophe. Perhaps even as the song is chanted the thunders of Sinai are
+echoed in a great storm that shakes the sky and rolls among the hills.
+The outward signs represent the new impressions of Divine power and
+authority which are startling and rousing the tribes. They have heard no
+voices, seen no tokens of God for many a year. He Who led their fathers
+out of bondage, He Who marched with them through the desert, has been
+forgotten; but He returns, He is with them again. The office of the
+prophetess is to celebrate God's presence and excite in the dull souls
+of men some feeling of His majesty. Sinai once trembled and was dismayed
+before God. The great peak beside which Tabor is but a mound flowed down
+in volcanic glow and rush. It is He Whose coming Deborah hears in the
+beating storm, He Whose victorious feet shake the hills of Ephraim. Have
+the people forsaken their King? Let them seek Him, trust Him now. Under
+the shadow of His wings there is refuge; before His arrows and the
+fierce floods He pours from heaven who can stand?
+
+It has been well said that for the Israel of ancient times all natural
+phenomena--a storm, a hurricane or a flood--had more than ordinary
+import. "Forbidden to recognise and, as it were, grasp the God of heaven
+in any material form, or to adore even in the heavens themselves any
+constant symbols of His being and His power, yet yearning more in
+spirit for manifestations of His invisible existence, Israel's mind was
+ever on the stretch for any hint in nature of the unseen Celestial
+Being, for any glimpse of His mysterious ways, and its courage rose to a
+far higher pitch when Divine encouragement and impulse seemed to come
+from the material world."[5] From the images of Baal and the Ashtaroth
+Israel had turned; but where was their Heavenly King? The answer came
+with marvellous power when Deborah in the midst of the rolling thunder
+could say, "Lord, when Thou wentest forth out of Seir, when Thou
+marchedst out of the field of Edom, the earth trembled, the heavens also
+dropped. The mountains flowed down at the presence of Jehovah." If the
+people bethought themselves of the clear demonstration of Divine majesty
+made to their fathers, they would realize God once more as the Ruler in
+heaven and earth. Then would courage revive, and in the faith of the
+Almighty they would go forth to victory.
+
+  [5] Ewald.
+
+Now was there in this faith an element of reason, a correspondence with
+fact? Is it fancy and nothing else, the poetic flight of an ardent soul
+eager to rouse a nation? Have we here an arbitrary connection made
+between striking natural events and a Divine Person throned in the
+heavens Whose existence the prophetess assumes, Whose supposed claim to
+obedience haunts her mind? In such a question our age utters its
+scepticism.
+
+An age it is of science, of positive science. Toiling for centuries at
+the task of understanding the phenomenal, research has at length assumed
+the right to tell us what we must believe concerning the world--what we
+are to _believe_, observe, for it is a new creed and nothing else that
+confronts us here. "The government of the world," says one, "must not be
+considered as determined by an extramundane intelligence, but by one
+immanent in the cosmical forces and their relations." Another says: "The
+world or matter with its properties which we term forces must have
+existed from eternity and must last for ever--in one word, the world
+cannot have been created.... The ever-changing action of the natural
+forces is the fundamental cause of all that arises and perishes." Or
+again, not most recent in time but entirely modern in temper, we have
+the following: "Science has gradually taken all the positions of the
+childish belief of the peoples; it has snatched thunder and lightning
+from the hands of the gods. The stupendous powers of the Titans of the
+olden time have been grasped by the fingers of man. That which appeared
+inexplicable, miraculous and the work of a supernatural power has by the
+touch of science proved to be the effect of hitherto unknown natural
+forces. Everything that happens does so in a natural way, _i.e._, in a
+mode determined only by accidental or necessary coalition of existing
+materials and their immanent natural forces." Here is dogma forced on
+faith with fine energy; and what more is to be said when judgment is
+given--"I have searched the heavens, but have nowhere found the traces
+of a God"?
+
+We hear the boast that no song of Hebrew seer can withstand this modern
+wisdom, that the superstition of Bible faith shall vanish like starlight
+before the rising sun. To science every opinion shall submit. But wait.
+It is dogmatism against belief after all, authority against authority,
+and the one in a lower region than the other, with vastly inferior
+sanctions. Natural science declares the present result of its
+observation of the universe, investigation brief, superficial, and
+limited to one small corner of the whole. Yet these deliverances are to
+be set above the science which deals with existence on the highest
+plane, the spiritual, solving deepest problems of life and conscience,
+finding perpetual support in the experience of men. The claim is
+somewhat large; it lacks the proof of service; it lacks verification.
+Science boasts greatly, as is natural to its adolescence. But at what
+point can it dare to say, Here is final truth, here is certainty? We do
+not repel our debt to the discoverer when we maintain that natural
+science is only watching the surface of a stream for a few miles along
+its course, while the springs far away among the eternal hills and the
+outflow into the infinite ocean are never viewed. Are we taunted with
+believing? Those who taunt us must supply for their part something more
+than inference ere we trust all to their wisdom. The "Force" that is so
+much invoked, what is it so far as the definitions of science go?
+Effects we see; Force never. All statements as to the nature of force
+are pure dogma. It is declared that there are necessary and eternal laws
+of matter. What makes them necessary, and who can prove their
+everlastingness? Using such words men pass infinitely beyond material
+research--they infer--they assert. In the region of natural science we
+can affirm nothing to be eternal, and even _necessity_ is a word that
+has no warrant. It is only in the soul, in the region of moral ideas, we
+come on that which endures, which is necessary, which has constant
+reality. And it is here that our belief in God as universal Creator, the
+Source of power and life, the One Agent, the King eternal, immortal and
+invisible, finds root and strength.
+
+The battle between materialism and religious faith is not a battle in
+which facts are arrayed on one side and inferences and dreams on the
+other. The array is of facts against facts, as we have said, and with an
+immense difference of value. Is it an established sequence that when the
+electricity in the clouds is not in equipoise with that of the earth,
+under certain conditions there is a thunderstorm? It is surely a
+sequence of higher moment that when the sense of righteousness seizes
+the minds of men they rise against iniquity and there is a revolution.
+There natural forces operate, here spiritual. But on which side is the
+indication of eternity? Which of these sequences can better claim to
+give a key to the order of the universe? Surely if the evolution of the
+ages, so far, has culminated in man with his capability of knowing and
+serving the true, the just, the good, these facts of his mind and life
+are the highest of which we can take cognizance, and in them, if
+anywhere, we must find the key to all knowledge, the reason of all
+phenomena. Evolutionary science itself must agree to this. In the
+movements of nature we find no advance to fixity and finality. Nature
+labours, men labour with or against nature; but the flux of things is
+perpetual; there is no escape from change. In the efforts of the
+spiritual life it is not so. When we strive for equalness, for verity,
+for purity, we have glimpses then of the changeless order which we must
+needs call Divine. Here is the indication of eternity; and as we
+investigate, as we experience, we come to certitude, we reach larger
+vision, larger faith. That which endures rises clear above that which
+appears and passes.
+
+Returning to Deborah's song and her vision of the coming of God in the
+impetuous storm, we see the practical value of Theism. One great idea,
+comprehensive and majestic, leads thought beyond symbol and change to
+the All-righteous Lord. To attribute phenomena to "Nature" is a sterile
+mode of thought; nothing is done for life. To attribute phenomena to a
+variety of superhuman persons limits and weakens the religious idea
+sought after; still one is lost in the changeable. Theism delivers the
+soul from both evils and sets it on a free upward path, stern yet
+alluring. By this path the Hebrew prophet rose to the high and fruitful
+conceptions which draw men together in responsibility and worship. The
+eternal governs all, rules every change; and that eternal is the holy
+will of God. The omnipotence nature obeys is the omnipotence of right.
+Israel returning to God will find Him coming to the help of His people
+in the awful or kindly movements of the natural world. Our view in one
+sense extends beyond that of the Hebrew seer. We find the purpose
+disclosed in natural phenomena to be somewhat different. Not the
+protection of a favoured race, but the discipline of humanity is what we
+perceive. Ours is an expansion of the Hebrew faith, revealing the same
+Divine goodness engaged in a redeeming work of wider scope and longer
+duration.
+
+The point is still in doubt among us whether the good, the true, the
+right, are invincible. Those who go forth in the service of God are
+often borne down by the graceless multitude. From age to age the problem
+of God's supremacy seems to remain in suspense, and men are not afraid,
+in the name of foulest iniquity, to try issues with the best. Be it so.
+The Divine work is slow. Even the best need discipline that they may
+have strength, and God is in no haste to carry His argument against
+atheism. There is abundance of time. Those bent on evil or misled by
+falsehood, those who are on the wrong side though they consider
+themselves soldiers of a good cause may gain on many a field, yet their
+gain will turn out in the long run to be loss, and they who lose and
+fall are really the victors. There is defeat that is better than
+success. Other ages than belong to this world's history are yet to dawn,
+and the discovery will come to every intelligence that he alone triumphs
+whose life is spent for righteousness and love, in fidelity to God and
+man.
+
+3. Let it be allowed that we find the latter canto of Deborah's song
+expressive of faith rather than of clear morality, pointing to a
+spiritual future rather than exhibiting actual knowledge of the Divine
+character. We hear of the righteous acts of the Lord, and the note is
+welcome, yet most likely the thought is of retributive justice and
+punishment that overtakes the enemies of Israel. When the remnant of the
+nobles and the people come down--that remnant of brave and faithful men
+never wanting to Israel--the Lord comes down with them, their Guide and
+Strength. Meroz is cursed because the inhabitants do not go forth to the
+help of Jehovah. And finally there is glorying over Sisera because he is
+an enemy of Israel's Unseen King. There is trust, there is devotion, but
+no largeness of spiritual view.
+
+We must, however, remember that a song full of the spirit of battle and
+the gladness of victory cannot be expected to breathe the ideal of
+religion. The mind of the singer is too excited by the circumstances of
+the time, the bustle, the triumph, to dwell on higher themes. When
+fighting has to be done it is the main business of the hour, cannot be
+aught else to those who are engaged. A woman especially, strung to an
+unusual pitch of nervous endurance, would be absorbed in the events and
+her own new and strange position; and she would pass rapidly from the
+tension of anxiety to a keen passionate exultation in which everything
+was lost except the sense of deliverance and of personal vindication.
+When that is past which was an issue of life or death, freedom or
+destruction, joy rises in a sudden spring, joy in the prowess of men,
+the fulness of Divine succour; neither the prophetess nor the fighters
+are indifferent to justice and mercy, though they do not name them here.
+Deborah, a woman of intense patriotism and piety, dared greatly for God
+and her country; of a base thing she was incapable. The men who fought
+by the waters of Megiddo and slew their enemies ruthlessly in the heat
+of battle knew in the time of peace the duties of humanity and no doubt
+showed kindness when the war was over to the widows and orphans of the
+slain. To know and serve Jehovah was a guarantee of moral culture in a
+rude age; and the Israelites when they returned to Him must have
+contrasted very favourably in respect of conduct with the devotees of
+Baal and Astarte.
+
+For a parallel case we may turn to Oliver Cromwell. In his letter after
+the storming of Bristol, a bloody piece of work in which the mettle of
+the Parliamentary force was put keenly to proof, Cromwell ascribes the
+victory to God in these terms:--"They that have been employed in this
+service know that faith and prayer obtained this city for you. God hath
+put the sword in the Parliament's hands for the terror of evil-doers and
+the praise of them that do well." Of victory after victory which left
+many a home desolate he speaks as mercies to be acknowledged with all
+thankfulness. "God exceedingly abounds in His goodness to us, and will
+not be weary until righteousness and peace meet, and until He hath
+brought forth a glorious work for the happiness of this poor kingdom."
+Read his dispatches and you find that though the man had a generous
+heart and was a sworn servant of Christ the merciful, yet he breathes no
+compassion for the royal troops. These are the enemy against whom a
+pious man is bound to fight; the slaughter of them is a terrible
+necessity.
+
+Just now it is the fashion to depreciate as much as possible the moral
+value of the old Hebrew faith. We are assured in a tone of authority
+that Israel's Jehovah was only another Chemosh, or, say, a respectable
+Baal, a being without moral worth,--in fact, a mere name of might
+worshipped by Israelites as their protector. The history of the people
+settles this uncritical theory. If the religion of Israel did not
+sustain a higher morality, if the faith of Jehovah was purely secular,
+how came Israel to emerge as a nation from the long conflict with
+Moabites, Canaanites, Midianites and Philistines? The Hebrews were not
+superior in point of numbers, unity or military skill to the nations
+whose interest it was to subdue or expel them. Some vantage ground the
+Israelites must have had. What was it? Justice between man and man,
+domestic honour, care for human life, a measure of unselfishness,--these
+at least, as well as the entire purity of their religious rites, were
+their inheritance; through these the blessing of the Eternal rested upon
+them. There could never be a return to Him in penitence and hope without
+a return to the duties and the faith of the sacred covenant. We know
+therefore that while Deborah sings her song of battle and exults over
+fallen Sisera there is latent in her mind and the minds of her people a
+warmth of moral purpose justifying their new liberty. This nation is
+again a militant church. The hearts of men enlarge that God may dwell in
+them. Israel's triumph, shall it not be for the good of those who are
+overcome? Shall not the people of Jehovah, going forth as the sun in his
+might, shed a kindly radiance over the lands around? So fine a
+conception of duty is scarcely to be found in Deborah's song, but,
+realized or not in Old Testament times, it was the revelation of God
+through Israel to the world.
+
+
+
+
+IX.
+
+_DEBORAH'S SONG: A CHANT OF PATRIOTISM._
+
+JUDGES v.
+
+
+We have already considered the song of Deborah as a declaration of God's
+working more broad and spiritual than might be looked for in that age.
+We now regard it as exhibiting different relations of men to the Divine
+purpose. There is a religious spirit in the whole movement here
+described. It begins in a revival of faith and obedience, prospers
+despite the coldness and opposition of many, grows in force and
+enthusiasm as it proceeds and finally is crowned with success. The
+church is militant in a literal sense; yet, fighting with carnal
+weapons, it is really contending for the glory of the Unseen King. There
+is a close parallel between the enterprise of Deborah and Barak and that
+which opens before the church of the present time. No forced
+accommodation is needed to gather from the song lessons of different
+kinds for our guidance and warning in the campaign of Christianity.
+
+Here are Deborah herself, a mother in Israel, and the leaders who take
+their places at the head of the armies of God. Here also are the people
+willingly offering themselves, imperilling their lives for religion and
+freedom. The history of the past and the vision of Jehovah as sole Ruler
+of nature and providence encourage the faithful, who rise out of
+lethargy and leave the by-ways of life to take the field in battle
+array. The levies of Ephraim, Benjamin, Zebulun, Issachar and Naphtali
+represent those who are decisively Christian, ready to hazard all for
+the gospel's sake. But Reuben sits among the sheepfolds and listens to
+the pipings for the flocks, Dan remains in ships, Asher at the haven of
+the sea; and these may stand for the self-cultivating self-serving
+professors of religion. Jabin and Sisera again are established opponents
+of the right cause; they are brave in their own defence; their positions
+look most formidable, their battalions shake the ground. But the stars
+from heaven, the floods of Kishon, are only a small part of the forces
+of the King of heaven; and the soul of Israel marches on in strength
+till the enemy is routed. Meroz practically helps the foe. Those who
+dwell within its walls are doubtful of the issue and will not risk their
+lives; the curse of sullen apostasy falls upon them. Jael is a vivid
+type of the unscrupulous helpers of a good cause, those who employing
+the weapons and methods of the world would fain be servants of that
+kingdom in which nothing base, nothing earthly can have place. And there
+are the children of the hour, the fine ladies of Harosheth whose
+pleasure and pride are bound up with oppression, who look through the
+lattices and listen in vain for the returning chariots laden with spoil.
+
+1. The leaders and head men of the tribes under Deborah and Barak,
+Deborah foremost in the great enterprise, her soul on fire with zeal for
+Israel and for God.
+
+Deborah and Barak show throughout that spirit of cordial agreement, that
+frank support of each other which at all times are so much to be
+desired in religious leaders. There is no jealousy, no striving for
+pre-eminence. Barak is a brave man, but he will not stir without the
+prophetess; he is quite content to give her the place of honour while he
+does the martial work. Deborah again would commit the task to Barak's
+hands in complete reliance on his wisdom and valour; yet she is ready to
+appear along with him, and in her song, while she claims the prophetic
+office, it is to Barak she renders the honours of victory--"Lead thy
+thraldom in thrall, thou son of Abinoam."
+
+Rarely, it must be confessed, is there entire harmony among the leaders
+of affairs. Jealousy is too often with them from the first. Suspicion
+lurks under the council table, private ambitions and unworthy fears make
+confusion when each should trust and encourage another. The fine
+enthusiasm of a great cause does not overcome as it ought the
+selfishness of human nature. Moreover, varieties in disposition as
+between the cautious and the impetuous, the more and the less of
+sagacity or of faith, a failure in sincerity here, in justice there, are
+separating influences constantly at work. But when the pressing
+importance of the duties entrusted to men by God governs every will,
+these elements of division cease; leaders who differ in temperament are
+loyal to each other then, each jealous of the others' honour as servants
+of truth. In the Reformation, for example, prosperity was largely due to
+the fact that two such men as Luther and Melanchthon, very different yet
+thoroughly united, stood side by side in the thick of the conflict,
+Luther's impetuosity moderated by the calmer spirit of the other,
+Melanchthon's craving for peace kept from dangerous concession by the
+boldness of his friend. Their mutual love and fidelity showed the
+nobleness of both, showed also what the Protestant Gospel was. Their
+differences melted away in enthusiasm for the Word of God, which one
+thought of as a celestial ambrosia, the other as a sword, a war, a
+destruction springing upon the children of Ephraim like a lioness in the
+forest. The Divine work was the life of each; each in his own way sought
+with splendid earnestness to forward the truth of Christ.
+
+Church leaders are responsible for not a little which they themselves
+condemn. Differences do not quickly arise among disciples when the
+teachers are modest, honourable, and brotherly. Paul cries, "Is Christ
+divided? Were ye baptized into the name of Paul? What is Apollos? What
+is Paul? Ministers by whom ye believed." When our leaders speak and feel
+in like manner there will be peace, not uniformity but something better.
+God's husbandry, God's building will prosper.
+
+But it is declared to be jealousy for religion that divides--jealousy
+for the pure doctrine of Christ--jealousy for the true church. We try to
+believe it. But then why are not all in that spirit of holy jealousy
+found side by side as comrades, eagerly yet in cordial brotherhood
+discussing points of difference, determined that they will search
+together and help each other until they find principles in which they
+can all rest? The leaders of different Christian bodies do not appear
+like Deborah and Barak engaged in a common enterprise, but as chiefs of
+rival or even opposing armies. The reason is that in this church and the
+other there has been a foreclosing of questions, and the elected leaders
+are almost all men who are pledged to the tribal decrees. In the
+decisions of councils and synods, and not less in the deliverances of
+learned doctors apologising each for his own sect and marking out the
+path his party must travel, there has been ever since the days of the
+apostles a hardening and limiting of opinion. Thought has been
+prematurely crystallized and each church prides itself on its own
+special deposit. The true church leader should understand that a course
+which may have been inevitable in the past is not the virtue of to-day
+and that those are simply adhering to an antiquated position who affirm
+one church to be the sole possessor of truth, the only centre of
+authority. It may seem strange to advise the churches to reconsider many
+of the ideas built into creed and constitution and to reject all leaders
+who are such by credit of sitting immovable in the seats of the rabbis,
+but the progress of Christianity in power and assurance waits upon a new
+brotherliness which will bring about a new catholicity. Under guides of
+the right kind the churches will have qualities and distinctions as
+heretofore, each will be a rendezvous for spirits of a certain order,
+but frankly confessing each other's right and honour they will press on
+abreast to scale and possess the uplands of truth.
+
+To be sure something is said of tolerance. But that is a purely
+political idea. Let it not be so much as named in the assembly of God's
+people. Does Barak tolerate Deborah? Does Moses tolerate Aaron? Does St.
+Peter tolerate St. Paul? The disciples of Christ _tolerate_ each other,
+do they? What marvellous largeness of soul! One or two, it appears, have
+been made sole keepers of the ark but are prepared to tolerate the
+embarrassing help of well-meaning auxiliaries. Neither charity of that
+sort nor flabbiness of belief is asked. Let each be strongly persuaded
+in his own mind of that which he has learned from Christ. But where
+Christ has not foreclosed inquiry and where sincere and thoughtful
+believers differ there is no place for what is called tolerance; the
+demand is for brotherly fellowship in thought and labour.
+
+Deborah was a mother in Israel, a nursing mother of the people in their
+spiritual childhood, with a mother's warm heart for the oppressed and
+weary flock. The nation needed a new birth, and that, by the grace of
+God, Deborah gave it in the sore travail of her soul. For many a year
+she suffered, prayed and entreated. Israel had chosen new gods and in
+serving them was dying to righteousness, dying to Jehovah. Deborah had
+to pour her own life into the half-dead, and compared to this effort the
+battle with the Canaanites was but a secondary matter. So is it always.
+The Divine task is that of the mother-like souls that labour for the
+quickening of faith and holy service. Great victories of Christian
+valour, patience and love are never won without that renewal of
+humanity; and everything is due to those who have guided the ignorant
+into knowledge, the careless to thought and the weak to strength through
+years of patient toil. They are not all prophets, not all known to the
+tribes: of many such the record waits hidden with their God until the
+day of revealing and rejoicing.
+
+Yet Barak also, the Lightning Chief, has honourable part. When the men
+are collected, men new-born into life, he can lead them. They are
+Ironsides under him. He rushes down from Tabor and they at his feet with
+a vigour nothing can resist. If we have Deborah we shall also have
+Barak, his army and his victory. The promise is not for women only but
+for all in the private ways and obscure settlements of life who labour
+at the making of men. Every Christian has the responsibility and joy of
+helping to prepare a way for the coming of Jehovah in some great
+outburst of faith and righteousness.
+
+2. We contrast next the people who offered themselves willingly, who
+"jeoparded their lives unto the death upon the high places of the
+field," and those who for one reason or another held aloof.
+
+With united leaders there is a measure of unity among the tribes. Barak
+and Deborah summon all who are ready to strike for liberty, and there is
+a great muster. Yet there might be double the number. Those who refuse
+to take arms have many pretexts, but the real cause is want of heart.
+The oppression of Jabin does not much affect some Israelites, and so far
+as it does they would rather go on paying tribute than risk their lives,
+rather bear the ills they have than hazard anything in joining Barak.
+These holding back, the work has to be done by a comparatively small
+number, a remnant of the nobles and the people.
+
+But a remnant is always found; there are men and women who do not bow
+the knee to the Baal of worldly fashion, who do not content their souls
+amid the fleshpots of low servitude. They have to venture and sacrifice
+much in a long and varying war, and oftentimes their flesh and heart may
+almost fail. But a great reward is theirs. While others are spiritless
+and hopeless they know the zest of life, its real power and joy. They
+know what believing means, how strong it makes the soul. Their all is in
+the spiritual kingdom which cannot be moved. God is the portion of their
+souls, their gladness and glory. Those who stand by and look on while
+the conflict rages may share to a certain extent in the liberty that is
+won, for the gains of Christian warfare are not limited, they are for
+all mankind. There is a wider and better ordered life for all when this
+evil custom and that have been overcome, when one Jabin after another
+ceases to oppress. Yet what is it after all to touch the border of
+Christian liberty? To the fighters belongs the inheritance itself, an
+ever-extending conquest, a land of olives and vineyards and streams of
+living water.
+
+Different tribes are named that sent contingents to the army of Barak.
+They are typical of different churches, different orders of society that
+are forward in the campaign of faith. The Hebrews who came most readily
+at the battle call appear to have belonged to districts where the
+Canaanite oppression was heavy, the country that lay between Harosheth,
+the head-quarters of Sisera, and Hazor the city of Jabin. So in the
+Christian struggle of the ages the strenuous part falls to those who
+suffer from the tyranny of the temporal and see clearly the hopelessness
+of life without religion. The gospel of Christ is peculiarly precious to
+men and women whose lot is hard, whose earthly future is clouded.
+Sacrifices for God's cause are made as a rule by these. In His great
+purpose, in His deep knowledge of the facts of life, our Lord joined
+Himself to the poor and left with them a special blessing. It is not
+that men who dwell in comfort are independent of the gospel, but they
+are tempted to think themselves so. In proportion as they are fenced in
+amongst possessions and social claims they are apt, though devout, to
+miss that very call which is the message of the gospel to them.
+Well-meaning but absorbed, they can rarely bestir themselves to hear and
+do until some personal calamity or public disaster awakens them to the
+truth of things. The steady support of Christian ordinances and work in
+our day is largely the honour of people who have their full share in
+the struggle for earthly necessaries or a humble standing in the ranks
+of the independent. The paradox is real and striking; it claims the
+attention of those who vainly dream that a comfortable society would
+certainly become Christian, as effect follows cause. While the religion
+of Christ makes for justice and temporal well-being, blessing even the
+unbeliever, while it leads the way to a high standard of social order,
+these things remain of no value in themselves to men unspiritual: it
+holds true that man can never live by bread alone, but by the words
+which proceed out of the mouth of God. And there are forces at work
+among us on behalf of the Divine counsel that shall not fail to maintain
+the struggle necessary to the discipline and growth of souls.
+
+The real army of faith is largely drawn from the ranks of the toilers
+and the heavy laden. Yet not entirely. We reckon many and fine
+exceptions. There are rich who are less worldly than those who have
+little. Many whose lot lies far from the shadow of tyranny in green and
+pleasant valleys are first to hear and quickest to answer every call
+from the Captain of the Lord's host. Their possessions are nothing to
+them. In the spiritual battle all is spent, knowledge, influence,
+wealth, life. And if you look for the highest examples of Christianity,
+a faith pure, keen and lovely, a generosity that most clearly reveals
+the Master, a passion for truth consuming all lower regards, you will
+find them where culture has done its best for the mind and the bounty of
+providence has kindled a gracious humility and an abounding gentleness
+of heart. The tawdry vanities of their fellows in rank and wealth seem
+what they are to these, the gaudy toys of children who have not yet seen
+the glory and the goal of life. And how can men and women hear the
+clarion of the Christian war ringing over the valleys of degradation and
+fear, see the Divine contest surging through the land, and not perceive
+that here and here only is life? Men play at statecraft and grow cold as
+they intrigue; they play at financing and become ciphers in a monstrous
+sum; they toil at pleasure till Satan himself might pity them, for at
+least he has a purpose to serve. All the while there is offered to them
+the vigour, the buoyancy, the glow of an ambition and a service in which
+no spirit tires and no heart withers. Passing strange it is that so few
+noble, so few mighty, so few wise hear the keen cry from the cross as
+one of life and power.
+
+Among the tribes that held aloof from the great conflict several are
+specially named. Messengers have gone to the land of Reuben beyond
+Jordan, and carried the fiery cross through Bashan. Dan has been
+summoned and Asher from the haven of the sea. But these have not
+responded. Reuben indeed has searchings of heart. Some of the people
+remember the old promise made at Shittim in the plain of Moab, that they
+would help their brethren who crossed into Canaan, never refusing
+assistance till the land was fully possessed. Moses had solemnly charged
+them with that duty, and they had bound themselves in covenant: "As the
+Lord hath said unto thy servants, so will we do." Could anything have
+been more seriously, more decisively undertaken? Yet, when this hour of
+need came, though the duty lay upon the conscience nothing was done.
+Along the watercourses of Gilead and Bashan there were flocks to tend,
+to protect from the Amalekites and Midianites of the desert who would be
+sure to make a raid in the absence of the fighting men. To Asher and
+Dan the reference is perhaps somewhat ironical. The "ships" for trade,
+the "haven of the sea," were never much to these tribes, and their
+maritime ambition made an unworthy excuse. They had perhaps a little
+fishing, some small trade on the coast, and petty as the gain was it
+filled their hearts. Asher "abode by his creeks."
+
+It is not to a religious festival that Deborah and Barak have called the
+tribes. It is to serious and dangerous duty. Yet the call of duty should
+come with more power than any invitation even to spiritual enjoyment.
+The great religious gathering has its use, its charm. We know the
+attraction of the crowded convocation in which Christian hope and
+enthusiasm are re-kindled by stirring words and striking instances,
+faith rising high as it views the wide mission of gospel truth and hears
+from eloquent lips the story of a modern day of Pentecost. To many,
+because their own spiritual life burns dull, the daily and weekly
+routine of things becomes empty, vain, unsatisfying. In the common round
+even of valued religious exercise the heat and promise of Christianity
+seem to be lacking. In the convention they appear to be realized as
+nowhere else, and the persuasion that God may be felt there in a special
+manner is laying hold of Christian people. They are right in their eager
+desire to be borne along with the flood of redeeming grace; but we have
+need to ask what the life of faith is, how it is best nourished. To have
+a personal share in God's controversy with evil, to have a place however
+obscure in the actual struggle of truth with falsehood,--this alone
+gives confidence in the result and power in believing. Those who are in
+contact with spiritual reality because they have their own testimony to
+bear, their own watch to keep at some outpost, find stimulus in the
+urgency of duty and exultation in the consciousness of service. Men
+often seek in public gatherings what they can only find in the private
+ways of effort and endurance; they seek the joy of harvest when they
+should be at the labour of sowing; they would fain be cheered by the
+song of victory when they should be roused by the trumpet of battle.
+
+And the result is that where spiritual work waits to be done there are
+but few to do it. Examine the state of any Christian church, reckon up
+those who are deeply interested in its efficiency, who make sacrifices
+of time and means, and set against these the half-hearted, who ignobly
+accept the religious provision made for them and perhaps complain that
+it is not so good as they would like, that progress is not so rapid as
+they think it might be,--the one class far outnumbers the other. As in
+Israel twice or three times as many might have responded to Barak's
+call, so in every church the resolute, the energetic and devoted are few
+compared with those who are capable of energy and devotion. It is
+sometimes maintained that the worship of goodness and the Christian
+ideal command the minds of men more to-day than ever they did, and proof
+seems ready to hand. But, after all, is it not religious taste rather
+than reverence that grows? Self-culture leads many to a certain
+admiration of Christ and a form of discipleship. Christian worship is
+enjoyed and Christian philanthropy also, but when the spiritual freedom
+of mankind calls for some effort of the soul and life, we see what
+religion means--a wave of the hand instead of enthusiasm, a guinea
+subscription instead of thoughtful service. Is it a Christian or a
+selfish culture which is content with fragmentary concessions and
+complacent patronage where the claims of social "inferiors" are
+concerned? That there is a wide diffusion of religious feeling is clear
+enough; but in many respects it is mere dilettantism.
+
+Notice the history of the tribes that lag behind in the day of the
+Lord's summons. What do we hear of Reuben after this? "Unstable as water
+thou shalt not excel." Along with Gad Reuben possessed a splendid
+country, but these two faded away into a sort of barbarism, scarcely
+maintaining their separateness from the wild races of the desert. Asher
+in like manner suffered from the contact with Phoenicia and lost touch
+with the more faithful tribes. So it is always. Those who shirk
+religious duty lose the strength and dignity of religion. Though greatly
+favoured in place and gifts they fall into that spiritual impotence
+which means defeat and extinction.
+
+"Curse ye Meroz, said the angel of the Lord, curse ye bitterly the
+inhabitants thereof; because they came not to the help of the Lord
+against the mighty." It is a stern judgment upon those whose active
+assistance was humanly speaking necessary in the day of battle. The men
+only held back, held back in doubt, supposing that it was vain for
+Hebrews to fling themselves against the iron chariots of Sisera. Were
+they not prudent, looking at the matter all round? Why should a curse so
+heavy be pronounced on men who only sought to save their lives? The
+reply is that secular history curses such men, those of Sparta for
+example to whom Athens sent in vain when the battle of Marathon was
+impending; and further that Christ has declared the truth which is for
+all time, "Whosoever will save his life shall lose it." Erasmus was a
+wise man; yet he made the great blunder. He saw clearly the errors of
+Romanism and the miserable bondage in which it kept the souls of men,
+and if he had joined the reformers his judgment and learning would have
+become part of the world's progressive life. But he held back doubting,
+criticising, a friend to the Reformation but not an apostle of it.
+Admire as we may the wit, the reasoner, the philosopher, there must
+always be severe judgment of one who professing to love truth declared
+that he had no inclination to die for it. There are many who without the
+intellect of Erasmus would fain be thought catholic in his company.
+Large is the family of Meroz, and little thought have they of any ban
+lying upon them. Is it a fanciful danger, a mere error of opinion
+without any peril in it, to which we point here? People think so; young
+men especially think so and drift on until the day of service is past
+and they find themselves under the contempt of man and the judgment of
+Christ. "Lord, when saw we Thee a stranger or in prison and did not
+minister unto Thee?" "Depart from Me, I never knew you."
+
+3. Jael, a type of the unscrupulous helpers of a good cause.
+
+Long has the error prevailed that religion can be helped by using the
+world's weapons, by acting in the temper and spirit of the world. Of
+that mischievous falsehood have been born all the pride and vainglory,
+the rivalries and persecutions that darken the past of Christendom,
+surviving in strange and pitiful forms to the present day. If we shudder
+at the treachery in the deed of Jael, what shall we say of that which
+through many a year sent victims to inquisition-dungeons and to the
+stake in the name of Christ? And what shall we say now of that moral
+assassination which in one tent and another is thought no sin against
+humanity, but a service of God? Among us are too many who suffer wounds
+keen and festering that have been given in the house of their friends,
+yea, in the name of the one Lord and Master. The battle of truth is a
+frank and honourable fight, served at no point by what is false or proud
+or low. To an enemy a Christian should be chivalrous and surely no less
+to a brother. Granting that a man is in error, he needs a physician not
+an executioner; he needs an example not a dagger. How much farther do we
+get by the methods of opprobrium and cruelty, the innuendo and the
+whisper of suspicion? Besides, it is not the Siseras to-day who are
+dealt with after this manner. It is the "schismatic" within the camp on
+whom some Jael falls with a hammer and a nail. If a church cannot stand
+by itself, approved to the consciences of men, it certainly will not be
+helped by a return to the temper of barbarism and the craft of the
+world. "The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through
+God to the casting down of strongholds."
+
+
+
+
+X.
+
+_THE DESERT HORDES; AND THE MAN AT OPHRAH._
+
+JUDGES vi. 1-14.
+
+
+Jabin king of Canaan defeated and his nine hundred chariots turned into
+ploughshares we might expect Israel to make at last a start in its true
+career. The tribes have had their third lesson and should know the peril
+of infidelity. Without God they are weak as water. Will they not bind
+themselves now in a confederacy of faith, suppress Baal and Astarte
+worship by stringent laws and turn their hearts to God and duty? Not
+yet: not for more than a century. The true reformer has yet to come.
+Deborah's work is certainly not in vain. She passes through the land
+administering justice, commanding the destruction of heathen altars. The
+people leave their occupations and gather in crowds to hear her; they
+shout, in answer to her appeals, Jehovah is our King. The Levites are
+called to minister at the shrines. For a time there is something like
+religion along with improving circumstances. But the tide does not rise
+long nor far.
+
+Some twenty years have passed, and what is to be seen going on
+throughout the land? The Hebrews have addressed themselves vigorously to
+their work in field and town. Everywhere they are breaking up new
+ground, building houses, repairing roads, organising traffic. But they
+are also falling into the old habit of friendly intercourse with
+Canaanites, talking with them over the prospects of the crops, joining
+in their festivals of new moon and harvest. In their own cities the old
+inhabitants of the land sacrifice to Baal and gather about the Asherim.
+Earnest Israelites are indignant and call for action, but the mass of
+the people are so taken up with their prosperity that they cannot be
+roused. Peace and comfort in the lower region seem better than
+contention for anything higher. In the centre of Palestine there is a
+coalition of Hebrew and Canaanite cities, with Shechem at their head,
+which recognize Baal as their patron and worship him as the master of
+their league. And in the northern tribes generally Jehovah has scant
+acknowledgment; the people see no great task He has given them to do. If
+they live and multiply and inherit the land they reckon their function
+as His nation to be fulfilled.
+
+It is a temptation common to men to consider their own existence and
+success a sort of Divine end in serving which they do all that God
+requires of them. The business of mere living and making life
+comfortable absorbs them so that even faith finds its only use in
+promoting their own happiness. The circle of the year is filled with
+occupations. When the labour of the field is over there are the houses
+and cities to enlarge, to improve and furnish with means of safety and
+enjoyment. One task done and the advantage of it felt, another presents
+itself. Industry takes new forms and burdens still more the energies of
+men. Education, art, science become possible and in turn make their
+demands. But all may be for self, and God may be thought of merely as
+the great Patron satisfied with His tithes. In this way the impulses
+and hopes of faith are made the ministers of egoism, and as a national
+thing the maintenance of law, goodwill, and a measure of purity may seem
+to furnish religion with a sufficient object. But this is far from
+enough. Let worship be refined and elaborated, let great temples be
+built and thronged, let the arts of music and painting be employed in
+raising devotion to its highest pitch--still if nothing beyond self is
+seen as the aim of existence, if national Christianity realizes no duty
+to the world outside, religion must decay. Neither a man nor a people
+can be truly religious without the missionary spirit, and that spirit
+must constantly shape individual and collective life. Among ourselves
+worship would petrify and faith wither were it not for the tasks the
+church has undertaken at home and abroad. But half-understood,
+half-discharged, these duties keep us alive. And it is because the great
+mission of Christians to the world is not even yet comprehended that we
+have so much practical atheism. When less care and thought are expended
+on the forms of worship and the churches address themselves to the true
+ritual of our religion, carrying out the redeeming work of our Saviour,
+there will be new fervour; unbelief will be swept away.
+
+Israel losing sight of its mission and its destiny felt no need of faith
+and lost it; and with the loss of faith came loss of vigour and
+alertness as on other occasions. Having no sense of a common purpose
+great enough to demand their unity the Hebrews were again unable to
+resist enemies, and this time the Midianites and other wild tribes of
+the eastern desert found their opportunity. First some bands of them
+came at the time of harvest and made raids on the cultivated districts.
+But year by year they ventured farther in increasing numbers. Finally
+they brought their tents and families, their flocks and herds, and took
+possession.
+
+In the case of all who fall away from the purpose of life the means of
+bringing failure home to them and restoring the balance of justice are
+always at hand. Let a man neglect his fields and nature is upon him;
+weeds choke his crops, his harvests diminish, poverty comes like an
+armed man. In trade likewise carelessness brings retribution. So in the
+case of Israel: although the Canaanites had been subdued other foes were
+not far away. And the business of this nation was of so sacred a kind
+that neglect of it meant great moral fault and every fresh relapse into
+earthliness and sensuality after a revival of religion implied more
+serious guilt. We find accordingly a proportionate severity in the
+punishment. Now the nation is chastised with whips, but next time it is
+with scorpions. Now the iron chariots of Sisera hold the land in terror;
+then hosts of marauders spread like locusts over the country,
+insatiable, all-devouring. Do the Hebrews think that careful tilling of
+their fields and the making of wine and oil are their chief concern? In
+that they shall be undeceived. Not mainly to be good husbandmen and
+vine-dressers are they set here, but to be a light in the midst of the
+nations. If they cease to shine they shall no longer enjoy.
+
+It was by the higher fords of Jordan, perhaps north of the Sea of
+Galilee, that the Midianites fell on western Canaan. Under their two
+great emirs Zebah and Zalmunna, who seem to have held a kind of barbaric
+state, troops of riders on swift horses and dromedaries swept the shore
+of the lake and burst into the plain of Jezreel. There were no doubt
+many skirmishes between their squadrons and the men of Naphtali and
+Manasseh. But one horde of the invaders followed another so quickly and
+their attacks were so sudden and fierce that at length resistance became
+impossible, the Hebrews had to betake themselves to the heights and
+dwell in the caves and rocks. Once in the desert under Moses they had
+been more than a match for these Arabs. Now, although on vantage ground
+moral and natural, fighting for their hearths and homes behind the
+breastwork of lake, river and mountain, they are completely routed.
+
+Between the circumstances of this oppressed nation and the present state
+of the church there is a wide interval, and in a sense the contrast is
+striking. Is not the Christianity of our time strong and able to hold
+its own? Is not the mood of many churches of the present day properly
+that of elation? As year after year reports of numerical increase and
+larger contributions are made, as finer buildings are raised for the
+purposes of worship and work at home and abroad is carried on more
+efficiently, is it not impossible to trace any resemblance between the
+state of Israel during the Midianite oppression and the state of
+religion now? Why should there be any fear that Baal-worship or other
+idolatry should weaken the tribes, or that marauders from the desert
+should settle in their land?
+
+And yet the condition of things to-day is not quite unlike that of
+Israel at the time we are considering. There are Canaanites who dwell in
+the land and carry on their debasing worship. These too are days when
+guerilla troops of naturalism, nomads of the prim�val desert, are
+sweeping the region of faith. Reckless and irresponsible talk in
+periodicals and on platforms; novels, plays and verses often as clever
+as they are unscrupulous are incidents of the invasion, and it is well
+advanced. Not for the first time is a raid of this kind made on the
+territory of faith, but the serious thing now is the readiness to give
+way, the want of heart and power to resist that we observe in family
+life and in society as well as in literature. Where resistance ought to
+be eager and firm it is often ignorant, hesitating, lukewarm. Perhaps
+the invasion must become more confident and more injurious before it
+rouses the people of God to earnest and united action. Perhaps those who
+will not submit may have to betake themselves to the caves of the
+mountains while the new barbarism establishes itself in the rich plain.
+It has almost come to this in some countries; and it may be that the
+pride of those who have been content to cultivate their vineyards for
+themselves alone, the security of those who have too easily concluded
+that fighting was over shall yet be startled by some great disaster.
+
+"Israel was brought very low because of Midian." A traveller's picture
+of the present state of things on the eastern frontier of Bashan enables
+us to understand the misery to which the tribes were reduced by seven
+years of rapine. "Not only is the country--plain and hill-side
+alike--chequered with fenced fields, but groves of fig-trees are here
+and there seen and terraced vineyards still clothe the sides of some of
+the hills. These are neglected and wild but not fruitless. They produce
+great quantities of figs and grapes which are rifled year after year by
+the Bedawin in their periodical raids. Nowhere on earth is there such a
+melancholy example of tyranny, rapacity and misrule as here. Fields,
+pastures, vineyards, houses, villages, cities are all alike deserted and
+waste. Even the few inhabitants that have hid themselves among the
+rocky fastnesses and mountain defiles drag out a miserable existence,
+oppressed by robbers of the desert on the one hand and robbers of the
+government on the other." The Midianites of Gideon's time acted the part
+both of tyrants and depredators. They "left no sustenance for Israel,
+neither sheep nor ox nor ass. They entered into the land for to destroy
+it."
+
+"And the children of Israel cried unto the Lord"; the prodigals
+bethought them of their Father. Having come to the husks they remembered
+Him who fed His people in the desert. Again the wheel has revolved and
+from the lowest point there is an upward movement. The tribes of God
+look once more towards the hills from whence their help cometh. And here
+is seen the importance of that faith which had passed into the nation's
+life. Although it was not of a very spiritual kind, yet it preserved in
+the heart of the people a recuperative power. The majority knew little
+more of Jehovah than His name. But the name suggested availing succour.
+They turned to the Awful Name, repeated it and urged their need. Here
+and there one saw God as the infinitely righteous and holy and added to
+the wail of the ignorant a more devout appeal, recognizing the evils
+under which the people groaned as punitive and knowing that the very God
+to Whom they cried had brought the Midianites upon them. In the prayer
+of such a one there was an outlook towards holier and nobler life. But
+even in the case of the ignorant the cry to One higher than the highest
+had help in it. For when that bitter cry was raised self-glorifying had
+ceased and piety begun.
+
+Ignorant indeed is much of the faith that still expresses itself in
+so-called Christian prayer, almost as ignorant as that of the
+disconsolate Hebrew tribes. The moral purpose of discipline, the Divine
+ordinances of defeat and pain and affliction are a mystery unread. The
+man in extremity does not know why his hour of abject fear has come, nor
+see that one by one all the stays of his selfish life have been removed
+by a Divine hand. His cry is that of a foolish child. Yet is it not true
+that such a prayer revives hope and gives new energy to the languid
+life? It may be many years since prayer was tried, not perhaps since he
+who is now past his meridian knelt at a mother's knee. Still as he names
+the name of God, as he looks upward, there comes with the dim vision of
+an Omnipotent Helper within reach of his cry the sense of new
+possibilities, the feeling that amidst the miry clay or the heaving
+waves there is something firm and friendly on which he may yet stand. It
+is a striking fact as to any kind of religious belief, even the most
+meagre, that it does for man what nothing else can do. Prayer must
+cease, we are told, for it is mere superstition. Without denying that
+much of what is called prayer is an expression of egotism, we must
+demand an explanation of the unique value it has in human life and a
+sufficient substitute for the habit of appeal to God. Those who would
+deprive us of prayer must first re-make man, for to the strong and
+enlightened prayer is necessary as well as to the weak and ignorant. The
+Heavenly is the only hope of the earthly. That we understand God is,
+after all, not the chief thing: but does He know us? Is He there, above
+yet beside us, for ever?
+
+The first answer to the cry of Israel came in the message of a prophet,
+one who would have been despised by the nation in its self-sufficient
+mood but now obtained a hearing. His words brought instruction and made
+it possible for faith to move and work along a definite line. Through
+man's struggle God helps him; through man's thought and resolve God
+speaks to him. He is already converted when he believes enough to pray,
+and from this point faith saves by animating and guiding the strenuous
+will. The ignorant abject people of God learns from the prophet that
+something is to be done. There is a command, repeated from Sinai,
+against the worship of heathen gods, then a call to love the true God
+the Deliverer of Israel. Faith is to become life, and life faith. The
+name of Jehovah which has stood for one power among others is clearly
+re-affirmed as that of the One Divine Being, the only Object of
+adoration. Israel is convicted of sin and set on the way of obedience.
+
+The answer to prayer lies very near to him who cries for salvation. He
+has not to move a step. He has but to hear the inner voice of
+conscience. Is there a sense of neglect of duty, a sense of
+disobedience, of faults committed? The first movement towards salvation
+is set up in that conviction and in the hope that the evil now seen may
+be remedied. Forgiveness is implied in this hope, and it will become
+assured as the hope grows strong. The mistake is often made of supposing
+that answer to prayer does not come till peace is found. In reality the
+answer begins when the will is bent towards a better life, though that
+change may be accompanied by the deepest sorrow and self-humiliation. A
+man who earnestly reproaches himself for despising and disobeying God
+has already received the grace of the redeeming Spirit.
+
+But to Israel's cry there was another answer. When repentance was well
+begun and the tribes turned from the heathen rites which separated them
+from each other and from Divine thoughts, freedom again became possible
+and God raised up a liberator. Repentance indeed was not thorough;
+therefore a complete national reformation was not accomplished. Yet as
+against Midian, a mere horde of marauders, the balance of righteousness
+and power inclined now in behalf of Israel. The time was ripe and in the
+providence of God the fit man received his call.
+
+South-west from Shechem, among the hills of Manasseh at Ophrah of the
+Abiezrites, lived a family that had suffered keenly at the hands of
+Midian. Some members of the family had been slain near Tabor, and the
+rest had as a cause of war not only the constant robberies from field
+and homestead but also the duty of blood-revenge. The deepest sense of
+injury, the keenest resentment fell to the share of one Gideon, son of
+Joash, a young man of nobler temper than most Hebrews of the time. His
+father was head of a Thousand; and as he was an idolater the whole clan
+joined him in sacrificing to the Baal whose altar stood within the
+boundary of his farm. Already Gideon appears to have turned with
+loathing from that base worship; and he was pondering earnestly the
+cause of the pitiful state into which Israel had fallen. But the
+circumstances perplexed him. He was not able to account for facts in
+accordance with faith.
+
+In a retired place on the hillside where a winepress has been fashioned
+in a hollow of the rocks we first see the future deliverer of Israel.
+His task for the day is that of threshing out some wheat so that, as
+soon as possible, the grain may be hid from the Midianites; and he is
+busy with the flail, thinking deeply, watching carefully as he plies
+the instrument with a sense of irksome restraint. Look at him and you
+are struck with his stalwart proportions and his bearing: he is "like
+the son of a king." Observe more closely and the fire of a troubled yet
+resolute soul will be seen in his eye. He represents the best Hebrew
+blood, the finest spirit and intelligence of the nation; but as yet he
+is a strong man bound. He would fain do something to deliver Israel; he
+would fain trust Jehovah to sustain him in striking a blow for liberty;
+but the way is not clear. Indignation and hope are baffled.
+
+In a pause of his work, as he glances across the valley with anxious
+eye, suddenly he sees under an oak a stranger sitting staff in hand, as
+if he had sought rest for a little in the shade. Gideon scans the
+visitor keenly, but finding no cause for alarm bends again to his
+labour. The next time he looks up the stranger is beside him and words
+of salutation are falling from his lips--"Jehovah is with thee, thou
+mighty man of valour." To Gideon the words did not seem so strange as
+they would have seemed to some. Yet what did they mean? Jehovah with
+him? Strength and courage he is aware of. Sympathy with his
+fellow-Israelites and the desire to help them he feels. But these do not
+seem to him proofs of Jehovah's presence. And as for his father's house
+and the Hebrew people, God seems far from them. Harried and oppressed
+they are surely God-forsaken. Gideon can only wonder at the unseasonable
+greeting and ask what it means.
+
+Unconsciousness of God is not rare. Men do not attribute their regret
+over wrong, their faint longing for the right to a spiritual presence
+within them and a Divine working. The Unseen appears so remote, man
+appears so shut off from intercourse with any supernatural Cause or
+Source that he fails to link his own strain of thought with the Eternal.
+The word of God is nigh him even in his heart, God is "closer to him
+than breathing, nearer than hands and feet." Hope, courage, will,
+life--these are Divine gifts, but he does not know it. Even in our
+Christian times the old error which makes God external, remote, entirely
+aloof from human experience survives and is more common than true faith.
+We conceive ourselves separated from the Divine, with springs of
+thought, purpose and power in our own being, whereas there is in us no
+absolute origin of power moral intellectual or physical. We live and
+move in God: He is our Source and our Stay, and our being is shot
+through and through with rays of the Eternal. The prophetic word spoken
+in our ear is not more assuredly from God than the pure wish or
+unselfish hope that frames itself in our minds or the stern voice of
+conscience heard in the soul. As for the trouble into which we fall,
+that too, did we understand aright, is a mark of God's providential
+care. Would we err without discipline? Would we be ineffective and have
+no bracing? Would we follow lies and enjoy a false peace? Would we
+refuse the Divine path to strength yet never feel the sorrow of the
+weak? Are these the proofs of God's presence our ignorance would desire?
+Then indeed we imagine an unholy one, an unfaithful one upon the throne
+of the universe. But God has no favourites; He does not rule like a
+despot of earth for courtiers and an aristocracy. In righteousness and
+for righteousness, for eternal truth He works, and for that His people
+must endure.
+
+"Jehovah is with thee:" so ran the salutation. Gideon thinking of
+Jehovah does not wonder to hear His name. But full of doubts natural to
+one so little instructed he feels himself bound to express them: "Why is
+all this evil befallen us? Hath not Jehovah cast us off and delivered us
+into the hand of Midian?" Unconstrainedly, plainly as man to man Gideon
+speaks, the burdensome thought of his people's misery overcoming the
+strangeness of the fact that in a God-forsaken land any one should care
+to speak of things like these. Yet momentarily as the conversation
+proceeds there grows in Gideon's soul a feeling of awe, a new and
+penetrating idea. The look fastened upon him conveys beside the human
+strain of will a suggestion of highest authority; the words, "Go in this
+thy might and save Israel, have not I sent thee?" kindle in his heart a
+vivid faith. Laid hold of, lifted above himself, the young man is made
+aware at last of the Living God, His presence, His will. Jehovah's
+representative has done his mediatorial work. Gideon desires a sign; but
+his wish is a note of habitual caution, not of disbelief, and in the
+sacrifice he finds what he needs.
+
+Now, why insist as some do on that which is not affirmed in the text?
+The form of the narrative must be interpreted: and it does not require
+us to suppose that Jehovah Himself, incarnate, speaking human words, is
+upon the scene. The call is from Him, and indeed Gideon has already a
+prepared heart, or he would not listen to the messenger. But seven times
+in the brief story the word _Malakh_ marks a commissioned servant as
+clearly as the other word Jehovah marks the Divine will and revelation.
+After the man of God has vanished from the hill swiftly, strangely,
+in the manner of his coming, Gideon remains alive to Jehovah's
+immediate presence and voice as he never was before. Humble and
+shrinking--"forasmuch as I have seen the angel of the Lord face to
+face"--he yet hears the Divine benediction fall from the sky, and
+following that a fresh and immediate summons. Whether from the
+tabernacle at Shiloh an acknowledged prophet came to the brooding
+Abiezrite, or the visitor was one who concealed his own name and haunt
+that Jehovah might be the more impressively recognised, it matters not.
+The angel of the Lord made Gideon thrill with a call to highest duty,
+opened his ears to heavenly voices and then left him. After this he felt
+God to be with himself.
+
+"The Lord looked upon Gideon and said, Go in this thy might and save
+Israel from the hand of Midian: have not I sent thee?" It was a summons
+to stern and anxious work, and the young man could not be sanguine. He
+had considered and re-considered the state of things so long, he had so
+often sought a way of liberating his people and found none that he
+needed a clear indication how the effort was to be made. Would the
+tribes follow him, the youngest of an obscure family in Manasseh? And
+how was he to stir, how to gather the people? He builds an altar,
+Jehovah-shalom; he enters into covenant with the Eternal in high and
+earnest resolution, and with a sudden flash of prophet sight he sees the
+first thing to do. Baal's altar in the high place of Ophrah must be
+overthrown. Thereafter it will be known what faith and courage are to be
+found in Israel.
+
+It is the call of God that ripens a life into power, resolve,
+fruitfulness--the call and the response to it. Continually the Bible
+urges upon us this great truth, that through the keen sense of a close
+personal relation to God and of duty owing to Him the soul grows and
+comes to its own. Our human personality is created in that way and in no
+other. There are indeed lives which are not so inspired and yet appear
+strong; an ingenious resolute selfishness gives them momentum. But this
+individuality is akin to that of ape or tiger; it is a part of the
+earth-force in yielding to which a man forfeits his proper being and
+dignity. Look at Napoleon, the supreme example in history of this
+failure. A great genius, a striking character? Only in the carnal
+region, for human personality is moral, spiritual, and the most
+triumphant cunning does not make a man; while on the other hand from a
+very moderate endowment put to the glorious usury of God's service will
+grow a soul clear, brave and firm, precious in the ranks of life. Let a
+human being, however ignorant and low, hear and answer the Divine
+summons and in that place a man appears, one who stands related to the
+source of strength and light. And when a man roused by such a call feels
+responsibility for his country, for religion, the hero is astir.
