THE PROPHECY OF THE RETURN
Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God.
Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her
warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she
hath received of the Lord’s hand double for all her sins.
The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the
way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our
God.
Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill
shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and
the rough places plain.
And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh
shall see it together: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken
it.--_Isaiah_ xl. 1-5.
Who gave Jacob for a spoil, and Israel to the robbers? did not
the Lord, he against whom we have sinned? for they would not
walk in his ways, neither were they obedient unto his law.
Therefore he hath poured upon him the fury of his anger, and
the strength of battle: and it hath set him on fire round
about, yet he knew not; and it burned him, yet he laid it not
to heart.--_Isaiah_ xlii. 24-25.
But now thus saith the Lord that created thee, O Jacob, and he
that formed thee, O Israel, Fear not: for I have redeemed thee,
I have called thee by thy name; thou art mine.
For I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour:
I gave Egypt for thy ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for thee.
Fear not: for I am with thee: I will bring thy seed from the
east, and gather thee from the west;
I will say to the north, Give up; and to the south, Keep not
back: bring my sons from far, and my daughters from the ends of
the earth.--_Isaiah_ xliii. 1, 3, 5, 6.
Thus saith the Lord, thy redeemer, and he that formed thee from
the womb, I am the Lord that maketh all things; that stretcheth
forth the heavens alone; that spreadeth abroad the earth by
myself;
That frustrateth the tokens of the liars, and maketh diviners
mad; that turneth wise men backward, and maketh their knowledge
foolish.
That confirmeth the word of his servant, and performeth the
counsel of his messengers; that saith to Jerusalem, Thou shalt
be inhabited; and to the cities of Judah, Ye shall be built,
and I will raise up the decayed places thereof:
That saith to the deep, Be dry, and I will dry up thy rivers:
That saith of Cyrus, He is my shepherd, and shall perform all
my pleasure: even saying to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be built; and
to the temple, Thy foundation shall be laid.--_Isaiah_ xliv.
24-28.
Thus saith the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand
I have holden, to subdue nations before him; and I will loose
the loins of kings, to open before him the two-leaved gates;
and the gates shall not be shut;
I will go before thee, and make the crooked places straight: I
will break in pieces the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the
bars of iron.--_Isaiah_ xlv. 1-2.
Bel boweth down, Nebo stoopeth, their idols were upon the
beasts, and upon the cattle; your carriages were heavy loaden;
they are a burden to the weary beast.
They stoop, they bow down together; they could not deliver the
burden, but themselves are gone into captivity.--_Isaiah_ xlvi.
1-2.
Come down, and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon,
sit on the ground: there is no throne, O daughter of the
Chaldeans: for thou shalt no more be called tender and
delicate.--_Isaiah_ xlvii. 1.
Sit thou silent, and get thee into darkness, O daughter of
the Chaldeans: for thou shalt no more be called, The lady of
kingdoms.
I was wroth with my people, I have polluted mine inheritance,
and given them into thine hand: thou didst shew them no mercy;
upon the ancient hast thou very heavily laid thy yoke.
And thou saidst, I shall be a lady for ever: so that thou didst
not lay these things to thy heart, neither didst remember the
latter end of it.
Therefore hear now this, thou that art given to pleasures, that
dwellest carelessly, that sayest in thine heart, I am, and none
else beside me; I shall not sit as a widow, neither shall I
know the loss of children:
But these two things shall come to thee in a moment in one day,
the loss of children, and widowhood: they shall come upon thee
in their perfection for the multitude of thy sorceries, and for
the great abundance of thine enchantments.--_Isaiah_ xlvii. 5-9.
Thou art wearied in the multitude of thy counsels. Let now the
astrologers, the stargazers, the monthly prognosticators, stand
up, and save thee from these things that shall come upon thee.
Behold, they shall be as stubble; the fire shall burn them;
they shall not deliver themselves from the power of the flame:
there shall not be a coal to warm at, nor fire to sit before it.
Thus shall they be unto thee with whom thou hast laboured, even
thy merchants, from thy youth: they shall wander every one to
his quarter; none shall save thee.--_Isaiah_ xlvii. 13-15.
Hear ye this, O house of Jacob, which are called by the name of
Israel, and are come forth out of the waters of Judah, which
swear by the name of the Lord, and make mention of the God of
Israel.--_Isaiah_ xlviii. 1.
[Sidenote: [586-536 B.C.]]
