Womanhood During the Conquest and the Theocracy, or Rule of the Judges.
RAHAB--GREAT GRACE FOR GREAT SINNERS--THE FALL OF JERICHO--THE
COVENANT REMEMBERED--DEBORAH--HER REMARKABLE COURAGE--SISERA’S IRON
CHARIOTS BROKEN--THE DAUGHTER OF JEPHTHAH--HER LOVING DEVOTION
AND SACRIFICE--THE STORY OF NAOMI--ORPAH’S KISS--THE LOVING
RUTH--GLEANING AMONG THE REAPERS--HER RICH REWARD--HANNAH--HER
CONSECRATION--YEARLY VISITS TO SHILOH--STITCHING BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS
INTO SAMUEL’S COAT--HER BEAUTIFUL LIFE.
After the death of Miriam at Kadesh, on the borders of Zin, and the
death of Aaron on Mount Hor, and of Moses on lofty Pisgah, Joshua “sent
out of Shittem two men to spy secretly, saying, Go, view the land, even
Jericho. And they went, and came into an harlot’s house, named Rahab,
and lodged there.”
The occupation of this woman has called out much comment, and many
attempts have been made to clear her character of the stains of vice
by affirming that she was only an inn-keeper, and not a harlot. No
doubt there is much truth in this statement, for we can not entertain
the thought that two pure-minded young men sent out by a leader like
Joshua would pass by an inn and purposely seek an house of ill repute.
It is also possible that to a woman of the age in which she lived,
such a calling may have implied a far less deviation from the standard
of morality than it does with us, with nearly two thousand years of
Christian teaching. We must not forget that Rahab was a heathen; and
the heathen knew very little of the simplest principles of truth and
purity. In the first chapter of Paul’s Epistle to the Romans he gives a
life picture of pagan morals. Even among the polished Greeks, loyalty
to their religion made personal purity impossible. The Canaanites were
so vile that, in the emphatic language of Scripture, the land vomited
them out. The glimpse we catch of Lot’s neighbors may show in what a
cesspool of vice Rahab was brought up. But even if we judge this woman
by our modern standards, and admit that she was all that is implied in
the opprobrious term, the fact that she is listed among God’s elect
women shows the wondrous power of divine grace. God can save a great
sinner just as easy as a small one. Notwithstanding she carried the
double disability, that of being a heathen and a great sinner, her
story is told in full. She has honorable mention by the Apostle James
as an illustration of the works that show strong faith; and by the
spirit of inspiration in the Epistle to the Hebrews, giving her a
place among the mighty heroes and heroines who wrought marvels through
confidence in God.
At the time when the Israelites were encamped in Shittem, ready to
cross the Jordan and enter the land of promise, Jericho was the
strongest fortified city in Canaan, and, as the key to Western
Palestine, commanded the two mountain passes which led into the land
that was to be possessed. It was to be taken; but how? Joshua sent two
of his most trusted men to spy out the land, remembering, no doubt with
much trepidation, the failure of forty years before, which made them go
back and die in the desert.
The life of the spies, the success of the enterprise, and the courage
their report would give the Israelites, all turned on the faith and
skill of Rahab. She saved to God’s people the battle they had lost
forty years before. No wonder that Hebrew writers have thrown the
glamor of romance over her story.
Her house was situated on the wall, probably near the city gate, so as
to be convenient for persons coming in and going out of Jericho. She
seems not only to have kept an inn for wayfaring men, but also to have
been engaged in the manufacture of linen and the art of dyeing, for
which the Phœnicians were early famous, since we find the flat roof of
her house covered with stalks of flax, put there to dry, and a stock
of scarlet or crimson line in her house, a circumstance which, coupled
with the mention of Babylonish garments as among the spoils of Jericho,
indicates the existence of a trade in such articles between Phœnicia
and Mesopotamia. It also appears she had a father and mother, brothers
and sisters, who, if they were not living in the same house with her,
were dwelling in Jericho.
Traders coming from Mesopotamia, or Egypt to Phœnicia, would frequently
pass through Jericho, situated as it was near the fords of the Jordan,
and, according to the customs of the times, these travelers would seek
a public inn.
These men, coming and going, would naturally enough carry the news of
current events with them. Rahab therefore had opportunity to be well
informed with regard to the events of the Exodus. As we learn from her
own story, she had heard of the passage through the Red Sea, of the
utter destruction of Sihon and Og, and of the irresistible progress
of the Israelitish host. The effect upon her mind had been what one
would not have expected in a person of her way of life. It led her to
a firm faith in Jehovah as the true God, and to the conviction that He
purposed to give Canaan to the Israelites. She may have thought long
and deeply on these strange events, and, possibly, her better nature
may have loathed the vices of her people, in which she herself had
become involved, and longed for the pure worship of the wonder-working
God of whom she had heard.
When, therefore, the two spies sent out by Joshua, who must have been
men of moral character and worthy of so important a commission, came to
Jericho, no doubt they were divinely directed to her house, who alone,
of the whole population, was friendly to their cause. Her heart, at all
events, was prepared to receive the message with which they intrusted
her, and she gave them the information they sought. And such faith had
she in the purposes of God to give the land to the hosts of Joshua that
she made a covenant with these representatives of his army, to save her
and her family when the city fell into their hands.
The coming of these spies, it seems, was quickly known, and the king of
Jericho, having received information of it while at supper, according
to Josephus, sent that very evening to require her to deliver them up.
It is very likely that, her house being a public one, some one who
resorted there may have seen and recognized the spies, and at once
reported the matter to the authorities. But not without awakening
Rahab’s suspicions, and she was courageous enough to hide them under
the flax on the roof, and throw the officers off their suspicion, while
she let the Hebrews down over the wall and hurried them away to the
mountains, to stay till the hunt was given up and the guards had come
back from the fords of the Jordan, thus allowing them to escape across
the river to their camp.