+Something will be done for which mankind waits.
+
+But heroism is rare. We do not often commune with God nor listen with
+eager souls for His word. The world is always in need of men, but few
+appear. The usual is worshipped; the pleasure and profit of the day
+occupy us; even the sight of the cross does not rouse the heart. Speak,
+Heavenly Word! and quicken our clay. Let the thunders of Sinai be heard
+again, and then the still small voice that penetrates the soul. So shall
+heroism be born and duty done, and the dead shall live.
+
+
+
+
+XI.
+
+_GIDEON, ICONOCLAST AND REFORMER._
+
+JUDGES vi. 15-32.
+
+
+"The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valour:"--so has the
+prophetic salutation come to the young man at the threshing-floor of
+Ophrah. It is a personal greeting and call--"with thee"--just what a man
+needs in the circumstances of Gideon. There is a nation to be saved, and
+a human leader must act for Jehovah. Is Gideon fit for so great a task?
+A wise humility, a natural fear have held him under the yoke of daily
+toil until this hour. Now the needed signs are given; his heart leaps up
+in the pulses of a longing which God approves and blesses. The criticism
+of kinsfolk, the suspicious carping of neighbours, the easily affronted
+pride of greater families no longer crush patriotic desire and overbear
+yearning faith. The Lord is with thee, Gideon, youngest son of Joash,
+the toiler in obscure fields. Go in this thy might; be strong in
+Jehovah.
+
+But the assurance must widen if it is to satisfy. With me--that is a
+great thing for Gideon; that gives him free air to breathe and strength
+to use the sword. But can it be true? Can God be with one only in the
+land? He seems to have forsaken Israel and sold His people to the
+oppressor. Unless He returns to all in forgiveness and grace nothing
+can be done; a renewal of the nation is the first thing, and this Gideon
+desires. Comfort for himself, freedom from Midianite vexation for
+himself and his father's house would be no satisfaction if, all around,
+he saw Israel still crushed under heathen hordes. To have a hand in
+delivering his people from danger and sorrow is Gideon's craving. The
+assurance given to himself personally is welcome because in it there is
+a sound as of the beginning of Israel's redemption. Yet "if the LORD be
+with us, why then is all this befallen us?" God cannot be with the
+tribes, for they are harassed and spoiled by enemies, they lie prone
+before the altars of Baal.
+
+There is here an example of largeness in heart and mind which we ought
+not to miss, especially because it sets before us a principle often
+unrecognised. It is clear enough that Gideon could not enjoy freedom
+unless his country was free, for no man can be safe in an enslaved land;
+but many fail to see that spiritual redemption in like manner cannot be
+enjoyed by one unless others are moving towards the light. Truly
+salvation is personal at first and personal at last; but it is never an
+individual affair only. Each for himself must hear and answer the Divine
+call to repentance; each as a moral unit must enter the strait gate,
+press along the narrow way of life, agonize and overcome. But the
+redemption of one soul is part of a vast redeeming purpose, and the
+fibres of each life are interwoven with those of other lives far and
+wide. Spiritual brotherhood is a fact but faintly typified by the
+brotherhood of the Hebrews, and the struggling soul to-day, like
+Gideon's long ago, must know God as the Saviour of all men before a
+personal hope can be enjoyed worth the having. As Gideon showed himself
+to have the Lord with him by a question charged not with individual
+anxiety but with keen interest in the nation, so a man now is seen to
+have the Spirit of God as he exhibits a passion for the regeneration of
+the world. Salvation is enlargement of soul, devotion to God and to man
+for the sake of God. If anyone thinks he is saved while he bears no
+burdens for others, makes no steady effort to liberate souls from the
+tyranny of the false and the vile, he is in fatal error. The salvation
+of Christ plants always in men and women His mind, His law of life, Who
+is the Brother and Friend of all.
+
+And the church of Christ must be filled with His Spirit, animated by His
+law of life, or be unworthy the name. It exists to unite men in the
+quest and realization of highest thought and purest activity. The church
+truly exists for all men, not simply for those who appear to compose it.
+Salvation and peace are with the church as with the individual believer,
+but only as her heart is generous, her spirit simple and unselfish.
+Doubtful and distressed as Gideon was the church of Christ should never
+be, for to her has been whispered the secret that the Abiezrite had not
+read, how the Lord is in the oppression and pain of the people, in the
+sorrow and the cloud. Nor is a church to suppose that salvation can be
+hers while she thinks of any outside with the least touch of Pharisaism,
+denying their share in Christ. Better no visible church than one
+claiming exclusive possession of truth and grace; better no church at
+all than one using the name of Christ for privilege and excommunication,
+restricting the fellowship of life to its own enclosure.
+
+But with utmost generosity and humaneness goes the clear perception that
+God's service is the sternest of campaigns, beginning with resolute
+protest and decisive deed, and Gideon must rouse himself to strike for
+Israel's liberty first against the idol-worship of his own village.
+There stands the altar of Baal, the symbol of Israel's infidelity; there
+beside it the abominable Asherah, the sign of Israel's degradation.
+Already he has thought of demolishing these, but has never summoned
+courage, never seen that the result would justify him. For such a deed
+there is a time, and before the time comes the bravest man can only reap
+discomfiture. Now, with the warrant in his soul, the duty on his
+conscience, Gideon can make assault on a hateful superstition.
+
+The idolatrous altar and false worship of one's own clan, of one's own
+family--these need courage to overturn and, more than courage, a
+ripeness of time and a Divine call. A man must be sure of himself and
+his motives, for one thing, before he takes upon him to be the corrector
+of errors that have seemed truth to his fathers and are maintained by
+his friends. Suppose people are actually worshipping a false god, a
+world-power which has long held rule among them. If one would act the
+part of iconoclast the question is, By what right? Is he himself clear
+of illusion and idolatry? Has he a better system to put in place of the
+old? He may be acting in mere bravado and self-display, flourishing
+opinions which have less sincerity than those which he assails. There
+were men in Israel who had no commission and could have claimed no right
+to throw down Baal's altar, and taking upon them such a deed would have
+had short shrift at the hands of the people of Ophrah. And so there are
+plenty among us who if they set up to be judges of their fellow-men and
+of beliefs which they call false, even when these are false, deserve
+simply to be put down with a strong hand. There are voices, professing
+to be those of zealous reformers, whose every word and tone are insults.
+The men need to go and learn the first lessons of truth, modesty and
+earnestness. And this principle applies all round--to many who assail
+modern errors as well as to many who assail established beliefs. On the
+one hand, are men anxious to uphold the true faith? It is well. But
+anxiety and the best of motives do not qualify them to attack science,
+to denounce all rationalism as godless. We want defenders of the faith
+who have a Divine calling to the task in the way of long study and a
+heavenly fairness of mind, so that they shall not offend and hurt
+religion more by their ignorant vehemence than they help it by their
+zeal. On the other hand, by what authority do they speak who sneer at
+the ignorance of faith and would fain demolish the altars of the world?
+It is no slight equipment that is needed. Fluent sarcasm, confident
+worldliness, even a large acquaintance with the dogmas of science will
+not suffice. A man needs to prove himself a wise and humane thinker, he
+needs to know by experience and deep sympathy those perpetual wants of
+our race which Christ knew and met to the uttermost. Some facile
+admiration of Jesus of Nazareth does not give the right to free
+criticism of His life and words, or of the faith based upon them. And if
+the plea is a rare respect for truth, an unusual fidelity to fact,
+humanity will still ask of its would-be liberator on what fields he has
+won his rank or what yoke he has borne. Successful men especially will
+find it difficult to convince the world that they have a right to strike
+at the throne of Him who stood alone before the Roman Pilate and died on
+the Cross.
+
+Gideon was not unfit to render high service. He was a young man tried
+in humble duty and disciplined in common tasks, shrewd but not arrogant,
+a person of clear mind and a patriot. The people of the farm and a good
+many in Ophrah had learned to trust him and were prepared to follow when
+he struck out a new path. He had God's call and also his own past to
+help him. Hence when Gideon began his undertaking, although to attempt
+it in broad day would have been rash and he must act under cover of
+darkness, he soon found ten men to give their aid. No doubt he could in
+a manner command them, for they were his servants. Still a business of
+the kind he proposed was likely to rouse their superstitious fears, and
+he had to conquer these. It was also sure to involve the men in some
+risk, and he must have been able to give them confidence in the issue.
+This he did, however, and they went forth. Very quietly the altar of
+Baal was demolished and the great wooden mast, hateful symbol of
+Astarte, was cut down and split in pieces. Such was the first act in the
+revolution.
+
+We observe, however, that Gideon does not leave Ophrah without an altar
+and a sacrifice. Destroy one system without laying the foundation of
+another that shall more than equal it in essential truth and practical
+power, and what sort of deliverance have you effected? Men will rightly
+execrate you. It is no reformation that leaves the heart colder, the
+life barer and darker than before; and those who move in the night
+against superstition must be able to speak in the day of a Living God
+who will vindicate His servants. It has been said over and over again
+and must yet be repeated, to overturn merely is no service. They that
+break down need some vision at least of a building up, and it is the new
+edifice that is the chief thing. The world of thought to-day is
+infested with critics and destroyers and may well be tired of them. It
+is too much in need of constructors to have any thanks to spare for new
+Voltaires and Humes. Let us admit that demolition is the necessity of
+some hours. We look back on the ruins of Bastilles and temples that
+served the uses of tyranny, and even in the domain of faith there have
+been fortresses to throw down and ramparts that made evil separations
+among men. But destruction is not progress; and if the end of modern
+thought is to be agnosticism, the denial of all faith and all ideals,
+then we are simply on the way to something not a whit better than
+primeval ignorance.
+
+The morning sun showed the gap upon the hill where the symbols had stood
+of Baal and Astarte, and soon like an angry swarm of bees the people
+were buzzing round the scattered stones of the old altar and the rough
+new pile with its smoking sacrifice. Where was he who ventured to rebuke
+the city? Very indignant, very pious are these false Israelites. They
+turn on Joash with the fierce demand, "Bring out thy son that he may
+die." But the father too has come to a decision. We get a hint of the
+same nature as Gideon's, slow, but firm when once roused; and if
+anything would rouse a man it would be this brutal passion, this sudden
+outbreak of cruelty nursed by heathen custom, his own conscience
+meanwhile testifying that Gideon was right. Tush! says Joash, will you
+plead for Baal? Will you save him? Is it necessary for you to defend one
+whom you have worshipped as Lord of heaven? Let him ply his lightnings
+if he has any. I am tired of this Baal who has no principles and is good
+only for feast-days. He that pleads for Baal, let him be the man to
+die.--Unexpected apology, serious too and unanswerable. Conscience that
+seemed dead is suddenly awakened and carries all before it. There is a
+quick conversion of the whole town because one man has acted decisively
+and another speaks strong words which cannot be gainsaid. To be sure
+Joash uses a threat--hints something of taking a very short method with
+those who still protest for Baal; and that helps conversion. But it is
+force against force, and men cannot object who have themselves talked of
+killing. By a rapid popular impulse Gideon is justified, and with the
+new name Jerubbaal he is acknowledged as a leader in Manasseh.
+
+False religion is not always so easily exposed and upset. Truth may be
+so mixed with the error of a system that the moral sense is confused and
+faith clings to the follies and lies conjoined with the truth. And when
+we look at Judaism in contact with Christianity, at Romanism in contact
+with the Protestant spirit, we see how difficult it may be to liberate
+faith. The Apostle Paul wielding the weapon of a singular and keen
+eloquence cannot overcome the Pharisaism of his countrymen. At Antioch,
+at Iconium he does his utmost with scant success. The Protestant
+reformation did not so swiftly and thoroughly establish itself in every
+European country as in Scotland. Where there is no pressure of outward
+circumstances forcing new religious ideas upon men there must be all the
+more a spirit of independent thought if any salutary change is to be
+made in creed and worship. Either there must be men of Berea who search
+the Scriptures daily, men of Zurich and Berne with the energy of free
+citizens, or reformation must wait on some political emergency. And in
+effect conscience rarely has free play, since men are seldom manly but
+more or less like sheep. Hence the value, as things go in this world, of
+leaders like Joash, princes like Luther's Elector, who give the
+necessary push to the undecided and check forward opponents by a
+significant warning. It is not the ideal way of reforming the world, but
+it has often answered well enough within limits. There are also cases in
+which the threats of the enemy have done good service, as when the
+appearance of the Spanish Armada on the English coast did more to
+confirm the Protestantism of the country than many years of peaceful
+argument. In truth were there not occasionally something like
+master-strokes in Providence the progress of humanity would be almost
+imperceptible. Men and nations are urged on although they have no great
+desire to advance; they are committed to a voyage and cannot return;
+they are caught in currents and must go where the currents bear them.
+Certainly in such cases there is not the ardour, and men cannot reap the
+reward belonging to the thinkers and brave servants of the truth.
+Practically whether Protestants or Romanists they are spiritually inert.
+Still it is well for them, well for the world, that a strong hand should
+urge them forward, since otherwise they would not move at all. Of many
+in all churches it must be said they are not victors in a fight of
+faith, they do not work out their own salvation. Yet they are guided,
+warned, persuaded into a certain habit of piety and understanding of
+truth, and their children have a new platform somewhat higher than their
+fathers' on which to begin life.
+
+At Ophrah of the Abiezrites, though we cannot say much for the nature of
+the faith in God which has replaced idolatry, still the way is prepared
+for further and decisive action. Men do not cease from worshipping Baal
+and become true servants of the Most Holy in a single day; that requires
+time. There are better possibilities, but Gideon cannot teach the way of
+Jehovah, nor is he in the mood for religious inquiry. The conversion of
+Abiezer is quite of the same sort as in early Christian times was
+effected when a king went over to the new faith and ordered his subjects
+to be baptized. Not even Gideon knows the value of the faith to which
+the people have returned, in the strength of which they are to fight.
+They will be bold now, for even a little trust in God goes a long way in
+sustaining courage. They will face the enemy now to whom they have long
+submitted. But of the purity and righteousness into which the faith of
+Jehovah should lead them they have no vision.
+
+Now with this in view many will think it strange to hear of the
+conversion of Abiezer. It is a great error however to despise the day of
+small things. God gives it and we ought to understand its use.
+Conversion cannot possibly mean the same in every period of the world's
+history; it cannot even mean the same in any two cases. To recognise
+this would be to clear the ground of much that hinders the teaching and
+the success of the gospel. Where there has been long familiarity with
+the New Testament, the facts of Christianity and the high spiritual
+ideas it presents, conversion properly speaking does not take place till
+the message of Christ to the soul stirs it to its depths, moves alike
+the reason and the will and creates fervent discipleship. But the
+history of Israel and of humanity moves forward continuously in
+successive discoveries or revelations of the highest culminating in the
+Christian salvation. To view Gideon as a religious reformer of the same
+kind as Isaiah is quite a mistake. He had scarcely an idea in common
+with the great prophet of a later day. But the liberty he desired for
+his people and the association of liberty with the worship of Jehovah
+made his revolution a step in the march of Israel's redemption. Those
+who joined him with any clear purpose and sympathy were therefore
+converted men in a true if very limited sense. There must be first the
+blade and then the ear before there can be the full corn. We reckon
+Gideon a hero of faith, and his hope was truly in the same God Whom we
+worship--the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Yet his faith
+could not be on a level with ours, his knowledge being far less. The
+angel who speaks to him, the altar he builds, the Spirit of the Lord
+that comes upon him, his daring iconoclasm, the new purpose and power of
+the man are in a range quite above material life--and that is enough.
+
+There are some circles in which honesty and truth-speaking are evidence
+of a work of grace. To become honest and to speak truth in the fear of
+God is to be converted, in a sense, where things are at that pass. There
+are people who are so cold that among them enthusiasm for anything good
+may be called superhuman. Nobody has it. If it appears it must come from
+above. But these steps of progress, though we may describe them as
+supernatural, are elementary. Men have to be converted again and again,
+ever making one gain a step to another. The great advance comes when the
+soul believes enthusiastically in Christ, pledging itself to Him in full
+sight of the cross. This and nothing less is the conversion we need. To
+love freedom, righteousness, charity only prepares for the supreme love
+of God in Christ, in which life springs to its highest power and joy.
+
+Now are we to suppose that Gideon alone of all the men of Israel had the
+needful spirit and faith to lead the revolution? Was there no one but
+the son of Joash? We do not find him fully equipped, nor as the years go
+by does he prove altogether worthy to be chief of the tribes of God.
+Were there not in many Hebrew towns souls perhaps more ardent, more
+spiritual than his, needing only the prophetic call, the touch of the
+Unseen Hand to make them aware of power and opportunity? The leadership
+of such a one as Moses is complete and unquestionable. He is the man of
+the age; knowledge, circumstances, genius fit him for the place he has
+to occupy. We cannot imagine a second Moses in the same period. But in
+Israel as well as among other peoples it is often a very imperfect hero
+who is found and followed. The work is done, but not so well done as we
+might think possible. Revolutions which begin full of promise lose their
+spirit because the leader reveals his weakness or even folly. We feel
+sure that there are many who have the power to lead in thought where the
+world has not dreamt of climbing, to make a clear road where as yet
+there is no path; and yet to them comes no messenger, the daily task
+goes on and it is not supposed that a leader, a prophet is passed by.
+Are there no better men that Ehud, Gideon, Jephthah must stand in the
+front?
+
+One answer certainly is that the nation at the stage it has reached
+cannot as a whole esteem a better man, cannot understand finer ideas. A
+hundred men of more spiritual faith were possibly brooding over Israel's
+state, ready to act as fearlessly as Gideon and to a higher issue. But
+it could only have been after a cleansing of the nation's life, a
+suppression of Baal-worship much more rigorous than could at that time
+be effected. And in every national crisis the thought of which the
+people generally are capable determines who must lead and what kind of
+work shall be done. The reformer before his time either remains unknown
+or ends in eclipse; either he gains no power or it passes rapidly from
+him because it has no support in popular intelligence or faith.
+
+It may seem well-nigh impossible in our day for any man to fail of the
+work he can do; if he has the will we think he can make the way. The
+inward call is the necessity, and when that is heard and the man shapes
+a task for himself the day to begin will come. Is that certain? Perhaps
+there are many now who find circumstance a web from which they cannot
+break away without arrogance and unfaithfulness. They could speak, they
+could do if God called them; but does He call them? On every side ring
+the fluent praises of the idols men love to worship. One must indeed be
+deft in speech and many other arts who would hope to turn the crowd from
+its folly, for it will only listen to what seizes the ear, and the
+obscure thinker has not the secret of pleasing. While those who see no
+visions lead their thousands to a trivial victory, many an uncalled
+Gideon toils on in the threshing-floor. The duties of a low and narrow
+lot may hold a man; the babble all around of popular voices may be so
+loud that nothing can make way against them. A certain slowness of the
+humble and patient spirit may keep one silent who with little
+encouragement could speak words of quickening truth. But the day of
+utterance never comes.
+
+To these waiting in the market-place it is comparatively a small thing
+that the world will not hire them. But does the church not want them?
+Where God is named and professedly honoured, can it be that the smooth
+message is preferred because it is smooth? Can it be that in the church
+men shrink from instead of seeking the highest, most real and vital word
+that can be said to them? This is what oppresses, for it seems to imply
+that God has no use in His vineyard for a man when He lets him wait long
+unregarded, it seems to mean that there is no end for the wistful hope
+and the words that burn unspoken in the breast. The unrecognized thinker
+has indeed to trust God largely. He has often to be content with the
+assurance that what he would say but cannot as yet shall be said in good
+time, that what he would do but may not shall be done by a stronger
+hand. And further, he may cherish a faith for himself. No life can
+remain for ever unfruitful, or fruitful only in its lower capacities.
+Purposes broken off here shall find fulfilment. Where the highways of
+being reach beyond the visible horizon leaders will be needed for the
+yet advancing host, and the time of every soul shall come to do the
+utmost that is in it. The day of perfect service for many of God's
+chosen ones will begin where beyond these shadows there is light and
+space. Were it not so, some of the best lives would disappear in the
+darkest cloud.
+
+
+
+
+XII.
+
+"_THE PEOPLE ARE YET TOO MANY._"
+
+JUDGES vi. 33-vii. 7.
+
+
+Another day of hope and energy has dawned. One hillside at least rises
+sunlit out of darkness with the altar of Jehovah on its summit and
+holier sacrifices smoking there than Israel has offered for many a year.
+Let us see what elements of promise, what elements of danger or possible
+error mingle with the situation. There is a man to take the lead, a
+young man, thoughtful, bold, energetic, aware of a Divine call and
+therefore of some endowment for the task to be done. Gideon believes
+Jehovah to be Israel's God and Friend, Israel to be Jehovah's people. He
+has faith in the power of the Unseen Helper. Baal is nothing, a mere
+name--Bosheth, vanity. Jehovah is a certainty; and what He wills shall
+come about. So far strength, confidence. But of himself and the people
+Gideon is not sure. His own ability to gather and command an army, the
+fitness of any army the tribes can supply to contend with Midian, these
+are as yet unproved. Only one fact stands clear, Jehovah the supreme God
+with Whom are all powers and influences. The rest is in shadow. For one
+thing, Gideon cannot trace the connection between the Most High and
+himself, between the Power that controls the world and the power that
+dwells in his own will or the hearts of other men. Yet with the first
+message a sign has been given, and other tokens may be sought as events
+move on. With that measure of uncertainty which keeps a man humble and
+makes him ponder his steps Gideon finds himself acknowledged leader in
+Manasseh and a centre of growing enthusiasm throughout the northern
+tribes.
+
+For the people generally this at least may be said, that they have
+wisdom enough to recognize the man of aptitude and courage though he
+belongs to one of the humblest families and is the least in his father's
+household. Drowning men indeed must take the help that is offered, and
+Israel is at present almost in the condition of a drowning man. A little
+more and it will sink under the wave of the Midianite invasion. It is
+not a time to ask of the rank of a man who has character for the
+emergency. And yet, so often is the hero unacknowledged, especially when
+he begins, as Gideon did, with a religious stroke, that some credit must
+be given to the people for their ready faith. As the flame goes up from
+the altar at Ophrah men feel a flash of hope and promise. They turn to
+the Abiezrite in trust and through him begin to trust God again. Yes:
+there is a reformation of a sort, and an honest man is at the head of
+it. So far the signs of the time are good.
+
+Then the old enthusiasm is not dead. Almost Israel had submitted, but
+again its spirit is rising. The traditions of Deborah and Barak, of
+Joshua, of Moses, of the desert march and victories linger with those
+who are hiding amongst the caves and rocks. Songs of liberty, promises
+of power are still theirs; they feel that they should be free. Canaan is
+Jehovah's gift to them and they will claim it. So far as reviving human
+energy and confidence avail, there is a germ out of which the proper
+life of the people of God may spring afresh. And it is this that Gideon
+as a reformer must nourish, for the leader depends at every stage on the
+desires that have been kindled in the hearts of men. While he goes
+before them in thought and plan he can only go prosperously where they
+intelligently, heartily will follow. Opportunism is the base lagging
+behind with popular coldness, as moderatism in religion is. The reformer
+does not wait a moment when he sees an aspiration he can guide, a spark
+of faith that can be fanned into flame. But neither in church nor state
+can one man make a conquering movement. And so we see the vast extent of
+duty and responsibility. That there may be no opportunism every citizen
+must be alive to the morality of politics. That there may be no
+moderatism every Christian must be alive to the real duty of the church.
+
+Now have the heads of families and the chief men in Israel been active
+in rallying the tribes? Or have the people waited on their chiefs and
+the chiefs coldly held back?
+
+There are good elements in the situation but others not so encouraging.
+The secular leaders have failed; and what are the priests and Levites
+doing? We hear nothing of them. Gideon has to assume the double office
+of priest and ruler. At Shiloh there is an altar. There too is the ark,
+and surely some holy observances are kept. Why does Gideon not lead the
+people to Shiloh and there renew the national covenant through the
+ministers of the tabernacle? He knows little of the moral law and the
+sanctities of worship; and he is not at this stage inclined to assume a
+function that is not properly his. Yet it is unmistakable that Ophrah
+has to be the religious centre. Ah! clearly there is opportunism among
+secular leaders and moderatism among the priests. And this suggests that
+Judah in the south, although the tabernacle is not in her territory, may
+have an ecclesiastical reason for holding aloof now, as in Deborah's
+time she kept apart. Simeon and Levi are brethren. Judah, the vanguard
+in the desert march, the leading tribe in the first assault on Canaan,
+has taken Simeon into close alliance. Has Levi also been almost
+absorbed? There are signs that it may have been so. The later supremacy
+of Judah in religion requires early and deep root; and we have also to
+explain the separation between north and south already evident, which
+was but half overcome by David's kingship and reappeared before the end
+of Solomon's reign. It is very significant to read in the closing
+chapters of Judges of two Levites both of whom were connected with
+Judah. The Levites were certainly respected through the whole land, but
+their absence from all the incidents of the period of Deborah, Gideon,
+Abimelech and Jephthah compels the supposition that they had most
+affinity with Judah and Simeon in the south. We know how people can be
+divided by ecclesiasticism; and there is at least some reason to suspect
+that while the northern tribes were suffering and fighting Judah went
+her own way enjoying peace and organizing worship.
+
+Such then is the state of matters so far as the tribes are concerned at
+the time when Gideon sounds the trumpet in Abiezer and sends messengers
+throughout Manasseh, Zebulun, Asher and Naphtali. The tribes are partly
+prepared for conflict, but they are weak and still disunited. The muster
+of fighting men who gather at the call of Gideon is considerable and
+perhaps astonishes him. But the Midianites are in enormous numbers in
+the plain of Jezreel between Moreh and Gilboa, having drawn together
+from their marauding expeditions at the first hint of a rising among the
+Hebrews. And now as the chief reviews his troops his early apprehension
+returns. It is with something like dismay that he passes from band to
+band. Ill-disciplined, ill-assorted these men do not bear the air of
+coming triumph. Gideon has too keen sight to be misled by tokens of
+personal popularity; nor can he estimate success by numbers. Looking
+closely into the faces of the men he sees marks enough of hesitancy,
+tokens even of fear. Many seem as if they had gathered like sheep to the
+slaughter, not as lions ready to dash on the prey. Assurance of victory
+he cannot find in his army; he must seek it elsewhere.
+
+It is well that multitudes gather to the church to-day for worship and
+enter themselves as members. But to reckon all such as an army
+contending with infidelity and wickedness--that would indeed be a
+mistake. The mere tale of numbers gives no estimation of strength,
+fighting strength, strength to resist and to suffer. It is needful
+clearly to distinguish between those who may be called captives of the
+church or vassals simply, rendering a certain respect, and those others,
+often a very few and perhaps the least regarded, who really fight the
+battles. Our reckoning at present is often misleading so that we occupy
+ground which we cannot defend. We attempt to assail infidelity with an
+ill-disciplined host, many of whom have no clear faith, and to overcome
+worldliness by the co-operation of those who are more than half-absorbed
+in the pastimes and follies of the world. There is need to look back to
+Gideon who knew what it was to fight. While we are thankful to have so
+many connected with the church for their own good we must not suppose
+that they represent aggressive strength; on the contrary we must clearly
+understand that they will require no small part of the available time
+and energy of the earnest. In short we have to count them not as helpers
+of the church's forward movement but as those who must be helped.
+
+Gideon for his work will have to make sharp division. Three hundred who
+can dash fearlessly on the enemy will be more to his purpose than
+two-and-thirty thousand most of whom grow pale at the thought of battle,
+and he will separate by-and-by. But first he seeks another sign of
+Jehovah. This man knows that to do anything worthy for his fellow-men he
+must be in living touch with God. The idea has no more than elementary
+form; but it rules. He, Gideon, is only an instrument, and he must be
+well convinced that God is working through him. How can he be sure? Like
+other Israelites he is strongly persuaded that God appears and speaks to
+men through nature; and he craves a sign in the natural world which is
+of God's making and upholding. Now to us the sign Gideon asked may
+appear rude, uncouth and without any moral significance. A fleece which
+is to be wet one morning while the threshing-floor is dry, and dry next
+morning while the threshing-floor is wet supplies the means of testing
+the Divine presence and approval. Further it may be alleged that the
+phenomena admit of natural explanation. But this is the meaning. Gideon
+providing the fleece identifies himself with it. It is his fleece, and
+if God's dew drenches it that will imply that God's power shall enter
+Gideon's soul and abide in it even though Israel be dry as the dusty
+floor. The thought is at once simple and profound, child-like and
+Hebrew-like, and carefully we must observe that it is a nature sign,
+not a mere portent, Gideon looks for. It is not whether God can do a
+certain seemingly impossible thing. That would not help Gideon. But the
+dew represents to his mind the vigour he needs, the vigour Israel needs
+if he should fail; and in reversing the sign, "Let the dew be on the
+ground and the fleece be dry," he seems to provide a hope even in
+prospect of his own failure or death. Gideon's appeal is for a
+revelation of the Divine in the same sphere as the lightning storm and
+rain in which Deborah found a triumphant proof of Jehovah's presence;
+yet there is a notable contrast. We are reminded of the "still small
+voice" Elijah heard as he stood in the cave-mouth after the rending wind
+and the earthquake and the lightning. We remember also the image of
+Hosea, "I will be as the dew unto Israel." There is a question in the
+Book of Job, "Hath the rain a father? or who hath begotten the drops of
+dew?" The faith of Gideon makes answer, "Thou, O Most High, dost give
+the dews of heaven." The silent distillation of the dew is profoundly
+symbolic of the spiritual economy and those energies that are "not of
+this noisy world but silent and Divine." There is much of interest and
+meaning that lies thus beneath the surface in the story of the fleece.
+
+Assured that yet another step in advance may be taken, Gideon leads his
+forces northward and goes into camp beside the spring of Harod on the
+slope of Gilboa. Then he does what seems a strange thing for a general
+on the eve of battle. The army is large but utterly insufficient in
+discipline and morale for a pitched battle with the Midianites. Men who
+have hastily snatched their fathers' swords and pikes of which they are
+half afraid are not to be relied upon in the heat of a terrible
+struggle. Proclamation is therefore made that those who are fearful and
+trembling shall return to their homes. From the entrenchment of Israel
+on the hillside, where the name Jalid or Gilead still survives, the
+great camp of the desert people could be seen, the black tents darkening
+all the valley toward the slope of Moreh a few miles away. The sight was
+enough to appal even the bold. Men thought of their families and
+homesteads. Those who had anything to lose began to re-consider and by
+morning only one-third of the Hebrew army was left with the leader. So
+perhaps it would be with thousands of Christians if the church were
+again called to share the reproach of Christ and resist unto blood.
+Under the banner of a popular Christianity many march to stirring music
+who if they supposed struggle to be imminent would be tempted to leave
+the ranks. Yet the fight is actually going on. Camp is set against camp,
+army is mingled with army; at the front there is hot work and many are
+falling. But in the rear it would seem to be a holiday; men are idling,
+gossiping, chaffering as though they had come out for amusement or
+trade, not at all like those who have pledged life in a great cause and
+have everything to win or lose. And again, in the thick of the strife,
+where courage and energy are strained to the utmost, we look round and
+ask whether the fearful have indeed withdrawn, for the suspicion is
+forced upon us that many who call themselves Christ's are on the other
+side. Did not some of those who are striking at us lift their hands
+yesterday in allegiance to the great Captain? Do we not see some who
+have marched with us holding the very position we are to take, bearing
+the very standards we must capture? Strangely confused is the field of
+battle, and hard is it to distinguish friends from foes. If the fearful
+would retire we should know better how we stand. If the enemy were all
+of Midian the issue would be clear. But fearful and faint-hearted
+Israelites who may be found any time actually contending against the
+faith are foes of a kind unknown in simpler days. So frequently does
+something of this sort happen that every Christian has need to ask
+himself whether he is clear of the offence. Has he ever helped to make
+the false world strong against the true, the proud world strong against
+the meek? Many of those who are doubtful and go home may sooner be
+pardoned than he who strikes only where a certain false _�clat_ is to be
+won.
+
+  "Just for a handful of silver he left us,
+    Just for a riband to stick in his coat--
+  Found the one gift of which fortune bereft us,
+    Lost all the others she lets us devote....
+  We shall march prospering--not thro' his presence;
+    Songs may inspirit us--not from his lyre;
+  Deeds will be done--while he boasts his quiescence,
+    Still bidding crouch whom the rest bade aspire."
+
+In the same line of thought lies another reflection. The men who had
+hastily snatched their fathers' swords and pikes of which they were half
+afraid represent to us certain modern defenders of Christianity--those
+who carry edged weapons of inherited doctrine with which they dare not
+strike home. The great battle-axes of reprobation, of eternal judgment,
+of Divine severity against sin once wielded by strong hands, how they
+tremble and swerve in the grasp of many a modern dialectician. The sword
+of the old creed, that once like Excalibur cleft helmets and
+breastplates through, how often it maims the hands that try to use it
+but want alike the strength and the cunning. Too often we see a
+wavering blow struck that draws not a drop of blood nor even dints a
+shield, and the next thing is that the knight has run to cover behind
+some old bulwark long riddled and dilapidated. In the hands of these
+unskilled fighters too well armed for their strength the battle is worse
+than lost. They become a laughingstock to the enemy, an irritation to
+their own side. It is time there was a sifting among the defenders of
+the faith and twenty and two thousand went back from Gilead. Is the
+truth of God become mere tin or lead that no new sword can be fashioned
+from it, no blade of Damascus firm and keen? Are there no gospel
+armourers fit for the task? Where the doctrinal contest is maintained by
+men who are not to the depth of their souls sure of the creeds they
+found on, by men who have no vision of the severity of God and the
+meaning of redemption, it ends only in confusion to themselves and those
+who are with them.
+
+Ten thousand Israelites remain who according to their own judgment are
+brave enough and prepared for the fight; but the purpose of the
+commander is not answered yet. He is resolved to have yet another
+winnowing that shall leave only the men of temper like his own, men of
+quick intelligence no less than zeal. At the foot of the hill there
+flows a stream of water, and towards it Gideon leads his diminished army
+as if at once to cross and attack the enemy in camp. Will they seize his
+plan and like one man act upon it? Only on those who do can he depend.
+It is an effective trial. With the hot work of fighting before them the
+water is needful to all, but in the way of drinking men show their
+spirit. The most kneel or lie down by the edge of the brook that by
+putting their lips to the water they may take a long and leisurely
+draught. A few supply themselves in quite another way. As a dog whose
+master is passing on with rapid strides, coming to a pool or stream by
+the way stops a moment to lap a few mouthfuls of water and then is off
+again to his master's side, so do these--three hundred of the ten
+thousand--bending swiftly down carry water to their mouths in the hollow
+of the hand. Full of the day's business they move on again before the
+nine thousand seven hundred have well begun to drink. They separate
+themselves and are by Gideon's side, beyond the stream, a chosen band
+proved fit for the work that is to be done. It is no haphazard division
+that is made by the test of the stream. There is wisdom in it,
+inspiration. "And the Lord said unto Gideon, By the three hundred men
+that lapped will I save you and deliver the Midianites into thine hand."
+
+Many are the commonplace incidents, the seemingly small points in life
+that test the quality of men. Every day we are led to the stream-side to
+show what we are, whether eager in the Divine enterprise of faith or
+slack and self-considering. Take any company of men and women who claim
+to be on the side of Christ, engaged and bound in all seriousness to His
+service. But how many have it clearly before them that they must not
+entangle themselves more than is absolutely needful with bodily and
+sensuous cravings, that they must not lie down to drink from the stream
+of pleasure and amusement? We show our spiritual state by the way in
+which we spend our leisure, our Saturday afternoons, our Sabbaths. We
+show whether we are fit for God's business by our use of the flowing
+stream of literature, which to some is an opiate, to others a pure and
+strengthening draught. The question simply is whether we are so engaged
+with God's plan for our life, in comprehending it, fulfilling it, that
+we have no time to dawdle and no disposition for the merely casual and
+trifling. Are we in the responsible use of our powers occupied as that
+Athenian was in the service of his country of whom it is recorded:
+"There was in the whole city but one street in which Pericles was ever
+seen, the street which led to the market-place and the council-house.
+During the whole period of his administration he never dined at the
+table of a friend"? Let no one say there is not time in a world like
+this for social intercourse, for literary and scientific pursuits or the
+practice of the arts. The plan of God for men means life in all possible
+fulness and entrance into every field in which power can be gained. His
+will for us is that we should give to the world as Christ gave in free
+and uplifting ministry, and as a man can only give what he has first
+made his own the Christian is called to self-culture as full as the
+other duties of life will permit. He cannot explore too much, he cannot
+be too well versed in the thoughts and doings of men and the revelations
+of nature, for all he learns is to find high use. But the aim of
+personal enlargement and efficiency must never be forgotten, that aim
+which alone makes the self of value and gives it real life--the service
+and glory of God. Only in view of this aim is culture worth anything.
+And when in the providence of God there comes a call which requires us
+to pass with resolute step beyond every stream at which the mind and
+taste are stimulated that we may throw ourselves into the hard fight
+against evil there is to be no hesitation. Everything must yield now.
+The comparatively small handful who press on with concentrated purpose,
+making God's call and His work first and all else even their own needs
+a secondary affair--to these will be the honour and the joy of victory.
+
+We live in a time when people are piling up object after object that
+needs attention and entering into engagement after engagement that comes
+between them and the supreme duty of existence. They form so many
+acquaintances that every spare hour goes in visiting and receiving
+visits: yet the end of life is not talk. They are members of so many
+societies that they scarcely get at the work for which the societies
+exist: yet the end of life is not organizing. They see so many books,
+hear so much news and criticism that truth escapes them altogether: yet
+the end of life is to know and do the Truth. Civilization defeats its
+own use when it keeps us drinking so long at this and the other spring
+that we forget the battle. We mean to fight, we mean to do our part, but
+night falls while we are still occupied on the way. Yet our Master is
+one who restricted the earthly life to its simplest elements because
+only so could spiritual energy move freely to its mark.
+
+In the incidents we have been reviewing voluntary churches may find
+hints at least towards the justification of their principle. The idea of
+a national church is on more than one side intelligible and valid.
+Christianity stands related to the whole body of the people, bountiful
+even to those who scorn its laws, pleading on their behalf with God,
+keeping an open door and sending forth a perpetual call of love to the
+weak, the erring, the depraved. The ideal of a national church is to
+represent this universal office and realize this inclusiveness of the
+Christian religion; and the charm is great. On the other hand a
+voluntary church is the recognition of the fact that while Christ stands
+related to all men it is those only who engage at expense to themselves
+in the labour of the gospel who can be called believers, and that these
+properly constitute the church. The Hebrew people under the theocracy
+may represent the one ideal; Gideon's sifting of his army points to the
+other; neither, it must be frankly confessed, has ever been realized.
+Large numbers may join with some intelligence in worship and avail
+themselves of the sacraments who have no sense of obligation as members
+of the kingdom and are scarcely touched by the teaching of Christianity
+as to sin and salvation. A separated community again, depending on an
+enthusiasm which too often fails, rarely if ever accomplishes its hope.
+It aims at exhibiting an active and daring faith, the militancy, the
+urgency of the gospel, and in this mission what is counted success may
+be a hindrance and a snare. Numbers grow, wealth is acquired, but the
+intensity of belief is less than it was and the sacrifices still
+required are not freely made. Nevertheless is it not plain that a
+society which would represent the imperative claim of Christ to the
+undivided faith and loyalty of His followers must found upon a personal
+sense of obligation and personal eagerness? Is it not plain that a
+society which would represent the purity, the unearthliness, the rigour,
+we may even say, of Christ's doctrine, His life of renunciation and His
+cross must show a separateness from the careless world and move
+distinctly in advance of popular religious sentiment? Israel was God's
+people, yet when a leader went forth to a work of deliverance he had to
+sift out the few keen and devoted spirits. In truth every reformation
+implies a winnowing, and he does little as a teacher or a guide who does
+not make division among men.
+
+
+
+
+XIII.
+
+"_MIDIAN'S EVIL DAY._"
+
+JUDGES vii. 8-viii. 21.
+
+
+There is now with Gideon a select band of three hundred ready for a
+night attack on the Midianites. The leader has been guided to a singular
+and striking plan of action. It is however as he well knows a daring
+thing to begin assault upon the immense camp of Midian with so small a
+band, even though reserves of nearly ten thousand wait to join in the
+struggle; and we can easily see that the temper and spirit of the enemy
+were important considerations on the eve of so hazardous a battle. If
+the Midianites, Amalekites and Children of the East formed a united
+army, if they were prepared to resist, if they had posted sentinels on
+every side and were bold in prospect of the fight, it was necessary for
+Gideon to be well aware of the facts. On the other hand if there were
+symptoms of division in the tents of the enemy, if there were no
+adequate preparations, and especially if the spirit of doubt or fear had
+begun to show itself, these would be indications that Jehovah was
+preparing victory for the Hebrews.
+
+Gideon is led to inquire for himself into the condition of the
+Midianitish host. To learn that already his name kindles terror in the
+ranks of the enemy will dispel his lingering anxiety. "Jehovah said
+unto him ... Go thou with Purah thy servant down to the camp; and thou
+shalt hear what they say; and afterward shall thine hands be
+strengthened." The principle is that for those who are on God's side it
+is always best to know fully the nature of the opposition. The temper of
+the enemies of religion, those irregular troops of infidelity and
+unrighteousness with whom we have to contend, is an element of great
+importance in shaping the course of our Christian warfare. We hear of
+organised vice, of combinations great and resolute against which we have
+to do battle. Language is used which implies that the condition of the
+churches of Christ contrasts pitiably with the activity and agreement of
+those who follow the black banners of evil. A vague terror possesses
+many that in the conflict with vice they must face immense resources and
+a powerful confederacy. The far-stretching encampment of the Midianites
+is to all appearance organised for defence at every point, and while the
+servants of God are resolved to attack they are oppressed by the
+vastness of the enterprise. Impiety, sensuality, injustice may seem to
+be in close alliance with each other, on the best understanding,
+fortified by superhuman craft and malice, with their gods in their midst
+to help them. But let us go down to the host and listen, the state of
+things may be other than we have thought.
+
+Under cover of the night which made Midian seem more awful the Hebrew
+chief and his servant left the outpost on the slope of Gilboa and crept
+from shadow to shadow across the space which separated them from the
+enemy, vaguely seeking what quickly came. Lying in breathless silence
+behind some bush or wall the Hebrews heard one relating a dream to his
+fellow. "I dreamed," he said, "and, lo, a cake of barley bread tumbled
+into the camp of Midian and came unto a tent and smote it that it fell,
+and overturned it that it lay along." The thoughts of the day are
+reproduced in the visions of the night. Evidently this man has had his
+mind directed to the likelihood of attack, the possibility of defeat. It
+is well known that the Hebrews are gathering to try the issue of battle.
+They are indeed like a barley cake such as poor Arabs bake among
+ashes--a defeated famished people whose life has been almost drained
+away. But tidings have come of their return to Jehovah and traditions of
+His marvellous power are current among the desert tribes. A confused
+sense of all this has shaped the dream in which the tent of the chief
+appears prostrate and despoiled. Gideon and Purah listen intently, and
+what they hear further is even more unexpected and reassuring. The dream
+is interpreted: "This is nothing else save the sword of Gideon the son
+of Joash, a man of Israel; for into his hand God hath delivered Midian
+and all the host." He who reads the dream knows more than the other. He
+has the name of the Hebrew captain. He has heard of the Divine messenger
+who called Gideon to his task and assured him of victory. As for the
+apparent strength of the host of Midian, he has no confidence in it for
+he has felt the tremor that passes through the great camp. So, lying
+concealed, Gideon hears from his enemies themselves as from God the
+promise of victory, and full of worshipping joy hastens back to prepare
+for an immediate attack.
+
+Now in every combination of godless men there is a like feeling of
+insecurity, a like presage of disaster. Those who are in revolt against
+justice, truth and the religion of God have nothing on which to rest,
+no enduring bond of union. What do they conceive as the issue of their
+attempts and schemes? Have they anything in view that can give heart and
+courage; an end worth toil and hazard? It is impossible, for their
+efforts are all in the region of the false where the seeming realities
+are but shadows that perpetually change. Let it be allowed that to a
+certain extent common interests draw together men of no principle so
+that they can co-operate for a time. Yet each individual is secretly
+bent on his own pleasure or profit and there is nothing that can unite
+them constantly. One selfish and unjust person may be depended upon to
+conceive a lively antipathy to every other selfish and unjust person.
+Midian and Amalek have their differences with one another, and each has
+its own rival chiefs, rival families, full of the bitterest jealousy
+which at any moment may burst into flame. The whole combination is weak
+from the beginning, a mere horde of clashing desires incapable of
+harmony, incapable of a sustaining hope.
+
+In the course of our Lord's brief ministry the insecurity of those who
+opposed Him was often shown. The chief priests and scribes and lawyers
+whispered to each other the fears and anxieties He aroused. In the
+Sanhedrin the discussion about Him comes to the point, "What do we? For
+this man doeth many signs. If we let Him thus alone, all men will
+believe on Him: and the Romans will come and take away both our peace
+and our nation." The Pharisees say among themselves, "Perceive ye how ye
+prevail nothing? Behold the world is gone after Him." And what was the
+reason, what was the cause of this weakness? Intense devotion to the law
+and the institutions of religion animated those Israelites yet sufficed
+not to bind them together. Rival schools and claims honeycombed the
+whole social and ecclesiastical fabric. The pride of religious ancestry
+and a keenly cherished ambition could not maintain peace or hope; they
+were of no use against the calm authority of the Nazarene. Judaism was
+full of the bitterness of falsehood. The seeds of despair were in the
+minds of those who accused Christ, and the terrible harvest was reaped
+within a generation.
+
+Passing from this supreme evidence that the wrong can never be the
+strong, look at those ignorant and unhappy persons who combine against
+the laws of society. Their suspicions of each other are proverbial, and
+ever with them is the feeling that sooner or later they will be
+overtaken by the law. They dream of that and tell each other their
+dreams. The game of crime is played against well-known odds. Those who
+carry it on are aware that their haunts will be discovered, their gang
+broken up. A bribe will tempt one of their number and the rest will have
+to go their way to the cell or the gallows. Yet with the presage of
+defeat wrought into the very constitution of the mind and with
+innumerable proofs that it is no delusion, there are always those
+amongst us who attempt what even in this world is so hazardous and in
+the larger sweep of moral economy is impossible. In selfishness, in
+oppression and injustice, in every kind of sensuality men adventure as
+if they could ensure their safety and defy the day of reckoning.
+
+Gideon is now well persuaded that the fear of disaster is not for
+Israel. He returns to the camp and forthwith prepares to strike. It
+seems to him now the easiest thing possible to throw into confusion that
+great encampment of Midian. One bold device rapidly executed will set
+in operation the suspicions and fears of the different desert tribes and
+they will melt away in defeat. The stratagem has already shaped itself.
+The three hundred are provided with the earthenware jars or pitchers in
+which their simple food has been carried. They soon procure firebrands
+and from among the ten thousand in the camp enough rams' horns are
+collected to supply one to each of the attacking party. Then three bands
+are formed of equal strength and ordered to advance from different sides
+upon the enemy, holding themselves ready at a given signal to break the
+pitchers, flash the torches in the air and make as much noise as they
+can with their rude mountain horns. The scheme is simple, quaint,
+ingenious. It reveals skill in making use of the most ordinary materials
+which is of the very essence of generalship. The harsh cornets
+especially filling the valley with barbaric tumult are well adapted to
+create terror and confusion. We hear nothing of ordinary weapons, but it
+must not be supposed that the three hundred were unarmed.
+
+It was not long after midnight, the middle watch had been newly set,
+when the three companies reached their stations. The orders had been
+well seized and all went precisely as Gideon had conceived. With crash
+and tumult and flare of torches there came the battle-shout--"Sword of
+Jehovah and of Gideon." The Israelites had no need to press forward;
+they stood every man in his place, while fear and suspicion did the
+work. The host ran and cried and fled. To and fro among the tents,
+seeing now on this side now on that the menacing flames, turning from
+the battle-cry here to be met in an opposite quarter by the wild
+dissonance of the horns, the surprised army was thrown into utter
+confusion. Every one thought of treachery and turned his sword against
+his fellow. Escape was the common impulse, and the flight of the
+disorganized host took a south-easterly direction by the road that led
+to the Jordan valley and across it to the Hauran and the desert. It was
+a complete rout and the Hebrews had only to follow up their advantage.
+Those who had not shared the attack joined in the pursuit. Every village
+that the flying Midianites passed sent out its men, brave enough now
+that the arm of the tyrant was broken. Down to the ghor of Jordan the
+terror-stricken Arabs fled and along the bank for many a mile, harassed
+in the difficult ground by the Hebrews who know every yard of it. At the
+fords there is dreadful work. Those who cross at the highest point near
+Succoth are not the main body, but the two chiefs Zebah and Zalmunna are
+among them and Gideon takes them in hand. Away to the south Ephraim has
+its opportunity and gains a victory where the road along the valley of
+Jordan diverges to Beth-barah. For days and nights the retreat goes on
+till the strange swift triumph of Israel is assured.
+
+1. There is in this narrative a lesson as to equipment for the battle of
+life and the service of God somewhat like that which we found in the
+story of Shamgar, yet with points of difference. We are reminded here of
+what may be done without wealth, without the material apparatus that is
+often counted necessary. The modern habit is to make much of tools and
+outfit. The study and applications of science have brought in a fashion
+of demanding everything possible in the way of furniture, means,
+implements. Everywhere this fashion prevails, in the struggle of
+commerce and manufacture, in literature and art, in teaching and
+household economy, worst of all in church life and work. Michael Angelo
+wrought the frescoes of the Sistine chapel with the ochres he dug with
+his own hands from the garden of the Vatican. Mr. Darwin's great
+experiments were conducted with the rudest and cheapest furniture,
+anything a country house could supply. But in the common view it is on
+perfect tools and material almost everything depends; and we seem in the
+way of being absolutely mastered by them. What, for example, is the
+ecclesiasticism which covers an increasing area of religious life? And
+what is the parish or congregation fully organized in the modern sense?
+Must we not call them elaborate machinery expected to produce spiritual
+life? There must be an extensive building with every convenience for
+making worship agreeable; there must be guilds and guild rooms,
+societies and committees, each with an array of officials; there must be
+due assignment of observances to fit days and seasons; there must be
+architecture, music and much else. The ardent soul desiring to serve God
+and man has to find a place in conjunction with all this and order his
+work so that it may appear well in a report. To some these things may
+appear ludicrous, but they are too significant of the drift from that
+simplicity and personal energy in which the Church of Christ began. We
+seem to have forgotten that the great strokes have been made by men who
+like Gideon delayed not for elaborate preparation nor went back on rule
+and precedent, but took the firebrands, pitchers and horns that could be
+got together on a hill-side. The great thing both in the secular and in
+the spiritual region is that men should go straight at the work which
+has to be done and do it with sagacity, intelligence and fervour of
+their own.
+
+We look back to those few plain men with whom lay the new life of the
+world, going forth with the strong certain word of a belief for which
+they could die, a truth by which the dead could be revived. Their
+equipment was of the soul. Of outward means and material advantages they
+were, one may say, destitute. Our methods are very different. No doubt
+in these days there is a work of defence which requires the finest
+weapons and most careful preparation. Yet even here no weight of
+polished armour is so good for David's use as the familiar sling and
+stone. And in the general task of the church, teaching, guiding, setting
+forth the Gospel of Christ, whatever keeps soul from honest and hearty
+touch with soul is bad. We want above all things men who have sanctified
+common-sense, mother-wit, courage and frank simplicity, men who can find
+their own means and gain their own victories. The churches that do not
+breed such are doomed.
+
+2. We have been reading a story of panic and defeat, and we may be
+advised to find in it a hint of the fate that is to overtake
+Christianity when modern criticism has finally ordered its companies and
+provided them with terrifying horns and torches. Or certain Christians
+may feel that the illustration fits the state of alarm in which they are
+obliged to live. Is not the church like that encampment in the valley,
+exposed to the most terrible and startling attacks on all sides, and in
+peril constantly of being routed by unforeseen audacities, here of
+Ingersoll, Bakunin, Bebel, there of Huxley or Renan? Not seldom still,
+though after many a false alarm, the cry is raised, "The church, the
+faith--in danger!"
+
+Once for all--the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ is never in danger,
+though enemies buzz on every side like furious hornets. A confederation
+of men, a human organization may be in deadly peril and may know that
+the harsh tumult around it means annihilation. But no institution is
+identical with the Catholic Church, much less with the kingdom of God.
+Christians need not dread the honest criticism which has a right to
+speak, nor even the malice, envy, which have no right yet dare to utter
+themselves. Whether it be sheer atheism or scientific dogma or political
+change or criticism of the Bible that makes the religious world tremble
+and cry out for fear, in every case panic is unchristian and unworthy.
+For one thing, do we not frame numerous thoughts and opinions of our own
+and devise many forms of service which in the course of time we come to
+regard as having a sacredness equal to the doctrine and ordinances of
+Christ? And do we not frequently fall into the error of thinking that
+the symbols, traditions, outward forms of a Christian society are
+essential and as much to be contended for as the substance of the
+gospel? Criticism of these is dreaded as criticism of Christ, decay of
+them is regarded, often quite wrongly, as decay of the work of God on
+earth. We forget that forms, as such, are on perpetual trial, and we
+forget also that no revolution or seeming disaster can touch the facts
+on which Christianity rests. The Divine gospel is eternal. Indeed,
+assailants of the right sort are needed, and even those of the bad sort
+have their use. The encampment of the unseeing and unthinking, of the
+self-loving and arrogant needs to be startled; and he is no emissary of
+Satan who honestly leads an attack where men lie in false peace, though
+he may be for his own part but a rude fighter. The panic indeed
+sometimes takes a singular and pathetic form. The unexpected enemy
+breaks in on the camp with blare of ignorant rebuke and noisy
+demonstration of strength and authority. Him the church hails as a new
+apostle, at his feet she takes her place with a strange unprofitable
+humility: and this is the worst kind of disaster. Better far a serious
+battle than such submission.