After hearing this sonorous prophecy of Isaiah, in which, at worst, the
wish was father to the thought, we may hear what so critical a student
of Jewish history as Ernest Renan had to say of the prophets in general.
“As much as half a century before the capture of Samaria,” he says,
“almost all the activity of the Hebrew genius had been concentrated
in Judah. Prophetism had arrived at its main conclusions--namely,
monotheism, God (or Jehovah) being the sole cause of the phenomena
of the universe; the justice of Jehovah and the necessity that that
justice should be carried into effect on earth and for each individual
within the limits of his own existence; a democratic puritanism in
manners, hatred of luxury, of secular civilisation, of the obligations
resulting from complicated civil organisation; absolute trust in
Jehovah; the worship of Jehovah, consisting above all in purity of
heart. The immensity of such a revolution astounds us, and when we
reflect on it we find that the moment when the creation took place is
the most fertile in the whole history of religion. Even the initial
movement of Christianity in the first century of our era, gives place
to this extraordinary movement of Jewish prophetism in the eighth
century before Christ. All of Jesus is contained in Isaiah. The
humanitarian destiny of Israel is as clearly written towards 720 as
that of Greece will be two hundred years later.
“Down to the time of Elijah and Elisha, Israel is not essentially
distinguished from the neighbouring peoples; there is no mark on her
forehead. From the moment now reached, her vocation is absolutely
laid down for her. After a very favourable reign (that of Hezekiah),
prophetism will traverse a long period of trial (the reigns of
Manasseh and Amon), and will then completely triumph under Josiah. The
history of Judah will henceforth be the history of a religion, first
confined during long centuries to her own limits, then mingling by the
victory of Christianity in the general movement of mankind. The ancient
prophets’ cry of justice will not be stifled. Greece will lay the
foundations of lay society, free in the sense in which the economists
understand it, without heeding the sufferings of the weak which result
from the greatness of the social work. Prophetism will accentuate the
just claims of the poor; it will undermine the position of the army
and of royalty in Israel; but it will found the synagogue, the Church,
societies for the poor, which, from the time of Theodosius, will become
all powerful and will govern the world. During the Middle Ages the
thundering voice of the prophets, interpreted by Saint Jerome, will awe
the rich and powerful, and, for the benefit of the poor, or those who
pretend to be such, will prevent every sort of industrial, scientific,
or worldly progress.
“Germanic laicism repulsed the thrusts of this oppressive ebionism. The
warrior, Frank, Lombard, Saxon, Frisian, took his revenge on the man
of God. The warrior of the Middle Ages was so simple-minded that his
credulity soon brought him again under the yoke of theocracy, but the
Renaissance and Protestantism emancipated him; the Church could not
recover her hold on her prey. In fact, the barbarian, the most brutal
of lay princes, was a deliverer compared with the Christian priest
with the secular arm at his disposal. The hardest oppression is that
exercised in the name of a spiritual principle; lay tyranny contents
itself with the homage of the body; the community which has the power
to enforce its opinions is the worst of scourges.
“The work of the prophets has thus remained one of the essential
elements of the world. The motion of the world is the resultant of the
parallelogram of two forces--liberalism on the one side, and socialism
on the other; liberalism of Greek origin, socialism of Hebrew origin;
liberalism making for the greatest human development, socialism paying
attention first of all to justice, understood in a strict sense, and to
the happiness of the greatest number in practice, so often sacrificed
to the needs of civilisation and the state. The socialist of our
time who declaims against the abuses inevitable in a great organised
state, greatly resembles Amos, representing as monstrous the most
obvious necessities of society, such as the payment of debts, loans on
security, and taxes.
“Before venturing to say which of these two opposing tendencies is
the right one, we must know what is the goal of humanity. Is it the
well-being of the individuals who compose it, or is it the attainment
of certain abstract, objective aims, as they are called, which require
hecatombs of individuals as sacrifices? Each will answer according to
his moral temperament, and that is enough. The universe, which never
ceases to make revelations, reaches its end by an infinite variety of
ways. What Jehovah wills always comes to pass. Let us be calm; if we
are of those who are mistaken, who work against the tide of the supreme
will, it is of little consequence. Humanity is one of the innumerable
ant-hills where reason gains her experience in space; if we miss our
part, others will gain it.”
