CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
Cornell University Library 
 BS445 .H94 
 
 Story of our Bible / by Harold B. Huntin 
 
 olin 
 
 3 1924 029 271 470 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tliis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924029271470 
 
THE BIBLE STUDY UNION LESSONS 
 
 THE COMPLETELY GRADED SERIES 
 
 THE STORY OF 
 
 OUR BIBLE 
 
 By 
 
 HAROLD B. HUNTING 
 
 Henry A. Sherman, Editor 
 
 Charles P. Kent 
 George A. Coe 
 
 ■ Consulting Editors 
 
 [eSd Thousand] 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 New Yor£, 
 
Copyright, 1914, 1915 
 By Charles Scribner's Son* 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 I. The Story of Tertius, a Christian Scribe . 
 
 II. Some Letters of a Missionary 
 
 III. Winning back Faithless Converts 
 
 IV. The Plans of a Great Religious Statesman 
 V. An Eye; Witness of. Jesus' Arrest 
 
 VI. Cherishing the Sayings of Jesus . 
 
 Vli. A Compassionate Physician .... 
 
 VIII. Messages of Encouragement for Persecuted 
 
 Christians 
 
 IX. What is True Christianity? 
 
 X. A Spiritual Gospel 
 
 XI. Jesus the Divine Saviour .... 
 
 XII. The Story of the New Testament 
 
 XIII. Bards and Ballard-Sinc^rs .... 
 
 XIV. Old Stories Told in a New Way 
 XV. Stories of a Nation's Heroes 
 
 XVI. Justice through Laws 
 
 XVII. A Century of Great Reformers . 
 
 XVIII. A Forgiving Husband who Told of God's Mercy 
 
 XIX. The Counsels of a Statesman-Prophet 
 
 XX.- A Great Prophet and His Faithful Secretary 
 
 XXI. Lessons from a Nation's Misfortunes . 
 
 XXII. Comforters and Guides in Dark Days 
 
 XXIII. A New Message for the Oppressed 
 
 XXIV. A New Kind of Patriotism . 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER ^^""^ 
 
 XXV. Prayers for Help in Time of Oppression . . 203 
 
 XXVI. Hymn-Books within Hymn-Books . . . .210 
 
 XXVII. Appealing to History in a Church Quarrel . 218 
 
 XXVIII. Two Kinds of Patriotism 226 
 
 XXIX. Hebrew Love Songs and a Hebrew Love Story . 232 
 
 XXX. Wise Men who Taught in the Gate . . . 240 
 
 XXXI. A Man Unjustly Condemned .... 248 
 
 XXXII. A Man who THoufcnT for Himself . . . 255 
 
 XXXIII. A Pessimist and an Optimist .... 263 
 
 XXXIV. Greek-Speaking Jews who were True to Their 
 
 Faith . . . . " 271 
 
 XXXV. A Story of Martyrdom and Triumph . . . 279 
 
 XXXVI. The Canon of the Old and New Testaments . 287 
 
 XXXVII. "The Books "in a Second Century Church . 295 
 
 XXXVIII. Making Bibles by Hand 301 
 
 XXXIX. The Beginnings of Our English Bible . . 308- 
 
 XL. A New Era of Triumph for the Bible . . 317 
 
 XLI. The Bible for the German People . . . 325 
 
 XLII. The Father of the English Bible . . . 332 
 
 XLIU. A Masterpiece of English Literature . .341 
 
 XLIV. A Quest FOR Perfect Accuracy .... 350 
 
 XLV. The Bible in Non-Christian Lands . . . 358 
 
 XLVI. The Bible and the Spade 366 
 
 XLVII. The Bible, Science and Religion . . . 376 
 
 XLVIII. A Survey of the Story of Our Bible . . . 382 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 Back of the Bible lies a fascinating story; the story 
 of the men and women who wrote it. They were hiiman 
 beings Hke ourselves, with their hopes and fears, their 
 dreams and their longings. More than that,- they were 
 noble, heroic men and women, whose supreme aim was 
 to help others, by bringing to them the glad tidings of 
 the living God. They sought to accomplish this aim 
 first of all through personal contact and teaching, and 
 then as a secondary method, through writings. Each 
 book in. the Bible, therefore, was written for a definite 
 purpose, and originally played an important part in 
 some great hero's Hfe-battle for God and for the right. 
 Sometimes the book, itself describes or suggests the 
 circumstances which called it forth, and the special 
 purpose for which it was written. Sometimes we must 
 infer the story from references found in other books, 
 and by our knowledge of ancient Hfe and customs. For 
 centuries men have been patiently searching for these 
 facts. As a result of their work it is now possible to 
 tell the story of the Bible as a whole; how its various 
 books came to be written and what results they achieved ; 
 and finally how these books were preserved through the 
 centuries and thus handed down to us. This is the story 
 which will be told in the following pages. 
 
 We shaE begin with the story of the New Testament 
 although chronologically, it might seem that we should 
 begin with the Old. It is easier to understand the con- 
 ditions in which the New Testament arose, for the very 
 reason that they are more like those of modem life; and 
 this study of the origin of the New Testament will give 
 us just the key we need with which to approach the Old 
 Testament. 
 
 This study should accomplish two things. It should 
 
vi INTRODUCTION 
 
 help us first to understand the Bible more clearly, and 
 to appreciate more deeply its value. In the second place, 
 even if for some conceivable reason, we could never 
 again read the actual words of the Bible, this story of 
 the men who wrote it, should in itself be a supreme in- 
 spiration to heroic living, and should help to satisfy our 
 deepest spiritual needs. 
 
THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE STORY OF TERTIUS, A CHRISTIAN SCRIBE 
 Rom. 16:1-27 
 
 ( Date of writing about 56 A. D. ) 
 
 The Earliest New Testament Writings 
 
 Matthew, Mark, Luke and John — every one knows 
 that these are the first foiir books in the New Testament. 
 We might naturally suppose that they were the first 
 New Testament books to be written. As a matter of 
 fact, the oldest part of the New Testament is not the 
 Gospel of Matthew but the letters of the Apostle Paul. 
 In the study which we are ' now undertaking we shall 
 foUow, in general, the chronological order of the various 
 Biblical writings. The earliest letter of Paul was either 
 I. Thessalonians or Galatians. We shall study these 
 two letters in chapter two. In the present chapter, we 
 begin our study with a short letter, which is not indeed 
 among the earliest of Paul's writings, but which illustrates 
 very well the method by which all his letters were written. 
 It is found in the sixteenth chapter of Romans. 
 
 An Apostle Dictating a Letter 
 
 We begin with a' scene from the life of the Apostle 
 Paul. He is dictating a letter, in his room at the house 
 of a man named Gaius in the city of Corinth. He has 
 been preaching in Corinth for some months, and has 
 won many converts. For some time he has been planning 
 to send a letter to a group of Christians in another city. 
 Paul himself seems to have been somewhat awkward 
 with the pen; he cannot afford to hire a professional 
 
 1 
 
2 THE STORY OP OUR BIBLE 
 
 scribe, however; so he has inquired whether there is a 
 good writer among the converts there at Corinth. Some 
 one has told him about a certain man named Tertius, 
 and Paul has sent for him. Would Tertius be kind 
 enough to come to the house of Gaius, some time this 
 week and write a letter from Paul's dictation? Tertius 
 has answered that he wottld be glad indeed to do so. 
 His heart is warm with his new love for Christ, of whom 
 Paul has told him, and he feels deep gratitude toward 
 Paul himself, through whose tender, burning words he 
 first found God. So Tertius has arranged to call at Paul's 
 room, to act as his scribe. 
 
 Ancient Writing Materials and Styles of 
 Writing 
 
 Before coming at the appointed hour, Tertius had. to 
 provide himself with writing material. Short letters 
 were often written on wax tablets. Such a tablet con- 
 sisted of two wooden frames, folding together like , an 
 old-fashioned pair of slates. The soft yielding wax 
 was packed into each frame, and its surface made levesl? 
 and smooth. The writing was done with a sharp metal 
 pencil or stylus by means of which the characters could 
 be scratched on the wax. Tertius may have provided 
 himself with several of these tablets ; but as Paul probably 
 wished to send a letter of considerable length, he doubt- 
 less bought several sheets of papyrus. Caspar Rene 
 Gregory, a noted German scholar, gives the following 
 description of papyrus : " It is a plant that one can often 
 find in parks and botanical gardens. In the parks, 
 it is four or five feet high. If I am. not mistaken I saw 
 it fifteen feet high at the Arethusa Spring at Syracuse. 
 It has a three-cornered stem, and the sides are covered 
 by a thin green skin. There are no joints. At the top^ 
 is a large inverted tassel of grass-like hair like the crest 
 of a helmet. The great place for papyrus in ancient 
 times was Egypt, although European rivers, for example 
 the Anapo near Syracuse, also produced it. ' The pith 
 stem was, cut crosswise into lengths of eight or ten inches. 
 
A PAPYRUS SWAMP. 
 
STORY OF TERTIUS 3 
 
 according to wish, and then cut lengthwise into thin 
 flat strips like tape.. These tape-like strips were laid 
 vertically to the edge of the table side by side, till there 
 were enough for a leaf of the desired size. Then a layer 
 of paste or glue was spread over them, and other strips 
 laid across, that is to say horizontally, running parallel 
 with the edge of the table. These leaves were pressed, 
 so that the strips should all stick flat together, and left 
 to dry. The drying is easy in Egypt. Things dry almost 
 before they have come to perceive that they were wet. 
 The dried leaves were a trifle rough. For nice paper 
 the surface was then smoothed off, it may be with pumice- 
 stone, or it was hammered. It was a very good surface 
 to write upon, not unlike birch bark, which many readers 
 will know from the Adirondacks or Maine or Canada." 
 