For her kindness to them she had asked that when the city should be
taken, her life and the lives of all that belonged to her should be
spared, and it was agreed that she should hang out her scarlet line at
the window from which the spies had escaped.
The event proved the wisdom of her precautions. The pursuers returned
to Jericho after a fruitless search, and the spies reached the
encampment of Israel in safety. The news they brought of the terror of
the king and citizens of Jericho doubtless inspired the Israelitish
host with fresh courage, and, within three days of their return, the
passage of the Jordan was effected.
No one could have been more interested than Rahab during those eventful
days. Perhaps, from the window of her dwelling on the city wall, she
saw the waters of the Jordan piled on each other, and stretching back
over the plain as far as the eye could see--a sight she had never
seen, and equal to the dividing of the Red Sea. Toward evening she saw
the advance guards of Joshua’s host, and then the white-robed priests
bearing the ark, followed by the army and people, and encamping at
Gilgal, within two miles of Jericho, and in full view of the city.
After having carefully reviewed her household to assure herself that
her father and mother, brothers and sisters, were all there--for this
was the covenant she had made with the spies--she probably seated
herself at the window from which hung the scarlet cord, to watch the
strange procession that marched around the city seven days. Each
morning it came filing up from Gilgal in solemn silence, except as the
white-robed priests blew their trumpet-blasts.
No one can tell what risk Rahab took, or what indignities she suffered
in convincing her relatives that they must be in the covenanted place
when the city fell. On her part it was a beautiful faith. Perhaps she
recounted to them the ten awful plagues that fell on the Egyptians,
the deliverance of His people from the house of bondage, the disaster
to Pharaoh and his army at the Red Sea, the opening of streams in the
desert, the nightly dewfall of food, the lofty column of cloud that
shaded and led by day, and the pillar of fire that kept them safe from
night enemies, human and bestial. All this she told to the assembled
household as the ground of her faith, with which she would inspire
them. No doubt this woman of Jericho, sick at heart on account of her
own past life, and the wickedness of her city, thirsted for a fuller
knowledge of the true and holy God whose name she hardly dared to take
on her sin-polluted lips, and yet, strange as it may seem, she had the
strength and honesty to succeed in the preaching of righteousness to
her friends.
Day after day she watched the strange procession marching around the
closely shut and guarded city. Joshua and the soldiers were at its
head; then came the priests with their trumpets, and after them the Ark
of the Covenant, hid from view with coverings, and carried reverently
on men’s shoulders, while soldiers guarded it from real dangers.
Jericho breathed a little more freely when it saw that the strange
desert people marched around the city day after day without striking a
blow; but Rahab’s faith held steady, and the scarlet cord swung from
her window. That cord may have meant to her the blood of the Redeemer
cleansing from sin. No doubt, like Moses, she knew the meaning of the
“reproach of Christ.”
The seventh day she was found early at her window, with a sense of
completeness in her obedience and faith. Again the Hebrews filed forth
from their camp and marched around the city; but this time they kept
on till they had gone around the wall six times. The seventh round,
the voice of the old captain at the head of the host rang along the
line--“Shout! for Jehovah hath given you the city.”
[Illustration: THE FALL OF JERICHO.]
Before Rahab fully realized the meaning of this strange command, her
ears were filled with the crash of falling walls. In the dust and din,
the cries, the shrieks, the terror, but little could be distinctly
remembered, only that the desert soldiers who were taking the town were
leading her and her kindred forth to a place of safety.
The narrator adds, “and she dwelleth in Israel unto this day,” meaning,
the family of which she was reckoned the head, continued to dwell among
the Lord’s people. May not the three hundred and forty-five “children
of Jericho,” mentioned in Ezra ii, 34, and “the men of Jericho” who
assisted Nehemiah in rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, have been the
descendants of her kindred?
As regards Rahab herself, we learn from Matt, i, 5, that she became
the wife of Salmon the son of Naasson, and the mother of Boaz, the
grandfather of Jesse. It has been conjectured that Salmon may have
been one of the spies whose life she saved, and that gratitude for so
great a benefit led to their marriage. But, however this may be, it
is certain that Rahab became the mother of the line from which sprang
David, and eventually Christ.
Distasteful as it may be to goody-good people, the fact remains that
Rahab believed God, and when He delivered her out of her heathen
surroundings, she entered upon a pure life. Whom God pardons, He
justifies. Whom he justifies, He brings to that relation with Himself
that would have been held if the sin had never been committed. He does
not doom man or woman to life-long penance for sins that have been
washed away by the blood of the Lamb.
It is not accidental that Matthew traces the Saviour’s genealogy
through four women, namely Thamar, Rachab, Ruth, and Bathsheba, who
were not of the Israelitish stock, three of whom were of doubtful
morals, and one, Rachab, who carried a double disability. Christ came
to save humanity, and that He might be an all-sufficient Saviour, He
abased Himself--took us at our worst--that no human soul, however sunk
in sin, might despair. And Rahab the harlot was transformed into Rahab
the saint, cleansed and purified, and clothed in White Raiment.
From the thrilling incidents just related, the history of God’s chosen
people runs on for a hundred years or more before Deborah comes to view
on the stage of life. In the meantime Joshua had led the Israelitish
hosts to victory, had subdued the several kings, and divided the
land among the tribes. Then came years of rest and prosperity, and,
strange to say, a turning away from the Author of all their blessings.
These departures from their national faith brought down upon them the
judgments of God.
The Israelites were now ruled by judges, and at the time Deborah comes
to our notice, Barak seems to have been the executive head of the
nation.
