_THE DEBT OF GUILT EXTINGUISHED_
iv. 21, 22
One after another the vain hopes of the Jews melt in mists of sorrow.
But just as the last of these flickering lights is disappearing a
gleam of consolation breaks out from another quarter, like the pale
yellow streak that may sometimes be seen low on the western sky of a
stormy day just before nightfall, indicating that the setting sun is
behind the clouds, although its dying rays are too feeble to penetrate
them. Hope is scarcely the word for so faint a sign of comfort as this
melancholy fourth elegy affords in lifting the curtain of gloom for
one brief moment; but the bare, negative relief which the prospect of
an end to the accumulation of new calamities offers is a welcome
change in itself, besides being a hint that the tide may be on the
turn.
It is quite characteristic of our poet's sombre tones that even in an
attempt to touch on brighter ideas than usually occupy his thoughts,
he should illustrate the improving prospects of Israel by setting them
in contrast to a sardonic description of the fate of Edom. This
neighbouring nation is addressed in the time of her elation over the
fall of Jerusalem. The extension of her territory to the land of Uz in
Arabia--Job's country--is mentioned to show that she is in a position
of exceptional prosperity. The poet mockingly encourages the jealous
people to "rejoice and be glad" at the fate of their rival. The irony
of his language is evident from the fact that he immediately proceeds
to pronounce the doom of Edom. The cup of God's wrath that Israel has
been made to drink shall pass to her also; and she shall drink deeply
of it till she is intoxicated and, like Noah, makes herself an object
of shame. Thus will God visit the daughter of Edom with the punishment
of her sins. The writer says that God will _discover_ them. He does
not mean by this phrase that God will find them out. They were never
hidden from God; there are no discoveries for Him to make concerning
any of us, because He knows all about us every moment of our lives.
The phrase stands in opposition to the common Hebrew expression for
the forgiveness of sins. When sins are forgiven they are said to be
covered; therefore when they are said to be uncovered it is as though
we were told that God does the reverse of forgiving them--strips them
of every rag of apology, lays them bare. That is their condemnation.
Nothing is more ugly than a naked sin.
The selection of this one neighbour of the Jews for special attention
is accounted for by what contemporary prophets tell us concerning the
behaviour of the Edomites when Jerusalem fell. They flew like vultures
to a carcass. Ezekiel writes: "Thus saith the Lord God, Because that
Edom hath dealt against the house of Judah by taking vengeance, and
hath greatly offended, and revenged himself upon them; therefore thus
saith the Lord God, I will stretch out Mine hand upon Edom, and will
cut off man and beast from it, and I will make it desolate from Teman;
even unto Dedan shall they fall by the sword. And I will lay My
vengeance upon Edom by the hand of My people Israel, and they shall do
in Edom according to Mine anger and according to My fury, and they
shall know My vengeance, saith the Lord God."[263] Isaiah xxxiv. is
devoted to a vivid description of the coming punishment of Edom. This
race of rough mountaineers had seldom been on friendly terms with
their Hebrew neighbours. Nations like individuals, do not always find
it easy to avoid quarrels with those who are closest to them. Neither
blood relationship nor commerce prevents the outbreak of hostilities
in a situation that gives many occasions for mutual jealousy. For
centuries France and England, which should be the best friends of
proximity generated friendship, regarded one another as natural
enemies. Germany is even a nearer neighbour to France than England is,
and the frontiers of the two great nations are studded with forts. It
does not appear that the extension of the means of communication among
the different countries is likely to close the doors of the temple of
Janus. The greatest problem of sociology is to discover the secret of
living in crowded communities among a variety of conflicting interests
without any injustice, or any friction arising from the juxtaposition
of different classes. It is far easier to keep the peace among
backwoodsmen who live fifty miles apart in lonely forests. Therefore
it is not a surprising thing that there were bitter feuds between
Israel and Edom. But at the time of the Babylonian invasion these had
taken a peculiarly odious turn on the side of the southern people, one
that was doubly offensive. The various tribes whom the huge
Babylonian empire was swallowing up with insatiable greed should have
forgotten their mutual differences in face of their common danger.
Besides, it was a cowardly thing for Edom to follow the example of the
Bedouin robbers, who hovered on the rear of the great armies of
conquest like scavengers. To settle old debts by wreaking vengeance on
a fallen rival in the hour of her humiliation was not the way to win
the honours of war. Even to a calm student of history in later ages
this long-past event shews an ugly aspect. How maddening must it have
been to the victims! Accordingly we are not astonished to see that the
doom of the Edomites is pronounced by Hebrew prophets with undisguised
satisfaction. The proud inhabitants of the rock cities, the wonderful
remains of which amaze the traveller in the present day, had earned
the severe humiliation so exultingly described.
[263] Ezek. xxv. 12-14.
In all this it is very plain that the author of the Lamentations, like
the Hebrew prophets generally, had an unhesitating belief in a
supremacy of God over foreign nations that was quite as effective as
His supremacy over Israel. On the other hand, iniquity is ascribed to
Israel in exactly the same terms that are applied to foreign nations.