 It is an interesting fact that our word "paper," is 
 derived from this word "papyrus." The cleaves which 
 Tertius bought were doubtless of a uniform size, with 
 neatly trimmed edges. If Paul told him that he expected 
 to send a long letter, he may have bought a blank roll. 
 If so, that roll was made by pasting several sheets together, 
 by the edges. Tertius began to write on the left-hand 
 end of the roll. He wrote in columns about as broad as 
 a finger is long. Professional scribes were paid by the 
 line, and the usual rule was to make each line about as 
 long as the average line of a modem printed page. Longer 
 lines would have been harder to read. 
 
 Tertius also provided himself with pens and ink. His 
 pens were made of reeds, pointed and split like our pens 
 today. He doubtless prepared three or four of them, 
 so as not to keep Paul waiting while he mended pens. 
 His ink was made of oak-galls, and was probably brownish 
 in color, . and paler and less clear than ours. He kept it 
 in a glass or metal bottle, stoppered with wax.. All 
 these articles he earned in his girdle, which, in those 
 days, served for a pocket. 
 
 Arriving at the house of Gains, Tertius takes his seat 
 at the writing table. Paul reclines on a couch, or perhaps 
 in his enthusiastic manner walks back and forth across 
 
4 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 the room. As he rapidly dictates the sentences, ^'^^^^l 
 writes them down as best he can. It is quite P^f™ 
 that Tertius took down Paul's words in shortnana^ 
 using cheap papyrus for that purpose. A very good 
 system of shorthand had been invented and was widely 
 used He probably wrote the final copy of the letter m 
 a "cursive" or "running" style of hand writing, which 
 was different from the letters which were used in per- 
 manent books, just as our script is different from print. 
 Unlike our writing or printing, there were no spaces 
 between the words in Tertius' letter, and almost no 
 punctuation marks. 
 
 A Letter of Introduction for Phoebe of 
 Cenchre^ 
 
 Paul probably dictated two letters to Tertius. The 
 first was a long one to the Christians at Rome. We will 
 have its story in chapter four. The second was only a 
 short note. In after years, the two were copied by other 
 writers on one roll, and in that way became a single 
 letter, and we now have the shorter one as the sixteenth 
 chapter of our "Epistle to the Romans." It was really 
 a note of introduction for a certain woman named Phoebe, 
 a prominent Christian worker in the little sea port of 
 Cenchrese, just across the isthmus, ten miles from 
 Corinth. She was going to Ephesus on business, and 
 Paul wrote this letter for her to give to friends of his 
 among the Christians there. As a stranger in the city, 
 and a woman, she would greatly appreciate their hospi- 
 tality. Paul had recently spent three years in Ephesus, 
 and had many dear friends . there ; so in the letter for 
 Phoebe, he sent greetings to many of them, just as in 
 our letters we ask to be "remembered" to various friends. 
 In the midst of these greetings, there seems to have been 
 a slight interruption. Perhaps a visitor came in and 
 talked a little while with Paul. Possibly Gaius and other 
 friends were in the room. Meanwhile Tertius, as he 
 sits there waiting, thinks "I know some of the people 
 to whom Paul is writing; I used to know Prisca and 
 
STORY OF TERTIUS 5 
 
 # 
 Aquila, when they made tents here in Corinth. [Rom, 
 
 16:3 and see Acts 18:1-3.] I believe I'll just put in 
 a friendly word for them." So he writes, "I, T.ertius, 
 who am writing the letter, salute you in the Lord." 
 Then the visitor goes out. Paul continues, "Gaius, my 
 host, salutes you," and after a ffew closing words the 
 letter is finished. A little later, it is rolled together as 
 compactly as possible, tied with a cord, and sealed with 
 a drop of wax. Tertius writes on it the address. To — , 
 in the city of Ephesus, the Province of Asia. The next 
 day Phoebe comes in and the letter is put in her hands. 
 No doubt she thanks Paul warmly, as she bids him good- 
 bye. 
 
 A Man who Performed an Humble Service 
 IN A Noble Spirit 
 
 It is not very much that we know about the scribe, 
 who thus wrote the very first copy of one of Paul's letters, 
 but what is known about him is intensely interesting. 
 This Tertius was not a man of genius. He was not an 
 intellectual giant, like Paul. Yet he could do something 
 that Paul could not do — he could write a clear legible 
 hand, and Paul needed his help. Had it not been for 
 this man Paul might not have been able to write his 
 letter. But Tertius performed the needed service; and 
 he did it, not for sake of money or fame, -but because 
 he loved the Master. , "I, Tertius, . , . salute you in the 
 Lord." These last three words show that he was a 
 Christian and that he was proud of his membership in 
 the Christian church. Moreover, he was quick to seize 
 opportunities to extend his Christian influence. "I 
 salute you in the Lord." "I'm. with you," Tertius 
 seem^s to say, "Don't forget I'm on your side, too." 
 Some days after the writing of this letter, Phoebe landed 
 at the docks in the harbor at Ephesus, and went tc the 
 house which Paul had mentioned. When the letter 
 was opened and passed around among Paul's friends, 
 we can easily imagine their pleasant surprise when 
 they came to that sentence from Tertius . ' ' Look, Aquila, ' ' 
 
6 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 said Prisca, "do you remember Tertius? Well, it was 
 Tertius to whom Paul dictated this letter, and Tertius 
 himself has put in a special greeting for us. 'I, Tertius, 
 salute you in the Lord. ' ' ' And Aquila may have answered, 
 as he went on with his tent making, "Really, I am almost 
 as glad to receive that greeting from Tertius, as I am to 
 hear from Paul himself." 
 
STORY OF TERTIUS 7 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1_. What were some personal qualities which wottld be 
 desirable in a secretary or stenographer, such as Tertius? 
 
 2. Do you think Tertius possessed them? If so, why? 
 
 3. What were some faults and mistakes which a secretary 
 might easily make with the writing materials and writing 
 customs of those days? 
 
 4. How many persons were benefited by the Idndly help- 
 fulness of Tertius? 
 
 5. What lesson is there in this story for us today, especially 
 for the Christian of merely average talents? 
 
 6. In the space below, write down any further questions 
 which may occur to you. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. Name the first four books of the New Testament. 
 
 2. What were reaUy the earUest written New Testament 
 books? 
 
 3. What writing material was used for letters, in Paul's 
 day? 
 
 4. Describe the plant called papyrus. 
 
 5. How was writing material made from it? 
 
 6. What is the derivation of oiir word " paper"? 
 
8 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 7. To whom did Paul address the letter of introduction 
 which he wrote for Phoebe ? 
 
 8. What were the circumstances which led to the wnting 
 of this letter? 
 
 9. Where in our Bibles is this letter found? 
 
 10. How did it happen to be placed just here? 
 
 11. Tell what is known about Tertius. 
 
 Suggested Notebook Work 
 
 In large cities, where there are botanical gardens, the curator 
 will often be willing to donate a damaged stalk of papyrus. 
 A sheet of papyrus paper may be made from this, in accordance 
 with the description given above. This may be inserted in 
 your notebook. The . strips should be wet, and the inside 
 surfaces laid together. It may be necessary to wet the inside 
 siufaces with mucilage. 
 
 If papyrus cannot be secured, you rhay be able to get some 
 birch bark. Write on a sheet of birch birk, a few verses of 
 Romans 16, in tmspaced columns, such as Tertius would have 
 written. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 SOME LETTERS OF A MISSIONARY 
 Galatians aJstd I AND II Thbssalonians 
 
 (Date of writing about 51 A. D.) 
 
 Why Paul Wrote Letters 
 The Apostle Paul was a great writer, yet he left only 
 St few letters as his contribution to the worid's literature. 
 The reason is evident. He was a busy man. What 
 with earning his own living by tent making, and his 
 unwearying evangelistic efforts, he had no time to write 
 books. His letters, on the other hand, were called forth 
 by the practical needs of his work. He had laid out 
 for himself a unique life task. He had planned, ap- 
 parently, to carry the Gospel message arotmd the entire 
 coast of the Mediterranean Sea, or in other words, through- 
 out the central portion of the Roman Empire. He 
 would stop a few months or years in one of the leading 
 cities, gathering and training converts and then go on 
 to the next town, planting a church in each. These 
 churches were to be centers from which Christianity 
 would spread into the surrounding regions, and thus 
 the entire Empire would eventually be Christianized. 
 It was a stupendous undertaking. No one had ever 
 dreamed of such a thing, hitherto. In fact up to the 
 time of the Roman empire, it would have been physically 
 impossible, for the lack of roads and ships, would have 
 kept the missionary at home. Now, however, the Roman 
 government had built good roads into the most remote 
 provinces, and had swept the pirates from the sea, and 
 the robbers from the public highways. Th^re were 
 passenger ships making regular trips between aU the 
 large cities on the coast of the Mediterranean. People 
 traveled a great deal. The Greek language was every- 
 
10 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 where understood. These facts made it Possible ^^ 
 Paul to carry out his campaign with a large measure 
 
 °^Tthif work, however, was to accomplish permanent 
 resultl, it was necessary for Paul to find some way to 
 follow up his own short personal campaigns m each 
 city otherwise the newly planted churches would wilt 
 and die in the heat of persecution or temptation. There 
 was nothing superficial in Paul. Whatever he undertook, 
 he did thoroughly. So he devised two methods for 
 looking after new converts. In the first place, he gradu- 
 ally built up a corps of lieutenants, men and women like 
 Prisca and Aquila, Timothy, Silas, and Luke. Whenever 
 he left a city, one of these assistants remained behind, 
 if possible, to go on with the work. At frequent intervals, 
 these helpers reported to him, wherever he happened 
 to be. The second method of looking after vhis converts, 
 was through letters. These he sent by his assistants, 
 or by any messenger whom he could secure. Thus in 
 addition to his missionary preaching, he was able to 
 keep constantly in touch with all his previous converts; 
 sympathizing with their perplexities and troubles; re- 
 buking their wrong doings; and cheering them on in 
 times of discouragement. . As the number of churches 
 grew, it is not siurprising that Paul sometimes felt burdened 
 by "that which presseth upon me daily, anxiety for all 
 the churches. ' ' (II Cor. 11 : 28) . 
 