+
+3. Without pursuing this suggestion we pass to another raised by the
+conduct of the men of Ephraim. They obeyed the call of Gideon when he
+hastily summoned them to take the lower fords of Jordan within their own
+territory and prevent the escape of the Midianites. To them it fell to
+gain a great victory, and especially to slay two subordinate chiefs,
+Oreb and Zeeb, the Crow and the Wolf. But afterwards they complained
+that they had not been called at first when the commander was gathering
+his army. We are informed that they chode with him sharply on this
+score, and it was only by his soft answer which implied a little
+flattery that they were appeased. "What have I now in comparison with
+you? Is not the gleaning of the grapes of Ephraim better than the
+vintage of Abiezer?"
+
+The men of Ephraim were not called at first along with Manasseh,
+Zebulun, Asher and Naphtali. True. But why? Was not Gideon aware of
+their selfish indifference? Did he not read their character? Did he not
+perceive that they would have sullenly refused to be led by a man of
+Manasseh, the youngest son of Joash of Abiezer? Only too well did the
+young chief know with whom he had to deal. There had been fighting
+already between Israel and the Midianites. Did Ephraim help then? Nay:
+but secure in her mountains that tribe sullenly and selfishly held
+aloof. And now the complaint is made when Gideon, once unknown, is a
+victorious hero, the deliverer of the Hebrew nation.
+
+Do we not often see something like this? There are people who will not
+hazard position or profit in identifying themselves with an enterprise
+while the issue is doubtful, but desire to have the credit of connection
+with it if it should succeed. They have not the humanity to associate
+themselves with those who are fighting in a good cause because it is
+good. In fact they do not know what is good, their only test of value
+being success. They lie by, looking with half-concealed scorn on the
+attempts of the earnest, sneering at their heat either in secret or
+openly, and when one day it becomes clear that the world is applauding
+they conceive a sudden respect for those at whom they scoffed. Now they
+will do what they can to help,--with pleasure, with liberality. Why were
+they not sooner invited? They will almost make a quarrel of that, and
+they have to be soothed with fair speeches. And people who are worldly
+at heart push forward in this fashion when Christian affairs have
+success or �clat attached to them, especially where religion wears least
+of its proper air and has somewhat of the earthly in tone and look.
+Christ pursued by the Sanhedrin, despised by the Roman is no person for
+them to know. Let Him have the patronage of Constantine or a de' Medici
+and they are then assured that He has claims which they will admit--in
+theory. More than that needs not be expected from men and women "of the
+world." "_Messieurs, surtout, pas de z�le._" Above all, no zeal: that is
+the motto of every Ephraim since time began. Wait till zeal is cooling
+before you join the righteous cause.
+
+4. But while there are the carnal who like to share the success of
+religion after it has cooled down to their temperature, another class
+must not be forgotten, those who in their selfishness show the worst
+kind of hostility to the cause they should aid. Look at the men of
+Succoth and Penuel. Gideon and his band leading the pursuit of the
+Midianites have had no food all night and are faint with hunger. At
+Succoth they ask bread in vain. Instead of help they get the taunt--"Are
+Zebah and Zalmunna now in thine hand that we should give bread unto
+thine army?" Onward they press another stage up the hills to Penuel, and
+there also their request is refused. Gideon savage with the need of his
+men threatens dire punishment to those who are so callous and cruel; and
+when he returns victorious his threat is made good. With thorns and
+briars of the wilderness he scourges the elders of Succoth. The pride of
+Penuel is its watchtower, and that he demolishes, at the same time
+decimating the men of the city.
+
+Penuel and Succoth lay in the way between the wilderness in which the
+Midianites dwelt and the valleys of western Palestine. The men of these
+cities feared that if they aided Gideon they would bring on themselves
+the vengeance of the desert tribes. Yet where do we see the lowest point
+of unfaith and meanness, in Ephraim or Succoth? It is perhaps hard to
+say which are the least manly: those contrive to join the conquering
+host and snatch the credit of victory; these are not so clever, and
+while they are as eager to make things smooth for themselves the thorns
+and briars are more visibly their portion. To share the honour of a
+cause for which you have done very little is an easy thing in this
+world, though an honest man cannot wear that kind of laurel; but as for
+Succoth and Penuel, the poor creatures, who will not pity them? It is so
+inconvenient often to have to decide. They would temporise if it were
+possible--supply the famished army with mouldy corn and raisins at a
+high price, and do as much next time for the Midianites. Yet the
+opportunity for this kind of salvation does not always come. There are
+times when people have to choose definitely whom they will serve, and
+discover to their horror that judgment follows swiftly upon base and
+cowardly choice. And God is faithful in making the recusants feel the
+urgency of moral choice and the grip He has of them. They would fain let
+the battle of truth sweep by and not meddle with it. But something is
+forced upon them. They cannot let the whole affair of salvation alone,
+but are driven to refuse heaven in the very act of trying to escape
+hell. And although judgment lingers, ever and anon demonstration is made
+among the ranks of the would-be prudent that One on high judges for His
+warriors. It is not the Gideon leading the little band of faint but
+eager champions of faith who punishes the callous heathenism and low
+scorn of a Succoth and Penuel. The Lord of Hosts Himself will vindicate
+and chasten. "Whoso shall cause one of these little ones that believe in
+Me to stumble, it is profitable for him that a great millstone should be
+hanged about his neck, and that he should be sunk in the depth of the
+sea."
+
+5. Yet another word of instruction is found in the appeal of Gideon:
+"Give, I pray you, loaves of bread unto the people that follow me, for
+they be faint and I am pursuing after Zebah and Zalmunna." Well has the
+expression "Faint yet pursuing" found its place as a proverb of the
+religious life. We are called to run with patience a race that needs
+long ardour and strenuous exertion. The goal is far away, the ground is
+difficult. As day after day and year after year demands are made upon
+our faith, our resolution, our thought, our devotion to One who remains
+unseen and on our confidence in the future life it is no wonder that
+many feel faint and weary. Often have we to pass through a region
+inhabited by those who are indifferent or hostile, careless or derisive.
+At many a door we knock and find no sympathy. We ask for bread and
+receive a stone; and still the fight slackens not, still have we to
+reach forth to the things that are before. But the faintness is not
+death. In the most terrible hours there is new life for our spiritual
+nature. Refreshment comes from an unseen hand when earth refuses help.
+We turn to Christ; we consider Him who endured great contradiction of
+sinners against Himself; we realize afresh that we are ensured of the
+fulness of His redemption. The body grows faint, but the soul presses
+on; the body dies and has to be left behind as a worn-out garment, but
+the spirit ascends into immortal youth.
+
+  "On, chariot! on, soul!
+  Ye are all the more fleet.
+  Be alone at the goal
+  Of the strange and the sweet!"
+
+6. Finally let us glance at the fate of Zebah and Zalmunna, not without
+a feeling of admiration and of pity for the rude ending of these stately
+lives.
+
+The sword of Jehovah and of Gideon has slain its thousands. The vast
+desert army has been scattered like chaff, in the flight, at the fords,
+by the rock Oreb and the winepress Zeeb, all along the way by Nobah and
+Jogbehah, and finally at Karkor, where having encamped in fancied
+security the residue is smitten. Now the two defeated chiefs are in the
+hand of Gideon, their military renown completely wrecked, their career
+destroyed. To them the expedition into Canaan was part of the common
+business of leadership. As emirs of nomadic tribes they had to find
+pasture and prey for their people. No special antagonism to Jehovah, no
+ill-will against Israel more than other nations led them to cross the
+Jordan and scour the plains of Palestine. It was quite in the natural
+course of things that Midianites and Amalekites should migrate and move
+towards the west. And now the defeat is crushing. What remains therefore
+but to die?
+
+We hear Gideon command his son Jether to fall upon the captive chiefs,
+who brilliant and stately once lie disarmed, bound and helpless. The
+indignity is not to our mind. We would have thought more of Gideon had
+he offered freedom to these captives "fallen on evil days," men to be
+admired not hated. But probably they do not desire a life which has in
+it no more of honour. Only let the Hebrew leader not insult them by the
+stroke of a young man's sword. The great chiefs would die by a warrior's
+blow. And Jether cannot slay them; his hand falters as he draws the
+sword. These men who have ruled their tens of thousands have still the
+lion look that quails. "Rise thou and fall upon us," they say to Gideon:
+"for as the man is, so is his strength." And so they die, types of the
+greatest earthly powers that resist the march of Divine Providence,
+overthrown by a sword which even in faulty weak human hands has
+indefeasible sureness and edge.
+
+"As the man is, so is his strength." It is another of the pregnant
+sayings which meet us here and there even in the least meditative parts
+of Scripture. Yes: as a man is in character, in faith, in harmony with
+the will of God, so is his strength; as he is in falseness, injustice,
+egotism and ignorance, so is his weakness. And there is but one real
+perennial kind of strength. The demonstration made by selfish and
+godless persons, though it shake continents and devastate nations, is
+not Force. It has no nerve, no continuance, but is mere fury which
+decays and perishes. Strength is the property of truth and truth only;
+it belongs to those who are in union with eternal reality and to no
+others in the universe. Would you be invincible? You must move with the
+eternal powers of righteousness and love. To be showy in appearance or
+terrible in sound on the wrong side with the futilities of the world is
+but incipient death.
+
+On all sides the application may be seen. In the home and its varied
+incidents of education, sickness, discipline; in society high and low;
+in politics, in literature. As the man or woman is in simple allegiance
+to God and clear resolution there is strength to endure, to govern, to
+think and every way to live. Otherwise there can only be instability,
+foolishness, blundering selfishness, a sad passage to inanition and
+decay.
+
+
+
+
+XIV.
+
+_GIDEON THE ECCLESIASTIC._
+
+JUDGES viii. 22-28.
+
+
+The great victory of Gideon had this special significance, that it ended
+the incursions of the wandering races of the desert. Canaan offered a
+continual lure to the nomads of the Arabian wilderness, as indeed the
+eastern and southern parts of Syria do at the present time. The hazard
+was that wave after wave of Midianites and Bedawin sweeping over the
+land should destroy agriculture and make settled national life and
+civilization impossible. And when Gideon undertook his work the risk of
+this was acute. But the defeat inflicted on the wild tribes proved
+decisive. "Midian was subdued before the children of Israel, and they
+lifted up their heads no more." The slaughter that accompanied the
+overthrow of Zebah and Zalmunna, Oreb and Zeeb became in the literature
+of Israel a symbol of the destruction which must overtake the foes of
+God. "Do thou to thine enemies as unto Midian"--so runs the cry of a
+psalm--"Make their nobles like Oreb and Zeeb: yea, all their princes
+like Zebah and Zalmunna, who said, Let us take to ourselves in
+possession the habitations of God." In Isaiah the remembrance gives a
+touch of vivid colour to the oracle of the coming Wonderful, Prince of
+Peace. "The yoke of his burden and the staff of his shoulder, the rod
+of his oppressor shall be broken as in the day of Midian." Regarding the
+Assyrian also the same prophet testifies, "The Lord of Hosts shall stir
+up against him a scourge as in the slaughter of Midian at the rock of
+Oreb." We have no song like that of Deborah celebrating the victory, but
+a sense of its immense importance held the mind of the people, and by
+reason of it Gideon found a place among the heroes of faith. Doubtless
+he had, to begin with, a special reason for taking up arms against the
+Midianitish chiefs that they had slain his two brothers: the duty of an
+avenger of blood fell to him. But this private vengeance merged in the
+desire to give his people freedom, religious as well as political, and
+it was Jehovah's victory that he won, as he himself gladly acknowledged.
+We may see, therefore, in the whole enterprise, a distinct step of
+religious development. Once again the name of the Most High was exalted;
+once again the folly of idol worship was contrasted with the wisdom of
+serving the God of Abraham and Moses. The tribes moved in the direction
+of national unity and also of common devotion to their unseen King. If
+Gideon had been a man of larger intellect and knowledge he might have
+led Israel far on the way towards fitness for the mission it had never
+yet endeavoured to fulfil. But his powers and inspiration were limited.
+
+On his return from the campaign the wish of the people was expressed to
+Gideon that he should assume the title of king. The nation needed a
+settled government, a centre of authority which would bind the tribes
+together, and the Abiezrite chief was now clearly marked as a man fit
+for royalty. He was able to persuade as well as to fight; he was bold,
+firm and prudent. But to the request that he should become king and
+found a dynasty Gideon gave an absolute refusal: "I will not rule over
+you, neither shall my son rule over you; Jehovah shall rule over you."
+We always admire a man who refuses one of the great posts of human
+authority or distinction. The throne of Israel was even at that time a
+flattering offer. But should it have been made? There are few who will
+pause in a moment of high personal success to think of the point of
+morality involved; yet we may credit Gideon with the belief that it was
+not for him or any man to be called king in Israel. As a judge he had
+partly proved himself, as a judge he had a Divine call and a marvellous
+vindication: that name he would accept, not the other. One of the chief
+elements of Gideon's character was a strong but not very spiritual
+religiousness. He attributed his success entirely to God, and God alone
+he desired the nation to acknowledge as its Head. He would not even in
+appearance stand between the people and their Divine Sovereign, nor with
+his will should any son of his take a place so unlawful and dangerous.
+
+Along with his devotion to God it is quite likely that the caution of
+Gideon had much to do with his resolve. He had already found some
+difficulty in dealing with the Ephraimites, and he could easily foresee
+that if he became king the pride of that large clan would rise strongly
+against him. If the gleaning of the grapes of Ephraim was better than
+the whole vintage of Abiezer, as Gideon had declared, did it not follow
+that any elder of the great central tribe would better deserve the
+position of king than the youngest son of Joash of Abiezer? The men of
+Succoth and Penuel too had to be reckoned with. Before Gideon could
+establish himself in a royal seat he would have to fight a great
+coalition in the centre and south and also beyond Jordan. To the pains
+of oppression would succeed the agony of civil war. Unwilling to kindle
+a fire which might burn for years and perhaps consume himself, he
+refused to look at the proposal, flattering and honourable as it was.
+
+But there was another reason for his decision which may have had even
+more weight. Like many men who have distinguished themselves in one way,
+his real ambition lay in a different direction. We think of him as a
+military genius. He for his part looked to the priestly office and the
+transmission of Divine oracles as his proper calling. The enthusiasm
+with which he overthrew the altar of Baal, built the new altar of
+Jehovah and offered his first sacrifice upon it survived when the wild
+delights of victory had passed away. The thrill of awe and the strange
+excitement he had felt when Divine messages came to him and signs were
+given in answer to his prayer affected him far more deeply and
+permanently than the sight of a flying enemy and the pride of knowing
+himself victor in a great campaign. Neither did kingship appear much in
+comparison with access to God, converse with Him and declaration of His
+will to men. Gideon appears already tired of war, with no appetite
+certainly for more, however successful, and impatient to return to the
+mysterious rites and sacred privileges of the altar. He had good reason
+to acknowledge the power over Israel's destiny of the Great Being Whose
+spirit had come upon him, Whose promises had been fulfilled. He desired
+to cultivate that intercourse with Heaven which more than anything else
+gave him the sense of dignity and strength. From the offer of a crown he
+turned as if eager to don the robe of a priest and listen for the holy
+oracles that none beside himself seemed able to receive.
+
+It is notable that in the history of the Jewish kings the tendency shown
+by Gideon frequently reappeared. According to the law of later times the
+kingly duties should have been entirely separated from those of the
+priesthood. It came to be a dangerous and sacrilegious thing for the
+chief magistrate of the tribes, their leader in war, to touch the sacred
+implements or offer a sacrifice. But just because the ideas of sacrifice
+and priestly service were so fully in the Jewish mind the kings, either
+when especially pious or especially strong, felt it hard to refrain from
+the forbidden privilege. On the eve of a great battle with the
+Philistines Saul, expecting Samuel to offer the preparatory sacrifice
+and inquire of Jehovah, waited seven days and then impatient of delay
+undertook the priestly part and offered a burnt sacrifice. His act was
+properly speaking a confession of the sovereignty of God; but when
+Samuel came he expressed great indignation against the king, denounced
+his interference with sacred things and in effect removed him then and
+there from the kingdom. David for his part appears to have been
+scrupulous in employing the priests for every religious function; but at
+the bringing up of the ark from the house of Obed-Edom he is reported to
+have led a sacred dance before the Lord and to have worn a linen ephod,
+that is a garment specially reserved for the priests. He also took to
+himself the privilege of blessing the people in the name of the Lord. On
+the division of the kingdom Jeroboam promptly assumed the ordering of
+religion, set up shrines and appointed priests to minister at them; and
+in one scene we find him standing by an altar to offer incense. The
+great sin of Uzziah, on account of which he had to go forth from the
+temple a hopeless leper, is stated in the second book of Chronicles to
+have been an attempt to burn incense on the altar. These are cases in
+point; but the most remarkable is that of Solomon. To be king, to build
+and equip the temple and set in operation the whole ritual of the house
+of God did not content that magnificent prince. His ambition led him to
+assume a part far loftier and more impressive than fell to the chief
+priest himself. It was Solomon who offered the prayer when the temple
+was consecrated, who pronounced the blessing of God on the worshipping
+multitude; and at his invocation it was that "fire came down from heaven
+and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices." This crowning act
+of his life, in which the great monarch rose to the very highest pitch
+of his ambition, actually claiming and taking precedence over all the
+house of Aaron, will serve to explain the strange turn of the
+Abiezrite's history at which we have now arrived.
+
+"He made an ephod and put it in his city, even in Ophrah." A strong but
+not spiritual religiousness, we have said, is the chief note of Gideon's
+character. It may be objected that such a one, if he seeks
+ecclesiastical office, does so unworthily; but to say so is an
+uncharitable error. It is not the devout temper alone that finds
+attraction in the ministry of sacred things; nor should a love of place
+and power be named as the only other leading motive. One who is not
+devout may in all sincerity covet the honour of standing for God before
+the congregation, leading the people in worship and interpreting the
+sacred oracles. A vulgar explanation of human desire is often a false
+one; it is so here. The ecclesiastic may show few tokens of the
+spiritual temper, the other-worldliness, the glowing and simple truth we
+rightly account to be the proper marks of a Christian ministry; yet he
+may by his own reckoning have obeyed a clear call. His function in this
+case is to maintain order and administer outward rites with dignity and
+care--a limited range of duty indeed, but not without utility,
+especially when there are inferior and less conscientious men in office
+not far away. He does not advance faith, but according to his power he
+maintains it.
+
+But the ecclesiastic must have the ephod. The man who feels the dignity
+of religion more than its humane simplicity, realizing it as a great
+movement of absorbing interest, will naturally have regard to the means
+of increasing dignity and making the movement impressive. Gideon calls
+upon the people for the golden spoils taken from the Midianites,
+nose-rings, earrings and the like, and they willingly respond. It is
+easy to obtain gifts for the outward glory of religion, and a golden
+image is soon to be seen within a house of Jehovah on the hill at
+Ophrah. Whatever form it had, this figure was to Gideon no idol but a
+symbol or sign of Jehovah's presence among the people, and by means of
+it, in one or other of the ways used at the time, as for example by
+casting lots from within it, appeal was made to God with the utmost
+respect and confidence. When it is supposed that Gideon fell away from
+his first faith in making this image the error lies in overestimating
+his spirituality at the earlier stage. We must not think that at any
+time the use of a symbolic image would have seemed wrong to him. It was
+not against images but against worship of false and impure gods that his
+zeal was at first directed. The sacred pole was an object of detestation
+because it was a symbol of Astarte.
+
+In some way we cannot explain the whole life of Gideon appears as quite
+separate from the religious ordinances maintained before the ark, and at
+the same time quite apart from that Divine rule which forbade the making
+and worship of graven images. Either he did not know the second
+commandment, or he understood it only as forbidding the use of an image
+of any creature and the worship of a creature by means of an image. We
+know that the cherubim in the Holy of Holies were symbolic of the
+perfections of creation, and through them the greatness of the Unseen
+God was realized. So it was with Gideon's ephod or image, which was
+however used in seeking oracles. He acted at Ophrah as priest of the
+true God. The sacrifices he offered were to Jehovah. People came from
+all the northern tribes to bow at his altar and receive divine
+intimations through him. The southern tribes had Gilgal and Shiloh. Here
+at Ophrah was a service of the God of Israel, not perhaps intended to
+compete with the other shrines, yet virtually depriving them of their
+fame. For the expression is used that all Israel went a whoring after
+the ephod.
+
+But while we try to understand we are not to miss the warning which
+comes home to us through this chapter of religious history. Pure and,
+for the time, even elevated in the motive, Gideon's attempt at
+priestcraft led to his fall. For a while we see the hero acting as judge
+at Ophrah and presiding with dignity at the altar. His best wisdom is at
+the service of the people and he is ready to offer for them at new moon
+or harvest the animals they desire to consecrate and consume in the
+sacred feast. In a spirit of real faith and no doubt with much sagacity
+he submits their inquiries to the test of the ephod. But "the thing
+became a snare to Gideon and his house," perhaps in the way of bringing
+in riches and creating the desire for more. Those who applied to him as
+a revealer brought gifts with them. Gradually as wealth increased among
+the people the value of the donations would increase, and he who began
+as a disinterested patriot may have degenerated into a somewhat
+avaricious man who made a trade of religion. On this point we have,
+however, no information. It is mere surmise depending upon observation
+of the way things are apt to go amongst ourselves.
+
+Reviewing the story of Gideon's life we find this clear lesson, that
+within certain limits he who trusts and obeys God has a quite
+irresistible efficiency. This man had, as we have seen, his limitations,
+very considerable. As a religious leader, prophet or priest, he was far
+from competent; there is no indication that he was able to teach Israel
+a single Divine doctrine, and as to the purity and mercy, the
+righteousness and love of God, his knowledge was rudimentary. In the
+remote villages of the Abiezrites the tradition of Jehovah's name and
+power remained, but in the confusion of the times there was no education
+of children in the will of God: the Law was practically unknown. From
+Shechem where Baal-Berith was worshipped the influence of a degrading
+idolatry had spread, obliterating every religious idea except the barest
+elements of the old faith. Doing his very best to understand God, Gideon
+never saw what religion in our sense means. His sacrifices were appeals
+to a Power dimly felt through nature and in the greater epochs of the
+national history, chastising now and now friendly and beneficent.
+
+Yet, seriously limited as he was, Gideon when he had once laid hold of
+the fact that he was called by the unseen God to deliver Israel went on
+step by step to the great victory which made the tribes free. His
+responsibility to his fellow-Israelites became clear along with his
+sense of the demand made upon him by God. He felt himself like the wind,
+like the lightning, like the dew, an agent or instrument of the Most
+High, bound to do His part in the course of things. His will was
+enlisted in the Divine purpose. This work, this deliverance of Israel
+was to be effected by him and no other. He had the elemental powers with
+him, in him. The immense armies of Midian could not stand in his way. He
+was, as it were, a storm that must hurl them back into the wilderness
+defeated and broken.
+
+Now this is the very conception of life which we in our far wider
+knowledge are apt to miss, which nevertheless it is our chief business
+to grasp and carry into practice. You stand there, a man instructed in a
+thousand things of which Gideon was ignorant, instructed especially in
+the nature and will of God Whom Christ has revealed. It is your
+privilege to take a broad survey of human life, of duty, to look beyond
+the present to the eternal future with its infinite possibilities of
+gain and loss. But the danger is that year after year all thought and
+effort shall be on your own account, that with each changing wind of
+circumstance you change your purpose, that you never understand God's
+demand nor find the true use of knowledge, will and life in fulfilling
+that. Have you a Divine task to effect? You doubt it. Where is anything
+that can be called a commission of God? You look this way and that for a
+little, then give up the quest. This year finds you without enthusiasm,
+without devotion even as you have been in other years. So life ebbs away
+and is lost in the wide flat sands of the secular and trivial, and the
+soul never becomes part of the strong ocean current of Divine purpose.
+We pity or deride some who, with little knowledge and in many errors
+alike of heart and head, were yet men as many of us may not claim to be,
+alive to the fact of God and their own share in Him. But they were so
+limited, those Hebrews, you say, a mere horde of shepherds and
+husbandmen; their story is too poor, too chaotic to have any lesson for
+us. And in sheer incapacity to read the meaning of the tale you turn
+from this Book of Judges, as from a barbarian myth, less interesting
+than Homer, of no more application to yourself than the legends of the
+Round Table. Yet, all the while, the one supreme lesson for a man to
+read and take home to himself is written throughout the book in bold and
+living characters--that only when life is realized as a vocation is it
+worth living. God may be faintly known, His will but rudely interpreted;
+yet the mere understanding that He gives life and rewards effort is an
+inspiration. And when His life-giving call ceases to stir and guide,
+there can be for the man, the nation, only irresolution and weakness.
+
+A century ago Englishmen were as little devout as they are to-day; they
+were even less spiritual, less moved to fine issues. They had their
+scepticisms too, their rough ignorant prejudices, their giant errors and
+perversities. "We have gained vastly," as Professor Seeley says, "in
+breadth of view, intelligence and refinement. Probably what we threw
+aside could not be retained; what we adopted was forced upon us by the
+age. Nevertheless, we had formerly what I may call a national
+discipline, which formed a firm, strongly-marked national character. We
+have now only materials, which may be of the first quality, but have not
+been worked up. We have everything except decided views and steadfast
+purpose--everything in short except character." Yes: the sense of the
+nation's calling has decayed, and with it the nation's strength. In
+leaders and followers alike purpose fades as faith evaporates, and we
+are faithless because we attempt nothing noble under the eye and sceptre
+of the King.
+
+You live, let us say, among those who doubt God, doubt whether there is
+any redemption, whether the whole Christian gospel and hope are not in
+the air, dreams, possibilities, rather than facts of the Eternal Will.
+The storm-wind blows and you hear its roaring: that is palpable fact,
+divine or cosmic. Its errand will be accomplished. Great rivers flow,
+great currents sweep through the ocean. Their mighty urgency who can
+doubt? But the spiritual who can believe? You do not feel in the sphere
+of the moral, of the spiritual the wind that makes no sound, the current
+that rolls silently charged with sublime energies, effecting a vast and
+wonderful purpose. Yet here are the great facts; and we must find our
+part in that spiritual urgency, do our duty there, or lose all. We must
+launch out on the mighty stream of redemption or never reach eternal
+light, for all else moves down to death. Christ Himself is to be
+victorious in us. The glory of our life is that we can be irresistible
+in the region of our duty, irresistible in conflict with the evil, the
+selfishness, the falsehood given us to overthrow. To realize that is to
+live. The rest is all mere experiment, getting ready for the task of
+existence, making armour, preparing food, otherwise, at the worst, a
+winter's morning before inglorious death.
+
+One other thing observe, that underlying Gideon's desire to fill the
+office of priest there was a dull perception of the highest function of
+one man in relation to others. It appears to the common mind a great
+thing to rule, to direct secular affairs, to have the command of armies
+and the power of filling offices and conferring dignities; and no doubt
+to one who desires to serve his generation well, royalty, political
+power, even municipal office offer many excellent opportunities. But set
+kingship on this side, kingship concerned with the temporal and earthly,
+or at best humane aspects of life, and on the other side priesthood of
+the true kind which has to do with the spiritual, by which God is
+revealed to man and the holy ardour and divine aspirations of the human
+will are sustained--and there can be no question which is the more
+important. A clever strong man may be a ruler. It needs a good man, a
+pious man, a man of heavenly power and insight to be in any right sense
+a priest. I speak not of the kind of priest Gideon turned out, nor of a
+Jewish priest, nor of any one who in modern times professes to be in
+that succession, but of one who really stands between God and men,
+bearing the sorrows of his kind, their trials, doubts, cries and prayers
+on his heart and presenting them to God, interpreting to the weary and
+sad and troubled the messages of heaven. In this sense Christ is the one
+True Priest, the eternal and only sufficient High Priest. And in this
+sense it is possible for every Christian to hold towards those less
+enlightened and less decided in their faith the priestly part.
+
+Now in a dim way the priestly function presented itself to Gideon and
+allured him. Sufficient for it he was not, and his ephod became a snare.
+Neither could he grasp the wisdom of heaven nor understand the needs of
+men. In his hands the sacred art did not prosper, he became content with
+the appearance and the gain. It is so with many who take the name of
+priests. In truth on one side the term and all it stands for must be
+confessed full of danger to him set apart and those who separate him.
+Here as pointedly as anywhere must it be affirmed, "Whatsoever is not of
+faith is sin." There must be a mastering sense of God's calling on the
+side of him who ministers, and on the side of the people recognition of
+a message, an example coming to them through this brother of theirs who
+speaks what he has received of the Holy Spirit, who offers a personal
+living word, a personal testimony. Here, be it called what it may, is
+priesthood after the pattern of Christ's, true and beneficent; and apart
+from this, priesthood may too easily become, as many have affirmed, a
+horrible imposture and baleful lie. Christianity brings the whole to a
+point in every life. God's calling, spiritual, complete, comes to each
+soul in its place, and the holy oil is for every head. The father,
+mother, the employer and the workman, the surgeon, writer,
+lawyer--everywhere and in all posts, just as men and women are living
+out God's demand upon them--these are His priests, ministrants of the
+hearth and the shop, the factory and the office, by the cradle and the
+sick-bed, wherever the multitudinous epic of life goes forward. Here is
+the common and withal the holiest calling and office. That one dwelling
+with God in righteousness and love introduce others into the sanctuary,
+declare as a thing he knows the will of the Eternal, uplift the
+feebleness of faith and revive the heart of love--this is the highest
+task on earth, the grandest of heaven. Of such it may be said, "Ye are a
+chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people
+that ye should show forth the praises of Him Who hath called you out of
+darkness into His marvellous light."
+
+
+
+
+XV.
+
+_ABIMELECH AND JOTHAM._
+
+JUDGES viii. 29-ix. 57.
+
+
+The history we are tracing moves from man to man; the personal influence
+of the hero is everything while it lasts and confusion follows on his
+death. Gideon appears as one of the most successful Hebrew judges in
+maintaining order. While he was there in Ophrah religion and government
+had a centre "and the country was in quietness forty years." A man far
+from perfect but capable of mastery held the reins and gave forth
+judgment with an authority none could challenge. His burial in the
+family sepulchre in Ophrah is specially recorded as if it had been a
+great national tribute to his heroic power and skilful administration.
+
+The funeral over, discord began. A rightful ruler there was not. Among
+the claimants of power there was no man of power. Gideon left many sons,
+but not one of them could take his place. The confederation of cities
+half Hebrew, half Canaanite with Shechem at their head, of which we have
+already heard, held in check while Gideon lived, now began to control
+the politics of the tribes. By using the influence of this league a
+usurper who had no title whatever to the confidence of the people
+succeeded in exalting himself.
+
+The old town of Shechem situated in the beautiful valley between Ebal
+and Gerizim had long been a centre of Baal worship and of Canaanite
+intrigue, though nominally one of the cities of refuge and therefore
+specially sacred. Very likely the mixed population of this important
+town, jealous of the position gained by the hill-village of Ophrah, were
+ready to receive with favour any proposals that seemed to offer them
+distinction. And when Abimelech, son of Gideon by a slave woman of their
+town, went among them with ambitious and crafty suggestions they were
+easily persuaded to help him. The desire for a king which Gideon had
+promptly set aside lingered in the minds of the people, and by means of
+it Abimelech was able to compass his personal ends. First, however, he
+had to discredit others who stood in his way. There at Ophrah were the
+sons and grandsons of Gideon, threescore and ten of them according to
+the tradition, who were supposed to be bent on lording it over the
+tribes. Was it a thing to be thought of that the land should have
+seventy kings? Surely one would be better, less of an incubus at least,
+more likely to do the ruling well. Men of Shechem too would not be
+governed from Ophrah if they had any spirit. He, Abimelech, was their
+townsman, their bone and flesh. He confidently looked for their support.
+
+We cannot tell how far there was reason for saying that the family of
+Gideon were aiming at an aristocracy. They may have had some vague
+purpose of the kind. The suggestion, at all events, was cunning and had
+its effect. The people of Shechem had stored considerable treasure in
+the sanctuary of Baal, and by public vote seventy pieces of silver were
+paid out of it to Abimelech. The money was at once used by him in hiring
+a band of men like himself, unscrupulous, ready for any desperate or
+bloody deed. With these he marched on Ophrah and surprising his brothers
+in the house or palace of Jerubbaal speedily put out of his way their
+dangerous rivalry. With the exception of Jotham, who had observed the
+band approaching and concealed himself, the whole house of Gideon was
+dragged to execution. On one stone, perhaps the very rock on which the
+altar of Baal once stood, the threescore and nine were barbarously
+slain.
+
+A villainous _coup d'�tat_ this. From Gideon overthrowing Baal and
+proclaiming Jehovah to Abimelech bringing up Baal again with hideous
+fratricide--it is a wretched turn of things. Gideon had to some extent
+prepared the way for a man far inferior to himself, as all do who are
+not utterly faithful to their light and calling; but he never imagined
+there could be so quick and shocking a revival of barbarism. Yet the
+ephod-dealing, the polygamy, the immorality into which he lapsed were
+bound to come to fruit. The man who once was a pure Hebrew patriot begat
+a half-heathen son to undo his own work. As for the Shechemites, they
+knew quite well to what end they had voted those seventy pieces of
+silver; and the general opinion seems to have been that the town had its
+money's worth, a life for each piece and, to boot, a king reeking with
+blood and shame. Surely it was a well-spent grant. Their confederation,
+their god had triumphed. They made Abimelech king by the oak of the
+pillar that was in Shechem.
+
+It is the success of the adventurer we have here, that common event.
+Abimelech is the oriental adventurer and uses the methods of another age
+than ours; yet we have our examples, and if they are less scandalous in
+some ways, if they are apart from bloodshed and savagery, they are still
+sufficiently trying to those who cherish the faith of divine justice and
+providence. How many have to see with amazement the adventurer triumph
+by means of seventy pieces of silver from the house of Baal or even from
+a holier treasury. He in a selfish and cruel game seems to have speedy
+and complete success denied to the best and purest cause. Fighting for
+his own hand in wicked or contemptuous hardness and arrogant conceit, he
+finds support, applause, an open way. Being no prophet he has honour in
+his own town. He knows the art of the stealthy insinuation, the lying
+promise and the flattering murmur; he has skill to make the favour of
+one leading person a step to securing another. When a few important
+people have been hoodwinked, he too becomes important and "success" is
+assured.
+
+The Bible, most entirely honest of books, frankly sets before us this
+adventurer, Abimelech, in the midst of the judges of Israel, as low a
+specimen of "success" as need be looked for; and we trace the well-known
+means by which such a person is promoted. "His mother's brethren spake
+of him in the ears of all the men of Shechem." That there was little to
+say, that he was a man of no character mattered not the least. The thing
+was to create an impression so that Abimelech's scheme might be
+introduced and forced. So far he could intrigue and then, the first
+steps gained, he could mount. But there was in him none of the mental
+power that afterwards marked Jehu, none of the charm that survives with
+the name of Absalom. It was on jealousy, pride, ambition he played as
+the most jealous, proud and ambitious; yet for three years the Hebrews
+of the league, blinded by the desire to have their nation like others,
+suffered him to bear the name of king.
+
+And by this sovereignty the Israelites who acknowledged it were doubly
+and trebly compromised. Not only did they accept a man without a record,
+they believed in one who was an enemy to his country's religion, one
+therefore quite ready to trample upon its liberty. This is really the
+beginning of a worse oppression than that of Midian or of Jabin. It
+shows on the part of Hebrews generally as well as those who tamely
+submitted to Abimelech's lordship a most abject state of mind. After the
+bloody work at Ophrah the tribes should have rejected the fratricide
+with loathing and risen like one man to suppress him. If the
+Baal-worshippers of Shechem would make him king there ought to have been
+a cause of war against them in which every good man and true should have
+taken the field. We look in vain for any such opposition to the usurper.
+Now that he is crowned, Manasseh, Ephraim and the North regard him
+complacently. It is the world all over. How can we wonder at this when
+we know with what acclamations kings scarcely more reputable than he
+have been greeted in modern times? Crowds gather and shout, fires of
+welcome blaze; there is joy as if the millennium had come. It is a king
+crowned, restored, his country's head, defender of the faith. Vain is
+the hope, pathetic the joy.
+
+There is no man of spirit to oppose Abimelech in the field. The duped
+nation must drink its cup of misrule and blood. But one appears of keen
+wit, apt and trenchant in speech. At least the tribes shall hear what
+one sound mind thinks of this coronation. Jotham, as we saw, escaped the
+slaughter at Ophrah. In the rear of the murderer he has crossed the
+hills and he will now utter his warning, whether men hear or whether
+they forbear. There is a crowd assembled for worship or deliberation at
+the oak of the pillar. Suddenly a voice is heard ringing clearly out
+between hill and hill, and the people looking up recognize Jotham who
+from a spur of rock on the side of Gerizim demands their audience.
+"Hearken unto me," he cries, "ye men of Shechem, that God may hearken
+unto you." Then in his parable of the olive, the fig-tree, the vine and
+the bramble, he pronounces judgment and prophecy. The bramble is exalted
+to be king, but on these terms, that the trees come and put their trust
+under its shadow; "but if not, then let fire come out of the bramble and
+devour the cedars of Lebanon."
+
+It is a piece of satire of the best order, brief, stinging, true. The
+craving for a king is lashed and then the wonderful choice of a ruler.
+Jotham speaks as an anarchist, one might say, but with God understood as
+the centre of law and order. It is a vision of the Theocracy taking
+shape from a keen and original mind. He figures men as trees growing
+independently, dutifully. And do trees need a king? Are they not set in
+their natural freedom each to yield fruit as best it can after its kind?
+Men of Shechem, Hebrews all, if they will only attend to their proper
+duties and do quiet work as God wills, appear to Jotham to need a king
+no more than the trees. Under the benign course of nature, sunshine and
+rain, wind and dew, the trees have all the restraint they need, all the
+liberty that is good for them. So men under the providence of God,
+adoring and obeying Him, have the best control, the only needful
+control, and with it liberty. Are they not fools then to go about
+seeking a tyrant to rule them, they who should be as cedars of Lebanon,
+willows by the watercourses, they who are made for simple freedom and
+spontaneous duty? It is something new in Israel this keen
+intellectualizing; but the fable, pointed as it is, teaches nothing for
+the occasion. Jotham is a man full of wit and of intelligence, but he
+has no practicable scheme of government, nothing definite to oppose to
+the mistake of the hour. He is all for the ideal, but the time and the
+people are unripe for the ideal. We see the same contrast in our own
+day; both in politics and the church the incisive critic discrediting
+subordination altogether fails to secure his age. Men are not trees.
+They are made to obey and trust. A hero or one who seems a hero is ever
+welcome, and he who skilfully imitates the roar of the lion may easily
+have a following, while Jotham, intensely sincere, highly gifted, a
+true-sighted man, finds none to mind him.
+
+Again the fable is directed against Abimelech. What was this man to whom
+Shechem had sworn fealty? An olive, a fig-tree, fruitful and therefore
+to be sought after? Was he a vine capable of rising on popular support
+to useful and honourable service? Not he. It was the bramble they had
+chosen, the poor grovelling jagged thorn-bush that tears the flesh,
+whose end is to feed the fire of the oven. Who ever heard of a good or
+heroic deed Abimelech had done? He was simply a contemptible upstart,
+without moral principle, as ready to wound as to flatter, and they who
+chose him for king would too soon find their error. Now that he had done
+something, what was it? There were Israelites among the crowd that
+shouted in his honour. Had they already forgotten the services of Gideon
+so completely as to fall down before a wretch red-handed from the murder
+of their hero's sons? Such a beginning showed the character of the man
+they trusted, and the same fire which had issued from the bramble at
+Ophrah would flame out upon themselves. This was but the beginning; soon
+there would be war to the knife between Abimelech and Shechem.
+
+We find instruction in the parable by regarding the answers put into the
+mouth of this tree and that when they are invited to wave to and fro
+over the others. There are honours which are dearly purchased, high
+positions which cannot be assumed without renouncing the true end and
+fruition of life. One for example who is quietly and with increasing
+efficiency doing his part in a sphere to which he is adapted must set
+aside the gains of long discipline if he is to become a social leader.
+He can do good where he is. Not so certain is it that he will be able to
+serve his fellows well in public office. It is one thing to enjoy the
+deference paid to a leader while the first enthusiasm on his behalf
+continues, but it is quite another thing to satisfy all the demands made
+as years go on and new needs arise. When any one is invited to take a
+position of authority he is bound to consider carefully his own
+aptitudes. He needs also to consider those who are to be subjects or
+constituents and make sure that they are of the kind his rule will fit.
+The olive looks at the cedar and the terebinth and the palm. Will they
+admit his sovereignty by-and-by though now they vote for it? Men are
+taken with the candidate who makes a good impression by emphasizing what
+will please and suppressing opinions that may provoke dissent. When they
+know him, how will it be? When criticism begins, will the olive not be
+despised for its gnarled stem, its crooked branches and dusky foliage?
+
+The fable does not make the refusal of olive and fig-tree and vine rest
+on the comfort they enjoy in the humbler place. That would be a mean and
+dishonourable reason for refusing to serve. Men who decline public
+office because they love an easy life find here no countenance. It is
+for the sake of its fatness, the oil it yields, grateful to God and man
+in sacrifice and anointing, that the olive-tree declines. The fig-tree
+has its sweetness and the vine its grapes to yield. And so men despising
+self-indulgence and comfort may be justified in putting aside a call to
+office. The fruit of personal character developed in humble unobtrusive
+natural life is seen to be better than the more showy clusters forced by
+public demands. Yet, on the other hand, if one will not leave his books,
+another his scientific hobbies, a third his fireside, a fourth his
+manufactory, in order to take his place among the magistrates of a city
+or the legislators of a land the danger of bramble supremacy is near.
+Next a wretched Abimelech will appear; and what can be done but set him
+on high and put the reins in his hand? Unquestionably the claims of
+church or country deserve most careful weighing, and even if there is a
+risk that character may lose its tender bloom the sacrifice must be made
+in obedience to an urgent call. For a time, at least, the need of
+society at large must rule the loyal life.
+
+The fable of Jotham, in so far as it flings sarcasm at the persons who
+desire eminence for the sake of it and not for the good they will be
+able to do, is an example of that wisdom which is as unpopular now as
+ever it has been in human history, and the moral needs every day to be
+kept full in view. It is desire for distinction and power, the
+opportunity of waving to and fro over the trees, the right to use this
+handle and that to their names that will be found to make many eager,
+not the distinct wish to accomplish something which the times and the
+country need. Those who solicit public office are far too often selfish,
+not self-denying, and even in the church there is much vain ambition.
+But people will have it so. The crowd follows him who is eager for the
+suffrages of the crowd and showers flattery and promises as he goes. Men
+are lifted into places they cannot fill, and after keeping their seats
+unsteadily for a time they have to disappear into ignominy.
+
+We pass here, however, beyond the meaning Jotham desired to convey, for,
+as we have seen, he would have justified every one in refusing to reign.
+And certainly if society could be held together and guided without the
+exaltation of one over another, by the fidelity of each to his own task
+and brotherly feeling between man and man, there would be a far better
+state of things. But while the fable expounds a God-impelled anarchy,
+the ideal state of mankind, our modern schemes, omitting God,
+repudiating the least notion of a supernatural fount of life, turn upon
+themselves in hopeless confusion. When the divine law rules every life
+we shall not need organised governments; until then entire freedom in
+the world is but a name for unchaining every lust that degrades and
+darkens the life of man. Far away, as a hope of the redeemed and
+Christ-led race, there shines the ideal Theocracy revealed to the
+greater minds of the Hebrew people, often re-stated, never realised. But
+at present men need a visible centre of authority. There must be
+administrators and executors of law, there must be government and
+legislation till Christ reigns in every heart. The movement which
+resulted in Abimelech's sovereignty was the blundering start in a series
+of experiments the Hebrew tribes were bound to make, as other nations
+had to make them. We are still engaged in the search for a right system
+of social order, and while fearers of God acknowledge the ideal towards
+which they labour, they must endeavour to secure by personal toil and
+devotion, by unwearying interest in affairs the most effective form of
+liberal yet firm government.
+
+Abimelech maintained himself in power for three years, no doubt amid
+growing dissatisfaction. Then came the outburst which Jotham had
+predicted. An evil spirit, really present from the first, rose between
+Abimelech and the men of Shechem. The bramble began to tear themselves,
+a thing they were not prepared to endure. Once rooted however it was not
+easily got rid of. One who knows the evil arts of betrayal is quick to
+suspect treachery, the false person knows the ways of the false and how
+to fight them with their own weapons. A man of high character may be
+made powerless by the disclosure of some true words he has spoken; but
+when Shechem would be rid of Abimelech it has to employ brigands and
+organise robbery. "They set liers in wait for him in the mountains who
+robbed all that came along that way," the merchants no doubt to whom
+Abimelech had given a safe conduct. Shechem in fact became the
+head-quarters of a band of highwaymen whose crimes were condoned or even
+approved in the hope that one day the despot would be taken and an end
+put to his misrule.
+
+It may appear strange that our attention is directed to these vulgar
+incidents, as they may be called, which were taking place in and about
+Shechem. Why has the historian not chosen to tell us of other regions
+where some fear of God survived and guided the lives of men, instead of
+giving in detail the intrigues and treacheries of Abimelech and his
+rebellious subjects? Would we not much rather hear of the sanctuary and
+the worship, of the tribe of Judah and its development, of men and women
+who in the obscurity of private life were maintaining the true faith and
+serving God in sincerity? The answer must be partly that the contents of
+the history are determined by the traditions which survived when it was
+compiled. Doings like these at Shechem keep their place in the memory of
+men not because they are important but because they impress themselves
+on popular feeling. This was the beginning of the experiments which
+finally in Samuel's time issued in the kingship of Saul, and although
+Abimelech was, properly speaking, not a Hebrew and certainly was no
+worshipper of Jehovah, yet the fact that he was king for a time gave
+importance to everything about him. Hence we have the full account of
+his rise and fall.
+
+And yet the narrative before us has its value from the religious point
+of view. It shows the disastrous result of that coalition with idolaters
+into which the Hebrews about Shechem entered, it illustrates the danger
+of co-partnery with the worldly on worldly terms. The confederacy of
+which Shechem was the centre is a type of many in which people who
+should be guided always by religion bind themselves for business or
+political ends with those who have no fear of God before their eyes.
+Constantly it happens in such cases that the interests of the commercial
+enterprise or of the party are considered before the law of
+righteousness. The business affair must be made to succeed at all
+hazards. Christian people as partners of companies are committed to
+schemes which imply Sabbath work, sharp practices in buying and
+selling, hollow promises in prospectuses and advertisements, grinding
+of the faces of the poor, miserable squabbles about wages that should
+never occur. In politics the like is frequently seen. Things are done
+against the true instincts of many members of a party; but they, for the
+sake of the party, must be silent or even take their places on platforms
+and write in periodicals defending what in their souls and consciences
+they know to be wrong. The modern Baal-Berith is a tyrannical god, ruins
+the morals of many a worshipper and destroys the peace of many a circle.
+Perhaps Christian people will by-and-by become careful in regard to the
+schemes they join and the zeal with which they fling themselves into
+party strife. It is high time they did. Even distinguished and pious
+leaders are unsafe guides when popular cries have to be gratified; and
+if the principles of Christianity are set aside by a government every
+Christian church and every Christian voice should protest, come of
+parties what may. Or rather, the party of Christ, which is always in the
+van, ought to have our complete allegiance. Conservatism is sometimes
+right. Liberalism is sometimes right. But to bow down to any Baal of the
+League is a shameful thing for a professed servant of the King of kings.
+
+Against Abimelech the adventurer there arose another of the same stamp,
+Gaal son of Ebed, that is the _Abhorred_, son of a slave. In him the men
+of Shechem put their confidence such as it was. At the festival of
+vintage there was a demonstration of a truly barbarous sort. High
+carousal was held in the temple of Baal. There were loud curses of
+Abimelech and Gaal made a speech. His argument was that this Abimelech,
+though his mother belonged to Shechem, was yet also the son of Baal's
+adversary, far too much of a Hebrew to govern Canaanites and good
+servants of Baal. Shechemites should have a true Shechemite to rule
+them. Would to Baal, he cried, this people were under my hand, then
+would I remove Abimelech. His speech, no doubt, was received with great
+applause, and there and then he challenged the absent king.
+
+Zebul, prefect of the city, who was present, heard all this with anger.
+He was of Abimelech's party still and immediately informed his chief,
+who lost no time in marching on Shechem to suppress the revolt.
+According to a common plan of warfare he divided his troops into four
+companies and in the early morning these crept towards the city, one by
+a track across the mountains, another down the valley from the west, the
+third by way of the Diviners' Oak, the fourth perhaps marching from the
+plain of Mamre by way of Jacob's well. The first engagement drove the
+Shechemites into their city, and on the following day the place was
+taken, sacked and destroyed. Some distance from Shechem, probably up the
+valley to the west, stood a tower or sanctuary of Baal around which a
+considerable village had gathered. The people there, seeing the fate of
+the lower town, betook themselves to the tower and shut themselves up
+within it. But Abimelech ordered his men to provide themselves with
+branches of trees, which were piled against the door of the temple and
+set on fire, and all within were smothered or burned to the number of a
+thousand.
+
+At Thebez, another of the confederate cities, the pretender met his
+death. In the siege of the tower which stood within the walls of Thebez
+the horrible expedient of burning was again attempted. Abimelech
+directing the operations had pressed close to the door when a woman cast
+an upper millstone from the parapet with so true an aim as to break his
+skull. So ended the first experiment in the direction of monarchy; so
+also God requited the wickedness of Abimelech.
+
+One turns from these scenes of bloodshed and cruelty with loathing. Yet
+they show what human nature is, and how human history would shape itself
+apart from the faith and obedience of God. We are met by obvious
+warnings; but so often does the evidence of divine judgment seem to
+fail, so often do the wicked prosper that it is from another source than
+observation of the order of things in this world we must obtain the
+necessary impulse to higher life. It is only as we wait on the guidance
+and obey the impulses of the Spirit of God that we shall move towards
+the justice and brotherhood of a better age. And those who have received
+the light and found the will of the Spirit must not slacken their
+efforts on behalf of religion. Gideon did good service in his day, yet
+failing in faithfulness he left the nation scarcely more earnest, his
+own family scarcely instructed. Let us not think that religion can take
+care of itself. Heavenly justice and truth are committed to us. The
+Christ-life generous, pure, holy must be commended by us if it is to
+rule the world. The persuasion that mankind is to be saved in and by the
+earthly survives, and against that most obstinate of all delusions we
+are to stand in constant resolute protest, counting every needful
+sacrifice our simple duty, our highest glory. The task of the faithful
+is no easier to-day than it was a thousand years ago. Men and women can
+be treacherous still with heathen cruelty and falseness; they can be
+vile still with heathen vileness, though wearing the air of the highest
+civilization. If ever the people of God had a work to do in the world
+they have it now.
+
+
+
+
+XVI.
+
+_GILEAD AND ITS CHIEF._
+
+JUDGES x. 1-xi. 11.
+
+
+The scene of the history shifts now to the east of Jordan, and we learn
+first of the influence which the region called Gilead was coming to have
+in Hebrew development from the brief notice of a chief named Jair who
+held the position of judge for twenty-two years. Tola, a man of
+Issachar, succeeded Abimelech, and Jair followed Tola. In the Book of
+Numbers we are informed that the children of Machir son of Manasseh went
+to Gilead and took it and dispossessed the Amorites which were therein;
+and Moses gave Gilead unto Machir the son of Manasseh. It is added that
+Jair the son or descendant of Manasseh went and took the towns of Gilead
+and called them Havvoth-jair; and in this statement the Book of Numbers
+anticipates the history of the judges.
+
+Gilead is described by modern travellers as one of the most varied
+districts of Palestine. The region is mountainous and its peaks rise to
+three and even four thousand feet above the trough of the Jordan. The
+southern part is beautiful and fertile, watered by the Jabbok and other
+streams that flow westward from the hills. "The valleys green with corn,
+the streams fringed with oleander, the magnificent screens of
+yellow-green and russet foliage which cover the steep slopes present a
+scene of quiet beauty, of chequered light and shade of uneastern aspect
+which makes Mount Gilead a veritable land of promise." "No one," says
+another writer, "can fairly judge of Israel's heritage who has not seen
+the exuberance of Gilead as well as the hard rocks of Jud�a which only
+yield their abundance to reward constant toil and care." In Gilead the
+rivers flow in summer as well as in winter, and they are filled with
+fishes and fresh-water shells. While in Western Palestine the soil is
+insufficient now to support a large population, beyond Jordan improved
+cultivation alone is needed to make the whole district a garden.
+
+To the north and east of Gilead lie Bashan and that extraordinary
+volcanic region called the Argob or the Lejah where the Havvoth-jair or
+towns of Jair were situated. The traveller who approaches this singular
+district from the north sees it rising abruptly from the plain, the edge
+of it like a rampart about twenty feet high. It is of a rude oval shape,
+some twenty miles long from north to south, and fifteen in breadth, and
+is simply a mass of dark jagged rocks, with clefts between in which were
+built not a few cities and villages. The whole of this Argob or Stony
+Land, Jephthah's land of Tob, is a natural fortification, a sanctuary
+open only to those who have the secret of the perilous paths that wind
+along savage cliff and deep defile. One who established himself here
+might soon acquire the fame and authority of a chief, and Jair,
+acknowledged by the Manassites as their judge, extended his power and
+influence among the Gadites and Reubenites farther south.
+
+But plenty of corn and wine and oil and the advantage of a natural
+fortress which might have been held against any foe did not avail the
+Hebrews when they were corrupted by idolatry. In the land of Gilead and
+Bashan they became a hardy and vigorous race, and yet when they gave
+themselves up to the influence of the Syrians, Sidonians, Ammonites and
+Moabites, forsaking the Lord and serving the gods of these peoples,
+disaster overtook them. The Ammonites were ever on the watch, and now,
+stronger than for centuries in consequence of the defeat of Midian and
+Amalek by Gideon, they fell on the Hebrews of the east, subdued them and
+even crossed Jordan and fought with the southern tribes so that Israel
+was sore distressed.
+
+We have found reason to suppose that during the many turmoils of the
+north the tribes of Judah and Simeon and to some extent Ephraim were
+pleased to dwell secure in their own domains, giving little help to
+their kinsfolk. Deborah and Barak got no troops from the south, and it
+was with a grudge Ephraim joined in the pursuit of Midian. Now the time
+has come for the harvest of selfish content. Supposing the people of
+Judah to have been specially engaged with religion and the arranging of
+worship--that did not justify their neglect of the political troubles of
+the north. It was a poor religion then, as it is a poor religion now,
+that could exist apart from national well-being and patriotic duty.