Jehovah is not imagined to be a mere tribal divinity like the Moabite
Chemosh; and the Jews are not held to be so much His favourites that
the treatment measured out to them in punishment of sin is essentially
different from that accorded to their neighbours.
To Israel, however, the doom of Edom is a sign of the return of mercy.
It is not merely that the passion of revenge is thereby satisfied--a
poor consolation, even if allowable. But in the overthrow of their
most annoying tormentor the oppressed people are at once liberated
from a very appreciable part of their troubles. At the same time, they
see in this event a clear sign that they are not selected for a
solitary example of the vengeance of heaven against sin; that would
have been indeed a hard destiny. But above all, this occurrence
affords a reassuring sign that God who is thus punishing their enemies
is ending the severe discipline of the Jews. In the very middle of the
description of the coming doom of Edom we meet with an announcement of
the conclusion of the long penance of Israel. This singular
arrangement cannot be accidental; nor can it have been resorted to
only to obtain the accentuation of contrast which we have seen is
highly valued by the elegist. Since it is while contemplating the
Divine treatment of the most spiteful of the enemies of Israel that we
are led to see the termination of the chastisement of the Jews, we may
infer that possibly the process in the mind of the poet took the same
course. If so, the genesis of prophecy which is usually hidden from
view here seems to come nearer the surface.
The language in which the improving prospect of the Jews is announced
is somewhat obscure; but the drift of its meaning is not difficult to
trace. The word rendered "punishment of iniquity" in our English
versions--Revised as well as Authorised--at the beginning of the
twenty-second verse, is one which in its original sense means simply
"iniquity"; and in fact it is so translated further down in the same
verse, where it occurs a second time, and where the parallel word
"sins" seems to settle the meaning. But if it has this meaning when
applied to Edom in the later part of the verse is it not reasonable to
suppose that it must also have it when applied to the daughter of Zion
in an immediately preceding clause? The Septuagint and Vulgate
Versions give it as "iniquity" in both cases. And so does a suggestion
in the margin of the Revised Version. But if we accept this rendering,
which commends itself to us as verbally most correct, we cannot
reconcile it with the evident intention of the writer. The promise
that God will no more carry His people away into captivity, which
follows as an echo of the opening thought of the verse, certainly
points to a cessation of punishment. Then the very idea that the
iniquity of the Jews is accomplished is quite out of place here. What
could we take it to mean? To say that the Jews had sinned to the full,
had carried out all their evil intentions, had put no restraint on
their wickedness, is to give a verdict which should carry the heaviest
condemnation; it would be absurd to bring this forward as an
introduction to a promise of a reprieve. It would be less incongruous
to suppose the phrase to mean, as is suggested in the margin of the
Revised Version, that the sin has come to an end, has ceased. That
might be taken as a ground for the punishment to be stayed also. But
it would introduce a refinement of theology out of keeping with the
extreme simplicity of the ideas of these elegies. Moreover, in another
place, as we have seen already,[264] the word "sins" seems to be used
for the _punishment_ of sins.[265] We have also met with the idea of
the _fulfilment_, literally the _finishing_, of God's word of warning,
with the necessary suggestion that there is to be no more infliction
of the evil threatened.[266] Therefore, if it were not for the
reappearance of the word in dispute where the primary meaning of it
seems to be necessitated by the context, we should have no hesitation
in taking it here in its secondary sense, as the punishment of
iniquity. The German word _schuld_, with its double signification--_debt_
and _guilt_--has been suggested as a happy rendering of the Hebrew
original in both places; and perhaps this is the best that can be proposed.
The debt of the Jews is paid; that of the Edomites has yet to be exacted.
[264] Page 269.
[265] iii. 39.
[266] ii. 17.
We are brought then to the conclusion that the elegist here announces
the extinction of the Jews' debt of guilt. Accordingly they are told
that God will no more carry them away into captivity. This promise has
occasioned much perplexity to people concerned for the literal
exactness of Scripture. Some have tried to get it applied to the time
subsequent to the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, after which,
it is said, the Jews were never again removed from their land. That is
about the most extravagant instance of all the subterfuges to which
literalists are driven when in a sore strait to save their theory.
Certainly the Jews have not been exiled again--not since the last
time. They could not be carried away from their land once more, for
the simple reason that they have never been restored to it. Strictly
speaking, it may be said indeed, something of the kind occurred on the
suppression of the revolt under _Bar-cochba_ in the second century of
the Christian era. But all theories apart, it is contrary to the
discovered facts of prophecy to ascribe to the inspired messengers of
God the purpose of supplying exact predictions concerning the events
of history in far-distant ages. Their immediate message was for their
own day, although we have found that the lessons it contains are
suitable for all times. What consolation would it be for the fugitives
from the ravaging hosts of Nebuchadnezzar to know that six hundred
years later an end would come to the successive acts of conquerors in
driving the Jews from Jerusalem, even if they were not told that this
would be because at that far-off time there would commence one long
exile lasting for two thousand years? But if the words of the elegist
are for immediate use as a consolation to his contemporaries, it is
unreasonable to press their negative statement in an absolute sense,
so as to make it serve as a prediction concerning all future ages. It
is enough for these sufferers to learn that the last of the series of
successive banishments of Jews from their land by the Babylonian
government has at length taken place.