Deborah was probably a woman of the tribe of Ephraim. Her tent was
spread under the palm-tree between Ramah and Bethel in Mount Ephraim,
and she was a prophetess, in whom was combined both poetry and
prophecy. Deborah stands before us in strong contrast with the customs
and prejudices of her time. God’s people were being oppressed by the
Canaanites. In the midst of this great national crisis she was called
to stand at the head both of statesmanship and the terrible exigencies
of war.
Sisera, the general of Jabin’s army, with nine hundred iron war
chariots, and a multitude had assembled in the western extremity of
the great plain of Jezreel, near the brook Kishon that flows along the
northern base of Mount Carmel. Barak, the executive head, was either so
timid or apprehensive that the campaign would fail, and thus fasten the
tyrant’s chain yet more strongly, that the people looked to Deborah for
judgment. She tried to arouse Barak’s courage. She even appealed to the
prejudices that were strong in those times, namely, that the victory
would be given to a woman if he refused to go. But in vain. He would
not move without her. She knew, far better than he, that the battle was
not theirs, but God’s. The Lord alone could give victory. Faith was
easier to her than to Barak, for she had the spiritual insight that
knows the utter nothingness of human help.
For twenty years God’s people had been oppressed by their enemies.
At last they had repented of the sins that made necessary their
captivity, and the Lord had inspired Deborah to rally them to resist
their oppressors. Perhaps Barak hesitated, because, viewed from a human
standpoint, he may have felt the utter inadequacy of the Hebrew army
to cope with the Syrians and their nine hundred iron war chariots. But
just there lies the secret of all success. Only when we are weak, are
we strong. This is the victory, even our faith. We have not that faith
till we get to the end of our own resources and trusts.
But while Deborah put Barak at the head of the army, she bravely stood
by him with her counsels, her prayers, her faith, and her wholesome
reproof, for Deborah was a practical and sensible woman. Her name
signifies “the bee,” and she was well provided with the sting as well
as the honey, and knew how to stir up Barak by wholesome severity as
well as encourage him by holy inspiration. He is a very foolish man who
refuses to be helped by the shrewd intuitive wisdom of a true woman,
for while her head may not be so large, its quality is generally of
the best; and her conclusions, though not reasoned out so elaborately,
generally reach the right end by intuitions which are seldom wrong.
Woman’s place is to counsel, to encourage, to pray, to believe, and
pre-eminently to help. This was what Deborah did.
Barak, however, was not always weak. As soon as he had recovered
himself from the surprise of the unexpected call to lead the little
army of ten thousand against the myriads of Sisera, he consented on
condition that the courageous Deborah go with him. By this timidity he
lost not a little of the honor that he might have won, and his sharp
and penetrating leader plainly told him that the victory should not be
wholly to his credit, for God should deliver Sisera into the hands of a
woman; and so there were really two women in this struggle for liberty,
and Barak was sandwiched in between them. With Deborah in front, and
Jael in the rear, and Barak in the midst, even poor, weak Barak became
one of the heroes of faith who shine in the constellation of eternal
stars, upon which the Holy Spirit has turned the telescope of the
eleventh chapter of Hebrews.
How the inspiring faith of Deborah must have nerved Barak for heroic
action. Her message to him is all alive with the very spirit and
innermost essence of the faith that counts the things that are not
as though they were. “Up,” she cries, as she rouses him by a trumpet
call from his timorous inactivity; “for this is the day,” she adds,
as she shakes him out of his procrastination, “in which the Lord hath
delivered Sisera into thine hand.” She goes on to say, as she reckons
upon the victory as already won, “Is not the Lord gone out before
thee?” She concludes, as she commits the whole matter into Jehovah’s
hands, and bids him simply follow on and take the victory that is
already given.
Is it possible for faith to speak in plainer terms, or language to
express with stronger emphasis the imperative mood or the present tense
of that victorious faith, for which nothing is impossible?
Again, we have here the lesson of mutual service. This victory was
not all won by any single individual, but God linked together as He
loves always to do, many co-operating instruments and agents in the
accomplishment of His will. There was Deborah representing the spirit
of faith and of prophecy. There was Barak representing obedience
and executive energy. There were the people that willingly offered
themselves; the volunteers of faith. There were the yet nobler hosts
of Zebulun, and Naphtali, that jeoparded their lives unto the death,
the martyrs who are the crowning glory of every great enterprise. And
there was Jael, the poor heathen woman away out on the frontiers of
Israel, who gave the finishing touch, and struck the last blow through
the temples of the proud Sisera, while high above all were the forces
of nature, and the unseen armies of God’s providence; for the stars in
their courses fought against Sisera, and the flood of the Kishon rolled
down in mountain torrents and swept the astonished foe away.
Sisera’s iron chariots were broken and scattered; but his will and
prowess would soon have another army in the field, more terrible than
the first. To answer fully the faith that took hold of God’s strength,
the Canaanitish general must die. But not by the hand of Barak. His
wavering faith had forfeited that honor. That last act which should
bring victory to the army of Israel would be performed through the
courage of a woman. The woman who was to complete the deliverance was
the wife of an Arab sheik, of a family descended from Jethro, Moses’
father-in-law.
The tribe of Jael and of her husband, Heber, was encamped under the
“Oak of the Wanderers.” These Arabs were on good terms with both
Hebrews and Syrians; but Jael must have had the spiritual sense to
see that the Lord had taken in hand the freeing of Israel, and she
must use the opportunity to further His plans. So when Sisera left his
unmanageable chariot and escaped from the battle on foot, he came to
her tent worn out with the fatigue of the fight and flight, and she
gave him the hospitality for which he begged; but while he was in the
deep sleep of exhaustion, she drove a tent pin into his temple. His
death made impossible the rallying of the host against God’s people.