+Brotherhood must be realised in the nation as well as in the church, and
+piety must fulfil itself through patriotism as well as in other ways.
+
+No doubt the duties we owe to each other and to the nation of which we
+form a part are imposed by natural conditions which have arisen in the
+course of history, and some may think that the natural should give way
+to the spiritual. They may see the interests of a kingdom of this world
+as actually opposed to the interests of the kingdom of God. The
+apostles of Christ, however, did not set the human and divine in
+contrast, as if God in His providence had nothing to do with the making
+of a nation. "The powers that be are ordained of God," says St. Paul in
+writing to the Romans; and again in his First Epistle to Timothy, "I
+exhort that supplications, prayers, intercessions, thanksgivings be made
+for all men: for kings and all that are in high place, that we may lead
+a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and gravity." To the same
+effect St. Peter says, "Be subject to every ordinance of man for the
+Lord's sake." Natural and secular enough were the authorities to which
+submission was thus enjoined. The policy of Rome was of the earth
+earthy. The wars it waged, the intrigues that went on for power savoured
+of the most carnal ambition. Yet as members of the commonwealth
+Christians were to submit to the Roman magistrates and intercede with
+God on their behalf, observing closely and intelligently all that went
+on, taking due part in affairs. No room was to be given for the notion
+that the Christian society meant a new political centre. In our own
+times there is a duty which many never understand, or which they easily
+imagine is being fulfilled for them. Let religious people be assured
+that generous and intelligent patriotism is demanded of them and
+attention to the political business of the time. Those who are careless
+will find, as did the people of Judah, that in neglecting the purity of
+government and turning a deaf ear to cries for justice, they are
+exposing their country to disaster and their religion to reproach.
+
+We are told that the Israelites of Gilead worshipped the gods of the
+Phoenicians and Syrians, of the Moabites and of the Ammonites. Whatever
+religious rites took their fancy they were ready to adopt. This will be
+to their credit in some quarters as a mark of openness of mind,
+intelligence and taste. They were not bigoted; other men's ways in
+religion and civilization were not rejected as beneath their regard. The
+argument is too familiar to be traced more fully. Briefly it may be said
+that if catholicity could save a race Israel should rarely have been in
+trouble, and certainly not at this time. One name by which the Hebrews
+knew God was _El_ or _Elohim_. When they found among the gods of the
+Sidonians one called El, the careless-minded supposed that there could
+be no harm in joining in his worship. Then came the notion that the
+other divinities of the Phoenician Pantheon, such as Melcarth, Dagon,
+Derketo, might be adored as well. Very likely they found zeal and
+excitement in the alien religious gatherings which their own had lost.
+So they slipped into practical heathenism.
+
+And the process goes on among ourselves. Through the principles that
+culture means artistic freedom and that worship is a form of art we
+arrive at taste or liking as the chief test. Intensity of feeling is
+craved and religion must satisfy that or be despised. It is the very
+error that led Hebrews to the feasts of Astarte and Adonis, and whither
+it tends we can see in the old history. Turning from the strong earnest
+gospel which grasps intellect and will to shows and ceremonies that
+please the eye, or even to music refined and devotional that stirs and
+thrills the feelings, we decline from the reality of religion. Moreover
+a serious danger threatens us in the far too common teaching which makes
+little of truth everything of charity. Christ was most charitable, but
+it is through the knowledge and practice of truth He offers freedom. He
+is our King by His witness-bearing not to charity but to truth. Those
+who are anxious to keep us from bigotry and tell us that meekness,
+gentleness and love are more than doctrine mislead the mind of the age.
+Truth in regard to God and His covenant is the only foundation on which
+life can be securely built, and without right thinking there cannot be
+right living. A man may be amiable, humble, patient and kind though he
+has no doctrinal belief and his religion is of the purely emotional
+sort; but it is the truth believed by previous generations, fought and
+suffered for by stronger men, not his own gratification of taste that
+keeps him in the right way. And when the influence of that truth decays
+there will remain no anchorage, neither compass nor chart for the
+voyage. He will be like a wave of the sea driven of the wind and tossed.
+
+Again, the religious so far as they have wisdom and strength are
+required to be pioneers, which they can never be in following fancy or
+taste. Here nothing but strenuous thought, patient faithful obedience
+can avail. Hebrew history is the story of a pioneer people and every
+lapse from fidelity was serious, the future of humanity being at stake.
+Each Christian society and believer has work of the same kind not less
+important, and failures due to intellectual sloth and moral levity are
+as dishonourable as they are hurtful to the human race. Some of our
+heretics now are more serious than Christians, and they give thought and
+will more earnestly to the opinions they try to propagate. While the
+professed servants of Christ, who should be marching in the van, are
+amusing themselves with the accessories of religion, the resolute
+socialist or nihilist reasoning and speaking with the heat of conviction
+leads the masses where he will.
+
+The Ammonite oppression made the Hebrews feel keenly the uselessness of
+heathenism. Baal and Melcarth had been thought of as real divinities,
+exercising power in some region or other of earth or heaven, and
+Israel's had been an easy backsliding. Idolatry did not appear as
+darkness to people who had never been fully in the light. But when
+trouble came and help was sorely needed they began to see that the
+Baalim were nothing. What could these idols do for men oppressed and at
+their wits' end? Religion was of no avail unless it brought an assurance
+of One Whose strong hand could reach from land to land, Whose grace and
+favour could revive sad and troubled souls. Heathenism was found utterly
+barren, and Israel turned to Jehovah the God of its fathers. "We have
+sinned against Thee even because we have forsaken our God and have
+served the Baalim."
+
+Those who now fall away from faith are in worse case by far than Israel.
+They have no thought of a real power that can befriend them. It is to
+mere abstractions they have given the divine name. In sin and sorrow
+alike they remain with ideas only, with bare terms of speculation in
+which there is no life, no strength, no hope for the moral nature. They
+are men and have to live; but with the living God they have entirely
+broken. In trouble they can only call on the Abyss or the Immensities,
+and there is no way of repentance though they seek it carefully with
+tears. At heart therefore they are pessimists without resource. Sadness
+deep and deadly ever waits upon such unbelief, and our religion to-day
+suffers the gloom because it is infected by the uncertainties and
+denials of an agnosticism at once positive and confused.
+
+Another paganism, that of gathering and doing in the world-sphere, is
+constantly beside us, drawing multitudes from fidelity to Christ as
+Baal-worship drew Israel from Jehovah, and it is equally barren in the
+sharp experiences of humanity. Earthly things venerated in the ardour of
+business and the pursuit of social distinction appear as impressive
+realities only while the soul sleeps. Let it be aroused by some overturn
+of the usual, one of those floods that sweep suddenly down on the cities
+which fill the valley of life, and there is a quick pathetic confession
+of the truth. The soul needs help now, and its help must come from the
+Eternal Spirit. We must have done with mere saying of prayers and begin
+to pray. We must find access if access is to be had to the secret place
+of the Most High on Whose mercy we depend to redeem us from bondage and
+fear. Sad therefore is it for those who having never learned to seek the
+throne of divine succour are swept by the wild deluge from their temples
+and their gods. It is a cry of despair they raise amid the swelling
+torrent. You who now by the sacred oracles and the mediation of Christ
+can come into the fellowship of eternal life be earnest and eager in the
+cultivation of your faith. The true religion of God which avails the
+soul in its extremity is not to be had in a moment, when suddenly its
+help is needed. That confidence which has been established in the mind
+by serious thought, by the habit of prayer and reliance on divine wisdom
+can alone bring help when the foundations of the earthly are destroyed.
+
+To Israel troubled and contrite came as on previous occasions a
+prophetic message; and it was spoken by one of those incisive ironic
+preachers who were born from time to time among this strangely heathen,
+strangely believing people. It is in terms of earnest remonstrance he
+speaks, at first almost going the length of declaring that there is no
+hope for the rebellious and ungrateful tribes. They found it an easy
+thing to turn from their Divine King to the gods they chose to worship.
+Now they perhaps expect as easy a recovery of His favour. But healing
+must begin with deeper wounding, and salvation with much keener anxiety.
+This prophet knows the need for utter seriousness of soul. As he loves
+and yearns over his country-folk he must so deal with them; it is God's
+way, the only way to save. Most irrationally, against all sound
+principles of judgment they had abandoned the Living One, the Eternal to
+worship hideous idols like Moloch and Dagon. It was wicked because it
+was wilfully stupid and perverse. And Jehovah says, "I will save you no
+more. Go and cry unto the gods which ye have chosen; let them save you
+in the day of your distress." The rebuke is stinging. The preacher makes
+the people feel the wretched insufficiency of their hope in the false,
+and the great strong pressure upon them of the Almighty, Whom, even in
+neglect, they cannot escape. We are pointed forward to the terrible
+pathos of Jeremiah:--"Who shall have pity upon thee, O Jerusalem? or who
+shall bemoan thee? or who shall turn aside to ask of thy welfare? Thou
+hast rejected me, saith the Lord, thou art gone backward: therefore have
+I stretched out my hand against thee, and destroyed thee: I am weary
+with repenting."
+
+And notice to what state of mind the Hebrews were brought. Renewing
+their confession they said, "Do thou unto us whatsoever seemeth good
+unto Thee." They would be content to suffer now at the hand of God
+whatever He chose to inflict on them. They themselves would have exacted
+heavy tribute of a subject people that had rebelled and came suing for
+pardon. Perhaps they would have slain every tenth man. Jehovah might
+appoint retribution of the same kind; He might afflict them with
+pestilence; He might require them to offer a multitude of sacrifices.
+Men who traffic with idolatry and adopt gross notions of revengeful gods
+are certain to carry back with them when they return to the better faith
+many of the false ideas they have gathered. And it is just possible that
+a demand for human sacrifices was at this time attributed to God, the
+general feeling that they might be necessary connecting itself with
+Jephthah's vow.
+
+It is idle to suppose that Israelites who persistently lapsed into
+paganism could at any time, because they repented, find the spiritual
+thoughts they had lost. True those thoughts were at the heart of the
+national life, there always even when least felt. But thousands of
+Hebrews even in a generation of reviving faith died with but a faint and
+shadowy personal understanding of Jehovah. Everything in the Book of
+Judges goes to show that the mass of the people were nearer the level of
+their neighbours the Moabites and Ammonites than the piety of the
+Psalms. A remarkable ebb and flow are observable in the history of the
+race. Look at some facts and there seems to be decline. Samson is below
+Gideon, and Gideon below Deborah; no man of leading until Isaiah can be
+named with Moses. Yet ever and anon there are prophetic calls and voices
+out of a spiritual region into which the people as a whole do not enter,
+voices to which they listen only when distressed and overborne.
+Worldliness increases, for the world opens to the Hebrew; but it often
+disappoints, and still there are some to whom the heavenly secret is
+told. The race as a whole is not becoming more devout and holy, but the
+few are gaining a clearer vision as one experience after another is
+recorded. The antithesis is the same we see in the Christian centuries.
+Is the multitude more pious now than in the age when a king had to do
+penance for rash words spoken against an ecclesiastic? Are the churches
+less worldly than they were a hundred years ago? Scarcely may we affirm
+it. Yet there never was an age so rich as ours in the finest
+spirituality, the noblest Christian thought. Our van presses up to the
+Simplon height and is in constant touch with those who follow; but the
+rear is still chaffering and idling in the streets of Milan. It is in
+truth always by the fidelity of the remnant that humanity is saved for
+God.
+
+We cannot say that when Israel repented it was in the love of holiness
+so much as in the desire for liberty. The ways of the heathen were
+followed readily, but the supremacy of the heathen was ever abominable
+to the vigorous Israelite. By this national spirit however God could
+find the tribes, and a special feature of the deliverance from Ammon is
+marked where we read: "The people, the princes of Gilead said one to the
+other, What man is he that will begin to fight against the children of
+Ammon? He shall be head over all the inhabitants of Gilead." Looking
+around for the fit leader they found Jephthah and agreed to invite him.
+
+Now this shows distinct progress in the growth of the nation. There is,
+if nothing more, a growth in practical power. Abimelech had thrust
+himself upon the men of Shechem. Jephthah is chosen apart from any
+ambition of his own. The movement which made him judge arose out of the
+consciousness of the Gileadites that they could act for themselves and
+were bound to act for themselves. Providence indicated the chief, but
+they had to be instruments of providence in making him chief. The vigour
+and robust intelligence of the men of Eastern Palestine come out here.
+They lead in the direction of true national life. While on the west of
+Jordan there is a fatalistic disposition, these men move. Gilead, the
+separated country, with the still ruder Bashan behind it and the Argob a
+resort of outlaws, is beneath some other regions in manners and in
+thought, but ahead of them in point of energy. We need not look for
+refinement, but we shall see power; and the chosen leader while he is
+something of the barbarian will be a man to leave his mark on history.
+
+At the start we are not prepossessed in favour of Jephthah. There is
+some confusion in the narrative which has led to the supposition that he
+was a foundling of the clan. But taking Gilead as the actual name of his
+father, he appears as the son of a harlot, brought up in the paternal
+home and banished from it when there were legitimate sons able to
+contend with him. We get thus a brief glance at a certain rough standard
+of morals and see that even polygamy made sharp exclusions. Jephthah,
+cast out, betakes himself to the land of Tob and getting about him a
+band of vain fellows or freebooters becomes the Robin Hood or Rob Roy of
+his time. There are natural suspicions of a man who takes to a life of
+this kind, and yet the progress of events shows that though Jephthah was
+a sort of outlaw his character as well as his courage must have
+commended him. He and his men might occasionally seize for their own use
+the cattle and corn of Israelites when they were hard pressed for food.
+But it was generally against the Ammonites and other enemies their raids
+were directed, and the modern instances already cited show that no
+little magnanimity and even patriotism may go along with a life of
+lawless adventure. If this robber chief, as some might call him, now and
+again levied contributions from a wealthy flock-master, the poorer
+Hebrews were no doubt indebted to him for timely help when bands of
+Ammonites swept through the land. Something of this we must read into
+the narrative otherwise the elders of Gilead would not so unanimously
+and urgently have invited him to become their head.
+
+Jephthah was not at first disposed to believe in the good faith of those
+who gave him the invitation. Among the heads of households who came he
+saw his own brothers who had driven him to the hills. He must have more
+than suspected that they only wished to make use of him in their
+emergency and, the fighting over, would set him aside. He therefore
+required an oath of the men that they would really accept him as chief
+and obey him. That given he assumed the command.
+
+And here the religious character of the man begins to appear. At Mizpah
+on the verge of the wilderness where the Israelites, driven northward by
+the victories of Ammon, had their camp there stood an ancient cairn or
+heap of stones which preserved the tradition of a sacred covenant and
+still retained the savour of sanctity. There it was that Jacob fleeing
+from Padan-aram on his way back to Canaan was overtaken by Laban, and
+there raising the Cairn of Witness they swore in the sight of Jehovah to
+be faithful to each other. The belief still lingered that the old
+monument was a place of meeting between man and God. To it Jephthah
+repaired at this new point in his life. No more an adventurer, no more
+an outlaw, but the chosen leader of eastern Israel, "he spake all his
+words before Jehovah in Mizpah." He had his life to review there, and
+that could not be done without serious thought. He had a new and
+strenuous future opened to him. Jephthah the outcast, the unnamed, was
+to be leader in a tremendous national struggle. The bold Gileadite feels
+the burden of the task. He has to question himself, to think of Jehovah.
+Hitherto he has been doing his own business and to that he has felt
+quite equal; now with large responsibility comes a sense of need. For a
+fight with society he has been strong enough; but can he be sure of
+himself as God's man, fighting against Ammon? Not a few words but many
+would he have to utter as on the hill-top in the silence he lifted up
+his soul to God and girt himself in holy resolution as a father and a
+Hebrew to do his duty in the day of battle.
+
+Thus we pass from doubt of Jephthah to the hope that the banished man,
+the free-booter will yet prove to be an Israelite indeed, of sterling
+character, whose religion, very rude perhaps, has a deep strain of
+reality and power. Jephthah at the cairn of Mizpah lifting up his hands
+in solemn invocation of the God of Jacob reminds us that there are great
+traditions of the past of our nation and of our most holy faith to which
+we are bound to be true, that there is a God our witness and our judge
+in Whose strength alone we can live and do nobly. For the service of
+humanity and the maintenance of faith we need to be in close touch with
+the brave and good of other days and in the story of their lives find
+quickening for our own. Along the same line and succession we are to
+bear our testimony, and no link of connection with the Divine Power is
+to be missed which the history of the men of faith supplies. Yet as our
+personal Helper especially we must know God. Hearing His call to
+ourselves we must lift the standard and go forth to the battle of life.
+Who can serve his family and friends, who can advance the well-being of
+the world, unless he has entered into that covenant with the Living God
+which raises mortal insufficiency to power and makes weak and ignorant
+men instruments of a divine redemption?
+
+
+
+
+XVII.
+
+_THE TERRIBLE VOW._
+
+JUDGES xi. 12-40.
+
+
+At every stage of their history the Hebrews were capable of producing
+men of passionate religiousness. And this appears as a distinction of
+the group of nations to which they belong. The Arab of the present time
+has the same quality. He can be excited to a holy war in which thousands
+perish. With the battle-cry of Allah and his Prophet he forgets fear. He
+presents a different mingling of character from the Saxon,--turbulence
+and reverence, sometimes apart, then blending--magnanimity and a
+tremendous want of magnanimity; he is fierce and generous, now rising to
+vivid faith, then breaking into earthly passion. We have seen the type
+in Deborah. David is the same and Elijah; and Jephthah is the Gileadite,
+the border Arab. In each of these there is quick leaping at life and
+beneath hot impulse a strain of brooding thought with moments of intense
+inward trouble. As we follow the history we must remember the kind of
+man it presents to us. There is humanity as it is in every race, daring
+in effort, tender in affection, struggling with ignorance yet thoughtful
+of God and duty, triumphing here, defeated there. And there is the
+Syrian with the heat of the sun in his blood and the shadow of Moloch on
+his heart, a son of the rude hills and of barbaric times, yet with a
+dignity, a sense of justice, a keen upward look, the Israelite never
+lost in the outlaw.
+
+So soon as Jephthah begins to act for his people, marks of a strong
+character are seen. He is no ordinary leader, not the mere fighter the
+elders of Gilead may have taken him to be. His first act is to send
+messengers to the king of Ammon saying, What hast thou to do with me
+that thou art come to fight against my land? He is a chief who desires
+to avert bloodshed--a new figure in the history.
+
+Natural in those times was the appeal to arms, so natural, so customary
+that we must not lightly pass this trait in the character of the
+Gileadite judge. If we compare his policy with that of Gideon or Barak
+we see of course that he had different circumstances to deal with.
+Between Jordan and the Mediterranean the Israelites required the whole
+of the land in order to establish a free nationality. There was no room
+for Canaanite or Midianite rule side by side with their own. The
+dominance of Israel had to be complete and undisturbed. Hence there was
+no alternative to war when Jabin or Zebah and Zalmunna attacked the
+tribes. Might had to be invoked on behalf of right. On the other side
+Jordan the position was different. Away towards the desert behind the
+mountains of Bashan the Ammonites might find pasture for their flocks,
+and Moab had its territory on the slopes of the lower Jordan and the
+Dead Sea. It was not necessary to crush Ammon in order to give Manasseh,
+Gad and Reuben space enough and to spare. Yet there was a rare quality
+of judgment shown by the man who although called to lead in war began
+with negotiation and aimed at a peaceful settlement. No doubt there was
+danger that the Ammonites might unite with Midian or Moab against
+Israel. But Jephthah hazards such a coalition. He knows the bitterness
+kindled by strife. He desires that Ammon, a kindred people, shall be won
+over to friendliness with Israel, henceforth to be an ally instead of a
+foe.
+
+Now in one aspect this may appear an error in policy, and the Hebrew
+chief will seem especially to blame when he makes the admission that the
+Ammonites hold their land from Chemosh their god. Jephthah has no sense
+of Israel's mission to the world, no wish to convert Ammon to a higher
+faith, nor does Jehovah appear to him as sole King, sole object of human
+worship. Yet, on the other hand, if the Hebrews were to fight idolatry
+everywhere it is plain their swords would never have been sheathed.
+Phoenicia was close beside; Aram was not far away; northward the
+Hittites maintained their elaborate ritual. A line had to be drawn
+somewhere and, on the whole, we cannot but regard Jephthah as an
+enlightened and humane chief who wished to stir against his people and
+his God no hostility that could possibly be avoided. Why should not
+Israel conquer Ammon by justice and magnanimity, by showing the higher
+principles which the true religion taught? He began at all events by
+endeavouring to stay the quarrel, and the attempt was wise.
+
+The king of Ammon refused Jephthah's offer to negotiate. He claimed the
+land bounded by the Arnon, the Jabbok and Jordan as his own and demanded
+that it should be peaceably given up to him. In reply Jephthah denied
+the claim. It was the Amorites, he said, who originally held that part
+of Syria. Sihon who was defeated in the time of Moses was not an
+Ammonite king, but chief of the Amorites. Israel had by conquest
+obtained the district in dispute, and Ammon must give place.
+
+The full account given of these messages sent by Jephthah shows a strong
+desire on the part of the narrator to vindicate Israel from any charge
+of unnecessary warfare. And it is very important that this should be
+understood, for the inspiration of the historian is involved. We know of
+nations that in sheer lust of conquest have attacked tribes whose land
+they did not need, and we have read histories in which wars unprovoked
+and cruel have been glorified. In after times the Hebrew kings brought
+trouble and disaster on themselves by their ambition. It would have been
+well if David and Solomon had followed a policy like Jephthah's rather
+than attempted to rival Assyria and Egypt. We see an error rather than a
+cause of boasting when David put garrisons in Syria of Damascus: strife
+was thereby provoked which issued in many a sanguinary war. The Hebrews
+should never have earned the character of an aggressive and ambitious
+people that required to be kept in check by the kingdoms around. To this
+nation, a worldly nation on the whole, was committed a spiritual
+inheritance, a spiritual task. Is it asked why being worldly the Hebrews
+ought to have fulfilled a spiritual calling? The answer is that their
+best men understood and declared the Divine will, and they should have
+listened to their best men. Their fatal mistake was, as Christ showed,
+to deride their prophets, to crush and kill the messengers of God. And
+many other nations likewise have missed their true vocation being
+deluded by dreams of vast empire and earthly glory. To combat idolatry
+was indeed the business of Israel and especially to drive back the
+heathenism that would have overwhelmed its faith; and often this had to
+be done with an earthly sword because liberty no less than faith was at
+stake. But a policy of aggression was never the duty of this people.
+
+The temperate messages of the Hebrew chief to the king of Ammon proved
+to be of no avail: war alone was to settle the rival claims. And this
+once clear Jephthah lost no time in preparing for battle. As one who
+felt that without God no man can do anything, he sought assurance of
+divine aid; and we have now to consider the vow which he made, ever
+interesting on account of the moral problem it involves and the very
+pathetic circumstances which accompanied its fulfilment.
+
+The terms of the solemn engagement under which Jephthah came were
+these:--"If Thou wilt indeed deliver the children of Ammon into mine
+hand, then it shall be that whatsoever" (Septuagint and Vulgate,
+"_whosoever_") "cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me when I
+return in peace from the children of Ammon shall be the Lord's, and I
+will offer it (otherwise, _him_) for a burnt offering." And here two
+questions arise; the first, what he could have meant by the promise; the
+second, whether we can justify him in making it. As to the first, the
+explicit designation to God of whatever came forth of the doors of his
+house points unmistakably to a human life as the devoted thing. It would
+have been idle in an emergency like that in which Jephthah found
+himself, with a hazardous conflict impending that was to decide the fate
+of the eastern tribes at least, to anticipate the appearance of an
+animal, bullock, goat or sheep, and promise that in sacrifice. The form
+of words used in the vow cannot be held to refer to an animal. The chief
+is thinking of some one who will express joy at his success and greet
+him as a victor. In the fulness of his heart he leaps to a wild savage
+mark of devotion. It is a crisis alike for him and for the people and
+what can he do to secure the favour and help of Jehovah? Too ready from
+his acquaintance with heathen sacrifices and ideas to believe that the
+God of Israel will be pleased with the kind of offerings by which the
+gods of Sidon and Aram were honoured, feeling himself as the chief of
+the Hebrews bound to make some great and unusual sacrifice, he does not
+promise that the captives taken in war shall be devoted to Jehovah, but
+some one of his own people is to be the victim. The dedication shall be
+all the more impressive that the life given up is one of which he
+himself shall feel the loss. A conqueror returning from war would, in
+ordinary circumstances, have loaded with gifts the first member of his
+household who came forth to welcome him. Jephthah vows to give that very
+person to God. The insufficient religious intelligence of the man, whose
+life had been far removed from elevating influences, this once
+perceived--and we cannot escape from the facts of the case--the vow is
+parallel to others of which ancient history tells. Jephthah expects some
+servant, some favourite slave to be the first. There is a touch of
+barbaric grandeur and at the same time of Roman sternness in his vow. As
+a chief he has the lives of all his household entirely at his disposal.
+To sacrifice one will be hard, for he is a humane man; but he expects
+that the offering will be all the more acceptable to the Most High. Such
+are the ideas moral and religious from which his vow springs.
+
+Now we should like to find more knowledge and a higher vision in a
+leader of Israel. We would fain escape from the conclusion that a Hebrew
+could be so ignorant of the divine character as Jephthah appears; and
+moved by such feelings many have taken a very different view of the
+matter. The Gileadite has, for example, been represented as fully aware
+of the Mosaic regulations concerning sacrifice and the method for
+redeeming the life of a firstborn child; that is to say he is supposed
+to have made his vow under cover of the Levitical provision by which in
+case his daughter should first meet him he would escape the necessity of
+sacrificing her. The rule in question could not, however, be stretched
+to a case like this. But, supposing it could, is it likely that a man
+whose whole soul had gone out in a vow of life and death to God would
+reserve such a door of escape? In that case the story would lose its
+terror indeed, but also its power: human history would be the poorer by
+one of the great tragic experiences wild and supernatural that show man
+struggling with thoughts above himself.
+
+What did the Gileadite know? What ought he to have known? We see in his
+vow a fatalistic strain; he leaves it to chance or fate to determine who
+shall meet him. There is also an assumption of the right to take into
+his own hands the disposal of a human life; and this, though most
+confidently claimed, was entirely a factitious right. It is one which
+mankind has ceased to allow. Further the purpose of offering a human
+being in sacrifice is unspeakably horrible to us. But how differently
+these things must have appeared in the dim light which alone guided this
+man of lawless life in his attempt to make sure of God and honour Him!
+We have but to consider things that are done at the present day in the
+name of religion, the lifelong "devotion" of young women in a nunnery,
+for example, and all the ceremonies which accompany that outrage on the
+divine order to see that centuries of Christianity have not yet put an
+end to practices which under colour of piety are barbaric and revolting.
+In the modern case a nun secluded from the world, dead to the world, is
+considered to be an offering to God. The old conception of sacrifice was
+that the life must pass out of the world by way of death in order to
+become God's. Or again, when the priest describing the devotion of his
+body says: "The essential, the sacerdotal purpose to which it should be
+used is to die. Such death must be begun in chastity, continued in
+mortification, consummated in that actual death which is the priest's
+final oblation, his last sacrifice,"[6]--the same superstition appears
+in a refined and mystical form.
+
+  [6] Henri Perreyve.
+
+His vow made, the chief went forth to battle leaving in his home one
+child only, a daughter beautiful, high-spirited, the joy of her father's
+heart. She was a true Hebrew girl and all her thought was that he, her
+sire, should deliver Israel. For this she longed and prayed. And it was
+so. The enthusiasm of Jephthah's devotion to God was caught by his
+troops and bore them on irresistibly. Marching from Mizpah in the land
+of Bashan they crossed Manasseh, and south from Mizpeh of Gilead, which
+was not far from the Jabbok, they found the Ammonites encamped. The
+first battle practically decided the campaign. From Aroer to Minnith,
+from the Jabbok to the springs of Arnon, the course of flight and
+bloodshed extended, until the invaders were swept from the territory of
+the tribes. Then came the triumphant return.
+
+We imagine the chief as he approached his home among the hills of
+Gilead, his eagerness and exultation mingled with some vague alarm. The
+vow he has made cannot but weigh upon his mind now that the performance
+of it comes so near. He has had time to think what it implies. When he
+uttered the words that involved a life the issue of war appeared
+doubtful. Perhaps the campaign would be long and indecisive. He might
+have returned not altogether discredited, yet not triumphant. But he has
+succeeded beyond his expectation. There can be no doubt that the
+offering is due to Jehovah. Who then shall appear? The secret of his vow
+is hid in his own breast. To no man has he revealed his solemn promise;
+nor has he dared in any way to interfere with the course of events. As
+he passes up the valley with his attendants there is a stir in his rude
+castle. The tidings of his coming have preceded him and she, that dear
+girl who is the very apple of his eye, his daughter, his only child,
+having already rehearsed her part, goes forth eagerly to welcome him.
+She is clad in her gayest dress. Her eyes are bright with the keenest
+excitement. The timbrel her father once gave her, on which she has often
+played to delight him, is tuned to a chant of triumph. She dances as she
+passes from the gate. Her father, her father, chief and victor!
+
+And he? A sudden horror checks his heart. He stands arrested, cold as
+stone, with eyes of strange dark trouble fixed upon the gay young figure
+that welcomes him to home and rest and fame. She flies to his arms, but
+they do not open to her. She looks at him, for he has never repulsed
+her--and why now? He puts forth his hands as if to thrust away a
+dreadful sight, and what does she hear? Amid the sobs of a strong man's
+agony, "Alas, my daughter, thou hast brought me very low ... and thou
+art one of them that trouble me." To startled ears the truth is slowly
+told. She is vowed to the Lord in sacrifice. He cannot go back. Jehovah
+who gave the victory now claims the fulfilment of the oath.
+
+We are dealing with the facts of life. For a time let us put aside the
+reflections that are so easy to make about rash vows and the iniquity of
+keeping them. Before this anguish of the loving heart, this awful issue
+of a sincere but superstitious devotion we stand in reverence. It is one
+of the supreme hours of humanity. Will the father not seek relief from
+his obligation? Will the daughter not rebel? Surely a sacrifice so awful
+will not be completed. Yet we remember Abraham and Isaac journeying
+together to Moriah, and how with the father's resignation of his great
+hope there must have gone the willingness of the son to face death if
+that last proof of piety and faith is required. We look at the father
+and daughter of a later date and find the same spirit of submission to
+what is regarded as the will of God. Is the thing horrible--too horrible
+to be dwelt upon? Are we inclined to say,
+
+  "... 'Heaven heads the count of crimes
+    With that wild oath?' She renders answer high,
+  'Not so; nor once alone, a thousand times
+    I would be born and die.'"
+
+It has been affirmed that "Jephthah's rash act, springing from a
+culpable ignorance of the character of God, directed by heathen
+superstition and cruelty poured an ingredient of extreme bitterness into
+his cup of joy and poisoned his whole life." Suffering indeed there must
+have been for both the actors in that pitiful tragedy of devotion and
+ignorance, who knew not the God to Whom they offered the sacrifice. But
+it is one of the marks of rude erring man that he does take upon himself
+such burdens of pain in the service of the invisible Lord. A shallow
+scepticism entirely misreads the strange dark deeds often done for
+religion; yet one who has uttered many a foolish thing in the way of
+"explaining" piety can at last confess that the renouncing mortifying
+spirit is, with all its errors, one of man's noble and distinguishing
+qualities. To Jephthah, as to his heroic daughter, religion was another
+thing than it is to many, just because of their extraordinary
+renunciation. Very ignorant they were surely, but they were not so
+ignorant as those who make no great offering to God, who would not
+resign a single pleasure, nor deprive a son or daughter of a single
+comfort or delight, for the sake of religion and the higher life. To
+what purpose is this waste? said the disciples, when the pound of
+ointment of spikenard very costly was poured on the head of Jesus and
+the house was filled with the odour. To many now it seems waste to
+expend thought, time or money upon a sacred cause, much more to hazard
+or to give life itself. We see the evils of enthusiastic self-devotion
+to the work of God very clearly; its power we do not feel. We are saving
+life so diligently, many of us, that we may well fear to lose it
+irremediably. There is no strain and therefore no strength, no joy. A
+weary pessimism dogs our unfaith.
+
+To Jephthah and his daughter the vow was sacred, irrevocable. The
+deliverance of Israel by so signal and complete a victory left no
+alternative. It would have been well if they had known God differently;
+yet better this darkly impressive issue which went to the making of
+Hebrew faith and strength than easy unfruitful evasion of duty. We are
+shocked by the expenditure of fine feeling and heroism in upholding a
+false idea of God and obligation to Him; but are we outraged and
+distressed by the constant effort to escape from God which characterizes
+our age? And have we for our own part come yet to the right idea of self
+and its relations? Our century, beclouded on many points, is nowhere
+less informed than in matters of self-sacrifice; Christ's doctrine is
+still uncomprehended. Jephthah was wrong, for God did not need to be
+bribed to support a man who was bent on doing his duty. And many fail
+now to perceive that personal development and service of God are in the
+same line. Life is made for generosity not mortification, for giving in
+glad ministry not for giving up in hideous sacrifice. It is to be
+devoted to God by the free and holy use of body, mind and soul in the
+daily tasks which Providence appoints.
+
+The wailing of Jephthah's daughter rings in our ears bearing with it the
+anguish of many a soul tormented in the name of that which is most
+sacred, tormented by mistakes concerning God, the awful theory that He
+is pleased with human suffering. The relics of that hideous
+Moloch-worship which polluted Jephthah's faith, not even yet purged away
+by the Spirit of Christ, continue and make religion an anxiety and life
+a kind of torture. I do not speak of that devotion of thought and time,
+eloquence and talent to some worthless cause which here and there amazes
+the student of history and human life,--the passionate ardour, for
+example, with which Flora Macdonald gave herself up to the service of a
+Stuart. But religion is made to demand sacrifices compared to which the
+offering of Jephthah's daughter was easy. The imagination of women
+especially, fired by false representations of the death of Christ in
+which there was a clear divine assertion of self, while it is made to
+appear as complete suppression of self, bears many on in a hopeless and
+essentially immoral endeavour. Has God given us minds, feelings, right
+ambitions that we may crush them? Does He purify our desires and
+aspirations by the fire of His own Spirit and still require us to crush
+them? Are we to find our end in being nothing, absolutely nothing,
+devoid of will, of purpose, of personality? Is this what Christianity
+demands? Then our religion is but refined suicide, and the God who
+desires us to annihilate ourselves is but the Supreme Being of the
+Buddhists, if those may be said to have a god who regard the suppression
+of individuality as salvation.
+
+Christ was made a sacrifice for us. Yes: He sacrificed everything
+except His own eternal life and power; He sacrificed ease and favour
+and immediate success for the manifestation of God. So He achieved
+the fulness of personal might and royalty. And every sacrifice His
+religion calls us to make is designed to secure that enlargement and
+fulness of spiritual individuality in the exercise of which we shall
+truly serve God and our fellows. Does God require sacrifice? Yes,
+unquestionably--the sacrifice which every reasonable being must make in
+order that the mind, the soul may be strong and free, sacrifice of the
+lower for the higher, sacrifice of pleasure for truth, of comfort for
+duty, of the life that is earthly and temporal for the life that is
+heavenly and eternal. And the distinction of Christianity is that it
+makes this sacrifice supremely reasonable because it reveals the higher
+life, the heavenly hope, the eternal rewards for which the sacrifice is
+to be made, that it enables us in making it to feel ourselves united to
+Christ in a divine work which is to issue in the redemption of mankind.
+
+There are not a few popularly accepted guides in religion who fatally
+misconceive the doctrine of sacrifice. They take man-made conditions for
+Divine opportunities and calls. Their arguments come home not to the
+selfish and overbearing, but to the unselfish and long-suffering members
+of society, and too often they are more anxious to praise
+renunciation--any kind of it, for any purpose, so it involve acute
+feeling--than to magnify truth and insist on righteousness. It is women
+chiefly these arguments affect, and the neglect of pure truth and
+justice with which women are charged is in no small degree the result of
+false moral and religious teaching. They are told that it is good to
+renounce and suffer even when at every step advantage is taken of their
+submission and untruth triumphs over generosity. They are urged to
+school themselves to humiliation and loss not because God appoints these
+but because human selfishness imposes them. The one clear and damning
+objection to the false doctrine of self-suppression is here: it makes
+sin. Those who yield where they should protest, who submit where they
+should argue and reprove, make a path for selfishness and injustice and
+increase evil instead of lessening it. They persuade themselves that
+they are bearing the cross after Christ; but what in effect are they
+doing? The missionary amongst ignorant heathen has to bear to the
+uttermost as Christ bore. But to give so-called Christians a power of
+oppression and exaction is to turn the principles of religion upside
+down and hasten the doom of those for whom the sacrifice is made. When
+we meddle with truth and righteousness even in the name of piety we
+simply commit sacrilege, we range ourselves with the wrong and unreal;
+there is no foundation under our faith and no moral result of our
+endurance and self-denial. We are selling Christ not following Him.
+
+
+
+
+XVIII.
+
+_SHIBBOLETHS._
+
+JUDGES xii. 1-7.
+
+
+While Jephthah and his Gileadites were engaged in the struggle with
+Ammon jealous watch was kept over all their movements by the men of
+Ephraim. As the head tribe of the house of Joseph occupying the centre
+of Palestine Ephraim was suspicious of all attempts and still more of
+every success that threatened its pride and pre-eminence. We have seen
+Gideon in the hour of his victory challenged by this watchful tribe, and
+now a quarrel is made with Jephthah who has dared to win a battle
+without its help. What were the Gileadites that they should presume to
+elect a chief and form an army? Fugitives from Ephraim who had gathered
+in the shaggy forests of Bashan and among the cliffs of the Argob, mere
+adventurers in fact, what right had they to set up as the protectors of
+Israel? The Ephraimites found the position intolerable. The vigour and
+confidence of Gilead were insulting. If a check were not put on the
+energy of the new leader might he not cross the Jordan and establish a
+tyranny over the whole land? There was a call to arms, and a large force
+was soon marching against Jephthah's camp to demand satisfaction and
+submission.
+
+The pretext that Jephthah had fought against Ammon without asking the
+Ephraimites to join him was shallow enough. The invitation appears to
+have been given; and even without an invitation Ephraim might well have
+taken the field. But the savage threat, "We will burn thine house upon
+thee with fire," showed the temper of the leaders in this expedition.
+The menace was so violent that the Gileadites were roused at once and,
+fresh from their victory over Ammon, they were not long in humbling the
+pride of the great western clan.
+
+One may well ask, Where is Ephraim's fear of God? Why has there been no
+consultation of the priests at Shiloh by the tribe under whose care the
+sanctuary is placed? The great Jewish commentary affirms that the
+priests were to blame, and we cannot but agree. If religious influences
+and arguments were not used to prevent the expedition against Gilead
+they should have been used. The servants of the oracle might have
+understood the duty of the tribes to each other and of the whole nation
+to God and done their utmost to avert civil war. Unhappily, however,
+professed interpreters of the divine will are too often forward in
+urging the claims of a tribe or favouring the arrogance of a class by
+which their own position is upheld. As on the former occasion when
+Ephraim interfered, so in this we scarcely go beyond what is probable in
+supposing that the priests declared it to be the duty of faithful
+Israelites to check the career of the eastern chief and so prevent his
+rude and ignorant religion from gaining dangerous popularity. Bishop
+Wordsworth has seen a fanciful resemblance between Jephthah's campaign
+against Ammon and the revival under the Wesleys and Whitefield which as
+a movement against ungodliness put to shame the sloth of the Church of
+England. He has remarked on the scorn and disdain--and he might have
+used stronger terms--with which the established clergy assailed those
+who apart from them were successfully doing the work of God. This was an
+example of far more flagrant tribal jealousy than that of Ephraim and
+her priests; and have there not been cases of religious leaders urging
+retaliation upon enemies or calling for war in order to punish what was
+absurdly deemed an outrage on national honour? With facts of this kind
+in view we can easily believe that from Shiloh no word of peace, but on
+the other hand words of encouragement were heard when the chiefs of
+Ephraim began to hold councils of war and to gather their men for the
+expedition that was to make an end of Jephthah.
+
+Let it be allowed that Ephraim, a strong tribe, the guardian of the ark
+of Jehovah, much better instructed than the Gileadites in the divine
+law, had a right to maintain its place. But the security of high
+position lies in high purpose and noble service; and an Ephraim
+ambitious of leading should have been forward on every occasion when the
+other tribes were in confusion and trouble. When a political party or a
+church claims to be first in regard for righteousness and national
+well-being it should not think of its own credit or continuance in power
+but of its duty in the war against injustice and ungodliness. The favour
+of the great, the admiration of the multitude should be nothing to
+either church or party. To rail at those who are more generous, more
+patriotic, more eager in the service of truth, to profess a fear of some
+ulterior design against the constitution or the faith, to turn all the
+force of influence and eloquence and even of slander and menace against
+the disliked neighbour instead of the real enemy, this is the nadir of
+baseness. There are Ephraims still, strong tribes in the land, that are
+too much exercised in putting down claims, too little in finding
+principles of unity and forms of practical brotherhood. We see in this
+bit of history an example of the humiliation that sooner or later falls
+on the jealous and the arrogant; and every age is adding instances of a
+like kind.
+
+Civil war, at all times lamentable, appears peculiarly so when the cause
+of it lies in haughtiness and distrust. We have found however that,
+beneath the surface, there may have been elements of division and
+ill-will serious enough to require this painful remedy. The campaign may
+have prevented a lasting rupture between the eastern and western tribes,
+a separation of the stream of Israel's religion and nationality into
+rival currents. It may also have arrested a tendency to ecclesiastical
+narrowness, which at this early stage would have done immense harm. It
+is quite true that Gilead was rude and uninstructed, as Galilee had the
+reputation of being in the time of our Lord. But the leading tribes or
+classes of a nation are not entitled to overbear the less enlightened,
+nor by attempts at tyranny to drive them into separation. Jephthah's
+victory had the effect of making Ephraim and the other western tribes
+understand that Gilead had to be reckoned with, whether for weal or woe,
+as an integral and important part of the body politic. In Scottish
+history, the despotic attempt to thrust Episcopacy on the nation was the
+cause of a distressing civil war; a people who would not fall in with
+the forms of religion that were in favour at head-quarters had to fight
+for liberty. Despised or esteemed they resolved to keep and use their
+rights, and the religion of the world owes a debt to the Covenanters.
+Then in our own times, lament as we may the varied forms of antagonism
+to settled faith and government, that enmity of which communism and
+anarchism are the delirium, it would be simply disastrous to suppress it
+by sheer force even if the thing were possible. Surely those who are
+certain they have right on their side need not be arrogant. The
+overbearing temper is always a sign of hollow principle as well as of
+moral infirmity. Was any Gilead ever put down by a mere assertion of
+superiority, even on the field of battle? Let the truth be acknowledged
+that only in freedom lies the hope of progress in intelligence, in
+constitutional order and purity of faith. The great problems of national
+life and development can never be settled as Ephraim tried to settle the
+movement beyond Jordan. The idea of life expands and room must be left
+for its enlargement. The many lines of thought, of personal activity, of
+religious and social experiment leading to better ways or else proving
+by-and-by that the old are best--all these must have place in a free
+state. The threats of revolution that trouble nations would die away if
+this were clearly understood; and we read history in vain if we think
+that the old autocracies or aristocracies will ever approve themselves
+again, unless indeed they take far wiser and more Christian forms than
+they had in past ages. The thought of individual liberty once firmly
+rooted in the minds of men, there is no going back to the restraints
+that were possible before it was familiar. Government finds another
+basis and other duties. A new kind of order arises which attempts no
+suppression of any idea or sincere belief and allows all possible room
+for experiments in living. Unquestionably this altered condition of
+things increases the weight of moral responsibility. In ordering our own
+lives as well as in regulating custom and law we need to exercise the
+most serious care, the most earnest thought. Life is not easier because
+it has greater breadth and freedom. Each is thrown back more upon
+conscience, has more to do for his fellow-men and for God.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+We pass now to the end of the campaign and the scene at the fords of
+Jordan, when the Gileadites, avenging themselves on Ephraim, used the
+notable expedient of asking a certain word to be pronounced in order to
+distinguish friend from foe. To begin with, the slaughter was quite
+unnecessary. If bloodshed there had to be, that on the field of battle
+was certainly enough. The wholesale murder of the "fugitives of
+Ephraim," so called with reference to their own taunt, was a passionate
+and barbarous deed. Those who began the strife could not complain; but
+it was the leaders of the tribe who rushed on war, and now the rank and
+file must suffer. Had Ephraim triumphed the defeated Gileadites would
+have found no quarter; victorious they gave none. We may trust, however,
+that the number forty-two thousand represents the total strength of the
+army that was dispersed and not those left dead on the field.
+
+The expedient used at the fords turned on a defect or peculiarity of
+speech. Shibboleth perhaps meant _stream_. Of each man who came to the
+stream of Jordan wishing to pass to the other side it was required that
+he should say _Shibboleth_. The Ephraimites tried but said _Sibboleth_
+instead, and so betraying their west-country birth they pronounced their
+own doom. The incident has become proverbial and the proverbial use of
+it is widely suggestive. First, however, we may note a more direct
+application.
+
+Do we not at times observe how words used in common speech, phrases or
+turns of expression betray a man's upbringing or character, his strain
+of thought and desire? It is not necessary to lay traps for men, to put
+it to them how they think on this point or that in order to discover
+where they stand and what they are. Listen and you will hear sooner or
+later the _Sibboleth_ that declares the son of Ephraim. In religious
+circles, for example, men are found who appear to be quite enthusiastic
+in the service of Christianity, eager for the success of the church, and
+yet on some occasion a word, an inflexion or turn of the voice will
+reveal to the attentive listener a constant worldliness of mind, a
+worship of self mingling with all they think and do. You notice that and
+you can prophesy what will come of it. In a few months or even weeks the
+show of interest will pass. There is not enough praise or deference to
+suit the egotist, he turns elsewhere to find the applause which he
+values above everything.
+
+Again, there are words somewhat rude, somewhat coarse, which in
+carefully ordered speech a man may not use; but they fall from his lips
+in moments of unguarded freedom or excitement. The man does not speak
+"half in the language of Ashdod"; he particularly avoids it. Yet now and
+again a lapse into the Philistine dialect, a something muttered rather
+than spoken betrays the secret of his nature. It would be harsh to
+condemn any one as inherently bad on such evidence. The early habits,
+the sins of past years thus unveiled may be those against which he is
+fighting and praying. Yet, on the other hand, the hypocrisy of a life
+may terribly show itself in these little things; and every one will
+allow that in choosing our companions and friends we ought to be keenly
+alive to the slightest indications of character. There are fords of
+Jordan to which we come unexpectedly, and without being censorious we
+are bound to observe those with whom we purpose to travel further.
+
+Here, however, one of the most interesting and, for our time, most
+important points of application is to be found in the self-disclosure of
+writers--those who produce our newspapers, magazines, novels, and the
+like. Touching on religion and on morals certain of these writers
+contrive to keep on good terms with the kind of belief that is popular
+and pays. But now and again, despite efforts to the contrary, they come
+on the _Shibboleth_ which they forget to pronounce aright. Some among
+them who really care nothing for Christianity and have no belief
+whatever in revealed religion, would yet pass for interpreters of
+religion and guides of conduct. Christian morality and worship they
+barely endure; but they cautiously adjust every phrase and reference so
+as to drive away no reader and offend no devout critic; that is, they
+aim at doing so; now and again they forget themselves. We catch a word,
+a touch of flippancy, a suggestion of licence, a covert sneer which goes
+too far by a hairsbreadth. The evil lies in this that they are teaching
+multitudes to say _Sibboleth_ along with them. What they say is so
+pleasant, so deftly said, with such an air of respect for moral
+authority that suspicion is averted, the very elect are for a time
+deceived. Indeed we are almost driven to think that Christians not a few
+are quite ready to accept the unbelieving _Sibboleth_ from sufficiently
+distinguished lips. A little more of this lubricity and there will have
+to be a new and resolute sifting at the fords. The propaganda is
+villainously active and without intelligent and vigorous opposition it
+will proceed to further audacity. It is not a few but scores of this
+sect who have the ear of the public and even in religious publications
+are allowed to convey hints of earthliness and atheism. A covert worship
+of Mammon and of Venus goes on in the temple professedly dedicated to
+Christ, and one cannot be sure that a seemingly pious work will not vend
+some doctrine of devils. It is time for a slaughter in God's name of
+many a false reputation.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+But there are _Shibboleths_ of party, and we must be careful lest in
+trying others we use some catchword of our own Gilead by which to judge
+their religion or their virtue. The danger of the earnest, alike in
+religion, politics and philanthropy, is to make their own favourite
+plans or doctrines the test of all worth and belief. Within our churches
+and in the ranks of social reformers distinctions are made where there
+should be none and old strifes are deepened. There are of course certain
+great principles of judgment. Christianity is founded on historical fact
+and revealed truth. "Every spirit which confesseth that Jesus Christ is
+come in the flesh is of God." In such a saying lies a test which is no
+tribal _Shibboleth_. And on the same level are others by which we are
+constrained at all hazards to try ourselves and those who speak and
+write. Certain points of morality are vital and must be pressed. When a
+writer says, "In medi�val times the recognition that every natural
+impulse in a healthy and mature being has a claim to gratification was a
+victory of unsophisticated nature over the asceticism of
+Christianity"--we use no Shibboleth-test in condemning him. He is judged
+and found wanting by principles on which the very existence of human
+society depends. It is in no spirit of bigotry but in faithfulness to
+the essentials of life and the hope of mankind that the sternest
+denunciation is hurled at such a man. In plain terms he is an enemy of
+the race.
+
+Passing from cases like this, observe others in which a measure of
+dogmatism must be allowed to the ardent. Where there are no strong
+opinions strenuously held and expressed little impression will be made.
+The prophets in every age have spoken dogmatically; and vehemence of
+speech is not to be denied to the temperance reformer, the apostle of
+purity, the enemy of luxurious self-indulgence and cant. Moral
+indignation must express itself strongly; and in the dearth of moral
+conviction we can bear with those who would even drag us to the ford and
+make us utter their _Shibboleth_. They go too far, people say: perhaps
+they do; but there are so many who will not move at all except in the
+way of pleasure.
+
+Now all this is clear. But we must return to the danger of making one
+aspect of morality the sole test of morals, one religious idea the sole
+test of religion and so framing a formula by which men separate
+themselves from their friends and pass narrow bitter judgments on their
+kinsfolk. Let sincere belief and strong feeling rise to the prophetic
+strain; let there be ardour, let there be dogmatism and vehemence. But
+beyond urgent words and strenuous example, beyond the effort to persuade
+and convert there lie arrogance and the usurpation of a judgment which
+belongs to God alone. In proportion as a Christian is living the life of
+Christ he will repel the claim of any other man however devout to force
+his opinion or his action. All attempts at terrorism betray a lack of
+spirituality. The Inquisition was in reality the world oppressing
+spiritual life. And so in less degree, with less truculence, the
+unspiritual element may show itself even in company with a fervent
+desire to serve the gospel. There need be no surprise that attempts to
+dictate to Christendom or any part of Christendom are warmly resented by
+those who know that religion and liberty cannot be separated. The true
+church of Christ has a firm grasp of what it believes and is aiming at,
+and by its resoluteness it bears on human society. It is also gracious
+and persuasive, reasonable and open, and so gathers men into a free and
+frank brotherhood, revealing to them the loftiest duty, leading them
+towards it in the way of liberty. Let men who understand this try each
+other and it will never be by limited and suspicious formul�.
+
+Amidst pedants, critics, hot and bitter partisans, we see Christ moving
+in divine freedom. Fine is the subtlety of His thought in which the
+ideas of spiritual liberty and of duty blend to form one luminous
+strain. Fine are the clearness and simplicity of that daily life in
+which He becomes the way and the truth to men. It is the ideal life,
+beyond all mere rules, disclosing the law of the kingdom of heaven; it
+is free and powerful because upheld by the purpose that underlies all
+activity and development. Are we endeavouring to realize it? Scarcely at
+all: the bonds are multiplying not falling away; no man is bold to claim
+his right, nor generous to give others their room. In this age of Christ
+we seem neither to behold nor desire His manhood. Shall this always be?
+Shall there not arise a race fit for liberty because obedient, ardent,
+true? Shall we not come in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge
+of the Son of God unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature
+of the fulness of Christ?
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For a little we must return to Jephthah, who after his great victory and
+his strange dark act of faith judged Israel but six years. He appears in
+striking contrast to other chiefs of his time and even of far later
+times in the purity of his home life, the more notable that his father
+set no example of good. Perhaps the legacy of dispeace and exile
+bequeathed to him with a tainted birth had taught the Gileadite, rude
+mountaineer as he was, the value of that order which his people too
+often despised. The silence of the history which is elsewhere careful to
+speak of wives and children sets Jephthah before us as a kind of
+puritan, with another and perhaps greater distinction than the desire to
+avoid war. The yearly lament for his daughter kept alive the memory not
+only of the heroine but of one judge in Israel who set a high example of
+family life. A sad and lonely man he went those few years of his rule in
+Gilead, but we may be sure that the character and will of the Holy One
+became more clear to him after he had passed the dreadful hill of
+sacrifice. The story is of the old world, terrible; yet we have found in
+Jephthah a sublime sincerity, and we may believe that such a man though
+he never repented of his vow would come to see that the God of Israel
+demanded another and a nobler sacrifice, that of life devoted to His
+righteousness and truth.
+
+
+
+
+XIX.
+
+_THE ANGEL IN THE FIELD._
+
+JUDGES xiii. 1-18.
+
+
+In our ignorance not in our knowledge, in our blindness not in our light
+we call nature secular and think of the ordinary course of events as a
+series of cold operations, governed by law and force, having nothing to
+do with divine purpose and love. Oftentimes we think so, and suffer
+because we do not understand. It is a pitiful error. The natural could
+not exist, there could be neither substance nor order without the
+over-nature which is at once law and grace. Vitality, movement are not
+an efflorescence heralding decay--as to the atheist; they are not the
+activity of an evil spirit--as sometimes to confused and falsely
+instructed faith. They are the outward and visible action of God, the
+hem of the vesture on which we lay hold and feel Him. In the seen and
+temporal there is a constant presence maintaining order, giving purpose
+and end. Were it otherwise man could not live an hour; even in
+selfishness and vileness he is a creature of two worlds which yet are
+one, so closely are they interwoven. At every point natural and
+supernatural are blended, the higher shaping the development of the
+lower, accomplishing in and through the lower a great spiritual plan.