Accepting the prophets and prophecy, then, in whatsoever spirit one
individually will, it is interesting to note in what manner and to what
degree the prophecy is fulfilled, for the Jews return to rebuild the
temple and the walls, only to remain obscure, and helplessly to pass
from master to master.[a]
THE CONDITION OF THE EXILES
The history of the Hebrews is divided into two distinct periods. The
first, purely legendary until the time of Samuel, only becomes a true
history under the kings; it ceases abruptly for Israel at the siege of
Samaria by Shalmaneser IV [and Sargon II] and for Judah about a century
later at the siege of Jerusalem by Nebuchadrezzar.
The ruin of Israel was complete; the tribes, transported to the other
side of the Euphrates, by degrees forgot their former recollections,
customs, language, even their religion, and became confounded with
the nations of Higher Asia. When and how, it is not known. Colonists
brought into Canaan by Esarhaddon, replaced them by mingling themselves
with the remains of the Israelite population. Such was not the case
with the Judeans taken to Babylon; although not so numerous, they kept
to their national life during exile. When the occasion arose, they
returned to their own country, surrounded themselves by the rural
population left by the conqueror to cultivate the land, and became the
centre of a new nation.
The Jews transported by Nebuchadrezzar had been established in
different provinces of the Chaldean Empire, in which they dwelt
together. Their condition was infinitely better than that of political
exiles in Siberia, Cayenne, or Numea at the present time. Jeremiah
advised his compatriots to cultivate and build, which proves that they
were given land and that they formed colonies.
They were governed by their elders who judged without appeal even in
extreme cases, as is seen by the story of Susanna in the addition to
the Book of Daniel. Nothing prevented them from carrying on their
religion freely. It is true that as sacrifices could be offered
regularly only at Jerusalem, the sacrificers had no employment: but
the prophets maintained their influence, and Ezekiel speaks several
times of the visits paid to them so as to consult the Lord. M. Munk
says: “There were probably meetings where prayer was offered up in
common, and perhaps the origin of synagogues dates back to this time. A
tradition referred to in the _Talmud_ of Babylon, Meghilla, fol. 28, a,
attributes the foundation of a synagogue built of stones from the Holy
Land, to the exiles who had accompanied Jehoiakim.”
The legends of Daniel in the lions’ den, and of the three men in the
furnace, do not suffice to make one believe in a religious persecution,
which the contemporary prophets would not fail to have mentioned; all
that can be concluded from these popular traditions, gathered very much
later, is that some Jews, doubtless eunuchs or diviners, were able to
play a part at the court of the Babylonian kings. The natural wrath
of the Jews against the destroyer of Jerusalem, gave rise to a legend
according to which, Nebuchadrezzar, in punishment of his arrogance,
was driven from amongst men for seven years and reduced to being a
beast. “And he did eat grass as oxen, and his body was wet with the dew
of heaven, till his hairs were grown like eagles’ _feathers_ and his
nails like birds’ _claws_.” It is probable that the Jewish captives in
Babylon took the large winged bulls with human heads at the gates of
the Assyrian palaces, for images of the kings. The historical books
of the Bible do not mention this legend, which is only quoted in the
Book of Daniel, written in the time of Antiochus Epiphanes. A song
of triumph on the death of Nebuchadrezzar is written in the Book of
Isaiah.
THE COMING OF CYRUS
[Sidenote: [538 B.C.]]
In the reign of Nabonidus, called Belshazzar in the Book of Daniel,
Babylon was besieged by Cyrus, king of the Persians. The town was
well supplied with provisions, and relied on the strength and height
of its walls: but Cyrus turned aside the waters of the Euphrates, and
made his army enter the dried-up bed of the river. Had the Babylonians
suspected his intentions they might have caught the enemy in a trap
by closing the doors leading to the Euphrates: but they were occupied
in celebrating a feast. This circumstance gave rise to the legend of
Belshazzar, related in the Book of Daniel.
Cyrus is not even mentioned in this account, a strange omission,
considering it was he who gave the Jews back their country. M. Munk
identifies the Median Darius of Daniel with the Xerxes of Xenophon; but
the _Cyropædia_ is a romance bearing no more authority than the Book of
Daniel. After the accession of Cyrus, the Jews had followed the rapid
progress of the New Persian Empire with interest. The siege of Babylon
seemed to them the vengeance of their God on those who had oppressed
his people. They considered the Persians as deliverers, for the enemies
of our enemies are always our friends. This sympathy and hope are
vividly expressed by the second Isaiah. He calls Cyrus, “the Shepherd
of Jehovah, who performeth his pleasure even in saying to Jerusalem,
Thou shalt be built, and to the temple, Thy foundations shall be laid.”