Better far that one man should die, than that thousands of both Hebrews
and Syrians should fall on the battlefields of prolonged warfare.
Jael has honorable mention in Deborah’s superb song of triumph. Stanley
says of that pæan of victory: “In the song of Deborah we have the only
prophetic utterance that breaks the silence between Moses and Samuel.
Hers is the one voice of inspiration (in the full sense of the word)
that breaks out in the Book of Judges.”
Jael is the only woman mentioned in the Bible who ever took a human
life. We confess that the exploit seems unwomanly, but we must not
forget there is no sex in right or wrong-doing, though it may be long
before we can rid ourselves of the habit of requiring a higher morality
in a woman than in a man.
In this heroic effort on the part of Deborah to throw off the yoke of
a cruel oppressor, we see the curse of neutrality, and the pitiful
spectacle, which seems always to be present, of the unfaithful,
ignoble and indifferent ones who quietly looked on while all this
was happening, and not only missed their reward, but justly received
the curse of God’s displeasure and judgment. And so, in the Song of
Deborah, we hear of Reuben’s enthusiastic purposes, but does nothing.
We see her fiery scorn for those who strayed among the bleatings of
the sheepfolds, rather than the trumpet of the battle. We see her
sarcasm strike the selfish men of Gilead who abode beyond Jordan; the
careless Danites who remained in their ships, and men of Asher who,
secure in their naval defences, stayed away up yonder on the seashore,
and took refuge in their ports and inland rivers, while, above all the
echoes of her denunciations, rings out the last awful curse against the
inhabitants of Meroz, a little obscure city that probably had taken
refuge in its insignificance, because its inhabitants had refused to
come up to the help of the Lord against the mighty.
Finally, this scene is a pattern page from God’s book of remembrance.
Some day we shall read the other pages and find our names recorded
either with the inhabitants of Meroz and Reuben, or with the victors of
faith who stood with Deborah, and Barak, and Jehovah, in the battles of
the Lord. Oh, shall we shine now like stars in the night, and then like
the sun in the kingdom of our Father?
Passing on in our narrative from the brave deeds of Deborah, we next
come to one of the most heroic daughters in Israel, and her great act
of utter abnegation to save a father’s vow is so beautiful that, like
the good Samaritan in our Lord’s touching parable, uttered in answer to
the question, Who is my neighbor? the name is lost in the fragrance of
the deed. She is simply Jephthah’s daughter.
It was during that stormy period in the history of Israel, when again
and again they had fallen into the idolatrous practices of their
heathen neighbors around them. These unlawful acts had often called
down the judgments of God upon them. In the time of Jephthah, the
Israelites were smarting under the oppression of an Ammonitish king.
The unsettled character of the age was such that the elders of the
people sought in vain for a suitable leader, who could command the
confidence of his countrymen.
There was one man, however, a native of Gilead, who was a brave and
successful leader. This was none other than Jephthah, but, because he
had been born a child of misfortune, his brethren disowned him, and
had cast him out. In most persons such treatment develops a spirit of
misanthropy and bitterness which often find expression in revenge.
But Jephthah seemed to have possessed a much sweeter disposition than
his brethren. His faith seems to have been anchored to God, and, as is
usually the case, when all else forsook him then the Lord took him up,
and, trusting in Jehovah, he lived to have a glorious revenge upon his
unkind people by bringing them a blessing instead of the curse that
they had given him.
We have a little touch of his character in the name he gave his new
home. He called it the land of Tob. Tob means “good,” and this is but a
little straw to tell how the wind blew in Jephthah’s life.
And so the day came when Jephthah’s brothers were glad to send
for him to be their deliverer, and Jephthah had the high honor of
returning good for evil, and saving the people that once despised
him. He consented to become their leader on the condition, which was
solemnly ratified before the Lord in Mizpah, that in the event of his
success against the Ammonitish king he should still remain as their
acknowledged head. This is the way that God loves to vindicate us, to
make us a blessing to those that hated us and wronged us. His promise
is, “I will make them to come and worship before thy feet, and to know
that I have loved thee.”
When Jephthah responded to their appeal, and came for their help, we
see in his very words and acts the spirit of godliness and a lofty
faith. We are told explicitly that all his words to his own people
were “before the Lord.” He spoke as in Jehovah’s presence. He also went
against his adversaries in the name of Jehovah God. The battle was not
his, but the Lord’s, and such faith never can be confounded. It was
not long before Jephthah returned in triumph from the slaughter of his
enemies. His country was delivered, his claims vindicated, and his
enemies were destroyed.
But now we come to the great trial in Jephthah’s life, which shows
not only the loftiest faith, but the sublimest faithfulness. In the
hour of peril he had vowed a vow unto Jehovah, pledging that when he
returned in victory the first object that he met should be dedicated to
the Lord, an offering to Him. As he came back amid the acclamations of
universal triumph, the first who met him when he approached his home
was his beautiful daughter, and as he realized all that his vow had
meant, he was overwhelmed for a moment with the deepest emotion. But
not for an instant did he hesitate in his firm and high purpose, nor
once did that dear child shrink back from the sacrifice imposed upon
her, but stood nobly with her father, demanding that he should fulfill
his vow to the utmost.
The scene is very graphically described: When “Jephthah came to Mizpah
unto his house, behold, his daughter came out to meet him with timbrels
and with dances; and she was his only child; beside her he had neither
son nor daughter. And it came to pass, when he saw her, that he rent
his clothes and said, Alas, my daughter! thou hast brought me very low,
and thou art one of them that trouble me, for I have opened my mouth
unto the Lord, and I can not go back.”
This noble child of faith certainly was equal to her father’s trial,
and lovingly replied, “My father, if thou hast opened thy mouth unto
the Lord, do to me according to that which hath proceeded out of thy
mouth.”