+This it is which gives depth and weight to our experience,
+communicating the dignity of the greatest moral and spiritual issues to
+the meanest, darkest human life. Everywhere, always, man touches God
+though he know Him not.
+
+No surprise, therefore, is excited by the modes of speech and thought we
+come upon as we read Scripture. The surprise would be in not coming upon
+them. If we found the inspired writers divorcing God from the world and
+thinking of "nature" as a dark chamber of sin and torture echoing with
+His curse, there would be no profit in studying this old volume. Then
+indeed we might turn from it in discontent and scorn, even as some cast
+it aside just because it is the revelation of God dwelling with men upon
+the earth.
+
+But what do the writers of faith mean when they tell of divine
+messengers coming to peasants at labour in the fields, speaking to them
+of events common to the race--the birth of some child, the defeat of a
+rival tribe--as affairs of the spiritual even more than of the temporal
+region? The narratives simple yet daring which affirm the mingling of
+divine purpose and action with human life give us the deepest science,
+the one real philosophy. Why do we have to care and suffer for each
+other? What are our sin and sorrow? These are not material facts; they
+are of quite another range. Always man is more than dust, better or
+worse than clay. Human lives are linked together in a gracious and awful
+order the course of which is now clearly marked, now obscurely
+traceable; and if it were in our power to revive the history of past
+ages, to mark the operation of faith and unbelief among men, issuing in
+virtue and nobleness on the one hand, in vice and lethargy on the other,
+we should see how near heaven is to earth, how rational a thing is
+prophecy, not only as relating to masses of men but to particular
+lives. It is our stupidity not our wisdom that starts back from
+revelations of the over-world as if they confused what would otherwise
+be clear.
+
+In more than one story of the Bible the motherhood of a simple peasant
+woman is a cause of divine communications and supernatural hopes. Is
+this amazing, incredible? What then is motherhood itself? In the coming
+and care of frail existences, the strange blending in one great
+necessity of the glad and the severe, the honourable and the
+humiliating, with so many possibilities of failure in duty, of error and
+misunderstanding ere the needful task is finished, death ever waiting on
+life, and agony on joy--in all this do we not find such a manifestation
+of the higher purpose as might well be heralded by words and signs? Only
+the order of God and His redemption can explain this "nature." Right in
+the path of atheistic reasoners, and of others not atheists, lie facts
+of human life which on their theory of naturalism are simply
+confounding, too great at once for the causes they admit and the ends
+they foresee. And if reason denies the possibility of prediction
+relating to these facts we need not wonder. Without philosophy or faith
+the range of denial is unlimited.
+
+From the quaint and simple narrative before us the imaginative
+rationalist turns away with the one word--"myth." His criticism is of a
+sort which for all its ease and freedom gives the world nothing. We
+desire to know why the human mind harbours thoughts of the kind, why it
+has ideas of God and of a supernatural order, and how these work in
+developing the race. Have they been of service? Have they given strength
+and largeness to poor rude lives and so proved a great reality? If so,
+the word myth is inadmissible. It sets falsehood at the source of
+progress and of good.
+
+Here are two Hebrew peasants, in a period of Philistine domination more
+than a thousand years before the Christian era. Of their condition we
+know only what a few brief sentences can tell in a history concerned
+chiefly with the facts of a divine order in which men's lives have an
+appointed place and use. It is certain that a thorough knowledge of this
+Danite family, its own history and its part in the history of Israel,
+would leave no difficulty for faith. Belief in the fore-ordination of
+all human existence and the constant presence of God with men and women
+in their endurance, their hope and yearning would be forced upon the
+most sceptical mind. The insignificance of the occasion marked by a
+prediction given in the name of God may astonish some. But what is
+insignificant? Wherever divine predestination and authority extend, and
+that is throughout the whole universe, nothing can properly be called
+insignificant. The laws according to which material things and forces
+are controlled by God touch the minutest particles of matter, determine
+the shape of a dew-drop as certainly as the form of a world. At every
+point in human life, the birth of a child in the poorest cottage as well
+as of the heir to an empire, the same principles of heredity, the same
+disposition of affairs to leave room for that life and to work out its
+destiny underlie the economy of the world.
+
+A life is to appear. It is not an interposition or interpolation. No
+event, no life is ever thrust into an age without relation to the past;
+no purpose is formed in the hour of a certain prophecy. For Samson as
+for every actor distinguished or obscure upon the stage of the world
+the stars and the seasons have co-operated and all that has been done
+under the sun has gone to make a place for him. One who knows this can
+speak strongly and clearly. One who knows what hinders and what is sure
+to aid the fulfilment of a great destiny can counsel wisely. And so the
+angel of Jehovah, a messenger of the spiritual covenant, is no mere
+vehicle of a prediction he does not understand. Without hesitation he
+speaks to the woman in the field of what her son shall do. By the story
+of God's dealings with Israel, by the experiences of tribe and family
+and individual soul since the primitive age, by the simple faith of
+these parents that are to be and the honest energy of their humble lives
+he is prepared to announce to them their honour and their duty. "Thou
+shalt bear a son and he shall begin to deliver Israel." The messenger
+has had his preparation of thought, inquiry deep devout and pondering,
+ere he became fit to announce the word of God. No seer serves the age to
+which he is sent with that which costs him nothing, and here as
+elsewhere the law of all ministry to God and man must apply to the
+preparation and work of the revealer.
+
+The personality of the messenger was carefully concealed. "A man of God
+whose countenance was like that of an angel of God very terrible"--so
+runs the pathetic, suggestive description; but the hour was too intense
+for mere curiosity. The honest mind does not ask the name and social
+standing of a messenger but only--Does he speak God's truth? Does he
+open life? There are few perhaps, to-day, who are simple and intelligent
+enough for this; few, therefore, to whom divine messages come. It is the
+credentials we are anxious about, and the prophet waits unheard while
+people are demanding his family and tribe, his college and reputation.
+Are these satisfactory? Then they will listen. But let no prophet come
+to them unnamed. Yet of all importance to us as to Manoah and his wife
+are the message, the revelation, the announcement of privilege and duty.
+Where that divine order is disclosed which lies too deep for our own
+discovery but once revealed stirs and kindles our nature, the prophet
+needs no certification.
+
+The child that was to be born, a gift of God, a divine charge, was
+promised to these parents. And in the case of every child born into the
+world there is a divine predestination which whether it has been
+recognized by the parents or not gives dignity to his existence from the
+first. There are natural laws and spiritual laws, the gathering together
+of energies and needs and duties which make the life unique, the care of
+it sacred. It is a new force in the world--a new vessel, frail as yet,
+launched on the sea of time. In it some stores of the divine goodness,
+some treasures of heavenly force are embarked. As it holds its way
+across the ocean in sunshine or shadow, this life will be watched by the
+divine eye, breathed gently upon by the summer airs or buffeted by the
+storms of God. Does heaven mind the children? "In heaven their angels do
+always behold the face of My Father."
+
+In the marvellous ordering of divine providence nothing is more
+calculated than fatherhood and motherhood to lift human life into the
+high ranges of experience and feeling. Apart from any special message or
+revelation, assuming only an ordinary measure of thoughtfulness and
+interest in the unfolding of life, there is here a new dignity the sense
+of which connects the task of those who have it with the creative energy
+of God. Everywhere throughout the world we can trace a more or less
+clear understanding of this. The tide of life is felt to rise as the new
+office, the new responsibility are grasped. The mother is become--
+
+  "A link among the days to knit
+  The generations each to each."
+
+The father has a sacred trust, a new and nobler duty to which his
+manhood is entirely pledged in the sight of that great God who is the
+Father of all spirits, doubly and trebly pledged to truth and purity and
+courage. It is the coronation of life; and the child, drawing father and
+mother to itself, is rightly the object of keenest interest and most
+assiduous care.
+
+The interest lies greatly in this, that to the father and mother first,
+then to the world there may be untold possibilities of good in the
+existence which has begun. Apart from any prophecy like that given
+regarding Samson we have truly what may be called a special promise from
+God in the dawning energy of every child-life. By the cradle surely, if
+anywhere, hope sacred and heavenly may be indulged. With what earnest
+glances will the young eyes look by-and-by from face to face. With what
+new and keen love will the child-heart beat. Enlarging its grasp from
+year to year the mind will lay hold on duty and the will address itself
+to the tasks of existence. This child will be a heroine of home, a
+helper of society, a soldier of the truth, a servant of God. Does the
+mother dream long dreams as she bends over the cradle? Does the father,
+one indeed amongst millions, yet with his special distinction and
+calling, imagine for the child a future better than his own? It is well.
+By the highest laws and instincts of our humanity it is right and good.
+Here men and women, the rudest and least taught, live in the immaterial
+world of love, faith, duty.
+
+We observe the anxiety of Manoah and his wife to learn the special
+method of training which should fit their child for his task. The
+father's prayer so soon as he heard of the divine annunciation was, "O
+Lord, let the man of God whom Thou didst send come again unto us and
+teach us what we shall do unto the child that shall be born." Conscious
+of ignorance and inexperience, feeling the weight of responsibility, the
+parents desired to have authoritative direction in their duty, and their
+anxiety was the deeper because their child was to be a deliverer in
+Israel. In their home on the hillside, where the cottages of Zorah
+clustered overlooking the Philistine plain, they were frequently
+disturbed by the raiders who swept up the valley of Sorek from Ashdod
+and Ekron. They had often wondered when God would raise up a deliverer
+as of old, some Deborah or Gideon to end the galling oppression. Now the
+answer to many a prayer and hope was coming, and in their own home the
+hero was to be cradled. We cannot doubt that this made them feel the
+pressure of duty and the need of wisdom. Yet the prayer of Manoah was
+one which every father has need to present, though the circumstances of
+a child's birth have nothing out of the most ordinary course.
+
+To each human mind are given powers which require special fostering,
+peculiarities of temperament and feeling which ought to be specially
+considered. One way will not serve in the upbringing of two children.
+Even the most approved method of the time, whether that of private
+tutelage or public instruction, may thwart individuality; and if the way
+be ignorant and rough the original faculty will at its very springing be
+distorted. It is but the barest commonplace, yet with what frequency it
+needs to be urged that of all tasks in the world that of the guide and
+instructor of youth is hardest to do well, best worth doing, therefore
+most difficult. There is no need to deny that for the earliest years of
+a child's life the instincts of a loving faithful mother may be trusted
+to guide her efforts. Yet even in those first years tendencies declare
+themselves that require to be wisely checked or on the other hand wisely
+encouraged; and the wisdom does not come by instinct. A spiritual view
+of life, its limitations and possibilities, its high calling and
+heavenly destiny is absolutely necessary--that vision of the highest
+things which religion alone can give. The prophet comes and directs; yet
+the parents must be prophets too. "The child is not to be educated for
+the present--for this is done without our aid unceasingly and
+powerfully--but for the remote future and often in opposition to the
+immediate future.... The child must be armed against the close-pressing
+present with a counter-balancing weight of three powers against the
+three weaknesses of the will, of love and of religion.... The girl and
+the boy must learn that there is something in the ocean higher than its
+waves--namely, a Christ who calls upon them."[7] On the religious
+teaching especially which is given to children much depends, and those
+who guide them should often begin by searching and reconsidering their
+own beliefs. Many a promising life is marred because youth in its wonder
+and sincerity was taught no living faith in God, or was thrust into the
+mould of some narrow creed which had more in it of human bigotry than of
+divine reason and love.
+
+  [7] Richter, _Levana_.
+
+"What shall be the ordering of the child?" is Manoah's prayer, and it is
+well if simply expressed. The child's way needs ordering. Circumstances
+must be understood that discipline may fit the young life for its part.
+In our own time this represents a serious difficulty. What to do with
+children, how to order their lives is the pressing question in thousands
+of homes. The scheme of education in favour shows little insight, little
+esteem for the individuality of children, which is of as much value in
+the case of the backward as of those who are lured and goaded into
+distinction. To broaden life, to give it many points of interest is
+well. Yet on the other hand how much depends on discipline, on
+limitation and concentration, the need of which we are apt to forget.
+Narrow and limited was the life of Israel when Samson was born into it.
+The boy had to be what the nation was, what Zorah was, what Manoah and
+his wife were. The limitations of the time held him and the secluded
+life of Dan knowing but one article of patriotic faith, hatred of the
+Philistines. Was there so much of restriction here as to make greatness
+impossible? Not so. To be an Israelite was to have a certain moral
+advantage and superiority. It was not a barren solidarity, a dry ground
+in which this new life was planted; the sprout grew out of a living
+tree; traditions, laws full of spiritual power made an environment for
+the Hebrew child. Through the limitations, fenced and guided by them, a
+soul might break forth to the upper air. It was not the narrowness of
+Israel nor of his own home and upbringing but the licence of Philistia
+that weakened the strong arm and darkened the eager soul of the young
+Danite. Are we now to be afraid of limitations, bent on giving to youth
+multiform experience and the freest possible access to the world? Do we
+dream that strength will come as the stream of life is allowed to wander
+over a whole valley, turning hither and thither in a shallow and shifty
+bed? The natural parallel here will instruct us, for it is an image of
+the spiritual fact. Strength not breadth is the mark at which education
+should be directed. The intellectually and morally strong will find
+culture waiting them at every turn of the way and will know how to
+select, what to appropriate. In truth there must be first the moral
+power gained by concentration, otherwise all culture--art, science,
+literature, travel--proves but a Barmecide feast at which the soul
+starves.
+
+The special method of training for the child Samson is described in the
+words, "He shall be a Nazirite unto God." The mother was to drink no
+strong drink nor eat any unclean thing. Her son was to be trained in the
+same rigid abstinence; and always the sense of obligation to Jehovah was
+to accompany the austerity. The hair neither cut nor shaven but allowed
+to grow in natural luxuriance was to be the sign of the separated life.
+For the hero that was to be, this ascetic purity, this sacrament of
+unshorn hair were the only things prescribed. Perhaps there was in the
+command a reference to the godless life of the Israelites, a protest
+against their self-indulgence and half-heathen freedom. One in the tribe
+of Dan would be clear of the sins of drunkenness and gluttony at least,
+and so far ready for spiritual work.
+
+Now it is notable enough to find thus early in history the example of a
+rule which even yet is not half understood to be the best as well as the
+safest for the guidance of appetite and the development of bodily
+strength. The absurdities commonly accepted by mothers and by those who
+only desire some cover for the indulgence of taste are here set aside.
+A hero is to be born, one who in physical vigour will distinguish
+himself above all, the Hercules of sacred history. His mother rigidly
+abstains, and he in his turn is to abstain from strong drink. The
+plainest dieting is to serve both her and him--the kind of food and
+drink on which Daniel and his companions throve in the Chaldean palace.
+Surely the lesson is plain. Those who desire to excel in feats of
+strength speak of their training. It embraces a vow like the Nazirites,
+wanting indeed the sacred purpose and therefore of no use in the
+development of character. But let a covenant be made with God, let
+simple food and drink be used under a sense of obligation to Him to keep
+the mind clear and the body clean, and soon with appetites better
+disciplined we should have a better and stronger race.
+
+It is not of course to be supposed that there was nothing out of the
+common in Samson's bodily vigour. Restraint of unhealthy and injurious
+appetite was not the only cause to which his strength was due. Yet as
+the accompaniment of his giant energy the vow has great significance.
+And to young men who incline to glory in their strength, and all who
+care to be fit for the tasks of life the significance will be clear. As
+for the rest whose appetites master them, who must have this and that
+because they crave it, their weakness places them low as men, nowhere as
+examples and guides. One would as soon take the type of manly vigour
+from a paralytic as from one whose will is in subjection to the cravings
+of the flesh.
+
+It soon becomes clear in the course of the history that while some forms
+of evil were fenced off by Naziritism others as perilous were not. The
+main part of the devotion lay in abstinence, and that is not spiritual
+life. Here is one who from his birth set apart to God is trained in
+manly control of his appetites. The locks that wave in wild luxuriance
+about his neck are the sign of robust physical vigour as well as of
+consecration. But, strangely, his spiritual education is not cared for
+as we might expect. He is disciplined and yet undisciplined. He fears
+the Lord and yet fears Him not. He is an Israelite but not a true
+Israelite. Jehovah is to him a God who gives strength and courage and
+blessing in return for a certain measure of obedience. As the Holy God,
+the true God, the God of purity, Samson knows Him not, does not worship
+Him. Within a certain limited range he hears a divine voice saying,
+"Thou shalt not," and there he obeys. But beyond is a great region in
+which he reckons himself free. And what is the result? He is strong,
+brave, sunny in temper as his name implies. But a helper of society, a
+servant of divine religion, a man in the highest sense, one of God's
+free men Samson does not become.
+
+So is it always. One kind of exercise, discipline, obedience, virtue
+will not suffice. We need to be temperate and also pure, we need to keep
+from self-indulgence but also from niggardliness if we are to be men. We
+have to think of the discipline of mind and soul as well as soundness of
+body. He is only half a man, however free from glaring faults and vices,
+who has not learned the unselfishness, the love, the ardour in holy and
+generous tasks which Christ imparts. To abstain is a negative thing; the
+positive should command us--the highest manhood, holy, aspiring,
+patient, divine.
+
+
+
+
+XX.
+
+_SAMSON PLUNGING INTO LIFE._
+
+JUDGES xiii. 24-xiv. 20.
+
+
+Of all who move before us in the Book of Judges Samson is pre-eminently
+the popular hero. In rude giant strength and wild daring he stands alone
+against the enemies of Israel contemptuous of their power and their
+plots. It is just such a man who catches the public eye and lives in the
+traditions of a country. Most Hebrews of the time minded piety and
+culture as little as did the Norsemen when they first professed
+Christianity. Both races liked manliness and feats of daring and could
+pardon much to one who flung his enemies and theirs to the ground with
+god-like strength of arm, and in the narrative of Samson's exploits we
+trace this note of popular estimation. He is a singular hero of faith,
+quite akin to those half-converted half-savage chiefs of the north who
+thought the best they could do for God was to kill His enemies and bound
+themselves by fierce oaths in the name of Christ to hack and slaughter.
+For the separateness from others, the isolation which marked Samson's
+whole career the reasons are evident. His vow of Naziritism, for one
+thing, kept him apart. Others were their own men, he was Jehovah's. His
+radiant health and uncommon physical energy even in boyhood were to
+himself and others the sign of a divine blessing which maintained his
+sense of consecration. While he looked on at the riot and drunkenness of
+the feasts of his people he felt a growing revulsion, nor was he pleased
+with other indications of their temper. The frequent raids of
+Philistines from their walled cities by the coast struck terror far and
+wide--up the valleys of Dan into the heart of Judah and Ephraim. Samson
+as he grew up marked the supineness of his people with wonder and
+disgust. If he did anything for them it was not because he honoured them
+but in fulfilment of his destiny. At the same time we must note that the
+hero though a man of wit was not wise. He did the most injudicious
+things. He had nothing in him of the diplomatist, not much of the leader
+of men. It was only now and again when the mood took him that he cared
+to exert himself. So he went his own way an admired hero, a lonely giant
+among smaller beings. Worst of all he was an easy prey to some kinds of
+temptation. Restrained on one side, he gave himself license on others;
+his strength was always undisciplined, and early in his career we can
+almost predict how it will end. He ventures into one snare after
+another. The time is sure to come when he will fall into a pit out of
+which there is no way of escape.
+
+Of the early life of the great Danite judge there is no record save that
+he grew and the Lord blessed him. The parents whose home on the
+hill-side he filled with boisterous glee must have looked on the lad
+with something like awe--so different was he from others, so great were
+the hopes based on his future. Doubtless they did their best for him.
+The consecration of his life to God they deeply impressed on his mind
+and taught him as well as they could the worship of the Unseen Jehovah
+in the sacrifice of lamb or kid at the altar, in prayers for protection
+and prosperity. But nothing is said of instruction in the righteousness,
+the purity, the mercifulness which the law of God required. Manoah and
+his wife seem to have made the mistake of thinking that outside the vow
+moral education and discipline would come naturally, so far as they were
+needed. There was great strictness on certain points and elsewhere such
+laxity that he must have soon become wilful and headstrong and somewhat
+of a terror to the father and mother. Lads of his own age would of
+course adore him; as their leader in every bold pastime he would command
+their deference and loyalty, and many a wild thing was done, we can
+fancy, at which the people of the valley laughed uneasily or shook their
+heads in dismay. He who afterwards tied the jackals' tails together and
+set firebrands between each pair to burn the Philistines' corn must have
+served an apprenticeship to that kind of savage sport. Hebrew or alien
+for miles round who roused the anger of Samson would soon learn how
+dangerous it was to provoke him. Yet a dash of generosity always took
+the edge from fiery temper and rash revenge, and the people of Dan, for
+their part, would allow much to one who was expected to bring
+deliverance to Israel. The wild and dangerous youth was the only
+champion they could see.
+
+But even before manhood Samson had times of deeper feeling than people
+in general would have looked for. Boisterous hot-blooded impetuous
+natures grievously wanting in decorum and sagacity are not always
+superficial; and there were occasions when the Spirit of the Lord began
+to move Samson. He felt the purpose of his vow, saw the serious work to
+which his destiny was urging him, looked down on the plain of the
+Philistines with a kindling eye, spoke in strains that even rose to
+prophetic intensity. At Mahaneh-Dan, the camp of Dan, where the more
+resolute spirits of the tribe came together for military exercise or to
+repel some raid of the enemy, Samson began to speak of his purpose and
+to make schemes for Israel's liberation. Into these the fiery vehemence
+of the young man flowed, and the enthusiasm of his nature bore others
+along. Can we be wrong in supposing that in various ways, by plans often
+ill-considered he sought to harass the Philistines, and that failure as
+a leader in these left him somewhat discredited? Samson was just of that
+sanguine venturesome disposition which makes light of difficulties and
+is always courting defeat. It was easy for him with his immense bodily
+strength to break through where other men were entrapped. A frequent
+result of the frays into which he hurried must have been, we imagine, to
+make his own friends doubt him rather than to injure the enemy. At all
+events he became no commander like Gideon or Jephthah, and the men of
+Judah, if not of Dan, while they acknowledged his calling and his power,
+began to think of him as a dangerous champion.
+
+So far we have the merest hints by which to go, but the narrative
+becomes more detailed when it approaches the time of Samson's marriage.
+A strange union it is for a hero of Israel. What made him think of going
+down among the Philistines for a wife? How can the sacred writer say
+that the thing was of the Lord? Let us try to understand the
+circumstances. Between the people of Zorah and the villagers of Timnah a
+few miles down the valley on the other side who, though Philistines,
+were presumably not of the fighting sort there was a kind of enforced
+neighbourliness. They could not have lived at all unless they had been
+content, Philistines for their part, Hebrews for theirs, to let the
+general enmity sleep. Samson by observing certain precautions and
+keeping his Hebrew tongue quiet was safe enough in Timnah, an object of
+fear rather than himself in danger. At the same time there may have been
+a touch of bravado in his rambles to the Philistine settlement, and the
+young woman of whom he caught a passing glance, perhaps at the spring,
+had very likely all the more charm for him that she was of the strong
+hostile race. History as well as fiction supplies instances in which
+this fascination does its work, family feuds, oppositions of caste and
+religion directing the eye and the fancy instead of repelling. In his
+sudden wilful way Samson resolved, and his mind once made up no one in
+Zorah could induce him to alter it. "The thing was of the Lord; for he
+sought an occasion against the Philistines." Perhaps Samson thought the
+woman would be denied to him, a straight way to a quarrel. But more
+probably it is the outcome of the whole pitiful business that is in the
+mind of the historian. After the event he traces the hand of Providence.
+
+As we pass with Samson and his parents down to Timnah we cannot but
+agree with Manoah in his objection, "Is there never a woman among the
+daughters of thy brethren or among all my people that thou goest to take
+a wife of the uncircumcised Philistines?" It was emphatically one of
+those cases in which liking should not have led. An impetuous man is not
+to be excused; much less those who claim to be exceedingly rational and
+yet go against reason because of what they call love--or, worse, apart
+from love. General rules are with difficulty laid down in matters of
+this sort, and to deny the right of love would be the worst error of
+all. So far as our popular writers are concerned, we must allow that
+they wonderfully balance the claims of "arrangement" and honest
+affection, declaring strongly for the latter. But yet such a difference
+as between faith and idolatry, between piety and godlessness, is a
+barrier that only the blindest folly can overleap when marriage is in
+view. Daughters of the Philistines may be "most divinely fair," most
+graceful and plausible; men who worship Moloch or Mammon or nothing but
+themselves may have most persuasive tongues and a large share of this
+world's good. But to mate with these, whatever liking there may be, is
+an experiment too rash for venturing. In Christian society now, is there
+not much need to repeat old warnings and revive a sense of peril that
+seems to have decayed? The conscience of piously bred young people was
+alive once to the danger and sin of the unequal yoke. In the rush for
+position and means marriage is being made by both sexes, even in most
+religious circles, an instrument and opportunity of earthly ambition,
+and it must be said that foolish romance is less to be feared than this
+carefulness in which conscience and heart alike submit to the imperious
+cravings of sheer worldliness. Novels have much to answer for; yet they
+can make one claim--they have done something for simple humanity. We
+want more than nature, however. Christian teaching must be heard and the
+Christian conscience must be re-kindled. The hope of the world waits on
+that devout simplicity of life which exalts spiritual aims and spiritual
+comradeship and by its beauty shames all meaner choice. In marriage not
+only should heart go out to heart, but mind to mind and soul to soul;
+and the spirit of one who knows Christ can never unite with a
+self-worshipper or a servant of mammon.
+
+Returning to Samson's case, he would possibly have said that he wished
+an adventurous marriage, that to wed a Danite woman would have in it too
+little risk, would be too dull, too commonplace a business for him, that
+he wanted a plunge into new waters. It is in this way, one must believe,
+many decide the great affair. So far from thinking they put thought
+away; a liking seizes them and in they leap. Yet in the best considered
+marriage that can be made is there not quite enough of adventure for any
+sane man or woman? Always there remain points of character unknown,
+unsuspected, possibilities of sickness, trouble, privation that fill the
+future with uncertainty, so far as human vision goes. It is, in truth, a
+serious undertaking for men and women, and to be entered upon only with
+the distinct assurance that divine providence clears the way and invites
+our advance. Yet again we are not to be suspicious of each other,
+probing every trait and habit to the quick. Marriage is the great
+example and expression of the trust which it is the glory of men and
+women to exercise and to deserve, the great symbol on earth of the
+confidences and unions of immortality. Matter of deep thankfulness it is
+that so many who begin the married life and end it on a low level,
+having scarcely a glimpse of the ideal, though they fail of much do not
+fail of all, but in some patience, some courage and fidelity show that
+God has not left them to nature and to earth. And happy are they who
+adventure together on no way of worldly policy or desire but in the pure
+love and heavenly faith which link their lives for ever in binding them
+to God.
+
+Samson, reasoned with by his parents, waved their objection royally
+aside and ordered them to aid his design. It was necessary according to
+the custom of the country that they should conduct the negotiations for
+the marriage, and his wilfulness imposed on them a task that went
+against their consciences. So they found themselves with the common
+reward of worshipping parents. They had toiled for him, made much of
+him, boasted about him no doubt; and now their boy-god turns round and
+commands them in a thing they cannot believe to be right. They must
+choose between Jehovah and Samson and they have to give up Jehovah and
+serve their own lad. So David's pride in Absalom ended with the
+rebellion that drove the aged father from Jerusalem and exposed him to
+the contempt of Israel. It is good for a man to bear the yoke in his
+youth, the yoke even of parents who are not so wise as they might be and
+do not command much reverence. The order of family life among us,
+involving no absolute bondage, is recognized as a wholesome discipline
+by all who attain to any understanding of life. In Israel, as we know,
+filial respect and obedience were virtues sacredly commended, and it is
+one mark of Samson's ill-regulated self-esteeming disposition that he
+neglected the obvious duty of deference to the judgment of his parents.
+
+On the way to Timnah the young man had an adventure which was to play an
+important part in his life. Turning aside out of the road he found
+himself suddenly confronted by a lion which, doubtless as much surprised
+as he was by the encounter, roared against him. The moment was not
+without its peril; but Samson was equal to the emergency and springing
+on the beast "rent it as he would have rent a kid." The affair however
+did not seem worth referring to when he joined his parents, and they
+went on their way. It was as when a man of strong moral principle and
+force meets a temptation dangerous to the weak, to him an enemy easily
+overcome. His vigorous truth or honour or chastity makes short work of
+it. He lays hold of it and in a moment it is torn in pieces. The great
+talk made about temptations, the ready excuses many find for themselves
+when they yield are signs of a feebleness of will which in other ranges
+of life the same persons would be ashamed to own. It is to be feared
+that we often encourage moral weakness and unfaithfulness to duty by
+exaggerating the force of evil influences. Why should it be reckoned a
+feat to be honest, to be generous, to swear to one's own hurt? Under the
+dispensation of the Spirit of God, with Christ as our guide and stay
+every one of us should act boldly in the encounter with the lions of
+temptation. Tenderness to the weak is a Christian duty, but there is
+danger that young and old alike, hearing much of the seductions of sin,
+little of the ready help of the Almighty, submit easily where they
+should conquer and reckon on divine forbearance when they ought to
+expect reproach and contempt. Our generation needs to hear the words of
+St. Paul: "There hath no temptation taken you but such as man can bear:
+but God is faithful Who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye
+are able." Is there a tremendous pressure constantly urging us towards
+that which is evil? In our large cities especially is the power of
+iniquity almost despotic? True enough. Yet men and women should be
+braced and strengthened by insistence on the other side. In Christian
+lands at least it is unquestionable that for every enticement to evil
+there is a stronger allurement to good, that against every argument for
+immorality ten are set more potent in behalf of virtue, that where sin
+abounds grace does much more abound. Young persons are indeed tempted;
+but nothing will be gained by speaking to them or about them as if they
+were children incapable of decision, of whom it can only be expected
+that they will fail. By the Spirit of God, indeed, all moral victories
+are gained; the natural virtue of the best is uncertain and cannot be
+trusted in the trying hour, and he only who has a full inward life and
+earnest Christian purpose is ready for the test. But the Spirit of God
+is given. His sustaining, purifying, strengthening power is with us. We
+do not breathe deep, and then we complain that our hearts cease to beat
+with holy courage and resolve.
+
+At Timnah, where life was perhaps freer than in a Hebrew town, Samson
+appears to have seen the woman who had caught his fancy; and he now
+found her, Philistine as she was, quite to his mind. It must have been
+by a low standard he judged, and many possible topics of conversation
+must have been carefully avoided. Under the circumstances, indeed, the
+difficulty of understanding each other's language may have been their
+safety. Certainly one who professed to be a fearer of God, a patriotic
+Israelite had to shut his eyes to many facts or thrust them from sight
+when he determined to wed this daughter of the enemy. But when we choose
+we can do much in the way of keeping things out of view which we do not
+wish to see. Persons who are at daggers drawn on fifty points show the
+greatest possible affability when it is their interest to be at one.
+Love gets over difficulties and so does policy. Occasions are found when
+the anxiously orthodox can join in some comfortable compact with the
+agnostic, and the vehement state-churchman with the avowed secularist
+and revolutionary. And it seems to be only when two are nearly of the
+same creed, with just some hairsbreadth of divergence on a few articles
+of belief, that the obstacles to happy union are apt to become
+insurmountable. Then every word is watched, each tone noted with
+suspicion. It is not between Hebrew and Philistine but between Ephraim
+and Judah that alliances are difficult to form. We hope for the time
+when the long and bitter disputes of Christendom shall be overcome by
+love of truth and God. Yet first there must be an end to the strange
+reconcilings and unions which like Samson's marriage often confuse and
+obstruct the way of Christian people.
+
+There is an interval of some months after the marriage has been arranged
+and the bridegroom is on his way once more down the valley to Timnah. As
+he passes the scene of his encounter with the lion he turns aside to see
+the carcase and finds that bees have made it their home. Vultures and
+ants have first found it and devoured the flesh, then the sun has
+thoroughly dried the skin and in the hollow of the ribs the bees have
+settled. At considerable risk Samson possesses himself of some of the
+combs and goes on eating the honey, giving a portion also to his father
+and mother. It is again a type, and this time of the sweetness to be
+found in the recollection of virtuous energy and overcoming. Not that we
+are to be always dwelling on our faithfulness even for the purpose of
+thanking God Who gave us moral strength. But when circumstances recall a
+trial and victory it is surely matter of proper joy to remember that
+here we were strong enough to be true, and there to be honest and pure
+when the odds seemed to be against us. The memories of a good man or
+good woman are sweeter than the honeycomb, though tempered often by
+sorrow over the human instruments of evil who had to be struggled with
+and thrust aside in the sharp conflict with sin and wrong. Very few in
+youth or middle-life seem to think of this joy, which makes beautiful
+many a worn and aged face on earth and will not be the least element in
+the felicity of heaven. Too often we bear burdens because we must; we
+are dragged through trial and distress to comparative quiet; we do not
+comprehend what is at stake, what we may do and gain, what we are kept
+from losing; and so the look across our past has none of the glow of
+triumph, little of the joy of harvest. For man's blessedness is not to
+be separated from personal striving. In fidelity he must sow that he may
+reap in strength, in courage that he may reap in gladness. He is made
+not for mere success, not for mere safety, but for overcoming.
+
+We are not finished with the lion; he next appears covertly, in a
+riddle. Samson has shown himself a strong man; now we hear him speak and
+he proves a wit. It is the wedding festival, and thirty young men have
+been gathered--to honour the bridegroom, shall we say?--or to watch him?
+Perhaps from the first there has been suspicion in the Philistine mind,
+and it seems necessary to have as many as thirty to one in order to
+overawe Samson. In the course of the feast there might be quarrels, and
+without a strong guard on the Hebrew youth Timnah might be in danger. As
+the days went by the company fell to proposing riddles and Samson,
+probably annoyed by the Philistines who watched every movement, gave
+them his, on terms quite fair, yet leaving more than a loophole for
+discontent and strife. In the conditions we see the man perfectly
+self-reliant, full of easy superiority, courting danger and defying
+envy. The thirty may win--if they can. In that case he knows how he will
+pay the forfeit. "Put forth thy riddle," they said, "that we may hear
+it;" and the strong mellow Hebrew voice chanted the puzzling verse:
+
+  "Out of the eater came forth meat;
+  Out of the strong came forth sweetness."
+
+Now in itself this is simply a curiosity of old-world table-talk. It is
+preserved here mainly because of its bearing on following events; and
+certainly the statement which has been made that it contained a gospel
+for the Philistines is one we cannot endorse. Yet like many witty
+sayings the riddle has a range of meaning far wider than Samson
+intended. Adverse influences conquered, temptation mastered,
+difficulties overcome, the struggle of faithfulness will supply us not
+only with happy recollections but also with arguments against
+infidelity, with questions that confound the unbeliever. One who can
+glory in tribulations that have brought experience and hope, in bonds
+and imprisonments that have issued in a keener sense of liberty, who
+having nothing yet possesses all things--such a man questioning the
+denier of divine providence cannot be answered. Invigoration has come
+out of that which threatened life and joy out of that which made for
+sorrow. The man who is in covenant with God is helped by nature; its
+forces serve him; he is fed with honey from the rock and with the finest
+of the wheat. When out of the mire of trouble and the deep waters of
+despondency he comes forth braver, more hopeful, strongly confident in
+the love of God, sure of the eternal foundation of life, what can be
+said in denial of the power that has filled him with strength and peace?
+Here is an argument that can be used by every Christian, and ought to be
+in every Christian's hand. Out of his personal experience each should be
+able to state problems and put inquiries unanswerable by unbelief. For
+unless there is a living God Whose favour is life, Whose fellowship
+inspires and ennobles the soul, the strength which has come through
+weakness, the hope that sprang up in the depth of sorrow cannot be
+accounted for. There are natural sequences in which no mystery lies.
+When one who has been defamed and injured turns on his enemy and pursues
+him in revenge, when one who has been defeated sinks back in languor and
+waits in pitiful inaction for death, these are results easily traced to
+their cause. But the man of faith bears witness to sequences of a
+different kind. His fellows have persecuted him, and he cares for them
+still. Death has bereaved him, and he can smile in its face. Afflictions
+have been multiplied and he glories in them. The darkness has fallen and
+he rejoices more than in the noontide of prosperity. Out of the eater
+has come forth meat, out of the strong has come forth sweetness. "Except
+a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if
+it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." The paradox of the life of Christ
+thus stated by Himself is the supreme instance of that demonstration of
+divine power which the history of every Christian should clearly and
+constantly support.
+
+
+
+
+XXI.
+
+_DAUNTLESS IN BATTLE, IGNORANTLY BRAVE._
+
+JUDGES xv.
+
+
+Given a man of strong passions and uninstructed conscience, wild courage
+and giant energy, with the sense of a mission which he has to accomplish
+against his country's enemies so that he reckons himself justified in
+doing them injury or killing them in the name of God, and you have, no
+complete hero, but a real and interesting man. Such a character,
+however, does not command our admiration. The enthusiasm we feel in
+tracing the career of Deborah or Gideon fails us in reviewing these
+stories of revenge in which the Hebrew champion appears as cruel and
+reckless as an uncircumcised Philistine. When we see Samson leaving the
+feast by which his marriage has been celebrated and marching down to
+Ashkelon where in cold blood he puts thirty men to death for the sake of
+their clothing, when we see a country-side ablaze with the standing corn
+which he has kindled, we are as indignant with him as with the
+Philistines when they burn his wife and her father with fire. Nor can we
+find anything like excuse for Samson on the ground of zeal in the
+service of pure religion. Had he been a fanatical Hebrew mad against
+idolatry his conduct might find some apology; but no such clue offers.
+The Danite is moved chiefly by selfish and vain passions, and his sense
+of official duty is all too weak and vague. We see little patriotism and
+not a trace of religious fervour. He is serving a great purpose with
+some sincerity, but not wisely, not generously nor greatly. Samson is a
+creature of impulse working out his life in blind almost animal fashion,
+perceiving the next thing that is to be done not in the light of
+religion or duty, but of opportunity and revenge. The first of his acts
+against the Philistines was no promising start in a heroic career, and
+almost at every point in the story of his life there is something that
+takes away our respect and sympathy. But the life is full of moral
+suggestion and warning. He is a real and striking example of the wild
+Berserker type.
+
+1. For one thing this stands out as a clear principle that a man has his
+life to live, his work to do, alone if others will not help, imperfectly
+if not in the best fashion, half-wrongly if the right cannot be clearly
+seen. This world is not for sleep, is not for inaction and sloth.
+"Whatsoever thy hand finds to do, do it with thy might." A thousand men
+in Dan, ten thousand in Judah did nothing that became men, sat at home
+while their grapes and olives grew, abjectly sowed and reaped their
+fields in dread of the Philistines, making no attempt to free their
+country from the hated yoke. Samson, not knowing rightly how to act, did
+go to work and, at any rate, lived. Among the dull spiritless Israelites
+of the day, three thousand of whom actually came on one occasion to
+beseech him to give himself up and bound him with ropes that he might be
+safely passed over to the enemy, Samson with all his faults looks like a
+man. Those men of Dan and Judah would slay the Philistines if they
+dared. It is not because they are better than Samson that they do not
+go down to Ashkelon and kill. Their consciences do not keep them back;
+it is their cowardice. One who with some vision of a duty owing to his
+people goes forth and acts, contrasts well with these chicken-hearted
+thousands.
+
+We are not at present stating the complete motive of human activity nor
+setting forth the ideal of life. To that we shall come afterwards. But
+before you can have ideal action you must have action. Before you can
+have life of a fine and noble type you must have life. Here is an
+absolute primal necessity; and it is the key to both evolutions, the
+natural and the spiritual. First the human creature must find its power
+and capability and must use these to some end, be it even a wrong end,
+rather than none; after this the ideal is caught and proper moral
+activity becomes possible. We need not look for the full corn in the ear
+till the seed has sprouted and grown and sent its roots well into the
+soil. With this light the roll of Hebrew fame is cleared and we can
+trace freely the growth of life. The heroes are not perfect; they have
+perhaps barely caught the light of the ideal; but they have strength to
+will and to do, they have faith that this power is a divine gift, and
+they having it are God's pioneers.
+
+The need is that men should in the first instance live so that they may
+be faithful to their calling. Deborah looking round beheld her country
+under the sore oppression of Jabin, saw the need and answered to it.
+Others only vegetated; she rose up in human stature resolute to live.
+That also was what Gideon began to do when at the divine call he
+demolished the altar on the height of Ophrah; and Jephthah fought and
+endured by the same law. So soon as men begin to live there is hope of
+them.
+
+Now the hindrances to life are these--first, slothfulness, the
+disposition to drift, to let things go; second, fear, the restriction
+imposed on effort of body or of mind by some opposing force ingloriously
+submitted to; third, ignoble dependence on others. The proper life of
+man is never reached by many because they are too indolent to win it. To
+forecast and devise, to try experiments, pushing out in this direction
+and that is too much for them. Some opportunity for doing more and
+better lies but a mile away or a few yards; they see but will not
+venture upon it. Their country is sinking under a despot or a weak and
+foolish government; they do nothing to avert ruin, things will last
+their time. Or again, their church is stirred with throbs of a new duty,
+a new and keen anxiety; but they refuse to feel any thrill, or feeling
+it a moment they repress the disturbing influence. They will not be
+troubled with moral and spiritual questions, calls to action that make
+life severe, high, heroic. Often this is due to want of physical or
+mental vigour. Men and women are overborne by the labour required of
+them, the weary tale of bricks. Even from youth they have had burdens to
+bear so heavy that hope is never kindled. But there are many who have no
+such excuse. Let us alone, they say, we have no appetite for exertion,
+for strife, for the duties that set life in a fever. The old ways suit
+us, we will go on as our fathers have gone. The tide of opportunity ebbs
+away and they are left stranded.
+
+Next, and akin, there is fear, the mood of those who hear the calls of
+life but hear more clearly the threatenings of sense and time. Often it
+comes in the form of a dread of change, apprehension as regards the
+unknown seas on which effort or thought would launch forth. Let us be
+still, say the prudent; better to bear the ills we have than fly to
+others that we know not of. Are we ground down by the Philistines?
+Better suffer than be killed. Are our laws unjust and oppressive? Better
+rest content than risk revolution and the upturning of everything. Are
+we not altogether sure of the basis of our belief? Better leave it
+unexamined than begin with inquiries the end of which cannot be
+foreseen. Besides, they argue, God means us to be content. Our lot in
+the world however hard is of His giving; the faith we hold is of his
+bestowing. Shall we not provoke Him to anger if we move in revolution or
+in inquiry? Still it is life they lose. A man who does not think about
+the truths he rests on has an impotent mind. One who does not feel it
+laid on him to go forward, to be brave, to make the world better has an
+impotent soul. Life is a constant reaching after the unattained for
+ourselves and for the world.
+
+And lastly there is ignoble dependence on others. So many will not exert
+themselves because they wait for some one to come and lift them up. They
+do not think, nor do they understand that instruction brought to them is
+not life. No doubt it is the plan of God to help the many by the
+instrumentality of the few, a whole nation or world by one. Again and
+again we have seen this illustrated in Hebrew history, and elsewhere the
+fact constantly meets us. There is one Luther for Europe, one Cromwell
+for England, one Knox for Scotland, one Paul for early Christianity. But
+at the same time it is because life is wanting, because men have the
+deadly habit of dependence that the hero must be brave for them and the
+reformer must break their bonds. The true law of life on all levels,
+from that of bodily effort upwards, is self-help; without it there is
+only an infancy of being. He who is in a pit must exert himself if he is
+to be delivered. He who is in spiritual darkness must come to the light
+if he is to be saved.
+
+Now we see in Samson a man who in his degree lived. He had strength like
+the strength of ten; he had also the consecration of his vow and the
+sense of a divine constraint and mandate. These things urged him to life
+and made activity necessary to him. He might have reclined in careless
+ease like many around. But sloth did not hold him nor fear. He wanted no
+man's countenance nor help. He lived. His mere exertion of power was the
+sign of higher possibilities.
+
+Live at all hazards, imperfectly if perfection is not attainable,
+half-wrongly if the right cannot be seen. Is this perilous advice? From
+one point of view it may seem very dangerous. For many are energetic in
+so imperfect a way, in so blundering and false a way that it might
+appear better for them to remain quiet, practically dead than degrade
+and darken the life of the race by their mistaken or immoral vehemence.
+You read of those traders among the islands of the Pacific who, afraid
+that their nefarious traffic should suffer if missionary work succeeded,
+urged the natives to kill the missionaries or drive them away, and when
+they had gained their end quickly appeared on the scene to exchange for
+the pillaged stores of the mission-house muskets and gunpowder and
+villainous strong drink. May it not be said that these traders were
+living out their lives as much as the devoted teachers who had risked
+everything for the sake of doing good? Napoleon I., when the scheme of
+empire presented itself to him and all his energies were bent on
+climbing to the summit of affairs in France and in Europe--was not he
+living according to a conception of what was greatest and best? Would it
+not have been better if those traders and the ambitious Corsican alike
+had been content to vegetate--inert and harmless through their days? And
+there are multitudes of examples. The poet Byron for one--could the
+world not well spare even his finest verse to be rid of his unlawful
+energy in personal vice and in coarse profane word?
+
+One has to confess the difficulty of the problem, the danger of praising
+mere vigour. Yet if there is risk on the one side the risk on the other
+is greater: and truth demands risk, defies peril. It is unquestionable
+that any family of men when it ceases to be enterprising and energetic
+is of no more use in the economy of things. Its land is a necropolis.
+The dead cannot praise God. The choice is between activity that takes
+many a wrong direction, hurrying men often towards perdition, yet at
+every point capable of redemption, and on the other hand inglorious
+death, that existence which has no prospect but to be swallowed up of
+the darkness. And while such is the common choice there is also this to
+be noted that inertness is not certainly purer than activity though it
+may appear so merely by contrast. The active life compels us to judge of
+it; the other a mere negation calls for no judgment, yet is in itself a
+moral want, an evil and injury. Conscience being unexercised decay and
+death rule all.
+
+Men cannot be saved by their own effort and vigour. Most true. But if
+they make no attempt to advance towards strength, dominion and fulness
+of existence, they are the prey of force and evil. Nor will it suffice
+that they simply exert themselves to keep body and soul together. The
+life is more than meat. We must toil not only that we may continue to
+subsist, but for personal distinctness and freedom. Where there are
+strong men, resolute minds, earnestness of some kind, there is soil in
+which spiritual seed may strike root. The dead tree can produce neither
+leaf nor flower. In short, if there is to be a human race at all for the
+divine glory it can only be in the divine way, by the laws that govern
+existence of every degree.
+
+2. We come, however, to the compensating principle of
+responsibility--the law of Duty which stands over energy in the range of
+our life. No man, no race is justified by force or as we sometimes say
+by doing. It is faith that saves. Samson has the rude material of life;
+but though his action were far purer and nobler it could not make him a
+spiritual man: his heart is not purged of sin nor set on God.
+
+Granted that the time was rough, chaotic, cloudy, that the idea of
+injuring the Philistines in every possible way was imposed on the Danite
+by his nation's abject state, that he had to take what means lay in his
+power for accomplishing the end. But possessed of energy he was
+deficient in conscience, and so failed of noble life. This may be said
+for him that he did not turn against the men of Judah who came to bind
+him and give him up. Within a certain range he understood his
+responsibility. But surely a higher life than he lived, better plans
+than he followed were possible to one who could have learned the will of
+God at Shiloh, who was bound to God by a vow of purity and had that
+constant reminder of the Holy Lord of Israel. It is no uncommon thing
+for men to content themselves with one sacrament, one observance which
+is reckoned enough for salvation--honesty in business, abstinence from
+strong drink, attendance on church ordinances. This they do and keep the
+rest of existence for unrestrained self-pleasing, as though salvation
+lay in a restraint or a form. But whoever can think is bound to
+criticise life, to try his own life, to seek the way of salvation, and
+that means being true to the best he knows and can know, it means
+believing in the will of God. Something higher than his own impulse is
+to guide him. He is free, yet responsible. His activity, however great,
+has no real power, no vindication unless it falls in with the course of
+divine law and purpose. He lives by faith.
+
+Generally there is one clear principle which, if a man held to it, would
+keep him right in the main. It may not be of a very high order, yet it
+will prepare the way for something better and meanwhile serve his need.
+And for Samson one simple law of duty was to keep clear of all private
+relations and entanglements with the Philistines. There was nothing to
+hinder him from seeing that to be safe and right as a rule of life. They
+were Israel's enemies and his own. He should have been free to act
+against them: and when he married a daughter of the race he forfeited as
+an honourable man the freedom he ought to have had as a son of Israel.
+Doubtless he did not understand fully the evil of idolatry nor the
+divine law that Hebrews were to keep themselves separate from the
+worshippers of false gods. Yet the instincts of the race to which he
+belonged, fidelity to his forefathers and compatriots made their claim
+upon him. There was a duty too which he owed to himself. As a brave
+strong man he was discredited by the line of action which he followed.
+His honour lay in being an open enemy to the Philistines, his dishonour
+in making underhand excuses for attacking them. It was base to seek
+occasion against them when he married the woman at Timnah, and from one
+act of baseness he went on to others because of that first error. And
+chiefly Samson failed in his fidelity to God. Scarcely ever was the name
+of Jehovah dragged through the mire as it was by him. The God of truth,
+the divine guardian of faithfulness, the God who is light, in Whom is no
+darkness at all, was made by Samson's deeds to appear as the patron of
+murder and treachery. We can hardly allow that an Israelite was so
+ignorant of the ordinary laws of morality as to suppose that faith need
+not be kept with idolaters; there were traditions of his people which
+prevented such a notion. One who knew of Abraham's dealings with the
+Hittite Ephron and his rebuke in Egypt could not imagine that the Hebrew
+lay under no debt of human equity and honour to the Philistine. Are
+there men among ourselves who think no faithfulness is due by the
+civilised to the savage? Are there professed servants of Christ who dare
+to suggest that no faith need be kept with heretics? They reveal their
+own dishonour as men, their own falseness and meanness. The primal duty
+of intelligent and moral beings cannot be so dismissed. And even Samson
+should have been openly the Philistines' enemy or not at all. If they
+were cruel, rapacious, mean, he ought to have shown that Jehovah's
+servant was of a different stamp. We cannot believe morality to have
+been at so low an ebb among the Hebrews that the popular leader did not
+know better than he acted. He became a judge in Israel, and his
+judgeship would have been a pretence unless he had some of the justice,
+truth and honour which God demanded of men. Beginning in a very
+mistaken way he must have risen to a higher conception of duty,
+otherwise his rule would have been a disaster to the tribes he governed.
+
+Conscience has originated in fear and is to decay with ignorance, say
+some. Already that extraordinary piece of folly has been answered.
+Conscience is the correlative of power, the guide of energy. If the one
+decays, so must the other. Living strongly, energetically, making
+experiments, seeking liberty and dominion, pressing towards the higher
+we are ever to acknowledge the responsibility which governs life. By
+what we know of the divine will we are to order every purpose and scheme
+and advance to further knowledge. There are victories we might win,
+there are methods by which we might harass those who do us wrong. One
+voice says Snatch the victories, go down by night and injure the foe,
+insinuate what you cannot prove, while the sentinels sleep plunge your
+spear through the heart of a persecuting Saul. But another voice asks,
+Is this the way to assert moral life? Is this the line for a man to
+take? The true man swears to his own hurt, suffers and is strong, does
+in the face of day what he has it in him to do and, if he fails, dies a
+true man still. He is not responsible for obeying commands of which he
+is ignorant, nor for mistakes which he cannot avoid. One like Samson is
+clean-handed in what it would be unutterably base for us to do. But
+close beside every man are such guiding ideas as straightforwardness,
+sincerity, honesty. Each of us knows his duty so far and cannot deceive
+himself by supposing that God will excuse him in acting, even for what
+he counts a good end, as a cheat and a hypocrite. In politics the rule
+is as clear as in companionship, in war as in love.
+
+It has not been asserted that Samson was without a sense of
+responsibility. He had it, and kept his vow. He had it, and fought
+against the Philistines. He did some brave things openly and like a man.
+He had a vision of Israel's need and God's will. Had this not been true
+he could have done no good; the whole strength of the hero would have
+been wasted. But he came short of effecting what he might have effected
+just because he was not wise and serious. His strokes missed their aim.
+In truth Samson never went earnestly about the task of delivering
+Israel. In his fulness of power he was always half in sport, making
+random shots, indulging his own humour. And we may find in his career no
+inapt illustration of the careless way in which the conflict with the
+evils of our time is carried on. With all the rage for societies and
+organizations there is much haphazard activity, and the fanatic for rule
+has his contrast in the free-lance who hates the thought of
+responsibility. A curious charitableness too confuses the air. There are
+men who are full of ardour to-day and strike in with some hot scheme
+against social wrongs, and the next day are to be seen sitting at a
+feast with the very persons most to blame under some pretext of finding
+occasion against them or showing that there is "nothing personal." This
+perplexes the whole campaign. It is usually mere bravado rather than
+charity, a mischief not a virtue.
+
+Israel must be firm and coherent if it is to win liberty from the
+Philistines. Christians must stand by each other steadily if they are to
+overcome infidelity and rescue the slaves of sin. The feats of a man who
+holds aloof from the church because he is not willing to be bound by its
+rules count for little in the great warfare of the age. Many there are
+among our literary men, politicians and even philanthropists who strike
+in now and again in a Christian way and with unquestionably Christian
+purpose against the bad institutions and social evils of our time, but
+have no proper basis or aim of action and maintain towards Christian
+organizations and churches a constant attitude of criticism. Samson-like
+they make showy random attacks on "bigotry," "inconsistency" and the
+like. It is not they who will deliver man from hardness and worldliness
+of soul; not they who will bring in the reign of love and truth.
+
+3. Looking at Samson's efforts during the first part of his career and
+observing the want of seriousness and wisdom that marred them, we may
+say that all he did was to make clear and deep the cleft between
+Philistines and Hebrews. When he appears on the scene there are signs of
+a dangerous intermixture of the two races, and his own marriage is one.