He is so persuaded that Cyrus is the instrument of the God of the
Jews, chosen especially to deliver them, that he gives him the name
of Messiah like to a true king of Israel: “Thus saith the Lord to his
anointed, to Cyrus whose right hand I have holden, to subdue nations
before him, to open before him the gates. I will go before thee, and
make the crooked places straight: I will break in pieces the gates of
brass and cut in sunder the bars of iron.… I am the Lord and there is
none else. I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and
create evil: I the Lord do all these things.” The last sentence is an
allusion to the Mazdean doctrine of the two principles. The Persians
attribute the good to a good god named Ormuzd, and evil to a wicked
god named Ahriman. The prophet on the contrary proclaims one only god,
author alike of good and evil, which proves that at this time the
belief in the devil had not yet been accepted by the Jews.
Nevertheless, there was a great connection between the Jewish and
Iranian religions: both were iconoclastic, and the Bible never accuses
the Persians of idolatry, as it does other nations. The kindness
Cyrus showed to the Jews is generally attributed to these religious
affinities. It can also be accounted for by political reasons. The
facility with which he had taken Babylon seems to indicate that he
had accomplices in the place. In favouring the Jews he was acquitting
himself of a great obligation. It may be that he proposed from thence
to conquer Egypt, and that he thought it would be advantageous to
place on the Egyptian frontier, an energetic people whose fidelity was
assured to him. According to the Bible, from the first year of his
reign, or rather in the year following the siege of Babylon, he allowed
the Jews to return to Jerusalem and build their temple. He even gave
the chief priest all the sacred vessels that had been taken from the
temple at Jerusalem by Nebuchadrezzar. This chief priest, grandson to
King Jehoiachin, bore the characteristic name of Zerubbabel, that is
to say, “born at Babel.” In other passages he is designated under the
name of Sheshbazzar, which seems to be more of a title than of a proper
name.
[Illustration: THE DAMASCUS GATE, JERUSALEM]
THE RETURN TO JERUSALEM
[Sidenote: [536-515 B.C.]]
The decree of Cyrus appeared in 536 B.C., fifty-two years after the
fall of Jerusalem, and sixty-three years after the exile of King
Jehoiachin. Ineffectual efforts have been made so that these figures
should correspond to the seventy years of captivity prophesied by
Jeremiah, which only represents a round and undetermined number in
the mind of the prophet. The greater part of the Hebrew captives had
followed the advice of Jeremiah, and built houses and cultivated their
fields. In the land of their exile they had developed that aptitude
for commerce which to-day distinguishes the Jewish race. It was hard
for them to sacrifice their interests to begin a new life in a ruined
country. Those who, having taken advantage of the decree of Cyrus, had
left Babylon under Zerubbabel, numbered about forty thousand without
counting the slaves according to Ezra, who also gives a list of the
families; this list is reproduced with variations in the Book of
Nehemiah and in the Third Book of Esdras.
“In adding up the detailed numbers,” says M. Munk, “there are scarcely
thirty thousand. According to the Jewish doctors one must take into
consideration the surplus of the Israelites of the ten tribes.”
In spite of this explanation made to conciliate the figures, it is
generally acknowledged that the emigrants all, or nearly all, belonged
to the ancient tribe of Judah. The name _Jehoudin_, Judeans, corrupted
into that of Jews, must henceforth be used to designate the new
political and religious society which established itself in Palestine.
It was, thanks to the unceasing efforts and exclusive patriotism of
the theocratic party, that the Jews had gone through the long years
of exile without ceasing to be a nation, without mixing with strange
people. Among the families who returned to Judea, those of the priests
formed at least one-eighth of the total. Some, not having their
genealogies, were excluded from the priesthood.
After the return to Jerusalem, the first care of Zerubbabel and the
high priest Jeshua was to raise the altar for the sacrifices, and to
gather together the offerings of the chiefs of the fathers for the
reconstruction of the temple.