There has been much discussion as to the real meaning of Jephthah’s
vow, and the real fate of his lovely, obedient daughter. That the
daughter of Jephthah was really offered up to God in sacrifice, slain
by the hand of her father and then burned, is a horrible conclusion,
and contrary to all we know of his life, upon which we have dwelt at
some length in order to bring out its characteristics. With such a
sweet trust and confidence in God as is manifest in his every act, we
can not believe that either Jephthah meant to make a human sacrifice,
or that his daughter so understood it. There are several passages and
constructions which can leave no doubt in the mind of the candid reader
that such was not the literal intention, and that this fair child
of faith and obedience was not to be slain upon the altar like the
children of Ammon before their god of fire, but that her fresh life was
given in all its purity as a living sacrifice of separation and life of
service to Jehovah.
In the eighteenth chapter of Deuteronomy we find the most solemn
warnings given to Israel against imitating in the least degree the
cruel and wicked rites of the Ammonites, especially in offering human
sacrifices. Now these Ammonites were the very people against whom
Jephthah had gone forth to war, and as godly follower of Jehovah
he must have been familiar with the commandments of the book of
Deuteronomy. For him, therefore, to directly disobey these solemn
injunctions would have been to prove false to all his character and all
the meaning of his victory in the name of Jehovah.
Again, in the twelfth chapter of Exodus, it is clearly taught that
the first-born of Israel were all to be recognized as the Lord’s, and
liable, therefore, to death, like the Egyptian first-born. But, instead
of their lives being literally required, they were redeemed by the
blood of a lamb, and the Paschal lamb was offered instead of the life
of the Hebrew, and that life was still regarded as wholly the Lord’s,
given to Him in living consecration, of which the whole tribe of Levi
was regarded as the type, and therefore it was separated unto the
service of the Lord as a substitute for the lives of the first-born.
In all this was clearly taught the lesson that what God required
from His people was not a dead body, but a “living sacrifice.” It is
much harder to live for God than to die for God. It takes much less
spiritual and moral power to leap into the conflict and fling a life
away in the excitement of the battle than it does to live through
fifty years of misunderstanding, pain and temptation. It would have
been easier for Jephthah’s daughter to have lain down amid the flowers
of spring, the chants and songs of a religious ceremonial, the tears
and songs of the people who loved her, and know that her name would
be forever enshrined, than to go out from the bright circle of human
society and all the charms of youth and beauty and domestic and social
delight, and live as a recluse for God alone, giving up the dearest
hope of every Hebrew woman, not only to be a mother, but to be the
mother of the promised Christ; giving up also, along with her father,
the fond desire of a son to share his honor and his sceptre, to prolong
his name. All this it meant. This was the sacrifice she made. And so we
read that she did not go aside to bewail her approaching death, but she
went aside for two months to bewail her “virginity,” the loneliness of
her own life, then gladly gave her life a living sacrifice to God.
There are several other considerations that might be added if necessary
to establish this construction of the passage. It is enough to briefly
refer to the fact that the phrase in the eleventh chapter of Judges,
verse thirty-nine, is in the future tense, and refers to her future
virginity and not her past, and also that the translation of the
fortieth verse in one of our versions, is that the daughters of Israel
went yearly “to talk” with the daughter of Jephthah four times in a
year. It is not necessary to pursue the argument further. Enough for
our present purpose that we catch the inspired lesson. That lesson is
supreme, unqualified, unquestioning fidelity to God.
How tender and beautiful the lesson which this passage gives to the
young as well as the old! Just as Isaac stands out in the older story
in a light as glorious as Abraham in yonder sacrifice on Mount Moriah,
so Jephthah’s daughter’s sacrifice must not be forgotten in the honor
we pay her father. Sweet child of single-hearted consecration! God help
her sisters and her followers to be as true. Oh, beloved, do not wait
until desire shall fail and age chill the pulses of ardent youth, and
the world fall away from you itself. But when the flowers are blooming,
and the cup is brimming, and the heart beats high with earthly love
and joy and hope, then it is so sweet, it is so wise, it is so rare,
to pour all at His blessed feet, as Mary poured her ointment on His
head, and some day to receive it back amid the bloom and peals of
yonder land, where they that have forsaken friends and treasures, fond
affections and brightest prospects for His dear sake, shall receive a
hundredfold, and shall have the still richer joy of knowing that they
have learned His spirit and understood His love.
Following the story of Jephthah’s daughter and her heroic
self-sacrifice, we next come to the touching scenes and incidents
related in the life of Ruth and her mother-in-law, Naomi. This is,
confessedly, one of the sweetest idyls ever written. As a singular
example of virtue and piety in a rude age and among an idolatrous
people; as one of the first fruits of the Gentile harvest gathered
into the Church; as the heroine of a story of exquisite beauty and
simplicity; as illustrating in her history the workings of Divine
Providence, and the truth of the saying, “the eyes of the Lord are
over the righteous;” for the many interesting revelations of ancient
domestic and social customs which are associated with her story, Ruth
has always held a foremost place among the Women in White Raiment.
The story begins at Bethlehem, so dear to the Christian heart. A famine
had occurred, and even the fertile plains of Bethlehem Ephratah (the
fruitful) failed to give sufficient food to its inhabitants. On this
account Elimelech, an Ephrathite, left his home with his wife and
two sons and went to sojourn in the land of Moab, the hilly region
south-east of the Dead Sea, where the descendants of Lot dwelt. Here
Elimelech died, and Naomi, his wife, was left a widow with her two
sons, Mahlon and Chilin.
The young men, when grown, took them wives of the women of Moab.