 The Letters to Thessalonica 
 
 Of the letters of Paul which are preserved in our New 
 Testament, the earliest are a group of three which were 
 written in Corinth during his first visit there, namely, 
 Galatians, and I and II Thessalonians. This visit 
 should probably be dated sometime between the autumn 
 of 50 A.D., and the spring of 52 A.D. _ When the first 
 letter to the Thessalonians was written, Silas and Timothy 
 had just' come down from Macedonia to Corinth. As 
 they appeared in the low doorway of the tent-maker's 
 shop, where Paul and Prisca and Aquila were at work, 
 
LETTERS OF A MISSIONARY 11 
 
 • 
 
 they received a royal welcome. Paul had been having 
 a fit of the blues. His work in Athens just before coming 
 to Corinth, had seemed a total failure, and he was ap- 
 parently succeeding no better in Corinth. He had 
 been compelled to flee from Macedonia much sooner 
 than he intended, and he was very anxious about his 
 converts there, especially the Thessalonians. The travel- 
 stained newcomers, however, brought good cheer. The 
 Philippians had actually taken up a collection, and had 
 sent the money to Paxil through Silas. As for the Thessa- 
 lonians, Timothy reported that in spite of the fact that 
 they had been severely persecuted, they had proved 
 themselves true Christians. At these good tidings, 
 Paul's spirits rose with a bound. Immediately he sent 
 the Thessalonians a letter praising them, and encouraging 
 them to continue in the good way. The second letter 
 was written a few weeks after the first. In their expecta- 
 tipn that Christ would soon return to earth, some of 
 fche Thessalonians had ceased from their daily work. 
 Paul explained to. them that the longed-for return of 
 the Master might be delayed, and urged them to return 
 to their work. "If any will not work," he says, "neither 
 let him eat." For the most part, the letters to, the ' 
 Thessalonians are letters of praise, rather than of reproof, 
 and are filled with beautiful and tender expressions of 
 Paul's love. 
 
 The Letter to the Galatians 
 
 The letter to the Galatians was written about the 
 same time as I Thessalonians, perhaps even earlier. 
 Messengers had just come to Paul, from the cities of 
 southern Galatia, where he had founded churches. 
 (Acts 13-14). There were four of these cities, namely 
 Pisidian Antioch, Iconium, Lystra and Derbe. Since 
 Paul's last visit, some Jewish-Christian teachers from 
 Jerusalem had come among them, saying that the Gentile 
 Christians, as well as the Jews^ must observe the rites 
 and ceremonies of the law of Moses, else they could not 
 be saved. "Paul was mistaken," they said, "in telling 
 
12 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 you that these rites are unnecessary. He was not one 
 of the original twelve Apostles anyway. He ^ej J^J^" 
 saw Tesus while He was on earth. The messengers 
 reported thai many of the Galatians had behaved wha 
 th?se men said, and that all the churches were m a turmoa 
 over the question. Paul was deeply stirred and troubled 
 bv what he heard. He realized, of course, that these 
 old ceremonies, in themselves, were not worth a contro- 
 versy. It was a matter of no consequence whether 
 they were observed or neglected. But the Jewish Chris- 
 tians taught that these things were an essential element 
 in Christianity. Thus they made religion a burden and 
 a bondage. Paul's religion, on the other hand, was a 
 religion of freedom. His mission among the Gentiles 
 was not to lay new burdens upon them, but to free them 
 from their old burdens, by telHng of a wondrous power 
 from on high which would make all burdens light. We 
 cannot wonder that Paul was angry, with a holy anger, 
 when the very heart and core of his message was thus 
 perverted, and when his whole work among the Galatians 
 was being undone. It was to fight these "blind leaders 
 of the blind," that he wrote his letter. It is in many 
 respects the greatest letter he ever wrote. It is more 
 like a firebrand than a letter. Every sentence, every 
 line, either blazes with indignation, or quivers with the 
 pleadings of love. He defends his own authority as a 
 religious teacher. He declares that even though he 
 never saw Jesus in the flesh, yet he has known him, in 
 the spirit. He appeals to their own experience and to 
 the teachings of the Old Testament, to prove that the 
 Jewish rites are not essential, but that God gives His 
 blessings freely to all, both to Jews and Gentiles, on the 
 one condition of faith. In other words, men are not kept 
 from God by the fact that they are not Jews, or by the 
 fact that they have not performed a certain ceremonial 
 rite. Only one thing can shut men away from God, 
 their own wilful unbelief. 
 

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LETTERS OF A MISSIONAkY 13 
 
 How Paul's Letters were Received 
 Suppose we follow this Galatian letter to its destination, 
 as a good illustration of the history of all of Paul's letters. 
 The same messengers who brought the news from Galatia 
 to Paul, no doubt returned with his answer. After a 
 short sea voyage from Cenchrese to Ephesus, or Miletus, 
 and a journey of a hundred miles or so along the Roman 
 road into the interior of Asia Minor, they arrived at the 
 city of Piaidian Antioch. They probably delivered the 
 letter to an elder in the church there, who immediately 
 sent word to all the Christians in the town to come to 
 his house that night. "A letter from Paul!" the news 
 was flashed very quickly from home to home. In the 
 evening, the room is crowded. Amidst an eager silence, 
 the elder begins to read. The characteristic sentences 
 of the great Apostle bring back to the minds of the listeners 
 the familiar tones and inflections of Paul's voice. After 
 about an hour's reading the letter is finished. A half- 
 suppressed sigh sweeps through the room, and there -are 
 some rather shame-faced glances. Here is a man who 
 remembers that he called a fellow-disciple by a hard 
 name the other day, because he was not observing the 
 Jewish fast of the new moon. Here is a woman who 
 has been saying rather unkind things about Paul himself. 
 Finally one of the leaders rises, a man who has the con- 
 fidence of all. "Brothers and sisters," he says, "Paul is 
 right. I had begun to observe these Jewish ordinances, 
 like most of you here; but I, for one, will do so no more. 
 These things only cultivate self-righteousness and pride. 
 It is through God's free grace that we are saved." At 
 this, one after another rises and declares himself on 
 Paul's side. There is not a person in that room, who 
 has not gained a new insight into the beauty of the Chris- 
 tian life. 
 
 The next day the letter was probably taken to Iconium, 
 twenty-five miles distant, where in the evening it was 
 read to the assembled disciples just as in Antioch. The 
 next evening it was read in Lystra, and finally in Derbe. 
 The disciples in Derbe probably kept it until they could 
 
14 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 make a copy of it; copies were likewise made in eacii of 
 the other towns. In their future meetings, they would 
 read and reread these copies, until the favorite parts 
 became finger marked, and the papyrus became ragged 
 and torn. Then new copies would be made. Some of 
 the members would make private copies for themselves. 
 Thus Paul's influence lived on from year to year, and 
 from generation to generation. 
 
LETTERS OF A MISSIONARY 15 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. General topic: Paul's characteristics as a worker. Was 
 he thorough? Was he oyer-thorough? 
 
 (a) The map "at the beginning of this book is drawn on the 
 scale of about 212 miles to the inch. How far was Paul extend- 
 ing his influence to the east and north of Corinth, in the period 
 covered by this lesson? 
 
 (b) What did Paul probably succeed in accomplishing through 
 Hs letter to the Christians in TheBsalonica? 
 
 (c) Suppose Paul had not protested against the ideas of the 
 Jewish Christians what harm would have come to the religious 
 life of his Galatiah converts? 
 
 (d) With all his other work, how did Paul find time to dictate 
 the letter to the Galatians ? 
 
 2. How this Lesson throws light on the Bible, 
 (a) Explain why the Thessalonians needed the advice con- 
 tained in I Thess. 4:11-12. 
 
 (6) Explain what Paul means by being " entangled in a yoke 
 of bondage . " See Gal .5:1. 
 
 (c) If you have time, read I. Thessalonians entirely through, 
 at a single sitting; and write questions in the space below, 
 regarding any sentence that you do not understand. 
 
16 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. In what ways did Paul keep in touch with his converts 
 in the various cities where he founded churches? _ 
 
 2. How had the Roman government made it possible for 
 him to accomplish so much as a travehng missionary? 
 
 3. What other fact contributed to Paxil's success? 
 
 4. What good news did Timothy bring frotn Thessalonica 
 to Paul at Corinth? 
 
 5. Who were the Galatians? 
 
 6. What was Paul's purpose in writing Galatians? 
 
 7. What was his purpose in writing I Thessalohians? 
 
 8. What was the purpose of II Thessalonians? 
 
 9. About when were these letters written? 
 
 10. Tell what happened when a letter from Paul was re- 
 ceived by one of his Churches. 
 
 1 1 . What became of the letter when it had been read ? 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 WINNING BACK FAITHLESS CONVERTS 
 
 Trouble in the Church at Corinth 
 
 Date, about 65 A. D. 
 