“They gave money also unto the masons, and to the carpenters; and meat
and drink, and oil, unto them of Sidon and to them of Tyre, to bring
cedar trees from Lebanon to the sea of Joppa, according to the grant
that they had of Cyrus, king of Persia. Now in the second year of
their coming into the house of God at Jerusalem, in the second month,
began Zerubbabel, son of Shealtiel, and Jeshua, the son of Jozadak,
and the remnant of their brethren the priests and the Levites, and all
they that were come out of the captivity unto Jerusalem; and appointed
the Levites from twenty years old and upward, to set forward the work
of the house of the Lord.… And when the builders laid the foundation
of the temple of the Lord, they set priests in their apparel with
trumpets, and the Levites the sons of Asaph with cymbals, to praise the
Lord, after the ordinance of David, king of Israel” (_Ezra_ iii. 8, 10).
In this, the Book of Ezra describes an event which Josephus places in
the time of Darius, and which shows that in the narrow zeal of the
sacerdotal aristocracy, the pride of race had as large a share as
religious intolerance. We remember that after the destruction of the
kingdom of Israel, populations from Media and Chaldea, principally
Kutheans, had been established by Esarhaddon in the land of Samaria, so
as to replace the Israelites transported over the Euphrates. According
to the Book of Kings, these strange colonists adopted the God of their
new country. They feared the Lord and served their own gods after the
manner of the nations out of which they had been brought to Samaria.
The descendants of these colonists having mingled themselves more and
more with the remains of the former Israelite population, the custom of
strange worship diminished. The reform of Josiah spread itself over the
land, and in the Book of Jeremiah we read that after the destruction
of Jerusalem, the people of Shiloh, Shechem, and Samaria came and wept
over the ruins of the temple. Thus, in spite of their strange origin,
the Samaritans had the same religion as the Jews, and although the Book
of Ezra calls them the enemies of Judah and Benjamin, the step they
took with regard to the emigrants of Babylon showed the most brotherly
dispositions.
“Now when the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that the Children
of the Captivity builded the temple unto the Lord God of Israel; then
they came to Zerubbabel, and to the chief of the fathers and said unto
them: Let us build with you: for we seek your God, as ye do; and we
do sacrifice unto him since the days of Esarhaddon king of Asshur,
which brought us up hither. But Zerubbabel and Jeshua and the rest of
the chief of the fathers of Israel said unto them: Ye have nothing to
do with us to build an house unto our God; but we ourselves together
will build unto the Lord God of Israel, as king Cyrus the king of
Persia hath commanded us. Then the people of the land weakened the
hands of the people of Judah, and troubled them in building. And hired
counsellors against them, to frustrate their purpose all the days of
Cyrus king of Persia, even until the reign of Darius king of Persia.”
[Sidenote: [515-450 B.C.]]
But the temple was built in spite of the intrigues of the Samaritans,
and the dedication took place in the sixth year of the reign of Darius
(515 B.C.). According to the Book of Ezra, Darius found the decree of
Cyrus among the records at Ecbatana and ordered it to be carried out.
We know nothing of the fate of the Jewish colony during the last thirty
years of the reign of Darius and during the twenty years of the reign
of Xerxes. The Book of Ezra contains no fact relating to this period
for more than half a century.
In the seventh year of the reign of Artaxerxes Longimanus (458 B.C.),
more than half a century after the establishment of the temple, a
new colony of Jews left Babylon for Jerusalem under the leadership
of Ezra, grandson of the priest Seraiah who had been put to death by
Nebuchadrezzar at the fall of Jerusalem. Ezra had taken the title
of “sophar,” that is to say, scribe or doctor of the law: “he had
prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord, and to do it, and to
teach in Israel statutes and judgments.” The firman he had obtained
from Artaxerxes has come to us travestied by the Jews, and the terms
are even more suspicious than those of the decree of Cyrus. It is
possible that the king may have helped the emigrants with money or
provisions and even exempted the priests from taxes; but it is not
likely that he would have condemned to death, as the Book of Ezra
says, those who would not submit to the religious law which the leader
of the expedition was going to enforce. This law, wrought during the
captivity under the influence of the prophet Ezekiel, answered to the
authoritative inspirations of the sacerdotal party of whom Ezra was
the chief. All privileges were reserved for the priests, of whom the
Levites were only the servants. This explains why among the fifteen
chiefs of families, who answered to Ezra’s appeal, there was not one
Levite. Nevertheless, there was a great number of them in Babylonia.
Ezra, with a great deal of trouble, succeeded in recruiting a few of
them.