Probably this was another severe trial to Naomi, for she had doubtless
warned them that it was contrary to God’s law that they should marry
daughters of the heathen. Other strokes came quickly upon her, for her
two sons died also. Naomi, notwithstanding her nationality, had won the
respect and warmest attachment of her sons’ wives; and now, when death
had desolated their homes and laid in the dust the strong men to whom
they had clung, they only drew the closer to each other.
At the end of ten years, and having heard that there was plenty again
in Judah, Naomi resolved to return to Bethlehem. Orpah and Ruth also
purposed to accompany her. We can imagine the sad farewell visit to the
graves of the beloved dead, and then together set out on foot for the
land which the Lord had blessed.
After they had gone on their way for some distance, Naomi, with
heartfelt acknowledgment of their fidelity to her, endeavored to
persuade them to return to their own kindred. But they both declared
that they would cleave to her. And so they trudged on until probably
the borders of Moab were reached, when Naomi once more urged them to
return to their people. Orpah this time yielded to Naomi’s urgent
request, and giving her a kiss of farewell, returned to her people.
Ruth, however, still clave to Naomi, with self-sacrificing love.
Pointing to the form of Orpah, Naomi entreated Ruth to follow her
sister’s example.
This was the crisis in Ruth’s life, on which her future destiny was to
turn. But the clinging nature of Ruth refused to be separated from the
warm heart of Naomi, and no one can fail to be moved by the pathos of
her reply, “Entreat me not to leave thee, or 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, I will die, and there will I be buried: the Lord do so to
me, and more also, if aught but death part thee and me.” This tender
loyalty and undying love must have touched the strong, brave heart of
Naomi, for Ruth’s noble plea covered every possible condition in life
through which they might be called to pass, and refused to be separated
even in death.
[Illustration: RUTH THE FAITHFUL FRIEND.]
The decision was so firmly, so solemnly stated that there was nothing
more to be said, and Naomi, doubtless glad in her loneliness to retain
the treasure of such a true and loving heart, made no further effort
to alter her purpose, and so the two journeyed on together towards
Bethlehem.
There were two things in conflict, one with the other, at this stage in
the experience of these women. 1. Ruth had learned to know and to love
the true God, and we must believe she loved him with the intensity of
her nature. The opportunity was offered, and she determined to forsake
her heathen idols, and to unite herself with the people of Jehovah, and
to rest within the shadow of the wings of the God of Israel, regardless
of trials or poverty that might await her in the future. 2. On the
other hand, Naomi was brave to take Ruth with her, for she knew the law
that excluded the Moabite, and it is marvelous that Ruth was received
into the Hebrew nation, for her people were specially interdicted, and
doubtless this was the reason why Naomi sought and urged Orpah and Ruth
to turn back.
At length, after days of travel, the two lone women, weary and
footsore, arrived at Bethlehem, and all the city was moved about the
event, and as they looked into the face of the elder woman and saw the
deep lines of sorrow, they said, “Is not this Naomi?” Yes, it was Naomi
(which means delightsome), in her youth, before her life became blasted
with sorrow and want. In her destitution her name seems to her to be
a mockery, and she exclaims, “Call me Mara!” that is, bitterness. She
went out with her husband and sons full of hope, now she has returned
with only the bitter recollection of three graves in the land of Moab,
and herself in abject poverty.
No one seemed to have helped Naomi in her sorrow and distress. But
Ruth, true to her declaration, clung to Naomi, and bravely took it upon
herself to provide for both. It was the time of the barley harvest, and
the brave girl went out into the fields to glean after the reapers, a
privilege that the law of Moses allowed to the poor of the land.
“Her hap” was to enter the field of Boaz. It was a “hap” so far as
Ruth was concerned, but back of it was the ordering of Him who is the
husband of the widow and the Father of the fatherless. Boaz came into
the field, and after the good manners of those times, exchanged pious
and kindly salutations with his reapers. Now Boaz was a near kinsman of
Ruth’s deceased husband, and a man of wealth and consideration, but of
course knew nothing about this Moabitess. However, having learned that
she was the companion of Naomi, he generously permitted her to glean
among the sheaves, and instructed his reapers to let drop a handful now
and then on purpose for her.
And so this loving heart gleaned through the hot hours of the day until
evening, and then she beat the barley from the straw, and the result
proved she had “about an ephah” (over a bushel) of barley.
With the result of her day’s labor under her arm, she hastened home,
and when Naomi saw it, she asked, “Where hast thou gleaned to-day?”
Ruth replied that the name of the man in whose field she had gleaned
was Boaz.
Naomi loved her beautiful, widowed daughter-in-law; and she was eager
for her to have a happy home, claiming in Israel the inheritance of the
departed, and so she told Ruth of the relation in which Boaz stood to
her, and instructed her to claim at the hands of Boaz that he should
perform the part of her husband’s near kinsman, by purchasing the
inheritance of Elimelech, and taking her to be his wife. But there
was a nearer kinsman than Boaz, and it was necessary that he should
have the option of redeeming the inheritance for himself. He, however,
declined, fearing to mar his own inheritance. Upon which, with all due
solemnity, Boaz took Ruth to be his wife, amidst the blessings and
congratulations of their neighbors.
The most sweetly primitive and poetic touch of all this story is the
blessing of the women upon Naomi, when the babe that had been given
Ruth after her marriage to Boaz was laid in the mother-in-law’s bosom:
“Blessed be the Lord, which had not left thee this day without a
kinsman, that his name may be famous in Israel. And he shall be unto
thee a restorer of thy life, and a nourisher of thine old age; for thy
daughter-in-law, which loveth thee, which is better to thee than seven
sons, hath borne him.”