 Paul's Pour Letters to the Corinthians 
 "Fotir Letters!" some one may object; "We have heard 
 about First and Second Corinthians, but never of Third 
 Corinthians or Fourth." Yet it is now generally agreed 
 that'Paul wrote four letters to the Christians in Corinth, 
 and probably aU fovir of them are in our Bible. This 
 series of letters was begim during the last few months 
 of Paul's stay in Ephesus. He had come to that city 
 in the autumn of 52 A.D., soon after leaving Corinth, 
 where he wrote the letters described in the previous 
 chapter. He had taken up an exceedingly active mis- 
 sionary campaign, which continued during three eventful 
 years, and brought to him many anxious hours. At 
 times, just as in Corinth, he ran short of money and 
 nearly starved. His clothes grew shabby and worn. 
 He was thrown out of his lodgings because he could not 
 pay the rent. With all this, his preaching was so success- 
 ful, that he won a large number of converts. This aroused 
 the hatred of both the Jews and the heathen Greeks and 
 he was nearly killed in the persecution which followed. 
 It was just as this strenuous career in Ephesus was 
 drawing toward its climax, that news came to Paul of 
 trouble among his converts in Corinth. The story of 
 the correspondence which at once began between the 
 Corinthians and Paul, and which lasted about a year, 
 is well-nigh as exciting as anything which happened in 
 Ephesus, 
 
 11 
 
18 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 The First Letter 
 The first of these four letters was called out by a scandal 
 in the Corinthian Church. Word was brought to- Paul 
 by friends who happened to come to Ephesus, that the 
 Christians in the former city had received m_to the church 
 a man who was openly Hving an immoral life. It seems 
 that he had married his father's wife, that is, his own 
 stepmother. Paul, of course, was shocked, and wrote 
 a short but emphatic note protesting that this man should 
 never have been taken into the church, and should at 
 once be expelled, unless he would repent of his wrong- 
 doing, and cease from his evil life. It was formerly 
 believed that this note was lost. Modem _ scholars, 
 however, have perhaps discovered it in what is now II 
 Cor. 6: 14 — 7: 1. We have already seen how the lettef 
 for Phcebe was added to the letter to the Romans. 
 Apparently this short note to the Corinthians has found 
 its way into the middle of a longer letter. Perhaps 
 some later scribe intended to copy it at the end, but 
 accidentally disarranged the leaves of papyrus' on which 
 he was writing, and thus inserted it by mistake in its 
 present position. If so, then the note began as follows: 
 "Be not unequally yoked together with unbelievers; 
 for what fellowship have righteousness and iniquity? 
 or what communion hath light with darkness? And 
 what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what portion 
 hath a believer with an unbeliever? And what agreement 
 hath a temple of God with idols?" These short crisp 
 sentences are like blows of the fist. They must have 
 awakened some, at least, of the Corinthians, to a realiza- 
 tion of the mistakes which they had made, and must have 
 helped to recall them to their senses. 
 
 Other Shortcomings of the Corinthians 
 After sending this note, Paul received further informa- 
 tion regarding the state of affairs at Corinth. It was a 
 discouraging situation in many ways. These Corinthian 
 Christians were; ftill of religious enthusiasm, but their 
 everyday conduct was far from ideal. Many of them 
 
WINNING BACK FAITHLESS CONVERTS 19 
 
 before their conversion, had been thieves, swindlers, 
 drunkards and grossly immoral. It is not surprising, 
 therefore, that even after their conversion, their standards 
 of conduct were somewhat low. There were also certain 
 persons in Corinth who ridiculed the Christian belief 
 in a life after death when men will be punished or re- 
 warded, according to their deeds on earth. "Let us 
 eat, drink and be merry," these scoffers seemed to say. 
 " Let us indulge ourselves as we please for tomorrow we 
 die." Some of the Christians had been influenced by 
 these arguments. Furthermore the church was torn with 
 jealousies and quarrels. They had quarreled over the 
 question, " who is the more eloquent preacher, Paul or 
 ApoUos" (Paul's friend and associate). They had 
 quarreled over the matter of spiritual gifts. Each one 
 claimed special honor for his own gift. This quarrelsome 
 spirit led to disorders in their meetings. Those who spoke 
 first, took up too much time. Often there would be 
 several persons trying to speak at once. At their suppers, 
 they broke up into little cliques, the members of each 
 clique in a comer by themselves. Here would be a group 
 of well-to-do people, who had brought a fine dinner, 
 and were behaving like gluttons, while over on the other 
 side of the room, would be certain poor persons who had 
 been able to bring little or nothing, and who were hungry 
 and embarrassed. Finally, what was perhaps more 
 discouraging than anything else, the majority of the 
 Corinthians including some of the worst offenders, were 
 excessively proud and conceited. They would take 
 advice from no one. They regarded themselves as 
 already wellnigh perfect. When any of the wiser members 
 attempted to remonstrate with them, they felt themselves 
 insulted. In general they were behaving like spoiled 
 children. 
 
 Paul Handles the Situation Boldly. 
 His Second Letter 
 
 Paul's second letter to this church, we have in the New 
 Testament tmder the heading First Corinthians. It 
 
20 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 was written some weeks after the real first letter ._ P^ 
 had just received an answer to that letter, in which the 
 Corinthians asked him how it would be possible to avoid 
 associating with immoral persons unless they were to go 
 out of the world altogether. It was a rather foolish 
 question, and shows that they were trying to excuse. 
 themselves for their conduct. They also asked a number 
 of other questions, as for example, whether it was ever 
 right to eat meat which had been dedicated to an idol. 
 In his second letter (I Corinthians), Paul gives practical 
 commonsense answers to all their questions, and also 
 goes very thoroughly into all the matters regarding which 
 they needed instruction. This letter must have made 
 a sensation. It was charged with spiritual electricity, 
 Patiently, tactfully, but with absolute fearlessness, Paul 
 discussed their errors and shortcomings. Two great 
 purposes underlie the whole letter, first, to lift the Corin- 
 thians to a higher standard of morals, and secondly to 
 inspire them with the Christian spirit of love. The 
 greatest passage in the letter, is the chapter in praise of 
 love, beginning with the word's, "If I spealc with the. 
 tongues of men or of angels, but have not love, I am 
 become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal." This 
 is one of the noblest and most eloquent passages in all 
 literature. 
 
 Trouble-makers from Outside 
 This second letter would probably have accomplished 
 its purpose had it not been that most unfortunately, some 
 of Paul's enemies among the Jewish Christians, came to 
 Corinth just at this time. These persons were perhaps 
 the very men who had tried to persuade the Galatians 
 to observe the Jewish law. They followed the same 
 course in Corinth, except that they attacked Paul him- 
 self, more bitterly. "Do you know who this man is?" 
 they asked. "Did he bring any letters of recommenda- 
 tion from the mother-church at Jerusalem?" They 
 found a ready hearing for these insinuations among those 
 whose conduct Paul had just rebuked. Getting together 
 a group of them, they poured into their willing ears some 
 
WINNING BACK FAITHLESS CONVERTS 21 
 
 such tale as follows. "You Corinthians have been 
 outrageously deceived. This man told you that he was 
 an apostle of Christ. He is always bragging about him- 
 self, and claiming to be some great personage. In reality 
 he is a rank imposter. He admits that he never knew 
 Christ while He was on earth, as the other apostles did. 
 Moreover, his teaching is false. He says that you 
 Gentile Christians do not need to keep the law which 
 God revealed to Moses, What a blasphemy to tell men 
 that they do not need to obey God's law! What then 
 is there to hinder any man committing any sin he may 
 choose ? The fellow knows that his doctrines lead directly 
 1:0 this dreadful conclusion, although he is too clever to 
 admit it. He throws a veil over his real meaning. Do 
 you ask what he is doing all this for ? Why he wants your 
 money. True, he would not accept any money from 
 you for his support, but that was merely in order to win 
 your confidence. Is he not at this very time raising a 
 great collection for the poor in Jerusalem? Do you 
 suppose the poor will ever see that money? Really, the 
 fellow is a scotmdrel. He is not only a liar, he is a coward 
 as well. His letters are bold and threatening to be sure, 
 but when he is Avith you does he dare to carry out his 
 threats? Soon after he first pretended to be converted, 
 he showed himself a coward; we heard all about it. He 
 was preaching in Damascus, and some of the unbelieving 
 Jews threatened to kill him. There really was no danger 
 at all, yet he ran from the city in terror. Why even his 
 bodily presence is weak, and his manner of speech is 
 contemptible." In their desperate attempt to blacken 
 Paul's character, these Jews seem to have even referred 
 to a chronic iUness to which Paul was subject, and which 
 caused him. much pain and annoyance. Perhaps this 
 disease was epilepsy. The Jews always regarded any 
 disease and especially nervous weaknesses of this kind, 
 as the result of some previous sin and therefore evidence 
 of a sinful character. This affliction was sent upon 
 Paul, so the Corinthians were told, as a punishment of 
 his evil deeds. There was just enough truth in some of 
 
22 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 these statements to make an impression on the Corin- 
 thians Even those who had been most loyal ^o i^aui, 
 found it hard to keep unshaken faith in Hm. When 
 Paul himself heard what was being said about him he 
 was of course deeply grieved and hurt and also filled 
 with anxious concern for the Corinthians themselves. 
 So he dropped his work in Ephesus and made a fiymg 
 visit to Corinth, thinking that he could quickly rally 
 his old friends about him. It was a sorrowful visit, 
 however. Scarcely any one welcomed hirn. At every 
 door, he was received with cold and suspicious glances. 
 He was even publicly insulted at a gathering of the 
 church members, and the man who committed the outrage 
 was not rebuked; on the contrary, the majority of those 
 present seemed to approve. So almost heart broken, 
 Paul sailed back to Ephesus. 
 