The first colony led by Zerubbabel, arrived in Judea under very
trying circumstances. The land had not remained unoccupied during the
captivity at Babylon. Besides the poor people whom Nebuchadrezzar left
there, because they were not worth taking away, Idumæans, Moabites,
and other strangers had come and settled themselves. A place had to
be found among them, for the new-comers were not powerful enough
to expel them. The emigrants had to consider themselves lucky in
forming alliances with the families who were in possession of the
territory, without ascertaining whether these families were of pure
Israelite blood. But when Ezra arrived at the head of a new colony,
the difficulties of the first installation no longer existed. The
marriages contracted by his predecessors with strange women seemed
to him abominable and ungodly. He prayed, fasted, rent his garments,
assembled the people, and begged that these wretched beings should be
sent away with their children. It was, as the authors of _The Family
Bible_ remark, like a new form of sacrifice of children to Moloch. But
without seeking examples in the Canaanite religions, Ezra could remind
them of Abraham sending his servant Hagar into the desert accompanied
by her child.
[Sidenote: [450-445 B.C.]]
The authority of a priest and the national pride stifled all family
feeling: “All the congregation answered and said with a loud voice, As
thou hast said, so must we do. But the people are many and it is a time
of much rain, and we are not able to stand without, neither is this a
work of one day or two: for we are many that have transgressed in this
thing.”
An assembly, presided over by Ezra, held a severe investigation. The
Bible gives us the names of one hundred and thirteen individuals who
had married strange women, and who had to send them away with their
children. Those belonging to the priesthood offered a ram in expiation
of their sin. The number of children is unknown, also whether each
mother was able to take away the bread and water such as Abraham had
given to Hagar in sending her into the desert. In the following year
great events took place, the counterblow of which must have been felt
in Judea, although the Bible does not mention it.
THE WALLS UPRAISED AGAIN
[Sidenote: [445-415 B.C.]]
Egypt raised itself against Persia and took as king the Libyan Inarus.
The armies of the land and sea, destined to crush this rebellion,
assembled in Syria and Phœnicia. Inarus having been put to death with
fifty Greek prisoners in spite of the conventions sworn, the satrap of
Syria, Megabyses, indignant at this treachery, in his turn revolted.
It is not known whether the Jews took the part of the king or of the
satrap. It is supposed that on this occasion the walls of Jerusalem
were again destroyed, but the Book of Ezra does not say so; it ends
abruptly after the account of the expulsion of the strange women, and
we only find Ezra again, thirteen years later, in the Book of Nehemiah,
which also bears the title of The Second Book of Ezra. Nehemiah,
whose recollections helped to compose this work, was a zealous Jew,
cupbearer to king Artaxerxes. He obtained his master’s permission to
go to Jerusalem and raise the walls, and started as a pasha of Judea
with an escort of cavalry, and royal letters to the keeper of the
forests who was to supply the timber for construction. In spite of his
official position, and the prestige which the favour of the king was
to give him, he had to fight against adversaries who were sufficiently
powerful to raise serious difficulties for him. He names three of them:
Sanballat, the Horonite; Tobiah, a royal servant in the land of the
Ammonites; and Geshem, the Arab.
The pride of the Jews began to bear its fruit; the Samaritans whose
disinterested help they had refused, the strange families whose
daughters they had repudiated, were not anxious to see Jerusalem a
stronghold once more: those who were for peace feared the dreams of
independence pertaining to the Messiah, and useless rebellions followed
by blood-shed: the country people feared the concentration of political
and religious authority in the capital.
At first they mocked at the fortifications begun, then threatened the
workmen; Nehemiah made them work with their swords at their sides; at
night there were sentinels. They tried to intimidate him, and told
him that he was accused of wishing to be proclaimed King of the Jews,
they wanted to draw him to meetings, but by prudence he refused to go.
He was even suspicious of his friends; prophets told him his life was
in danger, and advised him to hide in the temple; he thought a trap
was being laid for him, and that they were trying to make him violate
the law which forbids the laity to enter the temple; and he answered,
“Should such a man as I flee?” Thanks to his energy and activity, the
work was finished at the end of fifty-two days.
After having raised the walls of Jerusalem, Nehemiah resolved to quiet
the discord which was beginning to show itself among the classes. The
poor complained of the rich. Many people had to borrow money to pay the
taxes; they had hired out their fields and vineyards, and then sold
their sons and daughters so as to have bread.