+The Hebrews were apparently inclined to settle down in partial
+subjection to the Philistines and make the best they could of the
+situation, hoping perhaps that by-and-by they might reach a state of
+comfortable alliance and equality. Samson may have intended to end that
+movement or he may not. But he certainly did much to end it. After the
+first series of his exploits, crowned by the slaughter at Lehi, there
+was an open rupture with the Philistines which had the best effect on
+Hebrew morals and religion. It was clear that one Israelite had to be
+reckoned with whose strong arm dealt deadly blows. The Philistines drew
+away in defeat. The Hebrews learned that they needed not to remain in
+any respect dependent or afraid. This kind of division grows into
+hatred; but, as things were, dislike was Israel's safety. The
+Philistines did harm as masters; as friends they would have done even
+more. Enmity meant revulsion from Dagon-worship and all the social
+customs of the opposed race. For this the Hebrews were indebted to
+Samson; and although he was not himself true all along to the principle
+of separation, yet in his final act he emphasized it so by destroying
+the temple of Gaza that the lesson was driven home beyond the
+possibility of being forgotten.
+
+It is no slight service those do who as critics of parties and churches
+show them clearly where they stand, who are to be reckoned as enemies,
+what alliances are perilous. There are many who are exceedingly easy in
+their beliefs, too ready to yield to the _Zeit Geist_ that would
+obliterate definite belief and with it the vigour and hope of mankind.
+Alliance with Philistines is thought of as a good, not a risk, and the
+whole of a party or church may be so comfortably settling in the new
+breadth and freedom of this association that the certain end of it is
+not seen. Then is the time for the resolute stroke that divides party
+from party, creed from creed. A reconciler is the best helper of
+religion at one juncture; at another it is the Samson who standing alone
+perhaps, frowned on equally by the leaders and the multitude, makes
+occasion to kindle controversy and set sharp variance between this side
+and that. Luther struck in so. His great act was one that "rent
+Christendom in twain." Upon the Israel which looked on afraid or
+suspicious he forced the division which had been for centuries latent.
+Does not our age need a new divider? You set forth to testify against
+Philistines and soon find that half your acquaintances are on terms of
+the most cordial friendship with them, and that attacks upon them which
+have any point are reckoned too hot and eager to be tolerated in
+society. To the few who are resolute duty is made difficult and protest
+painful: the reformer has to bear the sins and even the scorn of many
+who should appear with him.
+
+
+
+
+XXII.
+
+_PLEASURE AND PERIL IN GAZA._
+
+JUDGES xvi. 1-3.
+
+
+By courage and energy Samson so distinguished himself in his own tribe
+and on the Philistine border that he was recognized as judge. Government
+of any kind was a boon, and he kept rude order, as much perhaps by
+overawing the restless enemy as by administering justice in Israel.
+Whether the period of twenty years assigned to Samson's judgeship
+intervened between the fight at Lehi and the visit to Gaza we cannot
+tell. The chronology is vague, as might be expected in a narrative based
+on popular tradition. Most likely the twenty years cover the whole time
+during which Samson was before the public as hero and acknowledged
+chief.
+
+Samson went down to Gaza, which was the principal Philistine city
+situated near the Mediterranean coast some forty miles from Zorah. For
+what reason did he venture into that hostile place? It may, of course,
+have been that he desired to learn by personal inspection what was its
+strength, to consider whether it might be attacked with any hope of
+success; and if that was so we would be disposed to justify him. As the
+champion and judge of Israel he could not but feel the danger to which
+his people were constantly exposed from the Philistine power so near to
+them and in those days always becoming more formidable. He had to a
+certain extent secured deliverance for his country as he was expected to
+do; but deliverance was far from complete, could not be complete till
+the strength of the enemy was broken. At great risk to himself he may
+have gone to play the spy and devise, if possible, some plan of attack.
+In this case he would be an example of those who with the best and
+purest motives, seeking to carry the war of truth and purity into the
+enemy's country, go down into the haunts of vice to see what men do and
+how best the evils that injure society may be overcome. There is risk in
+such adventure; but it is nobly undertaken, and even if we do not feel
+disposed to imitate we must admire. Bold servants of Christ may feel
+constrained to visit Gaza and learn for themselves what is done there.
+Beyond this too is a kind of adventure which the whole church justifies
+in proportion to its own faith and zeal. We see St. Paul and his
+companions in Ephesus, in Philippi, in Athens and other heathen towns,
+braving the perils which threaten them there, often attacked, sometimes
+in the jaws of death, heroic in the highest sense. And we see the modern
+missionary with like heroism landing on savage coasts and at the
+constant risk of life teaching the will of God in a sublime confidence
+that it shall awaken the most sunken nature; a confidence never at
+fault.
+
+But we are obliged to doubt whether Samson had in view any scheme
+against the Philistine power; and we may be sure that he was on no
+mission for the good of Gaza. Of a patriotic or generous purpose there
+is no trace; the motive is unquestionably of a different kind. From his
+youth this man was restless, adventurous, ever craving some new
+excitement good or bad. He could do anything but quietly pursue a path
+of duty; and in the small towns of Dan and the valleys of Judah he had
+little to excite and interest him. There life went on in a dull way from
+year to year, without gaiety, bustle, enterprise. Had the chief been
+deeply interested in religion, had he been a reformer of the right kind
+he would have found opportunity enough for exertion and a task into
+which he might have thrown all his force. There were heathen images to
+break in pieces, altars and high-places to demolish. To banish
+Baal-worship and the rites of Ashtoreth from the land, to bring the
+customs of the people under the law of Jehovah would have occupied him
+fully. But Samson did not incline to any such doings; he had no passion
+for reform. We never see in his life one such moment as Gideon and
+Jephthah knew of high religious daring. Dark hours he had, sombre
+enough, as at Lehi after the slaughter. But his was the melancholy of a
+life without aim sufficient to its strength, without a vision matching
+its energy. To suffer for God's cause is the rarest of joys and that
+Samson never knew though he was judge in Israel.
+
+We imagine then that in default of any excitement such as he craved in
+the towns of his own land he turned his eyes to the Philistine cities
+which presented a marked contrast. There life was energetic and gay,
+there many pleasures were to be had. New colonists were coming in their
+swift ships and the streets presented a scene of constant animation. The
+strong eager man, full of animal passion, found the life he craved in
+Gaza where he mingled with the crowds and heard tales of strange
+existence. Nor was there wanting the opportunity for enjoyment which at
+home he could not indulge. Beyond the critical observation of the
+elders of Dan he could take his fill of sensual pleasure. Not without
+danger of course. In some brawl the Philistines might close upon him.
+But he trusted to his strength to escape from their hands, and the risk
+increased the excitement. We must suppose that, having seen the nearer
+and less important towns such as Ekron, Gath and Ashkelon he now
+ventured to Gaza in quest of amusement, in order, as people say, to see
+the world.
+
+A constant peril this of seeking excitement, especially in an age of
+high civilization. The means of variety and stimulus are multiplied, and
+ever the craving outruns them, a craving yielded to, with little or no
+resistance, by many who should know better. The moral teacher must
+recognize the desire for variety and excitement as perhaps the chief of
+all the hindrances he has now to overcome. For one who desires duty
+there are scores who find it dull and tame and turn from it, without
+sense of fault, to the gaieties of civilized society in which there is
+"nothing wrong" as they say, or at least so little of the positively
+wrong that conscience is easily appeased. The religious teacher finds
+the demand for "brightness" and variety before him at every turn; he is
+indeed often touched by it himself and follows with more or less of
+doubt a path that leads straight from his professed goal. "Is amusement
+devilish?" asks one. Most people reply with a smile that life must be
+lively or it is not worth having. And the Philistinism that attracts
+them with its dash and gaudiness is not far away nor hard to reach. It
+is not necessary to go across to the Continent where the brilliance of
+Vienna or Paris offers a contrast to the grey dulness of a country
+village; nor even to London where amid the lures of the midnight
+streets there is peril of the gravest kind. Those who are restless and
+foolhardy can find a Gaza and a valley of Sorek nearer home, in the next
+market town. Philistine life, lax in morals, full of rattle and glitter,
+heat and change, in gambling, in debauchery, in sheer audacity of
+movement and talk, presents its allurements in our streets, has its
+acknowledged haunts in our midst. Young people brought up to fear God in
+quiet homes whether of town or country are enticed by the whispered
+counsels of comrades half ashamed of the things they say, yet eager for
+more companionship in what they secretly know to be folly or worse.
+Young women are the prey of those who disgrace manhood and womanhood by
+the offers they make, the insidious lies they tell. The attraction once
+felt is apt to master. As the current that rushes swiftly bears them
+with it they exult in the rapid motion even while life is nearing the
+fatal cataract. Subtle is the progress of infidelity. From the
+persuasion that enjoyment is lawful and has no peril in it the mind
+quickly passes to a doubt of the old laws and warnings. Is it so certain
+that there is a reward for purity and unworldliness? Is not all the talk
+about a life to come a jangle of vain words? The present is a reality,
+death a certainty, life a swiftly passing possession. They who enjoy
+know what they are getting. The rest is dismissed as altogether in the
+air.
+
+With Samson, as there was less of faith and law to fling aside, there
+was less hardening of heart. He was half a heathen always, more
+conscious of bodily than of moral strength, reliant on that which he
+had, indisposed to seek from God the holy vigour which he valued little.
+At Gaza where moral weakness endangered life his well-knit muscles
+released him. We see him among the Philistines entrapped, apparently in
+a position from which there is no escape. The gate is closed and
+guarded. In the morning he is to be seized and killed. But aware of his
+danger, his mind not put completely off its balance as yet by the
+seductions of the place, he arises at midnight and, plucking the doors
+of the city-gate from their sockets carries them to the top of a hill
+which fronts Hebron.
+
+Here is represented what may at first be quite possible to one who has
+gone into a place of temptation and danger. There is for a time a power
+of resolution and action which when the peril of the hour is felt may be
+brought into use. Out of the house which is like the gate of hell, out
+of the hands of vile tempters it is possible to burst in quick decision
+and regain liberty. In the valley of Sorek it may be otherwise, but here
+the danger is pressing and rouses the will. Yet the power of rising
+suddenly against temptation, of breaking from the company of the impure
+is not to be reckoned on. It is not of ourselves we can be strong and
+resolute enough, but of grace. And can a man expect divine succour in a
+harlot's den? He thinks he may depend upon a certain self-respect, a
+certain disgust at vile things and dishonourable life. But vice can be
+made to seem beautiful, it can overcome the aversion springing from
+self-respect and the best education. In the history of one and another
+of the famous and brilliant, from the god-like youth of Macedon to the
+genius of yesterday the same unutterably sad lesson is taught us; we
+trace the quick descent of vice. Self-respect? Surely to Goethe, to
+George Sand, to Musset, to Burns that should have remained, a saving
+salt. But it is clear that man has not the power of preserving himself.
+While he says in his heart, That is beneath me; I have better taste; I
+shall never be guilty of such a low, false and sickening thing--he has
+already committed himself.
+
+Samson heard the trampling of feet in the streets and was warned of
+physical danger. When midnight came he lost no time. But he was too
+late. The liberty he regained was not the liberty he had lost. Before he
+entered that house in Gaza, before he sat down in it, before he spoke to
+the woman there he should have fled. He did not; and in the valley of
+Sorek his strength of will is not equal to the need. Delilah beguiles
+him, tempts him, presses him with her wiles. He is infatuated; his
+secret is told and ruin comes.
+
+Moral strength, needful decision in duty to self and society and
+God--few possess these because few have the high ideal before them, and
+the sense of an obligation which gathers force from the view of
+eternity. We live, most of us, in a very limited range of time. We think
+of to-morrow or the day beyond; we think of years of health and joy in
+this world, rarely of the boundless after-life. To have a stain upon the
+character, a blunted moral sense, a scar that disfigures the mind seems
+of little account because we anticipate but a temporary reproach or
+inconvenience. To be defiled, blinded, maimed for ever, to be
+incapacitated for the labour and joy of the higher world does not enter
+into our thought. And many who are nervously anxious to appear well in
+the sight of men are shameless when God only can see. Moral strength
+does not spring out of such imperfect views of obligation. What availed
+Samson's fidelity to the Nazirite vow when by another gate he let in the
+foe?
+
+The common kind of religion is a vow which covers two or three points of
+duty only. The value and glory of the religion of the Bible are that it
+sets us on our guard and strengthens us against everything that is
+dangerous to the soul and to society. Suppose it were asked wherein our
+strength lies, what would be the answer? Say that one after another
+stood aside conscious of being without strength until one was found
+willing to be tested. Assume that he could say, I am temperate, I am
+pure; passion never masters me: so far the account is good. You hail him
+as a man of moral power, capable of serving society. But you have to
+inquire further before you can be satisfied. You have to say, Some have
+had too great liking for money. Francis Bacon, Lord Chancellor of
+England, notable in the first rank of philosophers, took bribes and was
+convicted upon twenty-three charges of corruption. Are you proof against
+covetousness? because if you can be tempted by the glitter of gold
+reliance cannot be placed upon you. And again it must be asked of the
+man--Is there any temptress who can wind you about her fingers, overcome
+your conscientious scruples, wrest from you the secret you ought to keep
+and make you break your covenant with God, even as Delilah overcame
+Samson? Because, if there is, you are weaker than a vile woman and no
+dependence can be placed upon you. We learn from history what this kind
+of temptation does. We see one after another, kings, statesmen, warriors
+who figure bravely upon the scene for a time, their country proud of
+them, the best hopes of the good centred in them, suddenly in the midst
+of their career falling into pitiable weakness and covering themselves
+with disgrace. Like Samson they have loved some woman in the valley of
+Sorek. In the life of to-day instances of the same pitiable kind occur
+in every rank and class. The shadow falls on men who held high places
+in society or stood for a time as pillars in the house of God.
+
+Or, taking another case, one may be able to say, I am not avaricious, I
+have fidelity, I would not desert a friend nor speak a falsehood for any
+bribe; I am pure; for courage and patriotism you may rely upon me:--here
+are surely signs of real strength. Yet that man may be wanting in the
+divine faithfulness on which every virtue ultimately depends. With all
+his good qualities he may have no root in the heavenly, no spiritual
+faith, ardour, decision. Let him have great opposition to encounter,
+long patience to maintain, generosity and self-denial to exercise
+without prospect of quick reward--and will he stand? In the final test
+nothing but fidelity to the Highest, tried and sure fidelity to God can
+give a man any right to the confidence of others. That chain alone which
+is welded with the fire of holy consecration, devotion of heart and
+strength and mind to the will of God is able to bear the strain. If we
+are to fight the battles of life and resist the urgency of its
+temptations the whole divine law as Christ has set it forth must be our
+Nazirite vow and we must count ourselves in respect of every obligation
+the bondmen of God. Duty must not be a matter of self-respect but of
+ardent aspiration. The way of our life may lead us into some Gaza full
+of enticements, into the midst of those who make light of the names we
+revere and the truths we count most sacred. Prosperity may come with its
+strong temptations to pride and vainglory. If we would be safe it must
+be in the constant gratitude to God of those who feel the responsibility
+and the hope that are kindled at the cross, as those who have died with
+Christ and now live with Him unto God. In this redeemed life it may be
+almost said there is no temptation; the earthly ceases to lure, gay
+shows and gauds cease to charm the soul. There still are comforts and
+pleasures in God's world, but they do not enchain. A vision of the
+highest duty and reality overshines all that is trivial and passing. And
+this is life--the fulness, the charm, the infinite variety and strength
+of being. "How can he that is dead to the world live any longer
+therein?" Yet he lives as he never did before.
+
+In the experience of Samson in the valley of Sorek we find another
+warning. We learn the persistence with which spiritual enemies pursue
+those whom they mark for their prey. It has been said that the
+adversaries of good are always most active in following the best men
+with their persecutions. This we take leave to deny. It is when a man
+shows some weakness, gives an opportunity for assault that he is pressed
+and hunted as a wounded lion by a tribe of savages. The occasion was
+given to the Philistines by Samson's infatuation. Had he been a man of
+stern purity they would have had no point of attack. But Delilah could
+be bribed. The lords of the Philistines offered her a large sum to
+further their ends, and she, a willing instrument, pressed Samson with
+her entreaties. Baffled again and again she did not rest till the reward
+was won.
+
+We can easily see the madness of the man in treating lightly, as if it
+were a game he was sure to win, the solicitations of the adventuress.
+"The Philistines be upon thee, Samson"--again and again he heard that
+threat and laughed at it. The green withes, the new ropes with which he
+was bound were snapped at will. Even when his hair was woven into the
+web he could go away with web and beam and the pin with which they had
+been fixed to the ground. But if he had been aware of what he was doing
+how could he have failed to see that he was approaching the fatal
+capitulation, that wiles and blandishments were gaining upon him? When
+he allowed her to tamper with the sign of his vow it was the presage of
+the end.
+
+So it often is. The wiles of the spirit of this world are woven very
+cunningly. First the "over-scrupulous" observance of religious
+ordinances is assailed. The tempter succeeds so far that the Sabbath is
+made a day of pleasure: then the cry is raised, "The Philistines be upon
+thee." But the man only laughs. He feels himself quite strong as yet,
+able for any moral task. Another lure is framed--gambling, drinking. It
+is yielded to moderately, a single bet by way of sport, one deep draught
+on some extraordinary occasion. He who is the object of persecution is
+still self-confident. He scorns the thought of danger. A prey to
+gambling, to debauchery? He is far enough from that. But his weakness is
+discovered. Satanic profit is to be made out of his fall; and he shall
+not escape.
+
+It is true as ever it was that the friendship of the world is a snare.
+When the meshes of time and sense close upon us we may be sure that the
+end aimed at is our death. The whole world is a valley of Sorek to weak
+man, and at every turn he needs a higher than himself to guard and guide
+him. He is indeed a Samson, a child in morals, though full-grown in
+muscle. There are some it is true who are able to help, who if they were
+beside in the hour of peril would interpose with counsel and warning and
+protection. But a time comes to each of us when he has to go alone
+through the dangerous streets. Then unless he holds straight forward,
+looking neither to right hand nor left, pressing towards the mark, his
+weakness will be quickly detected, that secret tendency scarcely known
+to himself by which he can be most easily assailed. Nor will it be
+forgotten if once it has been discovered. It is now the property of a
+legion. Be it vanity or avarice, ambition or sensuousness, the
+Philistines know how to gain their end by means of it. There is strength
+indeed to be had. The weakest may become strong, able to face all the
+tempters in the world and to pass unscathed through the streets of Gaza
+or the crowds of Vanity Fair. Nor is the succour far away. Yet to
+persuade men of their need and then to bring them to the feet of God are
+the most difficult of tasks in an age of self-sufficiency and spiritual
+unreason. Harder than ever is the struggle to rescue the victims of
+worldly fashion, enticement and folly: for the false word has gone forth
+that here and here only is the life of man and that renouncing the
+temporal is renouncing all.
+
+
+
+
+XXIII.
+
+_THE VALLEY OF SOREK AND OF DEATH._
+
+JUDGES xvi. 4-31.
+
+
+The strong bold man who has blindly fought his battles and sold himself
+to the traitress and to the enemy,
+
+  "Eyeless in Gaza at the mill with slaves,"
+
+the sport and scorn of those who once feared him, is a mournful object.
+As we look upon him there in his humiliation, his temper and power
+wasted, his life withered in its prime, we almost forget the folly and
+the sin, so much are we moved to pity and regret. For Samson is a
+picture, vigorous in outline and colour, of what in a less striking way
+many are and many more would be if it were not for restraints of divine
+grace. A fallen hero is this. But the career of multitudes without the
+dash and energy ends in the like misery of defeat; nothing done, not
+much attempted, their existence fades into the sere and yellow leaf.
+There has been no ardour to make death glorious.
+
+Every man has his defects, his besetting sins, his dangers. It is in the
+consciousness of our own that we approach with sorrow the last scenes of
+the eventful history of Samson. Who dares cast a stone at him? Who can
+fling a taunt as he is seen groping about in his blindness?
+
+  "A little onward lend thy guiding hand
+  To these dark steps, a little further on.
+  For yonder bank hath choice of sun or shade;
+  There I am wont to sit when any chance
+  Relieves me from my task of servile toil.
+  O dark, dark, dark amid the blaze of noon,
+  Irrecoverably dark, total eclipse
+  Without all hope of day:"
+
+so we hear him bewail his lot. And we, perchance, feeling weakness creep
+over us while bonds of circumstance still hold us from what we see to be
+our divine calling,--we compassionate ourselves in pitying him; or, if
+we are as yet strong and buoyant, our history before us, plans for
+useful service of our time clearly in view, have we not already felt the
+symptoms of moral infirmity which make it doubtful whether we shall
+reach our goal? There are many hindrances, and even the brave unselfish
+man who never loiters in Gaza or in the treacherous valley may find his
+way barred by obstacles he cannot remove. But in the case of most the
+hindrances within are the most numerous and powerful. This man who
+should effect much for his age is held by love which blinds him, that
+other by hatred which masters him. Now covetousness, now pride is the
+deterrent. Many begin to know themselves and the difficulty of doing
+great tasks for God and man when noontide is past and the day has begun
+to decline. Great numbers have only dreamed of attempting something and
+have never bestirred themselves to act. So it is that Samson's defeat
+appears a symbol of the pathetic human failure. To many his character is
+full of sad interest, for in it they see what they have fears of
+becoming or what they have already become.
+
+What has Samson lost when he has revealed his secret to Delilah? Observe
+him when he goes forth from the woman's house and stands in the
+sunlight. Apart from the want of his waving locks he seems the same and
+is physically the same; muscle and sinew, bone and nerve, stout-beating
+heart and strong arm, Samson is there. And his human will is as eager as
+ever; he is a bold daring man this morning as he was last evening, with
+the same dream of "breaking through all" and bearing himself as king.
+But he is more lonely than ever before; something has gone from his
+soul. A heavy sense of faithlessness to one prized distinction and known
+duty oppresses him. Shake thyself as at other times, poor rash Samson,
+but know in thy heart that at last thou art powerless: the audacity of
+faith is no longer thine. Thou art the natural man still, but that is
+not enough, the spiritual sanction gone. The Philistines, half afraid,
+gather about thee ten to one; they can bind now and lead captive for
+thou hast lost the girdle which knit thy powers together and made thee
+invincible. The consciousness of being God's man is gone--the
+consciousness of being true to that which united thee in a rude but very
+real bond to the Almighty. Thou hast scorned the vow which kept thee
+from the abyss, and with the knowledge of utter moral baseness comes
+physical prostration, despair, feebleness, ruin. Samson at last knows
+himself to be no king at all, no hero nor judge.
+
+It is common to think the spiritual of little account, faith in God of
+little account. Suppose men give that up; suppose they no longer hold
+themselves bound by duty to the Almighty; they expect nevertheless to
+continue the same. They will still have their reason, their strength of
+body and of mind; they believe that all they once did they shall still
+be able to do and now more freely in their own way, therefore even more
+successfully. Is that so? Hope is a spiritual thing. It is apart from
+bodily strength, distinct from energy and manual skill. Take hope away
+from a man, the strongest, the bravest, the most intelligent, and will
+he be the same? Nay. His eye loses its lustre; the vigour of his will
+decays; he lies powerless and defeated. Or take love away--love which is
+again a spiritual thing. Let the ardour, the reason for exertion which
+love inspired pass away. Let the man who loved and would have dared all
+for love be deprived of that source of vital power, and he will dare no
+longer. Sad and weary and dispirited he will cast himself down careless
+of life.
+
+But hope and love are not so necessary to the full tide of human vigour,
+are not so potent in stirring the powers of manhood as the friendship of
+God, the consciousness that made by God for ends of His we have Him as
+our stay. Indeed without this consciousness manhood never finds its
+strength. This gives a hope far higher and more sustaining than any of a
+personal or temporal kind. It makes us strong by virtue of the finest
+and deepest affection which can possibly move us; and more than that it
+gives to life full meaning, proper aim and justification. A man without
+the sense of a divine origin and election has no standing-ground; he is
+so to speak without the right of existence, he has no claim to be heard
+in speaking and to have a place among those who act. But he who feels
+himself to be in the world on God's business, to be God's servant, has
+his assured place and claim as a man, and can see reason and purpose for
+every sharp trial to which he is put. Here then is the secret of
+strength, the only source of power and steadfastness for any man or
+woman. And he who has had it and lost it, breaking with God for the sake
+of gain or pleasure or some earthly affection, must like Samson feel his
+vigour sapped, his confidence forfeited. Now his power to command, to
+advise, to contend for any worthy result has passed away. He is a tree
+whose root ceases to feed in the soil though still the leaves are green.
+
+The spiritual loss, the loss of living faith, is the great one: but is
+it for that we generally pity ourselves or any person known to us? Life
+and freedom are dear, the ability to put forth energy at our will, the
+sense of capacity; and it is the loss of these in outward and visible
+ranges that most moves us to grief. We commiserate the strong man whose
+exploits in the world seem to be over, as we pity the orator whose power
+of speech is gone, the artist who can no more handle the brush, the
+eager merchant whose bargaining is done. We give our sympathy to Samson,
+because in the midst of his days he has fallen overcome by treachery,
+because the cruelty of enemies has afflicted him. Yet, looking at the
+truth of things, the real cause of pity is deeper than any of these and
+different. A man who is still in living touch with God can suffer the
+saddest deprivations and retain a cheerful heart, unbroken courage and
+hope. Suppose that Samson, surprised by his enemies while he was about
+some worthy task, had been seized, deprived of his sight, bound with
+fetters of iron and consigned to prison. Should we then have had to pity
+him as we must when he is taken, a traitor to himself, the dupe of a
+deceiver, with the badge of his vow and the sense of his fidelity gone?
+We feel with Jeremiah in his affliction; we feel with John the Baptist
+confined in the prison into which Herod has cast him, with St. Paul in
+the Philippian dungeon and with St. Peter lying bound with chains in the
+castle of Jerusalem. But we do not commiserate, we admire and exult.
+Here are men who endure for the right. They are martyrs,
+fellow-sufferers with Christ; they are marching with the cohorts of God
+to the deliverances of eternity. Ah! It is the men who are "martyrs by
+the pang without the palm," the men who have lost not only liberty but
+nobleness, who dragged after false lures have sold their prudence and
+their strength--these it is for whom we need to weep. He who doing his
+duty has been mastered by enemies, he who fighting a brave battle has
+been overcome--let us not dare to pity him. But the man who has given up
+the battle of faith, who has lost his glory, him the heavens look upon
+with the profound sorrow that is called for by a wasted life.
+
+And how pathetic the touch: "He wist not that the Lord had departed from
+him." For a little time he failed to realize the spiritual disaster he
+had brought on himself. For a little time only; soon the dark conviction
+seized him. But worse still would have been his case if he had remained
+unconscious of loss. This sense of weakness is the last boon to the
+sinner. God still does this for him, poor headstrong child of nature as
+he would fain be, living by and for himself: he is not permitted.
+Whether he will own it or not he shall be weak and useless until he
+returns to God and to himself. Often indeed we find the enslaved Samson
+refusing to allow that anything is wrong with him. Out of sight of the
+world, in some very secret place he has broken the obligations of
+faith, temperance, chastity, and yet thinks no special result has
+followed. He can meet the demands of society and that is enough,
+supposing the matter should come to light. Of the subtle poisoning of
+his own soul he has no thought. Is the thing hidden then? The law which
+determines that as a man is so his strength shall be follows every one
+into the most secret place. It keeps watch over our veracity, our
+sobriety, our purity, our faithfulness. Whenever in one point our
+covenant with God is broken a part of strength is taken away. Do we not
+perceive the loss? Do we flatter ourselves that all is as before? That
+is only our spiritual blindness; the fact remains.
+
+What a pitiful thing it is to see men in this plight trying in vain to
+go about as if nothing had happened and they were as fit as ever for
+their places in society and in the church! We do not speak solely of
+sins like those into which Samson and David fell. There are others,
+scarcely reckoned sins, which as surely result in moral weakness
+perceived or unperceived, in the loss of God's countenance and support.
+Our covenant is to be pure and also merciful; let one fail in
+mercifulness, let there be a harsh pitiless temper cherished in secret,
+and this as well as impurity will make him morally weak. Our covenant is
+to be generous as well as honest; let a man keep from the poor and from
+the church what he ought to give, and he will lose his strength of soul
+as surely as if he cheated another in trade, or took what was not his
+own. But we distinguish between sin and default and think of the latter
+as a mere infirmity which has no ill effect. There is no acknowledgment
+of loss even when it has become almost complete. The man who is not
+generous nor merciful, nor a defender of faith goes on thinking all is
+well with him, imagining that his futile religious exercises or gifts to
+this and that keep him on good terms with God and that he is helping the
+world, while in truth he has not the moral strength of a child. He acts
+the part of a Christian teacher or servant of the church, he leads in
+prayer, he joins in deliberations that have to do with the success of
+Christian work. To himself all seems satisfactory and he expects that
+good shall result from his efforts. But it cannot be. There is the
+strain of exertion but no power.
+
+Do we wonder that more is not effected by our organizations, religious
+and other, which seem so powerful, quite capable of Christianising and
+reforming the world? The reason is that many of the professed religious
+and benevolent, who appear zealous and strenuous, are dying at heart.
+The Lord may not have departed from them utterly; they are not dead;
+there is still a rootlet of spiritual being. But they cannot fight; they
+cannot help others; they cannot run in the way of God's commandments.
+Are we not bound to ask ourselves how we stand, whether any failure in
+our covenant-keeping has made us spiritually weak. If we are paltering
+with eternal facts, if between us and the one Source of Life there is a
+widening distance surely the need is urgent for a return to Christian
+honour and fidelity which will make us strong and useful.
+
+And there is something here in the story of Samson that bids us think
+hopefully of a new way and a new life. In the misery to which he was
+reduced there came to him with renewed acceptance of his vow a fresh
+endowment of vigour. It is the divine healing, the grace of the
+long-suffering Father which are thus represented. No human soul needs
+to be utterly disconsolate, for grace waits ever on discomfiture. Return
+to me, says the Lord, and I will return to you; I will heal your
+backslidings and love you freely. Out of the deepest depths there is a
+way to the heights of spiritual privilege and power. To confess our
+faults and sins, to resume the fidelity, the uprightness, the generosity
+and mercifulness we renounced, to take again the straight upward path of
+self-denial and duty--this is always reserved for the soul that has not
+utterly perished. The man, young or old, who has become weaker than a
+child for any good work may hear the call that speaks of hope. He who in
+self-indulgence or hard worldliness has abandoned God may turn again to
+the Father's entreaty, "Remember from what thou hast fallen and repent."
+
+We pass now to consider a point suggested by the terms in which the
+Philistines triumphed over their captured foe. When the people saw him
+they praised their God: for they said, Our god hath delivered into our
+hand our enemy, and the destroyer of our country which hath slain many
+of us. Here the ignorant religiousness and gratitude of Philistines to a
+god which was no God might provoke a smile were it not for the
+consideration that under the clear light of Christianity equal ignorance
+is often shown by those who profess to be piously grateful. You say it
+was the bribe which the Philistine lords offered to Delilah and her
+treachery and Samson's sin that put him in the enemy's hand. You say,
+Surely the most ignorant man in Gaza must have seen that Dagon had
+nothing whatever to do with the result. And yet it is very common to
+ascribe to God what is nowise His doing. There are indeed times when we
+almost shudder to hear God thanked for that which could only be
+attributed to a Dagon or a Moloch.
+
+We are told of the tribal gods of those old Syrians--Baal, Melcarth,
+Sutekh, Milcom and the rest--each adored as master and protector by some
+people or race. Piously the devotees of each god acknowledged his hand
+in every victory and every fortunate circumstance, at the same time
+tracing to his anger and their own neglect of duty to him all calamities
+and defeats. May it not be said that the belief of many still is in a
+tribal god, falsely called by the name of Jehovah, a god whose chief
+function is to look after their interests whoever may suffer, and take
+their side in all quarrels whoever may be in the right? Men make for
+themselves the rude outline of a divinity who is supposed to be
+indifferent or hostile to every circle but their own, suspicious of
+every church but their own, careless of the sufferings of all but
+themselves. In two countries that are at war prayers for success will
+ascend in almost the same terms to one who is thought of as a national
+protector, not to the Father of all; each side is utterly regardless of
+the other, makes no allowance in prayer for the possibility that the
+other may be in the right. The thanksgivings of the victors too will be
+mixed with glorying almost fiendish over the defeated, whose blood, it
+may be, dyed in pathetic martyrdom their own hill-sides and valleys. In
+less flagrant cases, where it is only a question of gain or loss in
+trade, of getting some object of desire, the same spirit is shown. God
+is thanked for bestowing that of which another, perhaps more worthy, is
+deprived. It is not to the kindness of Heaven, but rather to the proving
+severity of God, we may say, that the result is due. Looking on with
+clear eyes we see something very different from divine approval in the
+prosperous efforts of unscrupulous push and wire-pulling. Those who have
+much success in the world have need to justify their comforts and the
+praise they enjoy. They need to show cause to the ranks of the obscure
+and ill-paid for their superior fortune. Success like theirs cannot be
+admitted as a special mark of the favour of that God Whose ways are
+equal, Whose name is the Holy and Just.
+
+Next look at the ignoble task to which Samson is put by the Philistines,
+a type of the ignominious uses to which the hero may be doomed by the
+crowd. The multitude cannot be trusted with a great man.
+
+In the prison at Gaza the fallen chief was set to grind corn, to do the
+work of slaves. To him, indeed, work was a blessing. From the bitter
+thoughts that would have eaten out his heart he was somewhat delivered
+by the irksome labour. In reality, as we now perceive, no work degrades;
+but a man of Samson's type and period thought differently. The
+Philistine purpose was to degrade him; and the Hebrew captive would feel
+in the depths of his hot brooding nature the humiliating doom. Look then
+at the parallels. Think of a great statesman placed at the head of a
+nation to guide its policy in the line of righteousness, to bring its
+laws into harmony with the principles of human freedom and divine
+justice--think of such a one, while labouring at his sacred task with
+all the ardour of a noble heart, called to account by those whose only
+desire is for better trade, the means of beating their rivals in some
+market or bolstering up their failing speculations. Or see him at
+another time pursued by the cry of a class that feels its prescriptive
+rights invaded or its position threatened. Take again a poet, an artist,
+a writer, a preacher intent on great themes, eagerly following after
+the ideal to which he has devoted himself, but exposed every moment to
+the criticism of men who have no soul--held up to ridicule and
+reprobation because he does not accept vulgar models and repeat the
+catchwords of this or that party. Philistinism is always in this way
+asserting its claim, and ever and anon it succeeds in dragging some
+ardent soul into the dungeon to grind thenceforth at the mill.
+
+With the very highest too it is not afraid to inter-meddle. Christ
+Himself is not safe. The Philistines of to-day are doing their utmost to
+make His name inglorious. For what else is the modern cry that
+Christianity should be chiefly about the business of making life
+comfortable in this world and providing not only bread but amusement for
+the crowd? The ideas of the church are not practical enough for this
+generation. To get rid of sin--that is a dream; to make men fearers of
+God, soldiers of truth, doers of righteousness at all hazards--that is
+in the air. Let it be given up; let us seek what we can reach; bind the
+name of Christ and the Spirit of Christ in chains to the work of a
+practical secularism, and let us turn churches into pleasant lounging
+places and picture galleries. Why should the soul have the benefit of so
+great a name as that of the Son of God? Is not the body more? Is not the
+main business to have houses and railways, news and enjoyment? The
+policy of undeifying Christ is having too much success. If it make way
+there will soon be need for a fresh departure into the wilderness.
+
+The last scene of Samson's history awaits us--the gigantic effort, the
+awful revenge in which the Hebrew champion ended his days. In one sense
+it aptly crowns the man's career. The sacred historian is not composing
+a romance, yet the end could not have been more fit. Strangely enough it
+has given occasion for preaching the doctrine of self-sacrifice as the
+only means of highest achievement, and we are asked to see here an
+example of the finest heroism, the most sublime devotion. Samson dying
+for his country is likened to Christ dying for His people.
+
+It is impossible to allow this for a moment. Not Milton's apology for
+Samson, not the authority of all the illustrious men who have drawn the
+parallel can keep us from deciding that this was a case of vengeance and
+self-murder not of noble devotion. We have no sense of vindicated
+principle when we see that temple fall in terrible ruin, but a thrill of
+disappointment and keen sorrow that a servant of Jehovah should have
+done this in His name. The lords of the Philistines, all the _serens_ or
+chiefs of the hundred cities are gathered in the ample porch of the
+building. True, they are assembled at an idolatrous feast; but this
+idolatry is their religion which they cannot choose but exercise for
+they know of no better, nor has Samson ever done one deed or spoken one
+word that could convince them of error. True, they are met to rejoice
+over their enemy and they call for him in cruel vainglory to make them
+sport. Yet this is the man who for his sport and in his revenge once
+burned the standing corn of a whole valley and more than once went on
+slaying Philistines till he was weary. True, Samson as a patriotic
+Israelite views these people as enemies. Yet it was among them he first
+sought a wife and afterwards pleasure. And now, if he decides to die
+that he may kill a thousand enemies at once, is the self-chosen death
+less an act of suicide?
+
+If this was truly a fine act of self-sacrifice what good came of it? The
+sacrifice that is to be praised does distinct and clearly purposed
+service to some worthy cause or high moral end. We do not find that this
+dreadful deed reconciled the Philistines to Israel or moved them to
+belief in Jehovah. We observe, on the contrary, that it went to increase
+the hatred between race and race, so that when Canaanites, Moabites,
+Ammonites, Midianites no longer vex Israel these Philistines show more
+deadly antagonism--antagonism of which Israel knew the heat when on the
+red field of Gilboa the kingly Saul and the well-beloved Jonathan were
+together stricken down in death. If there was in Samson's mind any
+thought of vindicating a principle it was that of Israel's dignity as
+the people of Jehovah. But here his testimony was worthless.
+
+As we have already said, much is written about self-sacrifice which is
+sheer mockery of truth, most falsely sentimental. Men and women are
+urged to the notion that if they can only find some pretext for
+renouncing freedom, for curbing and endangering life, for stepping aside
+from the way of common service that they may give up something in an
+uncommon way for the sake of any person or cause, good will come of it.
+The doctrine is a lie. The sacrifice of Christ was not of that kind. It
+was under the influence of no blind desire to give up His life, but
+first under the pressure of a supreme providential necessity, then in
+renunciation of the earthly life for a clearly seen and personally
+embraced divine end, the reconciliation of man to God, the setting forth
+of a propitiation for the sin of the world--for this it was He died. He
+willed to be our Saviour; having so chosen He bowed to the burden that
+was laid upon Him. "It pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He hath put Him
+to grief." To the end He foresaw and desired there was but one way--and
+the way was that of death because of man's wickedness and ruin.
+
+Suffering for itself is no end and never can be to God or to Christ or
+to a good man. It is a necessity on the way to the ends of righteousness
+and love. If personality is not a delusion and salvation a dream there
+must be in every case of Christian renunciation some distinct moral aim
+in view for every one concerned, and there must be at each step, as in
+the action of our Lord, the most distinct and unwavering sincerity, the
+most direct truthfulness. Anything else is a sin against God and
+humanity. We entreat would-be moralists of the day to comprehend before
+they write of "self-sacrifice." The sacrifice of the moral judgment is
+always a crime, and to preach needless suffering for the sake of
+covering up sin or as a means of atoning for past defects is to utter
+most unchristian falsehood.
+
+Samson threw away a life of which he was weary and ashamed. He threw it
+away in avenging a cruelty; but it was a cruelty he had no reason to
+call a wrong. "O God, that I might be avenged!"--that was no prayer of a
+faithful heart. It was the prayer of envenomed hatred, of a soul still
+unregenerate after trial. His death was indeed _self_-sacrifice--the
+sacrifice of the higher self, the true self, to the lower. Samson should
+have endured patiently, magnifying God. Or we can imagine something not
+perfect yet heroic. Had he said to those Philistines, My people and you
+have been too long at enmity. Let there be an end of it. Avenge
+yourselves on me, then cease from harassing Israel,--that would have
+been like a brave man. But it is not this we find. And we close the
+story of Samson more sad than ever that Israel's history has not taught
+a great man to be a good man, that the hero has not achieved the morally
+heroic, that adversity has not begotten in him a wise patience and
+magnanimity. Yet he had a place under Divine Providence. The dim
+troubled faith that was in his soul was not altogether fruitless. No
+Jehovah-worshipper would ever think of bowing before that god whose
+temple fell in ruins on the captive Israelite and his thousand victims.
+
+
+
+
+XXIV.
+
+_THE STOLEN GODS._
+
+JUDGES xvii., xviii.
+
+
+The portion of the Book of Judges which begins with the seventeenth
+chapter and extends to the close is not in immediate connection with
+that which has gone before. We read (ch. xviii. 30) that "Jonathan, the
+son of Gershom, the son of Manasseh, he and his sons were priests to the
+tribe of Dan until the day of the captivity of the land." But the proper
+reading is, "Jonathan, the son of Gershom, the son of Moses." It would
+seem that the renegade Levite of the narrative was a near descendant of
+the great law-giver. So rapidly did the zeal of the priestly house
+decline that in the third or fourth generation after Moses one of his
+own line became minister of an idol temple for the sake of a living. It
+is evident, then, that in the opening of the seventeenth chapter we are
+carried back to the time immediately following the conquest of Canaan by
+Joshua, when Othniel was settling in the south and the tribes were
+endeavouring to establish themselves in the districts allotted to them.
+The note of time is of course far from precise, but the incidents are
+certainly to be placed early in the period.
+
+We are introduced first to a family living in Mount Ephraim consisting
+of a widow and her son Micah who is married and has sons of his own. It
+appears that on the death of the father of Micah a sum of eleven hundred
+shekels of silver, about a hundred and twenty pounds of our money--a
+large amount for the time--was missed by the widow, who after vain
+search for it spoke in strong terms about the matter to her son. He had
+taken the money to use in stocking his farm or in trade and at once
+acknowledged that he had done so and restored it to his mother, who
+hastened to undo any evil her words had caused by invoking upon him the
+blessing of God. Further she dedicated two hundred of her shekels to
+make graven and molten images in token of piety and gratitude.
+
+We have here a very significant revelation of the state of religion. The
+indignation of Moses had burned against the people when at Sinai they
+made a rude image of gold, sacrificed to it and danced about it in
+heathen revel. We are reading of what took place say a century after
+that scene at the foot of Sinai, and already those who desire to show
+their devotion to the Eternal, very imperfectly known as Jehovah, make
+teraphim and molten images to represent Him. Micah has a sort of private
+chapel or temple among the buildings in his courtyard. He consecrates
+one of his sons to be priest of this little sanctuary. And the historian
+adds in explanation of this, as one keenly aware of the benefits of good
+government under a God-fearing monarch--"In those days there was no king
+in Israel. Every man did that which was right in his own eyes."
+
+We need not take for granted that the worship in this hill-chapel was of
+the heathen sort. There was probably no Baal, no Astarte among the
+images; or, if there was, it may have been merely as representing a
+Syrian power prudently recognised but not adored. No hint occurs in the
+whole story of a licentious or a cruel cult, although there must have
+been something dangerously like the superstitious practices of Canaan.
+Micah's chapel, whatever the observances were, gave direct introduction
+to the pagan forms and notions which prevailed among the people of the
+land. There already Jehovah was degraded to the rank of a
+nature-divinity, and represented by figures.
+
+In one of the highland valleys towards the north of Ephraim's territory
+Micah had his castle and his ecclesiastical establishment--state and
+church in germ. The Israelites of the neighbourhood, who looked up to
+the well-to-do farmer for protection, regarded him all the more that he
+showed respect for religion, that he had this house of gods and a
+private priest. They came to worship in his sanctuary and to inquire of
+the ecclesiastic, who in some way endeavoured to discover the will of
+God by means of the teraphim and ephod. The ark of the covenant was not
+far away for Bethel and Gilgal were both within a day's journey. But the
+people did not care to be at the trouble of going so far. They liked
+better their own local shrine and its homelier ways; and when at length
+Micah secured the services of a Levite the worship seemed to have all
+the sanction that could possibly be desired.
+
+It need hardly be said that God is not confined to a locality, that in
+those days as in our own the true worshipper could find the Almighty on
+any hill-top, in any dwelling or private place, as well as at the
+accredited shrine. It is quite true, also, that God makes large
+allowance for the ignorance of men and their need of visible signs and
+symbols of what is unseen and eternal. We must not therefore assume at
+once that in Micah's house of idols, before the widow's graven and
+molten figures there could be no acceptable worship, no prayers that
+reached the ear of the Lord of Hosts. And one might even go the length
+of saying that, perhaps, in this schismatic sanctuary, this chapel of
+images, devotion could be quite as sincere as before the ark itself.
+Little good came of the religious ordinances maintained there during the
+whole period of the judges, and even in Eli's latter days the vileness
+and covetousness practised at Shiloh more than countervailed any pious
+influence. Local and family altars therefore must have been of real use.
+But this was the danger, that leaving the appointed centre of
+Jehovah-worship, where symbolism was confined within safe limits, the
+people should in ignorant piety multiply objects of adoration and run
+into polytheism. Hence the importance of the decree, afterwards
+recognised, that one place of sacrifice should gather to it all the
+tribes and that there the ark of the covenant with its altar should
+alone speak of the will and holiness of God. And the story of the Danite
+migration connected with this of Micah and his Levite well illustrates
+the wisdom of such a law, for it shows how, in the far north, a
+sanctuary and a worship were set up which, existing long for tribal
+devotion, became a national centre of impure worship.
+
+The wandering Levite from Bethlehem-judah is one, we must believe, of
+many Levites, who having found no inheritance because the cities
+allotted to them were as yet unconquered spread themselves over the land
+seeking a livelihood, ready to fall in with any local customs of
+religion that offered them position and employment. The Levites were
+esteemed as men acquainted with the way of Jehovah, able to maintain
+that communication with Him without which no business could be
+hopefully undertaken. Something of the dignity that was attached to the
+names of Moses and Aaron ensured them honourable treatment everywhere
+unless among the lowest of the people; and when this Levite reached the
+dwelling of Micah, beside which there seems to have been a khan or
+lodging-place for travellers, the chance of securing him was at once
+seized. For ten pieces of silver, say twenty-five shillings a year, with
+a suit of clothes and his food, he agreed to become Micah's private
+chaplain. At this very cheap rate the whole household expected a time of
+prosperity and divine favour. "Now know I," said the head of the family,
+"that the Lord will do me good seeing I have a Levite to my priest." We
+must fear that he took some advantage of the man's need, that he did not
+much consider the honour of Jehovah yet reckoned on getting a blessing
+all the same. It was a case of seeking the best religious privileges as
+cheaply as possible, a very common thing in all ages.
+
+But the coming of the Levite was to have results Micah did not foresee.
+Jonathan had lived in Bethlehem, and some ten or twelve miles westward
+down the valley one came to Zorah and Eshtaol, two little towns of the
+tribe of Dan of which we have heard. The Levite had apparently become
+pretty well known in the district and especially in those villages to
+which he went to offer sacrifice or perform some other religious rite.
+And now a series of incidents brought certain old acquaintances to his
+new place of abode.
+
+Even in Samson's time the tribe of Dan, whose territory was to be along
+the coast west from Judah, was still obliged to content itself with the
+slopes of the hills, not having got possession of the plain. In the
+earlier period with which we are now dealing the Danites were in yet
+greater difficulty, for not only had they Philistines on the one side
+but Amorites on the other. The Amorites "would dwell," we are told, "in
+Mount Heres, in Aijalon and in Shaalbim." It was this pressure which
+determined the people about Zorah and Eshtaol to find if possible
+another place of settlement, and five men were sent out in search.
+Travelling north they took the same way as the Levite had taken, heard
+of the same khan in the hill-country of Ephraim and made it their
+resting-place for a night. The discovery of the Levite Jonathan followed
+and of the chapel in which he ministered with its wonderful array of
+images. We can suppose the deputation had thoughts they did not express,
+but for the present they merely sought the help of the priest, begging
+him to consult the oracle on their behalf and learn whether their
+mission would be successful. The five went on their journey with the
+encouragement, "Go in peace; before the Lord is your way wherein ye go."
+
+Months pass without any more tidings of the Danites until one day a
+great company is seen following the hill-road near Micah's farm. There
+are six hundred men girt with weapons of war with their wives and
+children and cattle, a whole clan on the march, filling the road for
+miles and moving slowly northward. The five men have indeed succeeded
+after a fashion. Away between Lebanon and Hermon in the region of the
+sources of Jordan they have found the sort of district they went to
+seek. Its chief town Laish stood in the midst of fertile fields with
+plenty of wood and water. It was a place, according to their large
+report, where was "no want of anything that is in the earth." Moreover
+the inhabitants, who seem to have been a Phoenician colony, dwelt by
+themselves quiet and secure having no dealings or treaty with the
+powerful Zidonians. They were the very kind of people whom a sudden
+attack would be likely to subdue. There was an immediate migration of
+Danites to this fresh field, and in prospect of bloody work the men of
+Zorah and Eshtaol seem to have had no doubt as to the rightness of their
+expedition; it was enough that they had felt themselves straitened. The
+same reason appears to suffice many in modern times. Were the aboriginal
+inhabitants of America and Australia considered by those who coveted
+their land? Even the pretence of buying has not always been maintained.
+Murder and rapine have been the methods used by men of our own blood,
+our own name, and no nation under the sun has a record darker than the
+tale of British conquest.
+
+Men who go forth to steal land are quite fit to attempt the strange
+business of stealing gods--that is appropriating to themselves the
+favour of divine powers and leaving other men destitute. The Danites as
+they pass Micah's house hear from their spies of the priest and the
+images that are in his charge. "Do you know that there is in these
+houses an ephod and teraphim and a graven image and a molten image? Now
+therefore consider what ye have to do." The hint is enough. Soon the
+court of the farmstead is invaded, the images are brought out and the
+Levite Jonathan, tempted by the offer of being made priest to a clan, is
+fain to accompany the marauders. Here is confusion on confusion. The
+Danites are thieves, brigands, and yet they are pious; so pious that
+they steal images to assist them in worship. The Levite agrees to the
+theft and accepts the offer of priesthood under them. He will be the
+minister of a set of thieves to forward their evil designs, and they
+knowing him to be no better than themselves expect that his sacrifices
+and prayers will do them good. It is surely a capital instance of
+perverted religious ideas.
+
+As we have said, these circumstances are no doubt recounted in order to
+show how dangerous it was to separate from the pure order of worship at
+the sanctuary. In after times this lesson was needed, especially when
+the first king of the northern tribes set his golden calves the one at
+Bethel, the other at Dan. Was Israel to separate from Judah in religion
+as well as in government? Let there be a backward look to the beginning
+of schism in those extraordinary doings of the Danites. It was in the
+city founded by the six hundred that one of Jeroboam's temples was
+built. Could any blessing rest upon a shrine and upon devotions which
+had such an origin, such an history?
+
+May we find a parallel now? Is there a constituted religious authority
+with which soundness of belief and acceptable worship are so bound up
+that to renounce the authority is to be in the way of confusion and
+error, schism and eternal loss? The Romanist says so. Those who speak
+for the Papal church never cease to cry to the world that within their
+communion alone are truth and safety to be found. Renounce, they say,
+the apostolic and divine authority which we conserve and all is gone. Is
+there anarchy in a country? Are the forces that make for political
+disruption and national decay showing themselves in many lands? Are
+monarchies overthrown? Are the people lawless and wretched? It all comes
+of giving up the Catholic order and creed. Return to the one fold under
+the one Shepherd if you would find prosperity. And there are others who
+repeat the same injunction, not indeed denying that there may be saving
+faith apart from their ritual, but insisting still that it is an error
+and a sin to seek God elsewhere than at the accredited shrine.
+
+With Jewish ordinances we Christians have nothing to do when we are
+judging as to religious order and worship now. There is no central
+shrine, no exclusive human authority. Where Christ is, there is the
+temple; where He speaks, the individual conscience must respond. The
+work of salvation is His alone, and the humblest believer is His
+consecrated priest. When our Lord said, "The hour cometh and now is when
+the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth";
+and again, "Where two or three are gathered together in My name there am
+I in the midst of them"; when He as the Son of God held out His hands
+directly to every sinner needing pardon and every seeker after truth,
+when He offered the one sacrifice upon the cross by which a living way
+is opened into the holiest place, He broke down the walls of partition
+and with the responsibility declared the freedom of the soul.
+
+And here we reach the point to which our narrative applies as an
+illustration. Micah and his household worshipping the images of silver,
+the Levite officiating at the altar, seeking counsel of Jehovah by ephod
+and teraphim, the Danites who steal the gods, carry off the priest and
+set up a new worship in the city they build--all these represent to us
+types and stages of what is really schism pitiful and disastrous--that
+is, separation from the truth of things and from the sacred realities of
+divine faith. Selfish untruth and infidelity are schism, the wilderness
+and outlawry of the soul.
+
+1. Micah and his household, with their chapel of images, their ephod and
+teraphim represent those who fall into the superstition that religion is
+good as insuring temporal success and prosperity, that God will see to
+the worldly comfort of those who pay respect to Him. Even among
+Christians this is a very common and very debasing superstition. The
+sacraments are often observed as signs of a covenant which secures for
+men divine favour through social arrangements and human law. The
+spiritual nature and power of religion are not denied, but they are
+uncomprehended. The national custom and the worldly hope have to do with
+the observance of devout forms rather than any movement of the soul
+heavenward. A church may in this way become like Micah's household, and
+prayer may mean seeking good terms with Him who can fill the land with
+plenty or send famine and cleanness of teeth. Unhappily many worthy and
+most devout persons still hold the creed of an early and ignorant time.
+The secret of nature and providence is hid from them. The severities of
+life seem to them to be charged with anger, and the valleys of human
+reprobation appear darkened by the curse of God. Instead of finding in
+pain and loss a marvellous divine discipline they perceive only the
+penalty of sin, a sign of God's aversion not of His Fatherly grace. It
+is a sad, a terrible blindness of soul. We can but note it here and pass
+on, for there are other applications of the old story.
+
+2. The Levite represents an unworthy worldly ministry. With sadness must
+confession be made that there are in every church pastors unspiritual,
+worldlings in heart whose desire is mainly for superiority of rank or of
+wealth, who have no vision of Christ's cross and battle except as
+objective and historical. Here, most happily, the cases of complete
+worldliness are rare. It is rather a tendency we observe than a
+developed and acknowledged state of things. Very few of those in the
+ranks of the Christian ministry are entirely concerned with the respect
+paid to them in society and the number of shekels to be got in a year.
+That he keeps pace with the crowd instead of going before it is perhaps
+the hardest thing that can be said of the worldly pastor. He is humane,
+active, intelligent; but it is for the church as a great institution, or
+the church as his temporal hope and stay. So his ministry becomes at the
+best a matter of serving tables and providing alms--we shall not say
+amusement. Here indeed is schism; for what is farther from the truth of
+things, what is farther from Christ?