 How Paul Regained the Confidence of the 
 Corinthians. 
 
 The Third Letter 
 Nevertheless this painful visit was not wholly a failure. 
 After Paul had gone the Corinthians began to be ashamed 
 of themselves. When his associate Titus came to them 
 from Ephesus, some two or three weeks later, with a 
 letter from the apostle, they were already in a better frame 
 of mind. This was Paul's third letter to them. We have 
 this letter, or a part of it, in the New Testament, at the 
 end of what is now called Second Corinthians (Chapters 
 10-13). It was doubtless added here by some one who 
 was making a copy of Paul's letters. It was a very 
 severe letter. Part of it seems never to have been made 
 public, probably because it mentioned the name of the 
 man who had instilted Paul. In the part which has 
 been handed down to us, Paul pleads for a fair, hearing. 
 He is fighting now with his back to the wall. With 
 biting irony, and splendid eloquence, he defends his 
 character and mission. He appeals to his past record 
 of toil and sacrifice for the cause of Christ. Referring 
 to the Jewish Christians, he asks: "Are they ministers 
 
WINNING BACK FAITHLESS CONVERTS 23 
 
 of Christ? (I speak as one beside himself), I am more; 
 in labors more abundantly, in prisons more abundantly, 
 in stripes above measure, in deaths oft." Then follows 
 a most remarkable and moving story of what he had 
 endured and achieved for Christ. (II Cor. 11:23-33). 
 In answer to the charge that his attacks of bodily sickness 
 were sent upon him as a punishment, he says that this 
 "thorn in the flesh" was really sent to him in connection 
 with his wonderful visions and revelations from the Lord, 
 lest he shotdd be tempted by them to be unduly proud. 
 Moreover, it had really been one of his greatest blessings ■ 
 for through it he had learned that the power of God was 
 made perfect in human weakness. "Most gladly there- 
 fore, wiU I rather boast in my weaknesses," — "for when 
 I am weak, then am I strong." This letter went home 
 hke an arrow to its mark. It would seem that the whole 
 assembly broke down in weeping, when it was read. To 
 think that instead of giving this great souled man their 
 truest love, they had pointed the finger of scorn at even 
 those physical sufferings which should have awakened 
 their deepest sympathy! They begged Titus to hurry 
 back to Paul and teU him they were sorry, and were longing 
 for his forgiveness. They also severely reprimanded the 
 man who had been guilty of the act of insult. 
 
 Paul's Fourth Letter: The Happy Reconciliation 
 
 Meanwhile, Patil's tender heart had been smiting him. 
 How would they take his letter? Had he written too 
 severely? Would they be alienated from him altogether? 
 Would Titus never come back? Unfortunately it had 
 been understood that Titus was to return by way of 
 Macedonia. So at last, when Paul could endure the 
 delay no longer, he closed his work at Ephesus, and 
 went to Troas, where the Macedonian boats came in. 
 Not finding Titus there, he went on across the sea, and 
 in one of the cities of Macedonia, he found the man he 
 was looking for. How about it Titus? Tell us quickly. 
 What news from Corinth? Eagerly and joyously Titus 
 pours out his welcome news. Then in overflowing 
 
24 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 happiness, Paul writes one more letter, a fourth, which 
 we have ^s II Cor. 1, 1-6:13; 7:2-9. He sends it back 
 post haste, with Titus, promising to come himselt very 
 soon In this letter Paul fairly smgs his tenderness and 
 his gratitude to God. He begs the Corinthians not to 
 deal too severely with the member who had wronged 
 him, but rather to forgive and comfort him, lest he should 
 be "'swallowed up with his overmuch sorrow." 
 
 To dispel any lingering perplexities which the Jewish 
 Christians may have suggested to their minds, he burst 
 forth into one final, splendid defence of himself, and his 
 gospel. He does not need "letters of recommendation," 
 he says, "Ye are an epistle of Christ, ministered by us, 
 written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living 
 God." In answer to the charge that' he had not known 
 Jesus while He was on earth, Paul says, "Wherefore, 
 henceforth, I will know no man after the flesh; even 
 though I have known Christ after, the flesh, yet now I 
 will know Him, so, no more." That is, Paul does know 
 something of the events in the earthly life of Jesus, through 
 his acquaintance with Peter, and James, the Lord's 
 brother; it is possible that he had even seen Jesus, when 
 He was in Jerusalem, but He is resolved to make use of 
 this knowledge even less in the future than in the past. 
 He will appeal rather to his knowledge of the living Christ, 
 who "shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowl- 
 edge of the glory of God." 
 
 This letter was delivered in due time. The Corinthians 
 were not expecting it so soon, for they supposed that 
 Paul was still in Ephesus. When Titus gave it into 
 their hands, how quickly they tore open the seal, and 
 scanned its closely written lines. Quickly the word 
 was passed around among all the members; "A letter 
 from Paul already! He has forgiven everything." And 
 then they began to count the days before Paul should 
 come in person once more. The letters had accomplished 
 their purpose. The Corinthian Church had been saved 
 for Paul, and for the cause of Christ. 
 
• WINNING BAoK FAITHLESS CONVERTS 25 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 (Choose any Five) 
 1. " Just as this career in Ephesus was drawing towards 
 its climax, the news came to Paul of trouble in Corinth." How 
 long do you think this trouble may have been going on? 
 
 2. What do you think was the most dangerous tendency 
 among the Corinthians? 
 
 3. Why were the Corinthians so ready to listen to the 
 charges of the Jewish Christians? 
 
 4. Whenthe Jewish Christians began to make these charges, 
 what should the Corinthians have said? 
 
 5. Mention one or two statements of the Jewish Christians 
 regarding Paul, whicli were partially true? 
 
 6. What would have been the effect on the characters of 
 the Corinthians, if their confidence in Paul had been entirely 
 destroyed? 
 
 7. In the light of the above story, explain the following 
 passages. 
 
 (a) I Cor. 4:8-13. To what experience of his own, is Paul 
 here referring? 
 
26 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 (&) I Cor. 5:9. To what letter does Paid here allude? 
 
 (c) I Cor. 12:27-13:1. Why does Paul break out in omisf 
 Df love in connection with the subject of spiritual gifts;' 
 
 {d) I Cor. 2 :4. To what letter does Paul here allude ? 
 
 8. Read as much as you can in either First or Second 
 Corinthians. Mention any passages which you like particularly 
 welL 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What evU tendencies began to manifest themselves 
 among the Corinthians, after Paul had been absent from them 
 for some time? 
 
 2. Describe briefly the first letter which Paul wrote to them. 
 
 3. What were Pavil's two chief aims, in his second letter 
 to the Corinthians? 
 
 4. What is the name of this letter, in the New Testament? 
 
 5. What outsiders tried to break down the confidence of 
 the Corinthians, in Paul's personal character? 
 
 6. How did Paul defend himself? 
 
 7. How was he received when he made them a short visit? 
 8: How did Paul reply to the charges of the Jewish Chris- 
 tians, in his third letter? 
 
 9. In what part of the New Testament is this letter to be 
 found? 
 
 10. What was the effect of this letter? 
 
 11. Where was Paul when he wrote his fourth letter to the 
 Corinthians? 
 
WINNING BACK FAITHLESS CONVERTS 27 
 
 * 
 
 12. What was his purpose in writing it? 
 
 13. In what part of the New Testament is it foimd? 
 
 14. What was the approximate date when this Corinthian 
 correspondence began, and about how long did it continue? 
 
 Suggestions for the Notebook 
 
 Take two cheap copies of the New Testament (obtainable 
 for 5 or 10 cents each), and clip out Paiil's first, second, third, 
 and fourth letters to the Corinthians, pasting them into the 
 notebook in proper order, and with proper title and date. Two 
 copies are necessary, because the clippings are printed on two 
 sides, and one side must be pasted to the notebook leaf. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE PLANS OF A GREAT RELIGIOUS 
 STATESMAN 
 Paul's Letter to Rome, and Letters Written 
 FROM Rome 
 
 (Date 66—61 A. D.) 
 