Nehemiah, instead of preaching resignation and patience to the poor,
made the rich ashamed of their hardness. He reminded them that at
Babylon, according to his means he had redeemed those Jews who had
become slaves to strangers: “And will ye even sell your brethren?
or shall they be sold unto us? Then held they their peace, and found
nothing to answer. And I said: It is not good that ye do: ought ye not
to walk in the fear of our God because of the reproach of the heathen
our enemies? I likewise, and my brethren and my servants might exact of
them money and corn. I pray you let us leave off this usury. Restore,
I pray you, to them, even this day, their lands, their vineyards,
their olive yards, and their houses. Then said they We will do as thou
sayest.” Nehemiah made them take the oath before the priests and shook
his garment, saying: “So God shake out every man from his house, and
from his labour, that performeth not this promise, even thus he be
shaken out, and emptied. And all the congregation said Amen.”
With its walls and gates Jerusalem was a town and not a city; there
were no inhabitants. The Jews preferred living in the country, where
they cultivated their fields, to shutting themselves up in this town
without any resources, which in the time of the monarchy owed its
riches only to the presence of the court. Nehemiah and the chiefs of
the people agreed that one-eighth of the population of Judea should
establish itself at Jerusalem, and they cast lots for the families
who had to transfer, _nolens volens_, their dwellings thither. They
established a sort of police; sentinels were placed at the gates, which
were shut at night, and only opened in the morning after sunrise. But
the new Jewish state could only be constituted by the promulgation of
the law. Standing on a platform facing the people, solemnly assembled
for the autumn feast, Ezra read the Law called by the name of Moses.
If Josephus can be relied on, the public reading of the Law took place
several years sooner, and Ezra had died before the arrival of Nehemiah
in Jerusalem: but the Bible attests the presence of Nehemiah beside
Ezra. The congregation indulged in oriental demonstrations, there
were fasts, prayers, loud confessions; they smote their breasts, clad
themselves in sackcloth, and put dust on their heads, after which they
signed the agreement to conform to the Law. The Bible gives the names
of those who signed in the name of all the people. There were twenty
priests, almost as many Levites, and forty-four laymen. Ezra’s name is
not on the list; it is supposed that he had died before the act was
drawn up.
Those who signed undertook to repudiate all strange marriages, to
buy nothing on the Sabbath day, to observe the sabbatical year, to
pay one-third of a shekel (about twenty cents) yearly for the divine
service, to supply the wood for the sacrifices, to offer the first-born
of men and animals and the first fruits of the earth, and to pay tithes
for the maintenance of the priests and Levites. As they had to live
in Jerusalem they had to be kept: but the precepts which appeal to
peoples’ purses are not readily received. Malachi, the last of the
prophets, complains of the negligence in the paying of the tithes. At
the same time he accuses the priests of failing to do their duty and
making themselves despised by the people.
[Sidenote: [415 B.C.]]
After a sojourn of twenty-two years in Jerusalem, Nehemiah had
resumed his duties at the court of Artaxerxes. He soon heard that his
constitution had difficulty in establishing itself, and he obtained
fresh leave from the king. He found his work compromised: buying
and selling took place on the Sabbath as on other days; the Levites
not being paid, had left their posts; mixed marriages had become so
frequent that the children spoke a mixture of Hebrew and strange
dialects. The ruling class set the bad example, as is nearly always
the case. The high priest, Eliashib, had given a lodging in the temple
to Tobiah, one of his relations, and had married one of his sons to a
daughter of Sanballat; these two men were adversaries of Nehemiah. He
showed himself very severe; he sent away the son-in-law of Sanballat,
turned Tobiah out of his apartment, closed the gates of the town during
the whole Sabbath, and forbade the merchants of Tyre to approach the
walls on that day. He entirely shared the ideas of Esdras on the
subject of mixed marriages. Had not strange women been the fall of the
wise king Solomon? Israel must be purified from this contamination. He
struck those who were refractory and pulled out their hair. They had to
submit, willingly or unwillingly. The payment of the tithes was assured
to the Levites and priests, and regular order was established in the
administration of the revenues of the temple. That was the chief point,
and Nehemiah had the right to consider himself the benefactor of the
Jewish theocracy: “Remember me, O my God, concerning this, and wipe not
out my good deeds that I have done for the house of my God, and for the
offices thereof.”[4][d]
FOOTNOTES
[4] [It should perhaps be mentioned that some critics and historians
are not inclined to accept the statements of the writers of Ezra and
Nehemiah _en masse_.]
[Illustration: THE DEAD SEA, LOOKING TOWARDS MOAB, WITH THE CONVENT OF
MAR SABA IN FOREGROUND]