+
+3. Once more we have with us to-day, very much with us, certain Danites
+of science, politics and the press who, if they could, would take away
+our God and our Bible, our Eternal Father and spiritual hope, not from a
+desire to possess but because they hate to see us believing, hate to see
+any weight of silver given to religious uses. Not a few of these are
+marching as they think triumphantly to commanding and opulent positions
+whence they will rule the thought of the world. And on the way, even
+while they deride and detest the supernatural, they will have the priest
+go with them. They care nothing for what he says; to listen to the voice
+of a spiritual teacher is an absurdity of which they would not be
+guilty; for to their own vague prophesying all mankind is to give heed,
+and their interpretations of human life are to be received as the bible
+of the age. Of the same order is the socialist who would make use of a
+faith he intends to destroy and a priesthood whose claim is offensive to
+him on his way to what he calls the organization of society. In his view
+the uses of Christianity and the Bible are temporal and earthly. He will
+not have Christ the Redeemer of the soul, yet he attempts to conjure
+with Christ's words and appropriate the power of His name. The audacity
+of these would-be robbers is matched only by their ignorance of the
+needs and ends of human life.
+
+We might here refer to the injustice practised by one and another band
+of our modern Israel who do not scruple to take from obscure and weak
+households of faith the sacraments and Christian ministry, the marks and
+rights of brotherhood. We can well believe that those who do this have
+never looked at their action from the other side, and may not have the
+least idea of the soreness they leave in the hearts of humble and
+sincere believers.
+
+In fine, the Danites with the images of Micah went their way and he and
+his neighbours had to suffer the loss and make the best of their empty
+chapel where no oracle thenceforth spoke to them. It is no parable, but
+a very real example of the loss that comes to all who have trusted in
+forms and symbols, the outward signs instead of the living power of
+religion. While we repel the arrogance that takes from faith its
+symbolic props and stays we must not let ourselves deny that the very
+rudeness of an enemy may be an excellent discipline for the Christian.
+Agnosticism and science and other Danite companies sweep with them a
+good deal that is dear to the religious mind and may leave it very
+distressed and anxious--the chapel empty, the oracle as it may appear
+lost for ever. With the symbol the authority, the hope, the power seem
+to be lost irrecoverably. What now has faith to rest upon? But the
+modern spirit with its resolution to sweep away every unfact and mere
+form is no destroyer. Rather does it drive the Christian to a science, a
+virtue far beyond its own. It forces we may say on faith that severe
+truthfulness and intellectual courage which are the proper qualities of
+Christianity, the necessary counterpart of its trust and love and grace.
+In short, when enemies have carried on the poor teraphim and fetishes
+which are their proper capture they have but compelled religion to be
+itself, compelled it to find its spiritual God, its eternal creed and to
+understand its Bible. This, though done with evil intent, is surely no
+cruelty, no outrage. Shall a man or a church that has been so roused and
+thrown back on reality sit wailing in the empty chapel for the images of
+silver and the deliverances of the hollow ephod? Everything remains, the
+soul and the spiritual world, the law of God, the redemption of Christ,
+the Spirit of eternal life.
+
+
+
+
+XXV.
+
+_FROM JUSTICE TO WILD REVENGE._
+
+JUDGES xix.-xxi.
+
+
+These last chapters describe a general and vehement outburst of moral
+indignation throughout Israel, recorded for various reasons. A vile
+thing is done in one of the towns of Benjamin and the fact is published
+in all the tribes. The doers of it are defended by their clan and
+fearful punishment is wrought upon them, not without suffering to the
+entire people. Like the incidents narrated in the chapters immediately
+preceding, these must have occurred at an early stage in the period of
+the judges, and they afford another illustration of the peril of
+imperfect government, the need for a vigorous administration of justice
+over the land. The crime and the volcanic vengeance belong to a time
+when there was "no king in Israel" and, despite occasional appeals to
+the oracle, "every man did that which was right in his own eyes." In
+this we have one clue to the purpose of the history.
+
+The crime of Gibeah brought under our notice here connects itself with
+that of Sodom and represents a phase of immorality which, indigenous to
+Canaan, mixed its putrid current with Hebrew life. There are traces of
+the same horrible impurity in the Judah of Rehoboam and Asa; and in the
+story of Josiah's reign we are horrified to read of "houses of
+Sodomites that were in the house of the Lord, where the women wove
+hangings for the Asherah." With such lurid historical light on the
+subject we can easily understand the revival of this warning lesson from
+the past of Israel and the fulness of detail with which the incidents
+are recorded. A crime originally that of the off-scourings of Gibeah
+became practically the sin of a whole tribe, and the war that ensued
+sets in a clear light the zeal for domestic purity which was a feature
+in every religious revival and, at length, in the life of the Hebrew
+people.
+
+It may be asked how, while polygamy was practised among the Israelites,
+the sin of Gibeah could rouse such indignation and awaken the signal
+vengeance of the united tribes. The answer is to be found partly in the
+singular and dreadful device which the indignant husband used in making
+the deed known. The ghastly symbols of outrage told the tale in a way
+that was fitted to stir the blood of the whole country. Everywhere the
+hideous thing was made vivid and a sense of utmost atrocity was kindled
+as the dissevered members were borne from town to town. It is easy to
+see that womanhood must have been stirred to the fieriest indignation,
+and manhood was bound to follow. What woman could be safe in Gibeah
+where such things were done? And was Gibeah to go unpunished? If so,
+every Hebrew city might become the haunt of miscreants. Further there is
+the fact that the woman so foully murdered, though a concubine, was the
+concubine of a Levite. The measure of sacredness with which the Levites
+were invested gave to this crime, frightful enough in any view, the
+colour of sacrilege. How degenerate were the people of Gibeah when a
+servant of the altar could be treated with such foul indignity and
+driven to so extraordinary an appeal for justice? There could be no
+blessing on the tribes if they allowed the doers or condoners of this
+thing to go unpunished. Every Levite throughout the land must have taken
+up the cry. From Bethel and other sanctuaries the call for vengeance
+would spread and echo till the nation was roused. Thus, in part at
+least, we can explain the vehemence of feeling which drew together the
+whole fighting force of the tribes.
+
+The doubt will yet remain whether there could have been so much purity
+of life or respect for purity as to sustain the public indignation. Some
+may say, Is there not here a sufficient reason for questioning the
+veracity of the narrative? First, however, let it be remembered that
+often where morals are far from reaching the level of pure monogamic
+life distinctions between right and wrong are sharply drawn.
+Acquaintance with phases of modern life that are most painful to the
+mind sensitively pure reveals a fixed code which none may infringe
+without bringing upon themselves reprobation, perhaps more vehement than
+in a higher social grade visits the breach of a higher law. It is the
+fact that concubinage has its unwritten acknowledgment and protecting
+customs. There is marriage that is only a name; there is concubinage
+that gives the woman more rights than one who is married. Against the
+immorality and the gross evils of cohabitation is to be set this
+unwritten law. And arguing from popular feeling in our great cities we
+reach the conclusion that in ancient Israel where concubinage prevailed
+there was a wide and keen feeling as to the rights of concubines and the
+necessity of upholding them. Many women must have been in this relation,
+below those who could count themselves legally married, and all the
+more that the concubine occupied a place inferior to that of the lawful
+wife would popular opinion take up her cause and demand the punishment
+of those who did her wrong.
+
+And here we are led to a point which demands clear statement and
+recognition. It has been too readily supposed that polygamy is always a
+result of moral decline and indicates a low state of domestic purity. It
+may, in truth, be a rude step of progress. Has it been sufficiently
+noted that in those countries in which the name of the mother not of the
+father descended to the children the reason may be found in universal or
+almost universal unchastity? In Egypt at one time the law gave to women,
+especially to mothers, peculiar rights; but to praise Egyptian
+civilization for this reason and hold up its treatment of women as an
+example to the nineteenth century is an extraordinary venture. The
+Israelites, however lax, were doubtless in advance of the society of
+Thebes. Among the Canaanites the moral degradation of women, whatever
+freedom may have gone with it, was so terrible that the Hebrew with his
+two or three wives and concubines, but with a morality otherwise severe,
+must have represented a new and holier social order as well as a new and
+holier religion. It is therefore not incredible but appears simply in
+accordance with the instincts and customs proper to the Hebrew people
+that the sin of Gibeah should provoke overwhelming indignation. There is
+no pretence of purity, no hypocritical anger. The feeling is sound and
+real. Perhaps in no other matter of a moral kind would there have been
+such intense and unanimous exasperation. A point of justice or of belief
+would not have so moved the tribes. The better self of Israel appears
+asserting its claim and power. And the miscreants of Gibeah representing
+the lower self, verily an unclean spirit, are detested and denounced on
+every hand.
+
+The time was that of fresh feeling, unwarped by those customs which in
+the guise of civilisation and refinement afterwards corrupted the
+nation. And we may see the prophetic or hortatory use of the narrative
+for an after age in which doings as vile as those at Gibeah were
+sanctioned by the court and protected even by religious leaders. It
+would be hoped by the sacred historian that this tale of the fierce
+indignation of the tribes might rouse afresh the same moral feeling. He
+would fain stir a careless people and their priests by the exhibition of
+this tumultuous vengeance. Nor can we say that the necessity for the
+impressive lesson has ceased. In the heart of our large cities vices as
+vile as those of Gibeah are heard muttering in the nightfall, life as
+abandoned lurks and festers creating a social gangrene.
+
+Recognise, then, in these chapters a truth for all time boldly drawn
+out--the great truth as to moral reform and national purity. Law will
+not cure moral evils; a statute book the purest and noblest will not
+save. Those who by the impulse of the Spirit gathered the various
+traditions of Israel's life knew well that on a living conscience in men
+everything depended, and they at least indicate the further truth which
+many of ourselves have not grasped, that the early and rude workings of
+conscience, producing stormy and terrible results, are a necessary stage
+of development. As there must be energy before there can be noble
+energy, so there must be moral vigour, it may be rude, violent,
+ignorant, a stream rushing out of barbarian hills, sweeping with most
+appalling vehemence, before there can be spiritual life patient calm and
+holy. Law is a product not a cause; it is not the code we make that will
+preserve us but the God-given conscience that informs the code and ever
+goes before it a pillar of fire, at times flashing vivid lightning. Even
+Christian law cannot save a people if it be merely a series of
+injunctions. Nothing will do but the mind of Christ in every man and
+woman continually inspiring and directing life. The reformer who thinks
+that a statute or regulation will end some sin or evil custom is in sad
+error. Say the decree he contends for is enacted; but have the
+consciences of those against whom it is made been quickened? If not, the
+law merely expresses a popular mood and the life of the whole community
+will not be permanently raised in tone.
+
+The church finds here a perpetual mission of influence. Her doctrine is
+but half her message. From the doctrine as from an eternal fount must go
+life-giving moral heat in every range, and the Spirit is ever with her
+to make the word like a fire. Her duty is wide as righteousness, great
+as man's destiny; it is never ended, for each generation comes in a new
+hour with new needs. The church, say some, is finishing its work; it is
+doomed to be one of the broken moulds of life. But the church that is
+the instructor of conscience and kindles the flame of righteousness has
+a mission to the ages. We are far yet from that day of the Lord when all
+the people shall be prophets; and until then how can the world live
+without the church? It would be a body without a soul.
+
+Conscience the oracle of life, conscience working badly rather than held
+in chains of mere rule without spontaneity and inspiration, moral energy
+widespread personal and keen, however rude--here is one of the notes of
+the sacred writer; and another note, no less distinct, is the assertion
+of moral intolerance. It has not occurred to this prophetic annalist
+that endurance of evil has any curative power. He is a Hebrew, full of
+indignation against the vile and false, and he demands a heat of moral
+force in his people. Foul things are done at the court and even in the
+temple; there is a depraving indifference to purity, a loose notion
+(very similar to the idea of our day), that all the sides of life should
+have free play and that the heathen had much to teach Israel. The whole
+of the narrative before us is infused with a righteous protest against
+evil, a holy plea for intolerance of sin. Will men refuse instruction
+and persist in making themselves one with bestiality and outrage? Then
+judgment must deal with them on the ground they have chosen to occupy,
+and until they repent the conscience of the race must repudiate them
+together with their sin. Along with a keenly burning conscience there
+goes this necessity of moral intolerance. Charity is good, but not
+always in place; and brotherhood itself demands at times strong
+uncompromising judgment of the evil-doer. How else among men of weak
+wills and wavering hearts can righteousness vindicate and enforce itself
+as the eternal reality of life? Compassion is strong only when it is
+linked to unfaltering declarations; mercy is divine only when it turns a
+front of mail to wickedness and flashes lightning at proud wrong. Any
+other kind of charity is but a new offence--the sinner pardoning sin.
+
+Now the people of Gibeah were not all vile. The wretches whose crime
+called for judgment were but the rabble of the town. And we can see that
+the tribes when they gathered in indignation were made serious by the
+thought that the righteous might be punished with the wicked. We are
+told that they went up to the sanctuary and asked counsel of the Lord
+whether they should attack the convicted city. There was a full muster
+of the fighting men, their blood at fever heat, yet they would not
+advance without an oracle. It was an appeal to heavenly justice, and
+demands notice as a striking feature of the whole terrible series of
+events. For an hour there is silence in the camp till a higher voice
+shall speak.
+
+But what is the issue? The oracle decrees an immediate attack on Gibeah
+in the face of all Benjamin which has shown the temper of heathenism by
+refusing to give up the criminals. Once and again there is trial of
+battle which ends in defeat of the allied tribes. The wrong triumphs;
+the people have to return humbled and weeping to the Sacred Presence and
+sit fasting and disconsolate before the Lord.
+
+Not without the suffering of the entire community is a great evil to be
+purged from a land. It is easy to execute a murderer, to imprison a
+felon. But the spirit of the murderer, of the felon, is widely diffused,
+and that has to be cast out. In the great moral struggle year after year
+the better have not only the openly vile but all who are tainted, all
+who are weak in soul, loose in habit, secretly sympathetic with the
+vile, arrayed against them. There is a sacrifice of the good before the
+evil are overcome. In vicarious suffering many must pay the penalty of
+crimes not their own ere the wide-reaching wickedness can be seen in its
+demonic power and struck down as the cruel enemy of the people.
+
+When an assault is made on some vile custom the sardonic laugh is heard
+of those who find their profit and their pleasure in it. They feel their
+power. They know the wide sympathy with them spread secretly through the
+land. Once and again the feeble attempt of the good is repelled. With
+sad hearts, with impoverished means, those who led the crusade retire
+baffled and weary. Has their method been unintelligent? There very
+possibly lies the cause of its failure. Or, perhaps, it has been, though
+nominally inspired by an oracle, all too human, weak through human
+pride. Not till they gain with new and deeper devotion to the glory of
+God, with more humility and faith, a clearer view of the battle-ground
+and a better ordering of the war shall defeat be changed into victory.
+And may it not be that the assault on moral evils of our day, in which
+multitudes are professedly engaged, in which also many have spent
+substance and life, shall fail till there is a true humiliation of the
+armies of God before Him, a new consecration to higher and more
+spiritual ends? Human virtue has ever to be jealous of itself, the
+reformer may so easily become a Pharisee.
+
+The tide turned and there came another danger, that which waits on
+ebullitions of popular feeling. A crowd roused to anger is hard to
+control, and the tribes having once tasted vengeance did not cease till
+Benjamin was almost exterminated. The slaughter extended not only to the
+fighting men, but to women and children. The six hundred who fled to the
+rock-fort of Rimmon appear as the only survivors of the clan. Justice
+overshot its mark and for one evil made another. Those who had most
+fiercely used the sword viewed the result with horror and amazement, for
+a tribe was lacking in Israel. Nor was this the end of slaughter. Next
+for the sake of Benjamin the sword was drawn and the men of
+Jabesh-gilead were butchered. It has to be noticed that the oracle is
+not made responsible for this horrible process of evil. The people came
+of their own accord to the decision which annihilated Jabesh-gilead. But
+they gave it a pious colour; religion and cruelty went together,
+sacrifices to Jehovah and this frightful outbreak of demonism. It is one
+of the dark chapters of human history. For the sake of an oath and an
+idea death was dealt remorselessly. No voice suggested that the people
+of Jabesh may have been more cautious than the rest, not less faithful
+to the law of God. The others were resolved to appear to themselves to
+have been right in almost annihilating Benjamin; and the town which had
+not joined in the work of destruction must be punished.
+
+The warning conveyed here is intensely keen. It is that men, made
+doubtful by the issue of their actions whether they have done wisely,
+may fly to the resolution to justify themselves and may do so even at
+the expense of justice; that a nation may pass from the right way to the
+wrong and then, having sunk to extraordinary baseness and malignity, may
+turn writhing and self-condemned to add cruelty to cruelty in the
+attempt to still the upbraidings of conscience. It is that men in the
+heat of passion which began with resentment against evil may strike at
+those who have not joined in their errors as well as those who truly
+deserve reprobation. We stand, nations and individuals, in constant
+danger of dreadful extremes, a kind of insanity hurrying us on when the
+blood is heated by strong emotion. Blindly attempting to do right we do
+evil, and again, having done the evil we blindly strive to remedy it by
+doing more. In times of moral darkness and chaotic social conditions,
+when men are guided by a few rude principles, things are done that
+afterwards appal themselves, and yet may become an example for future
+outbreaks. During the fury of their Revolution the French people, with
+some watchwords of the true ring as liberty, fraternity, turned hither
+and thither, now in terror, now panting after dimly seen justice or
+hope, and it was always from blood to blood. We understand the juncture
+in ancient Israel and realize the excitement and the rage of a
+self-jealous people when we read the modern tales of surging ferocity in
+which men appear now hounding the shouting crowd to vengeance then
+shuddering on the scaffold.
+
+In private life the story has an application against wild and violent
+methods of self-vindication. Many a man, hurried on by a just anger
+against one who has done him wrong, sees to his horror after a sharp
+blow is struck that he has broken a life and thrown a brother bleeding
+to the dust. One wrong thing has been done perhaps more in haste than
+vileness of purpose, and retribution, hasty, ill-considered, leaves the
+moral question tenfold more confused. When all is reckoned we find it
+impossible to say where the right is, where the wrong.
+
+Passing to the final expedient adopted by the chiefs of Israel to
+rectify their error--the rape of the women at Shiloh--we see only to how
+pitiful a pass moral blundering brings those who fall into it: other
+moral teaching there is none. We might at first be disposed to say that
+there was extraordinary want of reverence for religious order and
+engagements when the men of Benjamin were invited to make a sacred
+festival the occasion of taking what the other tribes had solemnly vowed
+not to give. But the festival at Shiloh must have been far more of a
+merry-making than of a sacred assembly. It needs to be recognised that
+many gatherings even in honour of Jehovah were mainly, like those of
+Canaanite worship, for hilarity and feasting. There was probably no
+great incongruity between the occasion and the plot.
+
+But the scenes certainly change in the course of this narrative with
+extraordinary swiftness. Fierce indignation is followed by pity, weeping
+for defeat by tears for too complete a victory. Horrible bloodshed
+wastes the cities and in a month there is dancing in the plain of Shiloh
+not ten miles from the field of battle. Chaotic indeed are the morality
+and the history; but it is the disorder of social life in its early
+stages, with the vehemence and tenderness, the ferocity and laughter of
+a nation's youth. And, all along, the Book of Judges bears the stamp of
+veracity as a series of records because these very features are to be
+seen--this tumult, this undisciplined vehemence in feeling and act. Were
+we told here of decorous solemn progress at slow march, every army going
+forth with some stereotyped invocation of the Lord of Hosts, every
+leader a man of conventional piety supported by a blameless priesthood
+and orderly sacrifices, we should have had no evidence of truth. The
+traditions preserved here, whoever collected them, are singularly free
+from that idyllic colour which an imaginative writer would have
+endeavoured to give.
+
+At the last, accordingly, the book we have been reading stands a real
+piece of history, proving itself over every kind of suspicion a true
+record of a people chosen and guided to a destiny greater than any other
+race of man has known. A people understanding its call and responding
+with eagerness at every point? Nay. The world is in the heart of Israel
+as of every other nation. The carnal attracts, and malignant cries
+overbear the divine still voice; the air of Canaan breathes in every
+page, and we need to recollect that we are viewing the turbulent
+upper-waters of the nation and the faith. But the working of God is
+plain; the divine thoughts we believed Israel to have in trust for the
+world are truly with it from the first, though darkened by altars of
+Baal and of Ashtoreth. The Word and Covenant of Jehovah are vital facts
+of the supernatural which surrounds that poor struggling erring Hebrew
+flock. Theocracy is a divine fact in a larger sense than has ever been
+attached to the word. Inspiration too is no dream, for the history is
+charged with intimations of the spiritual order. The light of the
+unrealized end flashes on spear and altar, and in the frequent roll of
+the storm the voice of the Eternal is heard declaring righteousness and
+truth. No story this to praise a dynasty or magnify a conquering nation
+or support a priesthood. Nothing so faithful, so true to heaven and to
+human nature could be done from that motive. We have here an
+imperishable chapter in the Book of God.
+
+
+
+
+THE BOOK OF RUTH.
+
+
+
+
+I.
+
+_NAOMI'S BURDEN._
+
+RUTH i. 1-13.
+
+
+Leaving the Book of Judges and opening the story of Ruth we pass from
+vehement out-door life, from tempest and trouble into quiet domestic
+scenes. After an exhibition of the greater movements of a people we are
+brought, as it were, to a cottage interior in the soft light of an
+autumn evening, to obscure lives passing through the cycles of loss and
+comfort, affection and sorrow. We have seen the ebb and flow of a
+nation's fidelity and fortune, a few leaders appearing clearly on the
+stage and behind them a multitude indefinite, indiscriminate, the
+thousands who form the ranks of battle and die on the field, who sway
+together from Jehovah to Baal and back to Jehovah again. What the
+Hebrews were at home, how they lived in the villages of Judah or on the
+slopes of Tabor the narrative has not paused to speak of with detail.
+Now there is leisure after the strife and the historian can describe old
+customs and family events, can show us the toiling flockmaster, the busy
+reapers, the women with their cares and uncertainties, the love and
+labour of simple life. Thunderclouds of sin and judgment have rolled
+over the scene; but they have cleared away and we see human nature in
+examples that become familiar to us, no longer in weird shadow or vivid
+lightning flash, but as we commonly know it, homely, erring, enduring,
+imperfect, not unblest.
+
+Bethlehem is the scene, quiet and lonely on its high ridge overlooking
+the Jud�an wilderness. The little city never had much part in the eager
+life of the Hebrew people, yet age after age some event notable in
+history, some death or birth or some prophetic word drew the eyes of
+Israel to it in affection or in hope; and to us the Saviour's birth
+there has so distinguished it as one of the most sacred spots on earth
+that each incident in the fields or at the gate appears charged with
+predictive meaning, each reference in psalm or prophecy has tender
+significance. We see the company of Jacob on a journey through Canaan
+halt by the way near Ephrath, which is Bethlehem, and from the tents
+there comes a sound of wailing. The beloved Rachel is dead. Yet she
+lives in a child new-born, the mother's Son of Sorrow, who becomes to
+the father Benjamin, Son of the Right Hand. The sword pierces a loving
+heart, but hope springs out of pain and life out of death. Generations
+pass and in these fields of Bethlehem we see Ruth gleaning, Ruth the
+Moabitess, a stranger and foreigner who has sought refuge under the
+shadow of Jehovah's wings; and at yonder gate she is saved from want and
+widowhood, finding in Boaz her _go�l_ and _menuchah_, her redeemer and
+rest. Later, another birth, this time within the walls, the birth of one
+long despised by his brethren, gives to Israel a poet and a king, the
+sweet singer of divine psalms, the hero of a hundred fights. And here
+again we see the three mighty men of David's troop breaking through the
+Philistine host to fetch for their chief a draught from the cool spring
+by the gate. Prophecy, too, leaves Israel looking to the city on the
+hill. Micah seems to grasp the secret of the ages when he exclaims, "But
+thou, Bethlehem Ephrathah, which art little to be among the thousands of
+Judah, out of thee shall one come forth unto Me that is to be the ruler
+in Israel; whose goings forth are from of old, from everlasting." For
+centuries there is suspense, and then over the quiet plain below the
+hill is heard the evangel: "Be not afraid: for, behold, I bring you good
+tidings of great joy which shall be to all the people: for there is born
+to you this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the
+Lord." Remembering this glory of Bethlehem we turn to the story of
+humble life there in the days when the judges ruled, with deep interest
+in the people of the ancient city, the race from which David sprang, of
+which Mary was born.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jephthah had scattered Ammon behind the hills and the Hebrews dwelt in
+comparative peace and security. The sanctuary at Shiloh was at length
+recognised as the centre of religious influence; Eli was in the
+beginning of his priesthood, and orderly worship was maintained before
+the ark. People could live quietly about Bethlehem, although Samson,
+fitfully acting the part of champion on the Philistine border, had his
+work in restraining the enemy from an advance. Yet all was not well in
+the homesteads of Judah, for drought is as terrible a foe to the
+flockmaster as the Arab hordes, and all the south lands were parched and
+unfruitful.
+
+We are to follow the story of Elimelech, his wife Naomi and their sons
+Mahlon and Chilion whose home at Bethlehem is about to be broken up. The
+sheep are dying in the bare glens, the cattle in the fields. From the
+soil usually so fertile little corn has been reaped. Elimelech, seeing
+his possessions melt away, has decided to leave Judah for a time so as
+to save what remains to him till the famine is over, and he chooses the
+nearest refuge, the watered Field of Moab beyond the Salt Sea. It was
+not far; he could imagine himself returning soon to resume the
+accustomed life in the old home. True Hebrews, these Ephrathites were
+not seeking an opportunity to cast off pious duty and break with Jehovah
+in leaving His land. Doubtless they hoped that God would bless their
+going, prosper them in Moab and bring them back in good time. It was a
+trial to go, but what else could they do, life itself, as they believed,
+being at hazard?
+
+With thoughts like these men often leave the land of their birth, the
+scenes of early faith, and oftener still without any pressure of
+necessity or any purpose of returning. Emigration appears to be forced
+upon many in these times, the compulsion coming not from Providence but
+from man and man's law. It is also an outlet for the spirit of adventure
+which characterizes some races and has made them the heirs of
+continents. Against emigration it would be folly to speak, but great is
+the responsibility of those by whose action or want of action it is
+forced upon others. May it not be said that in every European land there
+are persons in power whose existence is like a famine to a whole
+country-side? Emigration is talked of glibly as if it were no loss but
+always gain, as if to the mass of men the traditions and customs of
+their native land were mere rags well parted with. But it is clear from
+innumerable examples that many lose what they never find again, of
+honour, seriousness and faith.
+
+The last thing thought of by those who compel emigration and many who
+undertake it of their own accord is the moral result. That which should
+be first considered is often not considered at all. Granting the
+advantages of going from a land that is over-populated to some fertile
+region as yet lying waste, allowing what cannot be denied that material
+progress and personal freedom result from these movements of population,
+yet the risk to individuals is just in proportion to the worldly
+attraction. It is certain that in many regions to which the stream of
+migration is flowing the conditions of life are better and the natural
+environment purer than they are in the heart of large European cities.
+But this does not satisfy the religious thinker. Modern colonies have
+indeed done marvels for political independence, for education and
+comfort. Their success here is splendid. But do they see the danger? So
+much achieved in short time for the secular life tends to withdraw
+attention from the root of spiritual growth--simplicity and moral
+earnestness. The pious emigrant has to ask himself whether his children
+will have the same thought for religion beyond the sea as they would
+have at home, whether he himself is strong enough to maintain his
+testimony while he seeks his fortune.
+
+We may believe that the Bethlehemite if he made a mistake in removing to
+Moab acted in good faith and did not lose his hope of the divine
+blessing. Probably he would have said that Moab was just like home. The
+people spoke a language similar to Hebrew, and like the tribes of Israel
+they were partly husbandmen partly keepers of cattle. In the "Field of
+Moab," that is the upland canton bounded by the Arnon on the north, the
+mountains on the east and the Dead Sea precipices on the west, people
+lived very much as they did about Bethlehem, only more safely and in
+greater comfort. But the worship was of Chemosh, and Elimelech must
+soon have discovered how great a difference that made in thought and
+social custom and in the feeling of men toward himself and his family.
+The rites of the god of Moab included festivals in which humanity was
+disgraced. Standing apart from these he must have found his prosperity
+hindered, for Chemosh was lord in everything. An alien who had come for
+his own advantage yet refused the national customs would be scorned at
+least if not persecuted. Life in Moab became an exile, the Bethlehemites
+saw that hardship in their own land would have been as easy to endure as
+the disdain of the heathen and constant temptations to vile conformity.
+The family had a hard struggle, not holding their own and yet ashamed to
+return to Judah.
+
+Already we have a picture of wayworn human lives tried on one side by
+the rigour of nature, on the other by unsympathetic fellow-creatures,
+and the picture becomes more pathetic as new touches are added to it.
+Elimelech died; the young men married women of Moab; and in ten years
+only Naomi was left, a widow with her widowed daughters-in-law. The
+narrative adds shadow to shadow. The Hebrew woman in her bereavement,
+with the care of two lads who were somewhat indifferent to the religion
+she cherished, touches our sympathies. We feel for her when she has to
+consent to the marriage of her sons with heathen women, for it seems to
+close all hope of return to her own land and, sore as this trial is,
+there is a deeper trouble. She is left childless in the country of
+exile. Yet all is not shadow. Life never is entirely dark unless with
+those who have ceased to trust in God and care for man. While we have
+compassion on Naomi we must also admire her. An Israelite among heathen
+she keeps her Hebrew ways, not in bitterness but in gentle fidelity.
+Loving her native place more warmly than ever she so speaks of it and
+praises it as to make her daughters-in-law think of settling there with
+her. The influence of her religion is upon them both, and one at least
+is inspired with faith and tenderness equal to her own. Naomi has her
+compensations, we see. Instead of proving a trouble to her as she
+feared, the foreign women in her house have become her friends. She
+finds occupation and reward in teaching them the religion of Jehovah,
+and thus, so far as usefulness of the highest kind is concerned, Naomi
+is more blessed in Moab than she might have been in Bethlehem.
+
+Far better the service of others in spiritual things than a life of mere
+personal ease and comfort. We count up our pleasures, our possessions
+and gains and think that in these we have the evidence of the divine
+favour. Do we as often reckon the opportunities given us of helping our
+neighbours to believe in God, of showing patience and fidelity, of
+having a place among those who labour and wait for the eternal kingdom?
+It is here that we ought to trace the gracious hand of God preparing our
+way, opening for us the gates of life. When shall we understand that
+circumstances which remove us from the experience of poverty and pain
+remove us also from precious means of spiritual service and profit? To
+be in close personal touch with the poor, the ignorant and burdened is
+to have simple every-day openings into the region of highest power and
+gladness. We do something enduring, something that engages and increases
+our best powers when we guide, enlighten and comfort even a few souls
+and plant but a few flowers in some dull corner of the world. Naomi did
+not know how blest she had been in Moab. She said afterwards that she
+had gone out full and the Lord had brought her home again empty. She
+even imagined that Jehovah had testified against her and cast her from
+Him in rejection. Yet she had been finding the true power, winning the
+true riches. Did she return empty when the convert Ruth, the devoted
+Ruth went back with her?
+
+Her two sons taken away, Naomi felt no tie binding her to Moab. Moreover
+in Judah the fields were green again and life was prosperous. She might
+hope to dispose of her land and realize something for her old age. It
+seemed therefore her interest and duty to return to her own country; and
+the next picture of the poem shows Naomi and her daughters-in-law
+travelling along the northward highway towards the ford of Jordan, she
+on her way home, they accompanying her. The two young widows are almost
+decided when they leave the desolate dwelling in Moab to go all the way
+to Bethlehem. Naomi's account of the life there, the purer faith and
+better customs attract them, and they love her well. But the matter is
+not settled; on the bank of Jordan the final choice will be made.
+
+There are hours which bring a heavy burden of responsibility to those
+who advise and guide, and such an hour came now to Naomi. It was in
+poverty she was returning to the home of her youth. She could promise to
+her daughters-in-law no comfortable easy life there, for, as she well
+knew, the enmity of Hebrews against Moabites was apt to be bitter and
+they might be scorned as aliens from Jehovah. So far as she was
+concerned nothing could have been more desirable than their company. A
+woman in poverty and past middle life could not wish to separate
+herself from young and affectionate companions who would be a help to
+her in her old age. To throw off the thought of personal comfort natural
+to one in her circumstances and look at things from an unselfish point
+of view was very difficult. In reading her story let us remember how apt
+we are to colour advice half unconsciously with our own wishes, our own
+seeming needs.
+
+Naomi's advantage lay in securing the companionship of Ruth and Orpah,
+and religious considerations added their weight to her own desire. Her
+very regard and care for these young women seemed to urge as the highest
+service she could do them to draw them out of the paganism of Moab and
+settle them in the country of Jehovah. So while she herself would find
+reward for her patient efforts these two would be rescued from the
+darkness, bound in the bundle of life. Here, perhaps, was her strongest
+temptation; and to some it may appear that it was her duty to use every
+argument to this end, that she was bound as one who watched for the
+souls of Ruth and Orpah to set every fear, every doubt aside and to
+persuade them that their salvation depended on going with her to
+Bethlehem. Was this not her sacred opportunity, her last opportunity of
+making sure that the teaching she had given them should have its fruit?
+
+Strange it may seem that the author of the Book of Ruth is not chiefly
+concerned with this aspect of the case, that he does not blame Naomi for
+failing to set spiritual considerations in the front. The narrative
+indeed afterwards makes it clear that Ruth chose the good part and
+prospered by choosing it, but here the writer calmly states without any
+question the very temporal and secular reasons which Naomi pressed on
+the two widows. He seems to allow that home and country--though they
+were under the shadow of heathenism--home and country and worldly
+prospects were rightly taken account of even as compared with a place in
+Hebrew life and faith. But the underlying fact is a social pressure
+clearly before the Oriental mind. The customs of the time were
+overmastering, and women had no resource but to submit to them. Naomi
+accepts the facts and ordinances of the age; the inspired author has
+nothing to say against her.
+
+"The Lord grant you that ye may find rest, each of you in the house of
+her husband." That the two young widows should return each to her
+mother's house and marry again in Moab is Naomi's urgent advice to them.
+The times were rude and wild. A woman could be safe and respected only
+under the protection of a husband. Not only was there the old-world
+contempt for unmarried women, but, we may say, they were an
+impossibility; there was no place for them in the social life. People
+did not see how there could be a home without some man at the head of
+it, the house-band in whom all family arrangements centred. It had not
+been strange that in Moab Hebrew men should marry women of the land; but
+was it likely Ruth and Orpah would find favour at Bethlehem? Their
+speech and manners would be despised and dislike once incurred prove
+hard to overcome. Besides, they had no property to commend them.
+
+Evidently the two were very inexperienced. They had little thought of
+the difficulties, and Naomi, therefore, had to speak very strongly. In
+the grief of bereavement and the desire for a change of scene they had
+formed the hope of going where there were good men and women like the
+Hebrews they knew, and placing themselves under the protection of the
+gracious God of Israel. Unless they did so life seemed practically at an
+end. But Naomi could not take upon herself the responsibility of letting
+them drift into a hazardous position, and she forced a decision of their
+own in full view of the facts. It was true kindness no less than wisdom.
+The age had not dawned in which women could attempt to shape or dare to
+defy the customs of society, nor was any advantage to be sought at the
+risk of moral compromise. These things Naomi understood, though
+afterwards, in extremity, she made Ruth venture unwisely to obtain a
+prize.
+
+Looking around us now we see multitudes of women for whom there appears
+to be no room, no vocation. Up to a certain point, while they were
+young, they had no thought of failure. Then came a time when Providence
+appointed a task; there were parents to care for, daily occupations in
+the house. But calls for their service have ceased and they feel no
+responsibility sufficient to give interest and strength. The world has
+moved on and the movement has done much for women, yet all do not find
+themselves supplied with a task and a place. Around the occupied and the
+distinguished circles perpetually a crowd of the helpless, the aimless,
+the disappointed, to whom life is a blank, offering no path to a ford of
+Jordan and a new future. Yet half the needful work is done for these
+when they are made to feel that among the possible ways they must choose
+one for themselves and follow it; and all is done when they are shown
+that in the service of God, which is the service also of mankind, a task
+waits them fitted to engage their highest powers. Across into the region
+of religious faith and energy they may decide to pass, there is room in
+it for every life. Disappointment will end when selfish thoughts are
+forgotten; helplessness will cease when the heart is resolved to help.
+Even to the very poor and ignorant deliverance would come with a
+religious thought of life and the first step in personal duty.
+
+
+
+
+II.
+
+_THE PARTING OF THE WAYS._
+
+RUTH i. 14-19.
+
+
+We journey along with others for a time, enjoying their fellowship and
+sharing their hopes, yet with thoughts and dreams of our own that must
+sooner or later send us on a separate path. But decision is so difficult
+to many that they are glad of an excuse for self-surrender and are only
+too willing to be led by some authority, deferring personal choice as
+long as possible. Let an ecclesiastic or a strong-minded companion lay
+down for them the law of right and wrong and point the path of duty and
+they will obey, welcoming the relief from moral effort. Not seeing
+clearly, not disciplined in judgment, they crave external human
+guidance. The teachers of submission find many disciples not because
+they speak truth but because they meet the indolence of the human will
+with a crutch instead of a stimulus; they succeed by pampering weakness
+and making ignorance a virtue. A time comes, however, when the method
+will not serve. There are moments when the will must be exercised in
+choosing between one path and another, advance and retreat; and the
+alternative is too sharp to allow any escape. If the person is to live
+at all as a human being he has to decide whether he will go on in such
+a company or turn back; he has to declare what or who has the strongest
+hold upon his mind. Such an occasion came to Ruth and Orpah when they
+reached the border of Moab.
+
+To Orpah the arguments of Naomi were persuasive. Her mother lived in
+Moab, and to her mother's house she could return. There the customs
+prevailed which from childhood she had followed. She would have liked to
+go with Naomi, but her interest in the Hebrew woman and the land and law
+of Jehovah did not suffice to draw her forward. Orpah saw the future as
+Naomi painted it, not indeed very attractive if she returned to her
+native place, but with far more uncertainty and possible humiliation if
+she crossed the dividing river. She kissed Naomi and Ruth and took the
+southward road alone, weeping as she went, often turning for yet another
+sight of her friends, passing at every step into an existence that could
+never be the old life simply taken up again, but would be coloured in
+all its experience by what she had learned from Naomi and that parting
+which was her own choice.
+
+The others did not greatly blame her, and we, for our part, may not
+reproach her. It is unnecessary to suppose that in returning to her
+kinsfolk and settling down to the tasks that offered in her mother's
+house she was guilty of despising truth and love and renouncing the
+best. We may reasonably imagine her henceforth bearing witness for a
+higher morality and affirming the goodness of the Hebrew religion among
+her friends and acquaintances. Ruth goes where affection and duty lead
+her; but for Orpah too it may be claimed that in love and duty she goes
+back. She is not one who says, Moab has done nothing for me; Moab has no
+claim upon me; I am free to leave my country; I am under no debt to my
+people. We shall not take her as a type of selfishness, worldliness or
+backsliding, this Moabite woman. Let us rather believe that she knew of
+those at home who needed the help she could give, and that with the
+thought of least hazard to herself mingled one of the duty she owed to
+others.
+
+And Ruth:--memorable for ever is her decision, charming for ever the
+words in which it is expressed. "Behold," said Naomi, "thy sister-in-law
+is gone back unto her people, and unto her god: return thou after thy
+sister-in-law." But Ruth replied, "Intreat me not to leave thee, and to
+return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and
+where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy
+God my God: where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried:
+the Lord do so to me, and more also, if aught but death part thee and
+me." Like David's lament over Jonathan these words have sunk deep into
+the human heart. As an expression of the tenderest and most faithful
+friendship they are unrivalled. The simple dignity of the iteration in
+varying phrase till the climax is reached beyond which no promise could
+go, the quiet fervour of the feeling, the thought which seems to have
+almost a Christian depth--all are beautiful, pathetic, noble. From this
+moment a charm lingers about Ruth and she becomes dearer to us than any
+woman of whom the Hebrew records tell.
+
+Dignified and warm affection is the first characteristic of Ruth and
+close beside it we find the strength of a firm conclusion as to duty. It
+is good to be capable of clear resolve, parting between this and that of
+opposing considerations and differing claims. Not to rush at decisions
+and act in mere wilfulness, for wilfulness is the extreme of weakness,
+but to judge soundly and on this side or that to say, Here I see the
+path for me to follow: along this and no other I conclude to go.
+Unreason decides by taste, by momentary feeling, often out of mere spite
+or antipathy. But the resolve of a wise thoughtful person, even though
+it bring temporal disadvantage, is a moral gain, a step towards
+salvation. It is the exercise of individuality, of the soul.
+
+One may act in error, as perhaps Elimelech and Orpah acted, yet the life
+be the stronger for the mistaken decision; only there must be no
+repentance for having exercised the power of judgment and of choice.
+Women are particularly prone to go back on themselves in false
+repentance. They did what they could not but think to be duty; they
+carefully decided on a path in loyalty to conscience; yet too often they
+will reproach themselves because what they desired and hoped has not
+come about. We cannot imagine Ruth in after years, even though her lot
+had remained that of the poor gleaner and labourer, returning upon her
+decision and weeping in secret as if the event had proved her high
+choice a foolish one. Her mind was too firm and clear for that. Yet this
+is what numbers of women are doing, burdening their souls, making that a
+crime in which they should rather practise themselves. Our decisions,
+even when they are made with all the wisdom and information we can
+command in thorough sanity and sincerity, may be, often are very faulty;
+and do we expect that Providence will perpetually interfere to bring a
+perfect result out of the imperfect? Only in the perfect order of God,
+through the perfect work of Christ and the perfect operation of the Holy
+Spirit is the glorious consummation of human history and divine purpose
+to come. As for us, we are to learn of God in Christ, to judge and act
+our best; thereafter, leaving the result to Providence, never go back on
+that of which the Spirit of the Almighty made us capable in the hour of
+trial.
+
+    "Then welcome each rebuff
+    That turns earth's smoothness rough,
+  Each sting that bids nor sit nor stand but go!
+    Be our joys three parts pain!
+    Strive, and hold cheap the strain;
+  Learn, nor account the pang; dare, never grudge the throe!"[8]
+
+  [8] Browning: _Rabbi Ben Ezra_.
+
+In religion there is no escape from personal decision; no one can drift
+to salvation with companions or with a church. In art, in literature, in
+ordinary morality it is possible to possess something without any
+special effort. The atmosphere of cultured society, for instance, holds
+in solution the knowledge and taste which have been gained by a few and
+may pass in some measure to those who associate with them, though
+personally these have studied and acquired very little. Any one who
+observes how a new book is talked of will see the process. But the
+supreme nature of religion and its unique part in human development are
+seen here, that it demands high and sustained personal effort, the
+constant action of the will; that indeed every spiritual gain must
+result from the vital activity of the individual mind choosing to enter
+and enter yet farther the kingdom of divine revelation and grace. As it
+is expressed in the Epistle to the Hebrews: "We desire that every one of
+you do show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the
+end: that ye be not slothful, but followers of them who through faith
+and patience inherit the promises." The training in resoluteness,
+therefore, finds highest value and significance in view of the religious
+life. Those who live by habit and dependence in other matters are not
+prepared for the strenuous calling of faith, and many a one is kept from
+the freedom and joy of Christianity not because they are undesired, not
+because the call of Christ is unheeded, but for want of the power of
+decision, strength to go forward on a personal quest. Thousands are in
+the way of saying, Will you go to an evangelistic meeting? Then I will
+go. Will you take the Sacrament? Then I will. Will you teach in the
+Sunday-school? Then I will. So far something is gained: there is a
+half-decision. But the spiritual life is sure at some point to demand
+more than this. Even Naomi's advice must not deter Ruth from taking the
+way to Bethlehem.
+
+Like many women Ruth was moved greatly by love. Was her love justified?
+Did it rightly govern her to the extent her words imply? "Whither thou
+goest, I will go: thy people shall be my people: where thou diest I will
+die, and there will I be buried." It is beautiful to see such love: but
+how was it earned?
+
+Surely by years of patient faithful help; not by a few cheap words and
+caresses, a few facile promises; not by beauty of face, gaiety of
+temper. The love that has nothing but these to found upon is not enough
+for a life-companionship. But if there is honour, clear sincerity of
+soul, generosity of nature; if there is brave devotion to duty, there
+love can rest without fear, reproach or hazard. When these cast their
+light on your way, love then, love freely and strongly; you are safe. It
+is indeed called love where these are not--but only in ignorance and
+lightness: the heart has been caught by a word, ensnared by a look. How
+pathetic are the errors into which we see our friends and neighbours
+fall, errors that call for a life-long repentance because reason and
+serious purpose had nothing to do with the loving. No law of God is
+written against human affection, nor has He any jealousy of the devotion
+we show to worthy fellow-creatures; but there are divine laws of love to
+restrain our weak fancy and uplift our emotions; and if we disdain or
+cast aside these laws we must suffer however ardent and self-sacrificing
+affection may be. Egotistical wilfulness in serving some one who engages
+our admiration and passionate devotion is not properly speaking love. It
+is rather an offence against that divine grace which bears the noble
+name. Of course we are not here speaking of Christian charity towards
+our neighbours, interest in them and care for their well-being, which
+are always our duty and must not be limited. The story we are following
+is one of an intimate and personal affection.
+
+Lastly and chiefly the answer of Ruth implies a religious
+change--conversion. She renounces Chemosh and turns in faith and hope to
+the God of Israel, and this is the striking feature of her choice. Dimly
+seen, the grace and righteousness of the Most High touched her soul,
+commanded her reverence, drew her to follow one who was His servant and
+could recount the wonderful story of His people. Surely it is a supreme
+event in any life when this vision of the Best allures the mind and
+engages the will, even though knowledge of God be as yet very imperfect.
+And the reliance of Ruth upon the little she felt and knew of God, her
+clear resolution to seek rest under His wings appear in striking
+contrast with the reluctance, the unconcern, the hard unfaith of many
+to-day. How is it that they to whom the Word speaks and the life is
+revealed, whose portion is at every moment enriched by that Word and
+that life are so blind to the grace that encompasses and deaf to the
+love that entreats? Again and again we see them on the banks of some
+Jordan, with the land of God clear in view, with the promise of devotion
+trembling on their lips; but they turn back to Moab and Chemosh, to
+paganism, unrest and despair.
+
+Ruth's life properly began when at Naomi's side she passed through the
+waters, the very waters of baptism to her. There, with the purple
+mountains of Moab and the precipices of the Dead Sea shore behind, she
+sent her last look to Orpah and the past, and saw before her the steep
+narrow ascent through the Jud�an hills. With rising faith, with growing
+love she moved to the fulfilment of womanhood in realizing the soul's
+highest power and privilege. The upward path was hard to weary feet and
+all was not to be easy for Ruth in the Bethlehem of which she had
+dreamed; but fully committed and pledged to the new life she went
+forward. How much is missed when the choice to serve God is not
+unreservedly made, and there is not that full consecration of which
+Ruth's decision may be a type.
+
+Of this loss we see examples on every side. To remain in the low ground
+by the river, still within reach of some paganism that fascinates even
+after profession and baptism--this is the end of religious feeling with
+many. Where the narrow way of discipleship leads they will not
+adventure; it is too bare, confining and severe. They will not believe
+that freedom for the human soul is found by that path alone; they
+refuse to be bound and therefore never discover the inheritance of
+God's children to which they are called. When He who alone can guide,
+quicken, redeem is accepted solemnly and finally as the Lord of life,
+then at last the weak and entangled spirit knows the beginning of
+liberty and strength. Sad is the reckoning in our time of those who
+refuse to pledge themselves to the Saviour Whose claim they do feel to
+be divine and urgent. Not yet may the preacher cease to speak of
+conversion as the necessity in every life. Rather because it is easy to
+be in touch with Christianity at some point, because gospel influences
+are widely diffused, and church connection can be lightly held, the
+personal pledge to Christ must be insisted upon in the pulpit and kept
+in view as the end to which all the work of the church is directed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Life has many partings, and we have all had our experience of some which
+without fault on either side separate those well fitted to serve and
+bless each other. Over matters of faith, questions of political order
+and even social morality separations will occur. There may be no lack of
+faithfulness on either side when at a certain point widely divergent
+views of duty are taken by two who have been friends. One standing only
+a little apart from the other sees the same light reflected from a
+different facet of the crystal, streaming out in a different direction.
+As it would be altogether a mistake to say that Orpah took the way of
+worldly selfishness, Ruth only going in the way of duty, so it is
+entirely a mistake to accuse those who part with us on some question of
+faith or conduct and think of them as finally estranged. A little more
+knowledge and we would see with them or they with us. Some day they and
+we shall reach the truth and agree in our conclusions. Separations there
+must be for a time, for as the character leans to love or justice, the
+mind to reasoning or emotion, there is a difference in the vision of the
+good for which a man should strive. And if it comes to this that the
+paths chosen by those who were once dear friends divide them to the end
+of earthly days, they should retain the recollection not so much of the
+single point that separated, as of the many on which there was
+agreement. Even though they have to fight on opposite sides it should be
+as those who were brothers once and shall be brothers again. Indeed, are
+they not brothers still, if they fight for the same Master?
+
+Yet one difference between men reaches to the roots of life. The company
+of those who keep the straight way and press on towards the light have
+the most sorrowful recollection of some partings. They have had to leave
+comrades and brethren behind who despised the quest of holiness and
+immortality and had nothing but mockery for the Friend and Saviour of
+man. The shadows of estrangement falling between those who are of
+Christ's company are nothing compared with the dense cloud which divides
+them from men pledged to what is earthly and ignoble; and so the
+reproach of sectarian division coming from irreligious persons needs not
+trouble those who have as Christians an eternal brotherhood.
+
+There are divisions sharp and dreadful, not always at some river which
+clearly separates land from land. They may be made in the street where
+parting seems temporary and casual. They may be made in the very house
+of God. While some members of a family are responding with joy to a
+divine appeal, one may be resolutely turning from it to a base
+idolatry. Of three who went together to a place of prayer two may from
+that hour keep company in the heavenward journey, while the third moves
+every day towards the shadow of self-chosen reprobation. Christ has
+spoken of tremendous separations which men make by their acceptance or
+rejection of Him. "These shall go away into eternal punishment, but the
+righteous into life eternal."
+
+
+
+
+III.
+
+_IN THE FIELD OF BOAZ._
+
+RUTH i. 19-ii. 23.
+
+
+Weary and footsore the two travellers reached Bethlehem at length, and
+"all the city was moved about them." Though ten years had elapsed, many
+yet remembered as if it had been yesterday the season of terrible famine
+and the departure of the emigrants. Now the women lingering at the well,
+when they see the strangers approaching, say as they look in the face of
+the elder one, "Is this Naomi?" What a change is here! With husband and
+sons, hoping for a new life across in Moab, she went away. Her return
+has about it no sign of success; she comes on foot, in the company of
+one who is evidently of an alien race, and the two have all the marks of
+poverty. The women who recognize the widow of Elimelech are somewhat
+pitiful, perhaps also a little scornful. They had not left their native
+land nor doubted the promise of Jehovah. Through the famine they had
+waited, and now their position contrasts very favourably with hers.
+Surely Naomi is far down in the world since she has made a companion of
+a woman of Moab. Her poverty is against the wayfarer, and to those who
+know not the story of her life that which shows her goodness and
+faithfulness appears a cause of reproach and reason of suspicion.
+
+Is it too harsh to interpret thus the question with which Naomi is met?
+We are only using a key which common experience of life supplies. Do
+people give sincere and hearty sympathy to those who went away full and
+return empty, who were once in good standing and repute and come back
+years after to their old haunts impoverished and with strange
+associates? Are we not more ready to judge unfavourably in such a case
+than to exercise charity? The trick of hasty interpretation is common
+because every one desires to be on good terms with himself, and nothing
+is so soothing to vanity as the discovery of mistakes into which others
+have fallen. "All the brethren of the poor do hate him," says one who
+knew the Hebrews and human nature well; "how much more do his friends go
+far from him. He pursueth them with words, yet they are wanting to him."
+Naomi finds it so when she throws herself on the compassion of her old
+neighbours. They are not uninterested, they are not altogether unkind,
+but they feel their superiority.
+
+And Naomi appears to accept the judgment they have formed. Very touching
+is the lament in which she takes her position as one whom God has
+rebuked, whom it is no wonder, therefore, that old friends despise. She
+almost makes excuse for those who look down upon her from the high
+ground of their imaginary virtue and wisdom. Indeed she has the same
+belief as they that poverty, the loss of land, bereavement and every
+kind of affliction are marks of God's displeasure. For, what does she
+say? "Call me not Naomi, Pleasant, call me Mara, Bitter, for the
+Almighty hath dealt very bitterly with me.... The Lord hath testified
+against me and the Almighty hath afflicted me." Such was the Hebrew
+thought, the purpose of God in His dealings with men not being
+apprehended. Under the shadow of loss and sorrow it seemed that no heat
+of the Divine Presence could be felt. To have a husband and children
+appeared to Naomi evidence of God's favour; to lose them was a proof
+that He had turned against her. Heavy as her losses had been the
+terrible thing was that they implied the displeasure of God.
+
+It is perhaps difficult for us to realize even by an imaginative effort
+this condition of soul--the sense of banishment, darkness, outlawry
+which came to the Hebrew whenever he fell into distress or penury. And
+yet we ourselves retain the same standard of judgment in our common
+estimate of life; we still interpret things by an ignorant unbelief
+which causes many worthy souls to bow in a humiliation Christians should
+never feel. Do not the loneliness, the poverty, the testimony of Christ
+teach us something altogether different? Can we still cherish the notion
+that prosperity is an evidence of worth and that the man who can found a
+family must be a favourite of the heavenly powers? Judge thus and the
+providence of God is a tangle, a perplexing darkening problem which,
+believe as you may, must still overwhelm. Wealth has its conditions;
+money comes through some one's cleverness in work and trading, some
+one's inventiveness or thrift, and these qualities are reputable. But
+nothing is proved regarding the spiritual tone and nature of a life
+either by wealth or by the want of it. And surely we have learned that
+loss of friends and loneliness are not to be reckoned the punishment of
+sin. Often enough we hear the warning that wealth and worldly position
+are not to be sought for themselves, and yet, side by side with this
+warning, the implication that a high place and a prosperous life are
+proofs of divine blessing.