 Looking Westward from Corinth: 
 Hopes and Forebodings 
 
 When Paul sent his last letter from Macedonia to the 
 Corinthians, his work in that part of the world was 
 nearly completed. He had preached the Gospel in 
 Damascus, in Antioch, in the cities of Galatia, in Ephesus, 
 in Corinth, in the cities of Macedonia, and even as far 
 as lUyricum, northwest of Macedonia. In most of these 
 cities he had established churches, and thanks to his 
 ceaseless care and effort, these churches were now strong 
 and flourishing organizations. In accordance with his 
 missionary plan, his eyes now turned to the great provinces' 
 of the west : to Rome, the mighty heart and metropolis 
 of the whole empire, and beyond Rome, to distant Spain. 
 Before he could embark on this new part of his enterprise, 
 however, there was one duty which he felt that he must 
 fulfil. We have seen that he had been having constant 
 friction with certain Jewish-Christian teachers. They 
 had done all in their power to hinder him in his work* 
 They were evidently sincefe in believing him to be a 
 hypocrite, and a thoroughly bad man. There were, 
 to be sure, a few of the Jewish-Christian leaders, Peter, 
 for example, who believed in Paul; but a large number 
 of the Christian Jews in the church in Jerusalem, and 
 elsewhere, bitterly opposed him. Paul defended himself 
 against their attacks with all his might. Yet it was a 
 deep sorrow to him to be in conflict with men of his own 
 
 2S 
 
PLANS OF A RELIGIOUS STATESMAN 29 
 
 race, and especially with men who tried to follow the 
 teaching of Christ, however imperfect their appreciation 
 of Christianity may have been. He grieved over the 
 growing bitterness between the Gentile Churches which 
 he had founded, and the original mother-Church at 
 Jerusalem, and he determined to do what he could to 
 bring about a reconciliation. To this end, he had been 
 gathering for a year or more, a great collection for the 
 poor among the Christi|ans at Jerusalem. (See I Cor. 
 16 : 1-3 ; II Cor. 8-9) . This had been suggested, originally, 
 by Peter and other Jerusalem leaders who were friendly. 
 Paul took up the idea with enthusiasm, and his converts, 
 everywhere, responded generously. When he finally 
 reached Corinth, the money had all been gathered. He 
 was to take it to Jerusalem, in company with some eight 
 or nine men, representing the leading Gentile Churches. 
 It was hoped that this kindly gift would not only help 
 the poor, but would also win the hearts of the Jewish 
 brothers. For Paul, this journey was dangerous. In 
 fact, Jerusalem was the most dangerous place in the world 
 for him. If the Jewish Christians were in conflict with 
 hirn, how much more, the unbelieving Jews! They re- 
 garded him as a -renegade and a traitor. Many of his 
 friends besought him not to undertake the journey. If 
 he should once enter Jerusalem, would he ever leave it 
 alive? Would he ever see the fulfilment of his dreams? 
 Would he ever really preach the Gospel in Rome ? 
 
 A Letter to the Christians in Rome 
 
 With this eager ambition to go to Rome, and mingled 
 with it, this anxious foreboding as to the outcome of his 
 visit to Jerusalem, Paul's spirit must have chafed within 
 him, as he watched the white winged ships setting sail 
 for Italy from the harbor at Corinth. Fortunately, before 
 he left this city, he met with an acquaintance who was 
 going to Rome, and who could deliver a letter to the 
 Christians there; so Paul determined to write to them. 
 If he were successful in carrying out his plans, the letter 
 wotdd prepare the way for his coming. If on the other 
 
30 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 hand, it should prove to be the Lord's will that he die 
 in Terusalem, he would have spoken his message at least 
 through this letter, in the great metropohs of the world. 
 It was probably dictated to Tertms, like the note for 
 Phoebe. It is the longest of his letters. Apparently, 
 he had a little more leisure than usual, during these 
 closing days at Corinth. He tells the Romans how for 
 a long time he has been planning to come and visit them 
 and "be set forward by them " to Spain. (Rom. 1 : 13-15 ; 
 15 : 22-28). He gives them a full statement of the Gospel 
 message as he preached it. The entire human race, he 
 says, both Jews and Gentiles, is in deep need of salvation 
 from sin. We have a knowledge of God's will, to be sure, 
 both in our consciences, and in the law of Moses, but no 
 man, in his own unaided strength, can obey God's law. 
 We are too weak and sinful. God has therefore sent His 
 Son to be our Saviour. If we will but trust Him, His 
 Spirit will transform our characters. A new love will 
 be kindled in our hearts which will manifest itself in a 
 life of righteousness and helpfulness. In a touching 
 closing paragraph, Paul refers again to his hopes and 
 fears, and asks the Roman Christians to pray for him, 
 '•'that I may be delivered from them that are disobedient 
 in Judea, and that my gift which I have for Jerusalem 
 may be acceptable to Christ's people there; that I may 
 come to you in joy through the will of God, and together 
 with you find rest." (Rom. 15: 30-33).- 
 
 Rome at Last — But A Prisoner 
 
 Paul's prayer was answered, but only in part. He 
 did come to Rome, but not until three years later, and 
 then only as a prisoner, in the custody of a Roman cen- ' 
 turion. He had barely been in Jerusalem a week or so, 
 when he was mobbed by the Jews in the temple court, 
 and nearly killed. Rescued by Roman soldiers, he was 
 sent to Caesarea for trial. After his case had dragged 
 along through two years marked by vexatious delays, he 
 exercised his right as a Roman citizen and appealed to 
 Caesar, and was sent to Rome for trial. After an event- 
 
PLANS OF A RELIGIOUS STATESMAN 31 
 
 * 
 ful voyage, and a, shipwreck which nearly cost him his 
 
 life, he reached Rome, in chains. His heart must have 
 
 beat fast, as for the first time he walked along the streets 
 
 of the famous city, the capital of the world. Yet what 
 
 a disappointment ! He was naturally 'so full of energy, 
 
 and he had planned such great things. Had he been 
 
 free, how quickly he would have explored the city and 
 
 all that region! What an impetus he would have given 
 
 to the Christian movement there! Instead of that, 
 
 however, he must sit, day after day, chained to a soldier. 
 
 Nevertheless, Paul was not the man to mope and whine. 
 
 He always proceeded cheerfully to make the t^est of things; 
 
 and being granted the privilege, somewhat unusual for 
 
 a prisoner, of living in lis own hired house, he was able 
 
 to do much good service for the cause of Christ. He 
 
 cotild talk with those who came to see him. Through 
 
 these visitors, he could send letters far and wide. 
 
 Each of these avenues of influence is illustrated in the 
 
 story of two men who set out from Patil's lodgings one 
 
 day, to take ship for Asia Minor. The older of the two 
 
 was one of Paul's lieutenants named Tychicus. Paul 
 
 was sending him to certain churches in the province of 
 
 Asia, east of Ephesus, especially the church in the town 
 
 of Colossse. Paul himself had never visited this district. 
 
 The young man with Tychicus was a runaway slave 
 
 named Onesimus. He had stolen money from his master, 
 
 and had fled to Rome. Some friend of Paul's had found 
 
 him wandering about the city, friendless and disconsolate, 
 
 and had brought him to the apostle. Through Paul's 
 
 influence he became a Christian, and when at last he told 
 
 his whole story, it came out that he had belonged to an 
 
 old friend and convert of Paul himself, a man named 
 
 Philemon, who was living at that time in Colossse. 
 
 So Paul said to the young man, "Onesimus, why don't 
 
 you go back to your old master, with Tychicus here? 
 
 Surely it is providential that he is just about to set sail 
 
 for that very city, Colossse. I will write a letter for you 
 
 to take to Philemon, and I am sure he will forgive you." 
 
 So Paul wrote a kindly, courteous note, the "Epistle to 
 
32 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Philemon." In this letter he shows himself & true 
 Christian gentleman. (Read Philemon, verses /MO.) 
 He also wrote two letters for Tychicus to deliver. One 
 was addressed to the Christians in Colossse, and is known 
 to us as "The Epistle to the Colossians." The jther is 
 called in the New Testament, "The Epistle to tl'.^ Ephe- 
 sians," but was probably a circular letter intended for 
 all the churches in that region. In these letters, Paul 
 says to his readers that love for Christ should be the 
 supreme motive of their lives. "Seek the things that a:re 
 above, where Christ is. .... Set your mind on the things 
 that are above, not on the things that are upon the earth." 
 (Col. 3:1-21). With these letters therefore, the two 
 men set out together. When they reached Colossse, 
 Onesimus was doubtless received back into Philemon's 
 household, "no longer as a servant, but as more than a 
 servant, a brother beloved"; and wherever Tychicus 
 went he had only to say the magic word, "A letter from 
 Paul," to be sure of the most cordial welcome. 
 
 The Deepening Shadows 
 
 Our knowledge of the closing scenes of Paul's life is 
 very fragmentary. It seems unlikely that he ever carried 
 out his ambition to go to Spain. He was finally put to 
 death by order of the Roman emperor Nero. Our 
 chief source of information regarding the course of events 
 during this period is from his letter to the Philippians. 
 This was a letter thanking his old friends in Philippi for 
 a gift of money. Prisoners, in those da,ys, were not 
 supported by the government. Their food and clothing 
 and other necessities had to be provided by friends. 
 When Paul first reached Rome, he seems to have been well 
 supplied with money, through the generosity of the 
 churches. For two years he was able to rent a house 
 in which he was held as a prisoner. But alas for poor 
 human nature, it is so easy to forget an absent friend, 
 no matter how dear he has been to us. The churches 
 were busy with their own affairs, and gradually Paul 
 began to suffer from want. No doubt he had to give up 
 
THE TRADITIONAL HOUSE OF ST. PAUL IN ROME. 
 
PLANS OF A RELIGIOUS STATESMAN 33 
 
 • 
 
 his lodgings, and he was then thrown into some Roman 
 dungeon. Probably he even suffered from cold and hun- ' 
 gar. Just as his suffering was growing acute, however, 
 there came a welcome visitor. A messenger from the 
 Philippian Christians a man named Epaphroditus had 
 sought him out. The Philippians had surmised that 
 Paul would need more money, and had raised a consider- 
 able sum, and had bidden Epaphroditus to take it to him 
 as quickly as possible. The messenger had been faithful 
 to his trust. He had been sick on his way to Rome, but 
 realizing that Paul's need might perhaps be tu-gent, 
 he had kept steadily on his way. When he staggered 
 into Paul's dungeon that day, he was in truth a very sick 
 man, and he nearly died from the effects of his journey. 
 Paul's heart was touched to the depths. Here was a 
 church then, whose members had not forgotten him, 
 here was a man who was willing to risk his life, to help 
 him in his need. As soon as Epaphroditus was again 
 able to travel, Paul sent him back to Philippi with a 
 veritable love letter for his friends there. "Thank 
 ,you, and God bless you" — is the keynote of it. 
 