Ruth, by birth, was a heathen. As such, she was excluded from God’s
covenanted people. But, in her case, love was mightier than law. In the
fullness of time it was shown to be the fulfillment of law. Though her
people were specially interdicted, she was admitted to the first rank
and led by Providence into the line of the world’s nobility. Her life
shows how God values beautiful, loving character even more than great
deeds. As her name indicates, she was a “faithful friend.” It was what
she was, rather than what she did, that brought her the high honor
of being the mother of Obed, and the ancestress, not only of David
and Solomon, the greatest Jewish kings, but of Christ Himself. To a
believing people like the Hebrews, who lived for the future, that was
the climax of Divine approval.
What amazing results have been accomplished by women of faith. It will
be well for us to study and emulate the sweet, obedient faith of this
beautiful Moabitess. We must remember that it is not the quantity,
but quality, of our service that pleases most our heavenly Father;
not what we do, but what we are. We may never do great things, but,
through grace, we can all be faithful. We may pass from the stage of
action, but the splendid deeds wrought in faith will remain, shedding
their influence across the bosom of a sinful world, like so many beacon
lights guiding a guilty race back to a Father’s love, and the world’s
final redemption.
We now come to Hannah, the last woman in White Raiment under the
Theocracy. The mother of the great and good Samuel will ever stand in
history as among the purest of women. It often happens that the mother
is lost sight of in the fame of her son. This is quite true in the life
of Samuel. He stands out the great Reformer of his time, lifting his
people out of the Dark Ages of the Old Testament and leading them into
the Golden Age of David’s kingdom and Israel’s pre-eminence among the
nations.
But while Samuel ranks with Joseph, and Joshua, and Daniel, in the
blamelessness of his life, let us not forget that back of that great
life was a woman’s broken heart, a woman’s tears, a woman’s life made
bitter by disappointment and humiliation, made so by a polygamous
system whose fruit must ever be jealousy and sorrow--ever a sign of a
low condition of social morality.
Poor, heart-broken Hannah was one of the two wives of Elkanah, an
Ephrathite. However, the record does not show that she was unloved by
her husband. Indeed, it appears that he tried to comfort her, gallantly
asking her if he were not more to her than ten sons. But her sorrow
that she had no children made her countenance sad, and took away her
appetite for food. At length, however, out of her crushed heart came
the believing prayer that brought her victory and consolation.
It was the fixed habit of Elkanah to go with his family “yearly to
worship and to sacrifice unto the Lord of Hosts in Shiloh.” On one of
these yearly visits, Hannah poured out her prayer in great sobs and
tears. She was very definite in her petition. She asked for a son,
not that she might know the joy of motherhood, but that God might be
glorified. She promised that she would “give him unto the Lord all the
days of his life.” And so earnest was she in pressing her suit, that
Eli the priest thought her drunk, and reproved her for her conduct.
But she bravely told him her story. She said she was a “woman of a
sorrowful spirit.” She had drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but had
poured out her soul before the Lord.
The spirit of prophecy came upon the good old man, and though he knew
nothing of the nature of her prayer, he promised its fulfillment. “Go
in peace: and the God of Israel grant thee thy petition that thou hast
asked of Him.” Hannah believed, and she “went her way, and did eat, and
her countenance was no more sad.”
After her beautiful boy was born, and began to show his charming baby
ways, she trembled under his dainty caresses, and the kisses of his
pure, sweet mouth, for she remembered her vow; but she was true and
faithful.
It is a brave, strong, submissive mother who can give up without a
murmur the child that God takes to Himself; but to know that he is
alive somewhere, and at that very hour may be grieving for lack of the
love and care that only a mother can give, O how that ordeal must rend
the heart! Just that was the test of Hannah’s loyalty. In just that
severe balance of obedience and trust was she weighed, and she was not
found wanting.
When her child was old enough to be left without a mother’s watchful
care she took him to the Tabernacle and gave him to Eli, to be brought
up as a child of the sanctuary. “I have lent him to the Lord,” she
said, “and as long as he lives he shall be lent unto the Lord.” Not for
a few days or weeks did she give him up, but she gave him wholly and
with a sacrifice that only a mother could understand, she consented
that the little feet for whose pattering she had longed should be heard
no more in her cottage, that the prattle for whose music her lonely
heart had waited a lifetime should sound no more in her ears, but that
she should live on till the end alone, glad to know that he was all the
Lord’s, and was giving back to God the blessing which he had brought
to her. This is love and this is the difference between the love of
earth and the love of heaven. Earthly love loves for the pleasure it
can find in loving. Heavenly love loves for the blessing it can give to
the loved one. Hannah knew that her sacrifice was best for Samuel, and
that in giving him to God she was getting more for him than a mother’s
selfish fondness could ever have bestowed.
And yet there was still the sweet thought behind it all that he was
hers. She was not losing him but lending him, and God counted her
sacrifice a real service, and some day would restore the loan with
infinite and eternal additions.
When Hannah had triumphed over her own heart, and her boy was safely
under the care and instruction of Eli, to be used to the utmost in
the Lord’s service, she sung her song of thanksgiving for the birth
of her son. Her hymn is in the highest order of prophetic poetry.
Its resemblance to that of the Virgin Mary has been noticed by
Bible students, and is specially remarkable as containing the first
designation of the Messiah under that name. Though written in the days
of scant literary attainment, the song of Hannah is an exquisite piece
of composition. It is full of keen insight and superb power. Besides
what was written by Moses, men wrote but little poetry in that early
time. The hymns of Miriam, Deborah and Hannah have rare beauty. It was
the daughters rather than the sons who prophesied in song.