+
+On the whole subject Christian thought is far from clear, and we have
+need to go anew to the Master and inquire of Him Who had no place where
+to lay His head. The Hebrew belief in the prosperity of God's servants
+must fulfil itself in a larger better faith or the man of to-morrow will
+have no faith at all. One who bewails the loss of wealth or friends is
+doing nothing that has spiritual meaning or value. When he takes himself
+to task for that despondency he begins to touch the spiritual.
+
+In Bethlehem Naomi found the half-ruined cottage still belonging to her,
+and there she and Ruth took up their abode. But for a living what was to
+be done? The answer came in the proposal of Ruth to go into the fields
+where the barley harvest was proceeding and glean after the reapers. By
+great diligence she might gather enough day by day for the bare
+sustenance that contents a Syrian peasant, and afterwards some other
+means of providing for herself and Naomi might be found. The work was
+not dignified. She would have to appear among the waifs and wanderers of
+the country, with women whose behaviour exposed them to the rude gibes
+of the labourers. But whatever plan Naomi vaguely entertained was
+hanging in abeyance, and the circumstances of the women were urgent. No
+kinsman came forward to help them. Loath as she was to expose Ruth to
+the trials of the harvest-field, Naomi had to let her go. So it was Ruth
+who made the first move, Ruth the stranger who brought succour to the
+Hebrew widow when her own people held aloof and she herself knew not how
+to act.
+
+Now among the farmers whose barley was falling before the sickle was the
+land-owner Boaz, a kinsman of Elimelech, a man of substance and social
+importance, one of those who in the midst of their fruitful fields
+shine with bountiful good-humour and by their presence make their
+servants work heartily. To Ruth in after days it must have seemed a
+wonderful thing that her first timid expedition led her to a portion of
+ground belonging to this man. From the moment he appears in the
+narrative we note in him a certain largeness of character. It may be
+only the easy kindness of the prosperous man, but it commends him to our
+good opinion. Those who have a smooth way through the world are bound to
+be especially kind and considerate in their bearing toward neighbours
+and dependants, this at least they owe as an acknowledgment to the rest
+of the world, and we are always pleased to find a rich man paying his
+debt so far. There is a certain piety also in the greeting of Boaz to
+his labourers, a customary thing no doubt and good even in that sense,
+but better when it carries, as it seems to do here, a personal and
+friendly message. Here is a man who will observe with strict eye
+everything that goes on in the field and will be quick to challenge any
+lazy reaper. But he is not remote from those who serve him, he and they
+meet on common ground of humanity and faith.
+
+The great operations which some in these days think fit to carry on,
+more for their own glory certainly than the good of their country or
+countrymen, entirely preclude anything like friendship between the chief
+and the multitude of his subordinates. It is impossible that a man who
+has a thousand under him should know and consider each, and there would
+be too much pretence in saying, "God be with you," on entering a yard or
+factory when otherwise no feeling is shown with which the name of God
+can be connected. Apart altogether from questions as to wealth and its
+use every employer has a responsibility for maintaining the healthy
+human activity of his people, and nowhere is the immorality of the
+present system of huge concerns so evident as in the extinction of
+personal good will. The workman of course may adjust himself to the
+state of matters, but it will too often be by discrediting what he knows
+he cannot have and keeping up a critical resentful habit of mind against
+those who seem to treat him as a machine. He may often be wrong in his
+judgment of an employer. There may be less hardness of temper on the
+other side than there is on his own. But, the conditions being what they
+are, one may say he is certain to be a severe critic. We have
+unquestionably lost much and are in danger of losing more, not in a
+financial sense, which matters little, but in the infinitely more
+important affairs of social sweetness and Christian civilization.
+
+Boaz the farmer had not more in hand than he could attend to honestly,
+and everything under his care was well ordered. He had a foreman over
+the reapers, and from him he required an account of the stranger whom he
+saw gleaning in the field. There were to be no hangers-on of loose
+character where he exercised authority; and in this we justify him. We
+like to see a man keeping a firm hand when we are sure that he has a
+good heart and knows what he is doing. Such a one is bound within the
+range of his power to have all done rightly and honourably, and Boaz
+pleases us all the better that he makes close inquiry regarding the
+woman who seeks the poor gains of a common gleaner.
+
+Of course in a place like Bethlehem people knew each other, and Boaz was
+probably acquainted with most whom he saw about; at once, therefore, the
+new figure of the Moabite woman attracted his attention. Who is she? A
+kindly heart prompts the inquiry for the farmer knows that if he
+interests himself in this young woman he may be burdened with a new
+dependant. "It is the Moabitish damsel that came back with Naomi out of
+the country of Moab." She is the daughter-in-law of his old friend
+Elimelech. Before the eyes of Boaz one of the romances of life, common
+and tragic too, is unfolding itself. Often had Boaz and Elimelech held
+counsel with each other, met at each other's houses, talked together of
+their fields or of the state of the country. But Elimelech went away and
+lost all and died; and two widows, the wreck of the family, had returned
+to Bethlehem. It was plain that these would be new claimants on his
+favour, but unlike many well-to-do persons Boaz does not wait for some
+urgent appeal; he acts rather as one who is glad to do a kindness for
+old friendship's sake.
+
+Great was the surprise of the lonely gleaner when the rich man came to
+her side and gave her a word of comfortable greeting. "Hearest thou not,
+my daughter? Go not to glean in another field, but abide here fast by my
+maidens." Nothing had been done to make Ruth feel at home in Bethlehem
+until Boaz addressed her. She had perhaps seen proud and scornful looks
+in the street and at the well, and had to bear them meekly, silently. In
+the fields she may have looked for something of the kind and even feared
+that Boaz would dismiss her. A gentle person in such circumstances is
+exceedingly grateful for a very small kindness, and it was not a slight
+favour that Boaz did her. But in making her acknowledgments Ruth did not
+know what had prepared her way. The truth was that she had met with a
+man of character who valued character, and her faithfulness commended
+her. "It hath been fully showed me, all that thou hast done unto thy
+mother-in-law since the death of thine husband." The best point in Boaz
+is that he so quickly and fully recognises the goodness of another and
+will help her because they stand upon a common ground of conscience and
+duty.
+
+Is it on such a ground you draw to others? Is your interest won by
+kindly dispositions and fidelity of temper? Do you love those who are
+sincere and patient in their duties, content to serve where service is
+appointed by God? Are you attracted by one who cherishes a parent, say a
+poor mother, in the time of feebleness and old age, doing all that is
+possible to smooth her path and provide for her comfort? Or have you
+little esteem for such a one, for the duties so faithfully discharged,
+because you see no brilliance or beauty, and there are other persons
+more clever and successful on their own account, more amusing because
+they are unburdened? If so, be sure of your own ignorance, your own
+undutifulness, your own want of principle and heart. Character is known
+by character, and worth by worth. Those who are acquainted with you
+could probably say that you care more for display than for honour, that
+you think more of making a fine figure in society than of showing
+generosity, forbearance integrity at home. The good appreciate goodness,
+the true honour truth. One important lesson of the Book of Ruth lies
+here, that the great thing for young women, and for young men also, is
+to be quietly faithful in the service, however humble, to which God has
+called them and the family circle in which He has set them. Not indeed
+because that is the line of promotion, though Ruth found it so; every
+Ruth does not obtain favour in the eyes of a wealthy Boaz. So honourable
+and good a man is not to be met on every harvest held; on the contrary
+she may encounter a Nabal, one who is churlish and evil in his doings.
+
+We must take the course of this narrative as symbolic. The book has in
+it the strain of a religious idyl. The Moabite who wins the regard of
+this man of Judah represents those who, though naturally strangers to
+the covenant of promise, receive the grace of God and enter the circle
+of divine blessing--even coming to high dignity in the generations of
+the chosen people. It is idyllic, we say, not an exhibition of every-day
+fact; yet the course of divine justice is surely more beautiful, more
+certain. To every Ruth comes the Heavenly Friend Whose are all the
+pastures and fields, all the good things of life. The Christian hope is
+in One Who cannot fail to mark the most private faithfulness, piety and
+love hidden like violets among the grass. If there is not such a One,
+the Helper and Vindicator of meek fidelity, virtue has no sanction and
+well-doing no recompense.
+
+The true Israelite Boaz accepts the daughter of an alien and unfriendly
+people on account of her own character and piety. "The Lord recompense
+thy work, and a full reward be given thee of the Lord, the God of
+Israel, under Whose wings thou art come to take refuge." Such is the
+benediction which Boaz invokes on Ruth, receiving her cordially into the
+family circle of Jehovah. Already she has ceased to be a stranger and a
+foreigner to him. The boundary walls of race are overstepped, partly, no
+doubt, by that sense of kinship which the Bethlehemite is quick to
+acknowledge. For Naomi's sake and for Elimelech's as well as her own he
+craves divine protection and reward for the daughter of Moab. Yet the
+beautiful phrase he employs, full of Hebrew confidence in God, is an
+acknowledgment of Ruth's act of faith and her personal right to share
+with the children of Abraham the fostering love of the Almighty. The
+story, then, is a plea against that exclusiveness which the Hebrews too
+often indulged. On this page of the annals the truth is written out that
+though Jehovah cared for Israel much He cares still more for love and
+faithfulness, purity and goodness. We reach at last an instance of that
+fulfilment of Israel's mission to the nations around which in our study
+of the Book of Judges we looked for in vain.
+
+Not for Israel only in the time of its narrowness was the lesson given.
+We need it still. The justification and redemption of God are not
+restricted to those who have certain traditions and beliefs. Even as a
+Moabite woman brought up in the worship of Chemosh, with many heathen
+ideas still in her mind, has her place under the wings of Jehovah as a
+soul seeking righteousness, so from countries and regions of life which
+Christian people may consider a kind of rude heathen Moab many in
+humility and sincerity may be coming nigh to the kingdom of God. It was
+so in our Lord's time, and it is so still. All along the true religion
+of God has been for reconciliation and brotherhood among men, and it was
+possible for many Israelites to do what Naomi did in the way of making
+effectual the promise of God to Abraham that in his seed all families of
+the earth should be blessed. There never was a middle wall of partition
+between men except in the thought of the Hebrew. He was separated that
+he might be able to convert and bless, not that he might stand aloof in
+pride. The wall which he built Christ has broken down that the servants
+of His gospel may go freely forth to find everywhere brethren in common
+humanity and need, who are to be made brethren in Christ. The outward
+representation of brotherhood in faith must follow the work of the
+reconciling Spirit--cannot precede it. And when the reconciliation is
+felt in the depth of human souls we shall have the all-comprehensive
+church, a fair and gracious dwelling-place, wide as the race, rich with
+every noble thought and hope of man and every gift of Heaven.
+
+
+
+
+IV.
+
+_THE HAZARDOUS PLAN._
+
+RUTH iii.
+
+
+Hope came to Naomi when Ruth returned with the ephah of barley and her
+story of the rich man's hearty greeting. God was remembering His
+handmaiden; He had not shut up His tender mercies. Through His favour
+Boaz had been moved to kindness, and the house of Elimelech would yet be
+raised from the dust. The woman's heart, clinging to its last hope, was
+encouraged. Naomi was loud in her praises of Jehovah and of the man who
+had with such pious readiness befriended Ruth. And the young woman had
+due encouragement. She heard no fault-finding, no complaint that she had
+made too little of her chance. The young sometimes find it difficult to
+serve the old, and those who have come down in the world are very apt to
+be discontented and querulous; what is done for them is never rightly
+done, never enough. It was not so here. The elder woman seems to have
+had nothing but gratitude for the gentle effort of the other. And so the
+weeks of barley-harvest and of wheat-harvest went by, Ruth busy in the
+fields of Boaz, gleaning behind his maidens, helped by their
+kindness--for they knew better than to thwart their master--and cheered
+at home by the pleasure of her mother-in-law. An idyl? Yes: one that
+might be enacted, with varying circumstances, in a thousand homes where
+at present distrust and impatience keep souls from the peace God would
+give them.
+
+But, one may ask, why did Boaz, so well inclined to be generous, knowing
+these women to be deserving of help, leave them week after week without
+further notice and aid? Could he reckon his duty done when he allowed
+Ruth to glean in his fields, gave her a share of the refreshment
+provided for the reapers, and ordered them to pull some ears from the
+bundles that she might the more easily fill her arms? For friendships
+sake even, should he not have done more?
+
+We keep in mind, for one thing, that Boaz, though a kinsman, was not the
+nearest relation Naomi had in Bethlehem. Another was of closer kin to
+Elimelech, and it was his duty to take up the widow's case in accordance
+with the custom of the time. The old law that no Hebrew family should be
+allowed to lapse had deep root and justification. How could Israel
+maintain itself in the land of promise and become the testifying people
+of God if families were suffered to die out and homesteads to be lost?
+One war after another drained away many active men of the tribes. Upon
+those who survived lay the serious duty of protecting widows, upholding
+claims to farm and dwelling and raising up to those who had died a name
+in Israel. The stress of the time gave sanction to the law; without it
+Israel would have decayed, losing ground and power in the face of the
+enemy. Now this custom bound the nearest kinsman of Naomi to befriend
+her and, at least, to establish her claim to a certain parcel of land
+near Bethlehem. As for Boaz, he had to stand aside and give the go�l his
+opportunity.
+
+And another reason is easily seen for his not hastening to supply the
+two widows with every comfort and remove from their hearts every fear, a
+reason which touches the great difficulty of the philanthropic,--how to
+do good and yet do no harm. To give is easy; but to help without
+tarnishing the fine independence and noble thrift of poorer persons is
+not easy. It is, in truth, a very serious matter to use wealth wisely,
+for against the absolute duty of help hangs the serious mischief that
+may result from lavish or careless charity. Boaz appears a true friend
+and wise benefactor in leaving Ruth to enjoy the sweetness of securing
+the daily portion of corn by her own exertion. He might have relieved
+her from toiling like one of the poorest and least cared for of women.
+He might have sent her home the first day and one of his young men after
+her with store of corn and oil. But if he had done so he would have made
+the great mistake so often made now-a-days by the bountiful. An
+industrious patient generous life would have been spoiled. To protect
+Ruth from any kind or degree of insolence, to show her, for his own
+part, the most delicate respect--this Boaz could well do. In what he
+refrained from doing he is an example, and in the kind and measure of
+attention he paid to Ruth. Corresponding acts of Christian courtesy and
+justice due from the rich and influential of our time to persons in
+straitened circumstances are far too often unrendered. A thousand
+opportunities of paying this real debt of man to man are allowed to
+pass. Those concerned do not see any obligation, and the reason is that
+they want the proper state of mind. That is indispensable. Where it
+exists true neighbourliness will follow; the best help will be given
+naturally with perfect taste, in proper degree and without
+self-sufficiency or pride.
+
+A great hazard goes with much of the spiritual work of our time. The
+Ruth gleaning for herself in the field of Christian thought, finding
+here and there an ear of heavenly corn which, as she has gathered it,
+gives true nourishment to the soul--is met not by one but by many eager
+to save her all the trouble of searching the Scriptures and thinking out
+the problems of life and faith. Is it wrong to deprive a brave
+self-helper of the need to toil for daily bread? How much greater is the
+wrong done to minds capable of spiritual endeavour when they are taught
+to renounce personal effort and are loaded with sheaves of corn which
+they have neither sowed nor reaped. The fashion of our time is to save
+people trouble in religion, to remove all resistance from the way of
+mind and soul, and as a result the spiritual life never attains strength
+or even consciousness. Better the scanty meal won by personal search in
+the great harvest field than the surfeit of dainties on which some are
+fed, spiritual paupers though they know it not. The wisdom of the Divine
+Book is marvellously shown in that it gives largely without destroying
+the need for effort, that it requires examination and research,
+comparison of scripture with scripture, earnest thought in many a field.
+Bible study, therefore, makes strong Christians, strong faith.
+
+As time went by and harvest drew to a close, Naomi grew impatient.
+Anxious about Ruth's future she wished to see something done towards
+establishing her in safety and honour. "My daughter-in-law," we hear her
+say, "shall I not seek rest--a _menuchah_ or asylum for thee, that it
+may be well with thee?" No go�l or redeemer has appeared to befriend
+Naomi and reinstate her, or Ruth as representing her dead son, in the
+rights of Elimelech. If those rights are not to lapse, something must
+be done speedily; and Naomi's plot is a bold one. She sets Ruth to claim
+Boaz as the kinsman whose duty it is to marry her and become her
+protector. Ruth is to go to the threshing-floor on the night of the
+harvest festival, wait until Boaz lies down to sleep beside the mass of
+winnowed grain, and place herself at his feet, so reminding him that if
+no other will it is his part to be a husband to her for the sake of
+Elimelech and his sons. The plan is daring and appears to us indelicate
+at least. It is impossible to say whether any custom of the time
+sanctioned it; but even in that case we cannot acquit Naomi of resorting
+to a stratagem with the view of bringing about what seemed most
+desirable for Ruth and herself.
+
+Now let us remember the position of the two widows, lonely, with no
+prospect before them but hard toil that would by-and-by fail, unable to
+undertake anything on their own account, and still regarded with
+indifference if not suspicion by the people of Bethlehem. There is no
+asylum for Ruth except in the house of a husband. If Naomi dies she will
+be worse than destitute, morally under a cloud. To live by herself will
+be to lead a life of constant peril. It is, we may say, a desperate
+resource on which Naomi falls. Boaz is probably already married, has
+perhaps more wives than one. True, he has room in his house for Ruth; he
+can easily provide for her; and though the customs of the age are
+strained somewhat we must partly admit excuse. Still the venture is
+almost entirely suggested and urged by worldly considerations, and for
+the sake of them great risk is run. Instead of gaining a husband Ruth
+may completely forfeit respect. Boaz, so far from entertaining her
+appeal to his kinship and generosity, may drive her from the
+threshing-floor. It is one of those cases in which, notwithstanding
+some possible defence in custom, poverty and anxiety lead into dubious
+ways.
+
+We ask why Naomi did not first approach the proper go�l, the kinsman
+nearer than Boaz, on whom she had an undeniable claim. And the answer
+occurs that he did not seem in respect of disposition or means so good a
+match as Boaz. Or why did she not go directly to Boaz and state her
+desire? She was apparently not averse from grasping at the result,
+compromising him, or running the risk of doing so in order to gain her
+end. We cannot pass the point without observing that, despite the happy
+issue of this plot, it is a warning not an example. These secret,
+underhand schemes are not to our liking; they should in no circumstances
+be resorted to. It was well for Ruth that she had a man to deal with who
+was generous, not irascible, a man of character who had fully
+appreciated her goodness. The scheme would otherwise have had a pitiful
+result. The story is one creditable in many respects to human nature,
+and the Moabite acting under Naomi's direction appears almost blameless;
+yet the sense of having lowered herself must have cast its shadow. A
+risk was run too great by far for modesty and honour.
+
+To compromise ourselves by doing that which savours of presumption,
+which goes too far even by a hair's-breadth in urging a claim is a bad
+thing. Better remain without what we reckon our rights than lower our
+moral dignity in pressing them. Independence of character, perfect
+honour and uprightness are too precious by far to be imperilled even in
+a time of serious difficulty. To-day we can hardly turn in any direction
+without seeing instances of risky compromise often ending in disaster.
+To obtain preferment one will offer some mean bribe of flattery to the
+person who can give it. To gain a fortune men will condescend to pitiful
+self-humiliation. In the literary world the upward ways open easily to
+talent that does not refuse compromises; a writer may have success at
+the price of astute silence or careful caressing of prejudice. The
+candidate for office commits himself and has afterwards to wriggle as
+best he can out of the straits in which he is involved. And what is the
+meaning of the light judgment of drunkenness and impurity by men and
+women of all ranks who associate with those known to be guilty and make
+no protest against their wrongdoing?
+
+It would be shirking one of the plain applications of the incidents
+before us if we passed over the compromises so many women make with
+self-respect and purity. Ruth, under the advice of one whom she knew to
+be a good woman, risked something: with us now are many who against the
+entreaty of all true friends adventure into dangerous ways, put
+themselves into the power of men they have no reason to trust. And women
+in high place, who should set an example of fidelity to the divine order
+and understand the honour of womanhood, are rather leading the dance of
+freedom and risk. To keep a position or win a position in the crowd
+called society some will yield to any fashion, go all lengths in the
+license of amusement, sit unblushing at plays that serve only one end,
+give themselves and their daughters to embraces that degrade. The
+struggle to live is spoken of sometimes as an excuse for women. But is
+it the very poor only who compromise themselves? Something else is going
+on beside the struggle to find work and bread. People are forgetting
+God, thrusting aside the ideas of the soul and of sin; they want keen
+delight and are ready to venture all if only in triumphant ambition or
+on the perilous edge of infamy they can satisfy desire for an hour. The
+cry of to-day, spreading down through all ranks, is the old one, Why
+should we be righteous over much and destroy ourselves? It is the
+expression of a base and despicable atheism. To deny the higher light
+which shows the way of personal duty and nobleness, to prefer instead
+the miserable rushlight of desire is the fatal choice against which all
+wisdom of sage and seer testifies. Yet the thing is done daily, done by
+brilliant women who go on as if nothing was wrong and laugh back to
+those who follow them. The Divine Friend of women protests, but His
+words are unheard, drowned by the fascinating music and quick pulsation
+of the dance of death.
+
+To compromise ourselves is bad: close beside lies the danger of
+compromising others; and this too is illustrated by the narrative. Boaz
+acted in generosity and honour, told Ruth plainly that a kinsman nearer
+than himself stood between them, made her a most favourable promise. But
+he sent her away in the early morning "before one could recognise
+another." The risk to which she had exposed him was one he did not care
+to face. While he made all possible excuses for her and was in a sense
+proud of the trust she had reposed in him, still he was somewhat alarmed
+and anxious. The narrative is generous to Ruth; but this is not
+concealed. We see very distinctly a touch of something caught in heathen
+Moab.
+
+On the more satisfactory side of the picture is the confidence so
+unreservedly exercised, justified so thoroughly. It is good to be among
+people who deserve trust and never fail in the time of trial. Take them
+at any hour, in any way they are the same. Incapable of baseness they
+bear every test. On the firm conviction that Boaz was a man of this kind
+Naomi depended, upon this and an assurance equally firm that Ruth would
+behave herself discreetly. Happy indeed are those who have the honour of
+friendship with the honourable and true, with men who would rather lose
+a right hand than do anything base, with women who would die for
+honour's sake. To have acquaintance with faithful men is to have a way
+prepared for faith in God.
+
+Let us not fail, however, to observe where honour like this may be
+found, where alone it is to be found. Common is the belief that absolute
+fidelity may exist in soil cleared of all religious principle. You meet
+people who declare that religion is of no use. They have been brought up
+in religion, but they are tired of it. They have given up churches and
+prayers and are going to be honourable without thought of God, on the
+basis of their own steadfast virtue. We shall not say it is impossible,
+or that women like Ruth may not rely upon men who so speak. But a single
+word of scorn cast on religion reveals so faulty a character that it is
+better not to confide in the man who utters it. He is in the real sense
+an atheist, one to whom nothing is sacred. About some duties he may have
+a sentiment; but what is sentiment or taste to build upon? For one to
+trust where reputation is concerned, where moral well-being is involved
+a soul must be found whose life is rooted in the faith of God. True
+enough, we are under the necessity of trusting persons for whom we have
+no such guarantee. Fortunately, however, it is only in matters of
+business, or municipal affairs, or parliamentary votes, things
+extraneous to our proper life. Unrighteous laws may be made, we may be
+defrauded and oppressed, but that does not affect our spiritual
+position. When it comes to the soul and the soul's life, when one is in
+search of a wife, a husband, a friend, trust should be placed elsewhere,
+hope built on a sure foundation.
+
+May we depend upon love in the absence of religious faith? Some would
+fain conjure with that word; but love is a divine gift when it is pure
+and true; the rest is mere desire and passion. Do you suppose because an
+insincere worldly man has a selfish passion for you that you can be safe
+with him? Do you think because a worldly woman loves you in a worldly
+way that your soul and your future will be safe with her? Find a fearer
+of God, one whose virtues are rooted where alone they can grow, in
+faith, or live without a wife, a husband. It is presupposed that you
+yourself are a fearer of God, a servant of Christ. For, unless you are,
+the rule operates on the other side and you are one who should be
+shunned. Besides, if you are a materialist living in time and sense and
+yet look for spiritual graces and superhuman fidelity, your expectation
+is amazing, your hope a thing to wonder at.
+
+True, hypocrites exist, and we may be deceived just because of our
+certainty that religion is the only root of faithfulness. A man may
+simulate religion and deceive for a time. The young may be sadly
+deluded, a whole community betrayed by one who makes the divinest facts
+of human nature serve his own wickedness awhile. He disappears and
+leaves behind him broken hearts, shattered hopes, darkened lives. Has
+religion, then, nothing to do with morality? The very ruin we lament
+shows that the human heart in its depth testifies to an intimate and
+eternal connection with the absolute of fidelity. Not otherwise could
+that hypocrite have deceived. And in the strength of faith there are men
+and women of unflinching honour, who, when they find each other out,
+form rare and beautiful alliances. Step for step they go on, married or
+unmarried, each cheering the other in trial, sustaining the other in
+every high and generous task. Together they enter more deeply into the
+purpose of life, that is the will of God, and fill with strong and
+healthy religion the circle of their influence.
+
+Of the people of ordinary virtue what shall be said?--those who are
+neither perfectly faithful nor disgracefully unfaithful, neither certain
+to be staunch and true nor ready to betray and cast aside those who
+trust them. Large is the class of men whose individuality is not of a
+moral kind, affable and easy, brisk and clever but not resolute in truth
+and right. Are we to leave these where they are? If we belong to their
+number are we to stay among them? Must they get on as best they can with
+each other, neither blessed nor condemned? For them the gospel is
+provided in its depth and urgency. Theirs is the state it cannot
+tolerate nor leave untouched, unaffected. If earth is good enough for
+you, so runs the divine message to them, cling to it, enjoy its
+dainties, laugh in its sunlight--and die with it. But if you see the
+excellence of truth, be true; if you hear the voice of the eternal
+Christ, arise and follow Him, born again by the word of God which liveth
+and abideth for ever.
+
+
+
+
+V.
+
+_THE MARRIAGE AT THE GATE_
+
+RUTH iv
+
+
+A simple ceremony of Oriental life brings to a climax the history which
+itself closes in sweet music the stormy drama of the Book of Judges.
+With all the literary skill and moral delicacy, all the charm and keen
+judgment of inspiration the narrator gives us what he has from the
+Spirit. He has represented with fine brevity and power of touch the old
+life and custom of Israel, the private groups in which piety and
+faithfulness were treasured, the frank humanity and divine seriousness
+of Jehovah's covenant. And now we are at the gate of Bethlehem where the
+head men are assembled and according to the usage of the time the
+affairs of Naomi and Ruth are settled by the village court of justice.
+Boaz gives a challenge to the go�l of Naomi, and point by point we
+follow the legal forms by which the right to redeem the land of
+Elimelech is given up to Boaz and Ruth becomes his wife.
+
+Why is an old custom presented with such minuteness? We may affirm the
+underlying suggestion to be that the ways described were good ways which
+ought to be kept in mind. The usage implied great openness and
+neighbourliness, a simple and straightforward method of arranging
+affairs which were of moment to a community. People lived then in very
+direct and frank relations with each other. Their little town and its
+concerns had close and intelligent attention. Men and women desired to
+act so that there might be good understanding among them, no jealousy
+nor rancour of feeling. Elaborate forms of law were unknown,
+unnecessary. To take off the shoe and hand it to another in the presence
+of honest neighbours ratified a decision as well and gave as good
+security as much writing on parchment. The author of the Book of Ruth
+commends these homely ways of a past age and suggests to the men of his
+own time that civilization and the monarchy, while they have brought
+some gains, are perhaps to be blamed for the decay of simplicity and
+friendliness.
+
+More than one reason may be found for supposing the book to have been
+written in Solomon's time, probably the latter part of his reign when
+laws and ordinances had multiplied and were being enforced in endless
+detail by a central authority; when the manners of the nations around,
+Chaldea, Egypt, Phoenicia, were overbearing the primitive ways of
+Israel; when luxury was growing, society dividing into classes and a
+proud imperialism giving its colour to habit and religion. If we place
+the book at this period we can understand the moral purpose of the
+writer and the importance of his work. He would teach people to maintain
+the spirit of Israel's past, the brotherliness, the fidelity in every
+relation that were to have been all along a distinction of Hebrew life
+because inseparably connected with the obedience of Jehovah. The
+splendid temple on Moriah was now the centre of a great priestly system,
+and from temple and palace the national and, to a great extent, the
+personal life of all Israelites was largely influenced, not in every
+respect for good. The quiet suggestion is here made that the
+artificiality and pomp of the kingdom did not compare well with that old
+time when the affairs of an ancestress of the splendid monarch were
+settled by a gathering at a village gate.
+
+Nor is the lesson without its value now. We are not to go back on the
+past in mere antiquarian curiosity, the interest of secular research.
+Labour which goes to revive the story of mankind in remote ages has its
+value only when it is applied to the uses of the moralist and the
+prophet. We have much to learn again that has been forgotten, much to
+recall that has escaped the memory of the race. Through phases of
+complex civilization in which the outward and sensuous are pursued the
+world has to pass to a new era of more simple and yet more profound
+life, to a social order fitted for the development of spiritual power
+and grace. And the church is well directed by the Book of God. Her
+inquiry into the past is no affair of intellectual curiosity, but a
+research governed by the principles that have underlain man's life from
+the first and a growing apprehension of all that is at stake in the
+multiform energy of the present. Amid the bustle and pressure of those
+endeavours which Christian faith itself may induce our minds become
+confused. Thinkers and doers are alike apt to forget the deliverances
+knowledge ought to effect, and while they learn and attempt much they
+are rather passing into bondage than finding life. Our research seems
+more and more to occupy us with the manner of things, and even Bible
+Arch�ology is exposed to this reproach. As for the scientific comparers
+of religion they are mostly feeding the vanity of the age with a sense
+of extraordinary progress and enlightenment, and themselves are
+occasionally heard to confess that the farther they go in study of old
+faiths, old rituals and moralities the less profit they find, the less
+hint of a design. No such futility, no failure of culture and inquiry
+mark the Bible writers dealing with the past. To the humble life of the
+Son of Man on earth, to the life of the Hebrews long before He appeared
+our thought is carried back from the thousand objects that fascinate in
+the world of to-day. And there we see the faith and all the elements of
+spiritual vitality of which our own belief and hope are the fruit. There
+too without those cumbrous modern involutions which never become
+familiar, society wonderfully fulfils its end in regulating personal
+effort and helping the conscience and the soul.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The scene at the gate shows Boaz energetically conducting the case he
+has taken up. Private considerations urged him to bring rapidly to an
+issue the affairs of Naomi and Ruth since he was involved, and again he
+commends himself as a man who, having a task in hand, does it with his
+might. His pledge to Ruth was a pledge also to his own conscience that
+no suspense should be due to any carelessness of his; and in this he
+proved himself a pattern friend. The great man often shows his greatness
+by making others wait at his door. They are left to find the level of
+their insignificance and learn the value of his favour. So the grace of
+God is frustrated by those who have the opportunity and should covet the
+honour of being His instruments. Men know that they should wait
+patiently on God's time, but they are bewildered when they have to wait
+on the strange arrogance of those in whose hands Providence has placed
+the means of their succour. And many must be the cases in which this
+fault of man begets bitterness, distrust of God and even despair. It
+should be a matter of anxiety to us all to do with speed and care
+anything on which the hopes of the humble and needy rest. A soul more
+worthy than our own may languish in darkness while a promise which
+should have been sacred is allowed to fade from our memory.
+
+Boaz was also open and straightforward in his transactions. His own wish
+is pretty clear. He seems as anxious as Naomi herself that to him should
+fall the duty of redeeming her burdened inheritance and reviving her
+husband's name. Possibly without any public discussion, by consulting
+with the nearer kinsman and urging his own wish or superior ability he
+might have settled the affair. Other inducements failing, the offer of a
+sum of money might have secured to him the right of redemption. But in
+the light of honour, in the court of his conscience, the man was unable
+thus to seek his end; and besides the town's people had to be
+considered; their sense of justice had to be satisfied as well as his
+own.
+
+Often it is not enough that we do a thing from the best of motives; we
+must do it in the best way, for the support of justice or purity or
+truth. While private benevolence is one of the finest of arts, the
+Christian is not unfrequently called to exercise another which is more
+difficult and not less needful in society. Required at one hour not to
+let his left hand know what his right hand doeth, at another he is
+required in all modesty and simplicity to take his fellows to witness
+that he acts for righteousness, that he is contending for some thought
+of Christ's, that he is not standing in the outer court among those who
+are ashamed but has taken his place with the Master at the judgment bar
+of the world. Again, when a matter in which a Christian is involved is
+before the public and has provoked a good deal of discussion and perhaps
+no little criticism of religion and its professors it is not enough that
+out of sight, out of court some arrangement be made which counts for a
+moral settlement. That is not enough though a person whose rights and
+character are affected may consent to it. If still the world has reason
+to question whether justice has been done,--justice has not been done.
+If still the truthfulness of the church is under valid suspicion,--the
+church is not manifesting Christ as it should. For no moral cause once
+opened at public assize can be issued in private. It is no longer
+between one man and another, nor between a man and the church. The
+conscience of the race has been empanelled and cannot be discharged
+without judgment. Innumerable causes withdrawn from court, compromised,
+hushed up or settled in corners with an effort at justice still shadow
+the history of the church and cast a darkness of justifiable suspicion
+on the path along which she would advance.
+
+Even in this little affair at Bethlehem the good man will have
+everything done with perfect openness and honour and will stand by the
+result whether it meet his hopes or disappoint them. At the town-gate,
+the common meeting-place for conversation and business, Boaz takes his
+seat and invites the go�l to sit beside him and also a jury of ten
+elders. The court thus constituted, he states the case of Naomi and her
+desire to sell a parcel of land which belonged to her husband. When
+Elimelech left Bethlehem he had, no doubt, borrowed money on the field,
+and now the question is whether the nearest kinsman will pay the debt
+and beyond that the further value of the land so that the widow may have
+something to herself. Promptly the go�l answers that he is ready to buy
+the land. This, however, is not all. In buying the field and adding it
+to his estate will the man take Ruth to wife, to raise up the name of
+the dead upon his inheritance? He is not prepared to do that, for the
+children of Ruth would be entitled to the portion of ground and he is
+unwilling to impoverish his own family. "I cannot redeem it for myself,
+lest I mar my own inheritance." He draws off his shoe and gives it to
+Boaz renouncing his right of redemption.
+
+Now this marriage-custom is not ours, but at the time, as we have seen,
+it was a sacred rule, and the go�l was morally bound by it. He could
+have insisted on redeeming the land as his right. To do so was therefore
+his duty, and to a certain extent he failed from the ideal of a
+kinsman's obligation. But the position was not an easy one. Surely the
+man was justified in considering the children he already had and their
+claims upon him. Did he not exercise a wise prudence in refusing to
+undertake a new obligation? Moreover the circumstances were delicate and
+dispeace might have been caused in his household if he took the Moabite
+woman. It is certainly one of those cases in which a custom or law has
+great weight and yet creates no little difficulty, moral as well as
+pecuniary, in the observance. A man honest enough and not ungenerous may
+find it hard to determine on which side duty lies. Without, however,
+abusing this go�l we may fairly take him as a type of those who are more
+impressed by the prudential view of their circumstances than by the
+duties of kinship and hospitality. If in the course of providence we
+have to decide whether we will admit some new inmate to our home worldly
+considerations must not rule either on the one side or the other.
+
+A man's duty to his family, what is it? To exclude a needy dependant
+however pressing the claim may be? To admit one freely who has the
+recommendation of wealth? Such earthly calculation is no rule for a true
+man. The moral duty, the moral result are always to be the main elements
+of decision. No family ever gains by relief from an obligation
+conscience acknowledges. No family loses by the fulfilment of duty,
+whatever the expense. In household debate the balance too often turns
+not on the character of Ruth but on her lack of gear. The same woman who
+is refused as a heathen when she is poor, is discovered to be a most
+desirable relation if she brings fuel for the fire of welcome. Let our
+decisions be quite clear of this mean hypocrisy. Would we insist on
+being dutiful to a rich relation? Then the duty remains to him and his
+if they fall into poverty, for a moral claim cannot be altered by the
+state of the purse.
+
+And what of the duty to Christ, His church, His poor? Would to God some
+people were afraid to leave their children wealthy, were afraid of
+having God inquire for His portion. A shadow rests on the inheritance
+that has been guarded in selfish pride against the just claims of man,
+in defiance of the law of Christ. Yet let one be sure that his
+liberality is not mixed with a carnal hope. What do we think of when we
+declare that God's recompense to those who give freely comes in added
+store of earthly treasure, the tithe returned ten and twenty and a
+hundred fold? By what law of the material or spiritual world does this
+come about? Certainly we love a generous man, and the liberal shall
+stand by liberal things. But surely God's purpose is to make us
+comprehend that His grace does not take the form of a percentage on
+investments. When a man grows spiritually, when although he becomes
+poorer he yet advances to nobler manhood, to power and joy in
+Christ--this is the reward of Christian generosity and faithfulness. Let
+us be done with religious materialism, with expecting our God to repay
+us in the coin of this earth for our service in the heavenly kingdom.
+
+The marriage of Ruth at which we now arrive appears at once as the happy
+termination of Naomi's solicitude for her, the partial reward of her own
+faithfulness and the solution so far as she was concerned of the problem
+of woman's destiny. The idea of the spiritual completion of life for
+woman as well as man, of the woman being able to attain a personal
+standing of her own with individual responsibility and freedom was not
+fully present to the Hebrew mind. If unmarried, Ruth would have
+remained, as Naomi well knew and had all along said, without a place in
+society, without an asylum or shelter. This old-world view of things
+burdens the whole history, and before passing on we must compare it with
+the state of modern thought on the question.
+
+The incompleteness of the childless widow's life which is an element of
+this narrative, the incompleteness of the life of every unmarried woman
+which appears in the lament for Jephthah's daughter and elsewhere in the
+Bible as well as in other records of the ancient world had, we may say,
+a two-fold cause. On the one hand there was the obvious fact that
+marriage has a reason in physical constitution and the order of human
+society. On the other hand heathen practices and constant wars made it,
+as we have seen, impossible for women to establish themselves alone. A
+woman needed protection, or as the law of England has it, coverture. In
+very exceptional cases only could the opportunity be found, even among
+the people of Jehovah, for those personal efforts and acts which give a
+position in the world. But the distinction of Israel's custom and law as
+compared with those of many nations lay here, that woman was recognized
+as entitled to a place of her own side by side with man in the social
+scheme. The conception of her individuality as of individuality
+generally was limited. The idea of what is now called the social
+organism governed family life, and the very faith that was afterwards to
+become the strength of individuality was held as a national thing. The
+view of complete life had no clear extension into the future, even the
+salvation of the soul did not appear as a distinct provision for
+personal immortality. Under these limitations, however, the proper life
+of every woman and her place in the nation were acknowledged and
+provision was made for her as well as circumstances would allow. By the
+customs of marriage and by the laws of inheritance she was recognized
+and guarded.
+
+Now it may appear that the problem of woman's place, so far from
+approaching solution in Christian times, has rather fallen into greater
+confusion; and many are the attacks made from one point of view and
+another upon the present condition of things. By the nature school of
+revolutionaries physical constitution is made a starting-point in
+argument and the reasoning sweeps before it every hindrance to the
+completion of life on that side for women as for men. Christian marriage
+is itself assailed by these as an obstacle in the path of evolution.
+They find women, thanks to Christianity, no longer unable to establish
+themselves in life; but against Christianity which has done this they
+raise the loud complaint that it bars the individual from full life and
+enjoyment. In the course of our discussion of the Book of Judges
+reference has been made once and again to this propaganda, and here its
+real nature comes to light. Its conception of human life is based on
+mere animalism; it throws into the crucible the gain of the centuries in
+spiritual discipline and energetic purity in order to make ample
+provision for the flesh and the fulfilling of the lusts thereof.
+
+But the problem is not more confused; it is solved, as all other
+problems are by Christ. Penetrating and arrogant voices of the day will
+cease and His again be heard Whose terrible and gracious doctrine of
+personal responsibility in the supernatural order is already the heart
+of human thought and hope. There is turmoil, disorder, vile and foolish
+experimenting; but the remedy is forward not behind. Christ has opened
+the spiritual kingdom, has made it possible for every soul to enter. For
+each human being now, man and woman, life means spiritual overcoming,
+spiritual possession, and can mean nothing else. It is altogether out of
+date, an insult to the conscience and common sense of mankind, not to
+speak of its faith, to go back on the primitive world and the ages of a
+lower evolution and fasten down to sensuousness a race that has heard
+the liberating word, Repent, believe and live. The incompleteness of a
+human being lies in subjection to passion, in existing without moral
+energy, governed by the earthly and therefore without hope or reason of
+life. To the full stature of heavenly power the woman has her way open
+through the blood of the cross, and by a path of loneliness and
+privation, if need be, she may advance to the highest range of priestly
+service and blessing.
+
+To the Jewish people and to the writer of the Book of Ruth as a Jew
+genealogy was of more account than to us, and a place in David's
+ancestry appears as the final honour of Ruth for her dutifulness, her
+humble faith in the God of Israel. Orpah is forgotten; she remained with
+her own people and died in obscurity. But faithful Ruth lives
+distinguished in history. She takes her place among the matrons of
+Bethlehem and the people of God. The story of her life, says one, stands
+at the portal of the life of David and at the gates of the gospel.
+
+Yet suppose Ruth had not been married to Boaz or to any other good and
+wealthy man, would she have been less admirable and deserving? We
+attribute nothing to accident. In the providence of God Boaz was led to
+an admiration for Ruth and Naomi's plan succeeded. But it might have
+been otherwise. There is nothing, after all, so striking in her faith
+that we should expect her to be singled out for special honour; and she
+is not. The divine reward of goodness is the peace of God in the soul,
+the gladness of fellowship with Him, the opportunity of learning His
+will and dispensing His grace. It is interesting to note that Ruth's son
+Obed was the father of Jesse and the grandfather of David. But was Ruth
+not also the ancestress of the sons of Zeruiah, of Absalom, Adonijah and
+Rehoboam? Even though looking down the generations we see the Messiah
+born of her line, how can that glorify Ruth? or, if it does, how shall
+we explain the want of glory of many an estimable and godly woman who
+fighting a battle harder than Ruth's, with clearer faith in God, lived
+and died in some obscure village of Naphtali or dragged out a weary
+widowhood on the borders of the Syrian desert?
+
+Yet there is a sense in which the history of Ruth stands at the gates of
+the gospel. It bears the lesson that Jehovah acknowledged all who did
+justly and loved mercy and walked humbly with Him. The foreign woman was
+justified by faith, and her faith had its reward when she was accepted
+as one of Jehovah's people and knew Him as her gracious Friend. Israel
+had in this book the warrant for missionary work among the pagan nations
+and a beautiful apologue of the reconciliation the faith of Jehovah was
+to effect among the severed families of mankind. The same faith is ours,
+but with deeper urgency, the same spirit of reconciliation reaching now
+to farther mightier issues. We have seen the Go�l of the race and have
+heard His offer of redemption. We are commissioned to those who dwell in
+the remotest borders of the moral world under oppressions of heathenism
+and fear or wander in strange Moabs of confusion where deep calleth unto
+deep. We have to testify that with One and One only are the light, the
+joy, the completeness of man, because He alone among sages and helpers
+has the secret of our sin and weakness and the long miracle of the
+soul's redemption. "Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to
+the whole creation: and lo, I am with you." The faith of the Hebrew is
+more than fulfilled. Out of Israel He comes our Menuchah, Who is "_an
+hiding place from the wind and a covert from the tempest, as rivers of
+water in a dry place, as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land_."
+
+
+
+
+INDEX.
+
+
+  Achsah, 20.
+
+  Adoni-bezek, 12.
+
+  Adventurer, the, 211.
+
+  Agnosticism, 156.
+
+  Altars, local, 338.
+
+  Amalek, 78.
+
+  Amorites, 64.
+
+  Angel of Jehovah, 147.
+
+  Ascendency of races, 14.
+
+  Astarte, 52.
+
+
+  Baal, 52.
+
+  Baal-berith, the modern, 221.
+
+  Baal-peor, 51.
+
+  Balaam, 70.
+
+  Barak, the Lightning Chief, 99;
+    agreement with Deborah, 122.
+
+  Barbarism, the new, 140.
+
+  Bethlehem, 364.
+
+
+  Canaan, its population, 6;
+    central position, 6;
+    degeneracy of its people, 8;
+    god of, 52.
+
+  Character, national, 205;
+    of Arabs, 239;
+    decision of, 378.
+
+  Charity, careless, 399.
+
+  Christ, the Strengthener, 42, 43;
+    and the inquirer, 124;
+    and the church, 152, 177;
+    critics of, 154;
+    personal pledge to, 160, 383;
+    enemies of, 181;
+    priesthood of, 208;
+    kingship of, 228;
+    sacrifice of, 251, 332;
+    manliness of, 264;
+    the temple, 343;
+    His teaching as to wealth, 388.
+
+  Christianity secularized, 330.
+
+  Church, the opposition to, 79, 82;
+    leaders in, 123;
+    custody of truth by, 124;
+    world in, 133;
+    elation of, 139;
+    right spirit of, 152;
+    confusion in, 171;
+    national, 176;
+    attacks upon, 186;
+    perpetual duty of, 353.
+
+  Completeness of life, 416.
+
+  Compromise, 88, 402;
+    with heathens, 98.
+
+  Concentration, 175;
+    and breadth, 275.
+
+  Conscience, correlative of power, 303;
+    and life, 353, 354;
+    insanity of, 357.
+
+  Conversion, 27, 159;
+    imperfect, 41;
+    helped by circumstances, 158;
+    complete, 160;
+    Ruth's, 381.
+
+  Co-partnery, with the world, 220;
+    between Hebrew and Philistine, 284.
+
+  Creed, the old, 172.
+
+  Culture, 20, 88;
+    affecting religion, 228.
+
+  Cushan-rishathaim, 69.
+
+  Custom, old, why recorded, 408.
+
+
+  Danite migration, 340.
+
+  Date of Book of Ruth, 409.
+
+  Deborah, 91;
+    inspiration of, 96, 102, 108;
+    her wisdom, 100;
+    not unmerciful, 117;
+    her judgeship, 135.
+
+  Dependents, duty to, 414.
+
+  Dependence, ignoble, 297.
+
+  Divine judgment, 11;
+    of Meroz the prudent, 132.
+
+  Divine Vindicator, the, 394.
+
+  Doubt, religious, 26.
+
+
+  Earth-force in man, 149.
+
+  Ecclesiasticism, 167, 201.
+
+  Education, 273.
+
+  Ehud, 83.
+
+  Emigration, 366.
+
+  Entanglements, base, 301.
+
+  Equipment for life, 184.
+
+  Evil, despotic, 287.
+
+  Evolution, spiritual, 4, 85, 109.
+
+  Ezra, 38.
+
+
+  Faint yet pursuing, 191.
+
+  Faith, development of, 4;
+    conflicts of, 27;
+    link between generations, 49;
+    army of, 128;
+    recuperative power of, 141;
+    power through, 203;
+    ebb and flow of, 233;
+    saves, not doing, 300;
+    courage forced on, 347.
+
+  Fidelity depends on religion, 405.
+
+  Fittest, survival of, 9.
+
+  Fleece, Gideon's, 169.
+
+  Freedom, cradle of faith, 85, 86, 90;
+    right of the rude, 258.
+
+  Free-lance, 304.
+
+
+  Gibeah, crime of, 348
+
+  Gideon, 144;
+    his fleece, 169;
+    his three hundred, 173;
+    kingship refused by, 196;
+    his caution, 197;
+    desire for priesthood, 198;
+    his ephod-dealing, 202;
+    a storm of God, 204.
+
+  Gilead, its vigour, 235.
+
+  God with man, 146.
+
+  Go�l, duty of, 398.
+
+  Gospel, at the gates of, 420.
+
+
+  Heathenism, rites of, 53.
+
+  Hebrews, language of, 31;
+    intermixture with Canaanites, 68;
+    national spirit of, 234.
+
+  Heroism, 149.
+
+  History, key to, 5, 295.
+
+  Hittites, 65.
+
+  Honey from the carcase, 289.
+
+  Humanity, priesthood of, 208.
+
+
+  Ideal, of life, 29;
+    for Israel, 48, 242.
+
+  Idolatry, 33;
+    unpardonable, 49.
+
+  Intolerance, moral, 354.
+
+  Israel, mission of, 13;
+    oppressed by Cushan-rishathaim, 72;
+    by Jabin, 92;
+    by Midianites, 137;
+    tribes of, 97, 132, 167;
+    its idea of Jehovah, 107, 118;
+    superiority of, 55, 69, 90.
+
+
+  Jael, 103, 134;
+    her tragic moment, 105.
+
+  Jealousy, tribal, 255.
+
+  Jebusites, 28.
+
+  Jephthah, the outlaw, 235;
+    chosen leader, 236;
+    his peaceful policy, 240;
+    his vow, 243;
+    his daughter, 247.
+
+  Jerusalem, 15.
+
+  Joash of Abiezer, 156.
+
+  Joshua, 45.
+
+  Jotham's parable, 214.
+
+  Judges, their vindication, 57.
+
+  Justice, passion for, 58;
+    human effort for, 104;
+    should be open, 412.
+
+
+  Kenites, 24.
+
+  Kingship, refused by Gideon, 196.
+
+  Kiriath-sepher, 18.
+
+
+  Leaders, uncalled, 163.
+
+  Leadership, incomplete, 161.
+
+  Levites, 338.
+
+  Life, the law of, 294, 299;
+    hindrances to, 296;
+    fear hindering, 297;
+    complete, 314.
+
+  Literature, 19;
+    Danites of, 345, 346.
+
+  Love, 380.
+
+  Luz, 28.
+
+
+  Marriage, 20;
+    a failure? 24;
+    rash experiments in, 284.
+
+  Marriages, mixed, 38.
+
+  Master-strokes in providence, 158.
+
+  Meroz, 132.
+
+  Micah, 335.
+
+  Midianites, 137, 195.
+
+  Missionary spirit, 137.
+
+  Moab, 77, 367.
+
+  Moderatism, 166.
+
+  Monotheism, 32.
+
+  Moral intolerance, 354.
+
+  Moses, 13, 19.
+
+  Motherhood, 268.
+
+
+  National church, 176.
+
+  Nature, God revealed in, 111-15;
+    and supernatural, 266.
+
+  Nature-cult, 42, 418.
+
+  Nazirite vow, 276.
+
+  Nomadism, religious, 25.
+
+
+  Opportunism, 166.
+
+  Organized vice, 179.
+
+  Orpah, 376.
+
+  Othniel, 22, 73.
+
+
+  Parentage, 271.
+
+  Past, the, returning, 71;
+    lessons of, 410.
+
+  Pastors, unspiritual, 344.
+
+  Patriotism, religious, 226.
+
+  Personal ends engrossing, 136.
+
+  Personality, 15;
+    in religion, 379.
+
+  Pessimism, 230.
+
+  Pharisaism, 39;
+    danger of, 356.
+
+  Philistines, 26, 62.
+
+  Philistinism, 310, 329.
+
+  Phoenicians, 63.
+
+  Polygamy, 21, 351.
+
+  Polytheism, its development, 54.
+
+  Prayer, 142, 143, 231.
+
+  Predestination, 269.
+
+  Priesthood, Gideon's desire for, 198;
+    true, 206;
+    Roman Catholic, 246.
+
+  Prophets, unrecognized, 162;
+    their preparation, 270.
+
+  Prosperity, misunderstood, 388.
+
+  Providence, imperfect instruments of, 58, 84.
+
+  Public office, 216.
+
+  Purity, 350.
+
+
+  Reconciliation, religion always for, 395.
+
+  Reformer, his character, 153.
+
+  Reformation, the true, 155.
+
+  Religion, emotional, 130;
+    and the state, 36, 75.
+
+  Remnant, the godly, 126, 131.
+
+  Repentance, imperfect, 40.
+
+  Responsibility, 300;
+    in advising, 370.
+
+  Retribution, 138.
+
+  Rich, obligations of, 390.
+
+  Rights and duties, 30, 256.
+
+  Ruth, her choice, 377;
+    conversion of 381;
+    goodness commending her, 392;
+    her danger, 401;
+    her marriage, 416.
+
+
+  Sacred places, 33.
+
+  Salvation, personal, 151.
+
+  Samson, his loneliness, 279;
+    boyhood of, 280;
+    character of, 281;
+    his marriage, 290;
+    his riddle, 291;
+    no reformer, 308.
+
+  Schism, 342, 345.
+
+  Science, dogmatism of, 112;
+    Danites of, 345.
+
+  Self-respect, 312.
+
+  Self-sacrifice, 249, 331, 333.
+
+  Self-suppression, 16, 251, 375.
+
+  Self-vindication, 358.
+
+  Separations in life, 383.
+
+  Shechem, 210.
+
+  Shibboleths, of reform, 262;
+    allowable, 263;
+    Christ used none, 264.
+
+  Sibboleths, of egotism, 260;
+    of bad habit, 260;
+    of literature, 261.
+
+  Sisera, 101.
+
+  Spiritual brotherhood, 151;
+    strength, 321, 324;
+    service, 369;
+    pauperism, 400.
+
+  Strength and character, 193.
+
+  Struggle, the law of existence, 10.
+
+  Success, sanctified, 80;
+    succeeding, 189.
+
+  Succoth and Penuel, 190.
+
+  Supernatural in human life, 267.
+
+
+  Temptation, 287;
+    process of, 317.
+
+  Theocracy, 3, 46;
+    Jotham's idea of, 214, 218.
+
+  Tribal religion, 328.
+
+  Truth and charity, 228.
+
+
+  Unscrupulous helpers, 133.
+
+
+  Veracity of the narrative, 359.
+
+  Vicarious suffering, 355.
+
+  Voluntary churches, 176.
+
+
+  Wars of conquest, 5.
+
+  Women, treatment of, 21;
+    their freedom, 22;
+    duties of, 125;
+    social bondage of, 372;
+    helpless, 373;
+    submission preached to, 375;
+    problems in their life, 416, 418.
+
+  Wrong never strong, 182.
+
+
+  Zephath, 25.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Judges and Ruth, by Robert A. Watson
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