 Still later, Paul wrote a letter or letters to his best 
 loved lieutenant, Timothy. At this time, or earlier 
 he also wrote a short note to Titus. These letters to 
 Timothy and Titus have probably not been preserved 
 in the form in which Patd wrote them. In later times, 
 all of Paul's letters were read in the meetings of the 
 Christians, and long sections seem to have been added 
 to these short personal notes in order to make them more 
 useful in public worship. There is one passage in II 
 Timothy, however, which is almost certainly from Paul's 
 own hand. "I am already being offered," he says, 
 "and the time of my departure has come. I have fought 
 a good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the 
 xaith." (II Tim. -4:6-8.) Evidently Paul has been 
 condemned to die, and writes this letter to comfort 
 Timothy, and to help him to say, "I also will try to fight 
 the good fight no matter how hard a fight it may prove 
 to be." When Timothy next visited one of the old 
 
34 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 churches, Ephesus, perhaps, or Philippi, or Corinth, 
 'no doubt the people crowded around him as usual. 
 "Have you a letter for us, from Paul," they said. But 
 they read their answer in the look on Timothy's face. 
 "No, comrades, there will be no more letters for you, 
 from your old captain. All that remains now, is to treas- 
 ure up his memory, and like him to 'fight the good fight, 
 to finish our course, to keep the faith. ' " 
 
PLANS OF A RELIGIOUS STATESMAN 35 
 
 Questions and Topics * 
 
 1. In going to Jerusalem with the money for the poor, was 
 .-•atil following the main line of his purpose or was he switching 
 o a side-track? 
 
 2. Discuss the question: " Resolved, that it would have 
 3een wiser for Paul to go directly from Corinth to Rome," 
 )r in other words, " Resolved that Paul's last visit to Jerusalem 
 vas a mistake," 
 
 3. What do you think was Paul's chief motive in appealing 
 rom the Roman authorities in Palestine, to Cjesar himself. 
 
 4. What did Pavil hope for, when he reached Rome? 
 
 5. How many times in this lesson, do we find Paul cheerfully 
 loing the " next best thing "? 
 
 6. Was it a mistake for Paul to attempt such a grea,t life 
 work, only to end in partial failure? 
 
 7. If not a mistake, explain why not. 
 
 8. Mention any favorite verse or passage, in the New Testa- 
 .■nent books treated in this chapter. Suggested readings; 
 Romans 1, 12; Eph. 5; Phil. 4. 
 
36 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. Where was Paul when he wrote the letter to the Romans? 
 
 2. Why did he write this letter? 
 
 3. What is the general substance of the letter? 
 
 4. What was the outcome.of his last visit to Jerusalem? 
 
 5. How did he finally reach Rome? 
 
 6. What means did he use, while a prisoner in Rome, to 
 extend his influence? 
 
 7. What letters did he write whUe a prisoner in Rome? 
 
 8. What were his reasons for writing the following letters? 
 
 (a) Colossians? 
 
 (b) Ephesians? 
 
 (c) Philemon? 
 
 (d) Philippians? 
 
 9. Why were additions made after Paul's death to his 
 letters to Timothy and Titus? 
 
 10. What was the outcome of Paul's appeal to Caesar? 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 AN EYE WITNESS OF JESUS' ARREST 
 John Mark and His Gospel 
 
 (Written about 70 A. D.) 
 
 The Synoptic Gospels 
 Next after the letters of Paul, the earliest New Testa- 
 ment writings were the three Gospels, now known as 
 Mark, Mathew, and Luke. These books are in many 
 ways very similar, and are therefore classed together. 
 They are called the Synoptic Gospels. This word, 
 "synoptic," means, "from the same point of view." 
 In this chapter, we take. up the story of the Gospel of 
 Mark, which was written about ten or fifteen years after 
 the death of Paul. 
 
 A Boy who Tried to Warn His Mother's Friend 
 Among those present in the Garden of Gethsemane 
 when Jesus was arrested, was probably a yotmg man 
 named John Mark. Earlier that evening Jesus had 
 eaten supper with his disciples. The place of the supper 
 was probably an upper room in Mark'« home. The 
 house belonged to Mark's mother, a widow named Mary. 
 We can picture the scene. The family had been awakened 
 not long after the departure of their guests, by a loud 
 knocking at the street door. When Mary opened the 
 door, she saw before her a crowd of men, carrying torches, 
 and armed with swords and clubs. Their leader, who 
 wore the garb of a priest, asked for Jesus of Nazareth. 
 When they had assured themselves that Jesus was not 
 in the house, they went away, grumbling and cursing. 
 Mary hurried to her son, who had been awakened by the 
 commotion, and told him that a wicked plot was on foot 
 against the Master. "And they will go straight from 
 
 37 
 
38 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 here to the Oil Press on the Motint of Olives," added 
 Mary. "Judas knows that Jesus often sleeps there, 
 and they wiU find Him there tonight." Springing from 
 his mattress, and stopping only to wrap a Hnen sheet 
 about him (for the night was chilly), Mark set out to 
 warn Jesus. Hurrying out of the house, he was off 
 through the dark narrow streets, without a moment's 
 delay. He was young and strong, and he hoped to cover 
 the two miles or so to the old olive orchard, sooner than 
 the men with Judas. When, at last, however, he came 
 breathless up the hill to the orchard gate, the torches 
 were there ahead of him. By their glare, and by the 
 light of the full moon, he could see Jesus' hands being 
 tied ; he saw the blow which cut off the ear of the servant 
 of the high priest; finally he saw the disciples turn and 
 run. After this the men set out with Jesus in the direction, 
 of the city. As they passed out the gate and started 
 down the hill, Mark followed along behind, almost 
 broken hearted that he had come too late. Drawing 
 up a little too close, he was seen by one of the men, who 
 turned and seized him, thinking that he was one of the 
 disciples. Slipping out however, from the folds of the 
 sheet which he was wearing, Mark left it in the rnan's 
 hand, and fled away. 
 
 Telling the Story of Jesus 
 
 A few weeks later, there was a gathering of men and 
 women, mostly Galileans, in Mark's home, perhaps in 
 that same upper room where Jesus had eaten the Last 
 Supper. What wonderful events had happened since. 
 that tragic night, when Mark had sped across the Eadron 
 valley on his errand of warning ! Jesus had been crucified. 
 And yet, He still lived! Every member of that little 
 band in Mark's home, had been in His presence. They 
 were a joyous company therefore. "Jesus is still alive, 
 and will one day be the King of Israel." This was the 
 thought which filled their minds. Their hopes were 
 chiefly of the future, when that Kingdom was to be 
 estabhshed, but they could not forget the past. How 
 
AN EYE WITNESS OF JESUS' ARREST 39 
 
 they must have loved to rehearse together their memories 
 of Jesus. One after another would teU of this incident 
 or that. Among those who hstened, with shining eyes, 
 was Mark, sitting with his mother; and when they talked 
 of Jesus' arrest, the young man could contain himself 
 no longer. "I was there," he cried, and then, of course, 
 he had to tell the story of his experience that night. 
 The disciples were deeply interested, and for a special 
 reason. The Jews claimed that Jesus could not be the 
 Messiah, for He had been crucified. The disciples 
 replied that Jesus died for the sins of others, even as 
 was foretold in the Book of Isaiah: "He was bruised for 
 our transgressions." Now this story of Mark helped 
 to prove the truth of their belief; for Mark could testify 
 that Jesus made no attempt to escape or to resist those 
 who came to arrest Him. On the contrary, he "laid 
 down His life," of his own free will. It was perhaps 
 because he could give this testimony that Mark, in spite 
 of his youth, quickly rose to prominence as a leader 
 among the disciples. A few years later, he went with 
 Paul, and with his uncle Barnabas, on a missionary tour. 
 It was perhaps a decade or so later, that he became an 
 assistant of Peter. We are told that he acted as Peter's 
 interpreter. Peter himself spoke Aramaic, a dialect of 
 Hebrew, the mother tongue of Jesus, and of aU the early 
 disciples in Palestine. In preaching to Greek-speaking 
 people, he would of course need an interpreter. In this 
 missionary work Mark had many opportunities to tell 
 his own story. In winning others to believe in Jesus 
 the disciples found that one of their most effective argu- 
 ments was the simple narrative of Jesus' life. Peter's 
 missionary sermons seem to have been made up largely 
 of reminiscences of his experiences with Jesus. Mark 
 also would no doubt be called on many times to tell 
 how he was present when Jesus was arrested, and how he 
 saw Him "led as a lamb to the slaughter," for the sins 
 of men. Doubtless, many a heart was touched, and many 
 a disciple won. As new converts came into the churches, 
 it was necessary to tell them over and over again, what 
 
40 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 kind of a life Jesus had lived on earth. Those who could 
 tell anecdotes about Him were called upon at their 
 meetings. Some stories as for example, that of Mark, 
 were especially popular; for they Ustened eagerly _ to 
 every scrap of information regarding Jesus' self-sacnficmg 
 death. 
 