But while the child Samuel, “girded with a linen ephod,” “ministered
before the Lord,” in the Tabernacle, in Shiloh, the loving mother
heart, in her home, was stitching her beautiful thoughts year after
year into the little coat which she annually brought to him, “when
she came up with her husband to offer the yearly sacrifice.” And we
may well believe that Hannah’s loyalty and good sense made plain,
serviceable garments, so that the mind of the young Samuel was not
diverted from his Tabernacle duties to gay and bright colors in his
tunics, and so his young heart was kept from the blight of pride. This
was the lad’s high privilege. He was always a holy child. He never
knew the defiling breath of wickedness. This may be the privilege of
your child, Christian mother. God help you to protect your innocent
babe from the foul breath of sin’s contamination and always to shelter
that trusting life under the protecting wings of God. This may be your
privilege, happy Christian child, who perchance may read these lines
to-day. Oh, let God have your earliest years and may you never know the
mystery of iniquity and the memories of sin and shame which, though
they may be forgiven, yet come back to defile and distress the heart.
But Samuel was not holy and good by natural birth or disposition. It
was not because that he was good anyhow by temperament. The keynote of
his life was, “Speak, Lord, for Thy servant heareth.” At first even he
made some mistakes and misunderstood the voice that spake to him so
gently in his little chamber. Three times it called to him in vain, and
he thought it was the old priest’s message, but even when he understood
not he still responded and sprang to his feet, ready instantly to obey.
The very peculiarities of Samuel’s call lingered in his later life in
his messages to Saul, “Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and
to hearken than the fat of rams.” All his blessings had come to him
by hearkening and obeying, and all Saul’s calamities had come to him
because he willfully took his own way and refused to listen to God.
From Hannah’s consecration of her child we may learn two excellent
lessons, embodying the greatest principles that underlie the human side
of the redemption of the race: First, the mother’s power; and second,
the child’s ability to know God. She had so thoroughly lent Samuel to
the Lord that he held true to God in the degeneracy of Eli’s judgeship
and the slackness of the priesthood, as illustrated in the family of
Eli. The social condition of the age was a shocking exhibition of low
sensuality, licentiousness and cupidity that would disgrace even the
grossest heathenism. Eli himself, while a just and holy man in his own
private character, was weak and inefficient as a judge and a priest,
and utterly failed to restrain his ungodly family or exercise any just
administration of public affairs. The whole nation was, therefore, in
a most pitiable condition, at the mercy of its foreign oppressors and
so enfeebled that a few years later we find there was not a sword in
Israel, and they had even to go to the grindstones of the Philistines
in order to grind their plough coulters for the ordinary operations of
husbandry. It was at such a time as this that God called Samuel to be
at once the pattern and deliverer of his country.
In the very outset, the Lord had some very unpleasant work for Samuel
to do, which must have tested his obedience. While yet quite young he
had a hard, sad message to deliver to his old friend and instructor,
and it was no easy task to go to Eli and tell him all that God had
spoken against his house. It was the hard test which often came again
in his later ministry as the messenger of God to sinful man. Again and
again did he have to go to those he loved and say to them the thing
which nearly broke his heart.
When this child of promise finally passed from under the watchful care
of the devoted Hannah, we are told, “the Lord was with Samuel,” and he
“let none of his words fall to the ground, and all Israel knew that
Samuel was established to be a prophet of the Lord.”
The life of Samuel marks a transition period in the history of Israel
from the time of the Judges to the kingdom of Saul and David. His was
an epoch life like Abraham’s, Joshua’s and John the Baptist’s.
He also enjoyed the distinguished honor of being the founder of the
school of the prophets and the first in that glorious succession of
holy men who spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, and who formed
the only unbroken line of truth and righteousness in the history of
God’s ancient people. From the days of Samuel the prophets formed a
distinct class, and had a regular school of training, corresponding
somewhat to our theological seminaries and training institutes, and
Samuel had the pre-eminence of being the founder of these prophetic
schools. Later in his life he went about the country as a pastor and
overseer, visiting the towns and villages, holding conventions, from
place to place and instructing the people in the law of God and the
schools of the prophets in the principles of the kingdom.
But, above all his public ministries and even his national influence,
Samuel was himself a beautiful and spotless character. In an age of
almost universal corruption he lived a life of blameless piety, and at
a later period, when bidding farewell to the nation as their judge, he
could truly call upon them to witness to his uprightness and integrity.
“Behold,” he said, “I am old and gray-headed, and I have walked before
you from my childhood unto this day. Behold, here I am; witness against
me before the Lord and before His anointed. Whose ox have I taken?
or whose ass have I taken? or whom have I defrauded? whom have I
oppressed? or of whose hand have I received any bribe to blind mine
eyes therewith? and I will restore it to you.” And they said, “Thou
hast not defrauded us nor oppressed us, neither hast thou taken aught
of any man’s hand.”
Samuel stands forth as one of the blameless lives of sacred history;
human no doubt in his infirmities, but no fault has been recorded
against him, and his personal character is the most eloquent testimony
of all his history.
We have been permitted to trace this beautiful life to its source. Some
characters, like Elijah’s suddenly burst upon our vision and we only
know them in the public and closing chapters of their history. Some,
however, are like a beautiful river that you can trace to its crystal
fountain and follow all through its winding channel until, like our own
Hudson, it pours its volume into the sea. Thus we have been permitted
to stand by Samuel’s cradle and even to know something of his prophetic
future before his very birth. We enter into the joys and sorrows and
the believing prayers of Hannah, the devoted mother, who was the real
fountain, not only of his natural life, but also of his piety and holy
power. And we walk side by side with him through his childhood and
his youth until, at last, we meet him in the busy activities of his
manhood and follow him until he lays down his ministry and passes to
his honored rest.
What a touching story is the life of Hannah of motherly consecration of
herself and her Samuel. If all who wear the crown of motherhood were as
noble, as loyal, as self-giving and trustful as Hannah was, and brought
up their children to know and obey the voice of the Lord, what a world
this would be. O that our land were filled with Hannahs, then would we
have more Samuels.