But with this information there comes a deeper truth. The debt is
paid. Yet this is only at the commencement of the Captivity. Two
generations must live in exile before the restoration will be
possible. There is no reference to that event, which did not take
place till the Babylonian power had been utterly destroyed by Cyrus.
Still the deliverance into exile following the terrible sufferings of
the siege and the subsequent flight is taken as the final act in the
drama of doom. The long years of the captivity, though they
constituted an invaluable period of discipline, did not bring any
fresh kind of punishment at all comparable with the chastisements
already inflicted.
Thus we are brought face to face with the question of the satisfaction
of punishment. We have no right to look to a single line of a poem for
a final settlement of the abstract problem itself. Whether, as St.
Augustine maintained, every sin is of infinite guilt because it is an
offence against an infinite Being; whether, therefore, it would take
eternity to pay the debts contracted during one short life on earth,
and other questions of the same character, cannot be answered one way
or the other from the words before us. Still there are certain aspects
of the problem of human guilt to which our attention is here drawn.
In the first place, we must make a distinction between the national
punishment of national wickedness and the personal consequences of
personal wrongdoing. The nation only exists on earth, and it can only
be punished on earth. Then the nation outlasts generations of
individual lives, and so remains on earth long enough for the harvest
of its actions to be reaped. Thus national guilt may be wiped out
while the separate accounts of individual men and women still remain
unsettled. Next we must remember that the exaction of the uttermost
farthing is not the supreme end of the Divine government of the world.
To suggest any such idea is to assimilate this perfect government to
that of corrupt Oriental monarchies, the chief object of which in
dealing with their provinces seems to have been to drain them of
tribute. The payment of the debt of guilt in punishment, though just
and necessary, cannot be a matter of any satisfaction to God. Again,
when, as in the case now before us, the punishment of sin is a
chastisement for the reformation of the corrupt nation on whom it is
inflicted, it may not be necessary to make it exactly equivalent to
the guilt for which it is the remedy rather than the payment. Lastly,
even when we think of the punishment as direct retribution, we cannot
say what means God may provide for the satisfaction of the due claims
of justice. The second Isaiah saw in the miseries inflicted upon the
innocent at this very time, a vicarious suffering by the endurance of
which pardon was extended to the guilty;[267] and from the days of
the Apostles, Christians have recognised in his language on this
subject the most striking prophecy the Bible contains concerning the
atonement wrought by our Lord in His sufferings and death. When we put
all these considerations together, and also call to our assistance the
New Testament teachings about the character of God and the object of
the work of Jesus Christ, we shall see that there are various
possibilities lying behind the thought of the end of chastisement
which no bare statement of the abstract relations of sin, guilt, and
doom would indicate.
[267] Isa. liii. 4-6.
It may be objected that all such ideas as those just expressed tend to
generate superficial views of sin. Possibly they may be employed so as
to encourage this tendency. But if so, it will only be by
misinterpreting and abusing them. Certainly the elegist does not
belittle the rigour of the Divine chastisement. It must not be
forgotten that the phrase which gives rise to these ideas concerning
the debt of guilt occurs in the doleful Book of Lamentations, and at
the close of an elegy that bewails the awful fate of Jerusalem in the
strongest language. But in point of fact it is not the severity of
punishment, beyond a certain degree, but the certainty of it that most
affects the mind when contemplating the prospect of doom. Not only
does the imagination fail to grasp that which is immeasurably vast in
the pictures presented to it, but even the reason rises in revolt and
questions the possibility of such torments, or the conscience ventures
to protest against what appears to be unjust. In any of these cases
the effect of the menace is neutralised by its very extravagance.
On the other hand, we have St. Paul's teaching about the goodness of
God that leads us to repentance.[268] Thus we understand how it can
be said that Christ--who is the most perfect revelation of God's
goodness--was raised up to give "_repentance_ to Israel" as well as
"remission of sins."[269] It is at Calvary, not at Sinai, that sin
looks most black. When a man sees his guilt in the light of his
Saviour's love he is in no mood to apologise for it or to minimise his
ill desert. If he then contemplates the prospect of the full payment
of the debt it is with a feeling of the impossibility of ever
achieving so stupendous a task. The punishment from which he would
revolt as an injustice if it were held over him in a threat now
presents itself to him of its own accord as something quite right and
reasonable. He cannot find words strong enough to characterise his
guilt, as he lies at the foot of the cross in absolute self-abasement.
There is no occasion to fear that such a man will become careless
about sin if he is comforted by a vision of hope. This is just what he
needs to enable him to rise up and accept the forgiveness in the
strength of which he may begin the toilsome ascent towards a better
life.
[268] Rom. ii. 4.
[269] Acts v. 31.