 A Priceless Treasure in Danger of Being Lost 
 For the first few years after Jesus' death, it did not 
 occur to the disciples that a written narrative of His 
 life would ever be needed. They were for the most part., 
 not famihar with books, or with their value. They were 
 not looking forward to twenty centtuies of Christian 
 history. On the contrary they supposed that Jesus would 
 return within a few years, at which time, "this present 
 evil world" would pass away. In the next world they 
 would need no books. For a long time therefore, the 
 story of Jesus was handed down orally from teacher to 
 pupil, and from friend to friend. Those who told these 
 stories no doubt tried their best to be accurate. Human 
 memory however is weak, and errors easily crept into 
 these narratives. There was an unconscious tendency 
 to over-emphasize some points, and to neglect others 
 perhaps more important. As time went on, it became 
 more difficult to correct such errors by the testimony 
 of eye witnesses for death thinned the ranks of those who 
 had been with Jesus. Many perished as martyrs. Peter 
 himself was crucified by Nero. Finally the disciples 
 began to realize that the facts regarding Jesus were in 
 danger of being forgotten. Those eye witnesses therefore 
 who still remained, were urged to write down their re- 
 collections. Written narratives were accordingly pre- 
 pared, and were read at the church gatherings in place 
 of stories told from memory. In the case of the more 
 popular stories, as that of the Supper by the Sea, a nurhber 
 of different narratives were prepared by different men. 
 
 The Gospel of Mark 
 At this period in the history of the church, John Mark 
 was probably living in Rome. Peter seems to have 
 
AN EYE WITNESS OF JESUS' ARREST 41 
 
 spent his last days in that city, and Mark may have 
 remained there. We may imagine that some friend of 
 his spoke to him somewhat as follows: "Brother Mark, 
 you were an intimate associate of the Apostle Peter; 
 again and again you must have heard him tell of incidents 
 of Jesus' life. You yourself saw Jesus arrested. You 
 ought by all means to write these things down, before 
 you forget them. We need such a book in our mis- 
 sionary work." So Mark wrote for ihe Roman Christians 
 the book which we call the Gospel of Mark. It was 
 largely a collection of the stories of Peter. To some extent 
 it probably reproduced Peter's own language. Naturally 
 enough, the chief character in it, next to Jesus was Peter. 
 We even find in it the story of Peter's denial, which is 
 doubtless just what honest, humble Peter would have 
 wished. Throughout his book, Mark tried to be accurate. 
 He seems to have ha4 accurate information regarding all 
 the more important events, but his sources of information 
 were not always perfect. For example he did not know 
 the exact order ilj which many of the events in Jesus 
 life occtirred. He had heard Peter relating one anecdote 
 or another in accordance with the needs of his hearers 
 and he evidently set down these events in the order that 
 seemed most probable. To some extent, in addition to 
 what he remembered from Peter, he made use of narra- 
 tives which had already been written, copying them into 
 his book. Sometimes he copied two stories which he 
 thought represented two distinct events, but which were 
 really two different accounts of the same event. (Com- 
 pare, Mark 6:30-43 with Mark 8: 1; 10.) At one im- 
 portant point in the story, however, he did not need to 
 rely on the testimony of others. At the close of his account 
 of Jesus' arrest, he added this sentence: "And a certain 
 young man followed with him, having a linen cloth cast 
 about him, and they laid hold on him; but he left the 
 linen cloth and fled away naked." It is quite possible 
 that he was an eye-witness of other events in that closing 
 week, besides the arrest in Gethsemane. At any rate, 
 his mother must have been in close touch with Jesus and 
 the disciples, and a keen witted young man like Mark 
 
42 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 could not have failed to know what was going on. As a 
 result, his account of the closing days of Jesus' life is 
 very full and complete. This life of Jesus by Mark, 
 was so much better than any of the other narratives 
 which had been written, that these others were no longer 
 used and soon all copies seem to have been lost. Other 
 important Gospels were written later, as we shall see, of 
 which Matthew, Luke and John, have been preserved 
 in our New Testament. These Gospels give us the 
 sayings of Jesus which Mark for the most part omitted. 
 They also give us some very valuable additional in- 
 formation regarding Jesus' deeds, and the events in His 
 life. These other writers, however, relied on Mark for 
 the main body of their story of His deeds. As we shall 
 see, Matthew and Luke copied into their Gospels practi- 
 cally the whole of Mark. It is to Mark, therefore, that 
 we are chiefly indebted for our knowledge of the course 
 of Jesus' life. And what a story he has told us! Not 
 that Mark was a literary genius. His language is not 
 particularly elegant. He simply told what he knew, 
 in plain, straightforward sentences. But through him, 
 we hear Peter's voice, telling us of his association with 
 the Master. Through Mark, for example, we go with 
 Peter and Jesus into Peter's lowly fisherman's cottage 
 in Capernaum. Through Mark, we see the crowds 
 gather around the cottage door, when the sun had set, 
 and we see the many sick people restored to health by 
 the healing touch of Jesus. Through Mark, we seem to 
 hear the voice of Jesus calling to us, across the rippling 
 waves of the lake, "Follow me." Countless multitudes, 
 through Mark's story, have "left all," like Peter, to 
 follow Jesus. Above all, what an influence has been 
 wielded by Mark's story of Passion Week: from the 
 triumphal entry into Jerusalem, to the betrayal, arrest, 
 trial, crucifixion and resurrection. What would the 
 Christian- religion be without the story of the Cross? 
 We may truly say that this story as told by Mark has 
 created Christian history, and it remains today the 
 supreme influence for the creation and development of 
 Christian character. 
 
AN EYE WITNESS OF JESUS' ARREST 43 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1. What is the explanation of the influence with this young 
 man Mark, with his merely average abiUty, has exerted in the 
 world? 
 
 2. Why is the story of Jesus' death such a power in changing 
 the lives of men? 
 
 3. Would the story of Jesus' deatL ^>e as effective as it now 
 is, if we knew nothing of His earlier life? 
 
 4. Mention any favorite verse or chapter in. Mark's Gospel. 
 Suggested readings, Mark 14-16. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. Who was the " young man ' ' referred to in Mark 14 :51-52, 
 as following after Jesus from Gethsemane? 
 
 2. How did Mark probably happen to be an eye witness of 
 the arrest of Jesus? 
 
 3. Why were the disciples especially interested in Mark's 
 story of his experience, after Jesus' death and resurrection? 
 
 4. On what occasions did the disciples tell the story of the 
 events in Jesus' life? 
 
 5. Why did they not immediately prepare a written narrative 
 of these events? 
 
 6. As they passed on the story of these events from memory, 
 what errors were likely to creep in? 
 
 7. When did the disciples begin to realize that a written 
 narrative ought to be prepared? 
 
 8. How had it come about that Mark was particularly 
 weU informed regarding Jesus' life? 
 
 9. What sources of information did he make use of besides 
 his own recollections, and what he had heard from Peter? 
 
44 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 10. Regarding what part of Jesus' Kfe was he able to give 
 the most complete account? 
 
 11. State briefly just what Mark's contribution is, to our 
 knowledge of the hfe of Jesus.? 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 CHERISHING THE SAYINGS OP JESUS 
 The Gospel of Matthew 
 
 (Written about SO A. D.) 
 
 A Teacher who Wrote his Messages only on Men's 
 
 Hearts 
 Only once in the Gospel records is there reference to 
 Jesus' use of writing. When the Pharisees brought into 
 his presence a sinful woman, and asked him what punish- 
 inent shoiild be inflicted upon her, he ' ' stooped down and 
 mth his finger wrote on the ground." (John 8:6.) 
 Jesus, then, knew how to write, in spite of the fact that 
 the scribes considered him uneducated. (John 7:15.) 
 For the most part, however. He made Httle use of the 
 art of writing. When He died He left behind him no 
 books. This is all the more remarkable, when we con- 
 sider His astonishing anticipations for the future. He 
 beHeved that His life and work were introducing a new 
 era in history, the triumph of God's kingdom in all the 
 earth. This belief must have seemed to many like a 
 beautiful but impossible dream. Yet when His disciples 
 were discouraged because so few persons were being in- 
 fluenced by His message, He said to them, "The Kingdom 
 of God is like a grain of mustard seed, which indeed is less 
 than aU seeds, but when it is grown ... it becometh a 
 tree." In this parable, Jesus implies that His influence 
 wiU not be limited to the few disciples who can listen 
 to his voice, but will be vastly extended, until the tiny 
 mustard seed becomes a great tree. Yet it never seemed 
 to occur to Jesus to hasten this extension of His influence 
 by writing down His teachings. These sayings, and 
 especially His parables, are classed with the world's 
 supreme masterpieces of literary beauty. Yet He made 
 
 45 
 
46 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 no effort to preserve them in written form. He was 
 content that the beautiful form of His sayings should 
 be forgotten. He did not even urge His disciples to 
 commit His words to memory. His great injtmction, 
 was not "remember" but "do." His chief desire was 
 that they should take His truth to heart, and practice 
 it in their lives. "Every one that heareth these words 
 of mine-, and doeth them, shall be likened unto a wise man." 
 With sublime faith, He was only anxious that His truth 
 should be planted in the' hearts of living men; thus. He 
 believed, it would be transmitted through them to others, 
 until at last the Kingdom should tritimph on the earth. 
 
 Keeping in Memory the Master's Words 
 
 Nevertheless, Jesus' disciples from the very beginning 
 were careful to memorize word for word as many of His 
 sayings as possible. This was in harmony -with the cus- 
 toms and ideas of that age. In Judea of old,^ as in China 
 up to recent years, the chief business of paplls in school 
 was to commit their lessons to memory. Every Jewish 
 rabbi of that day had his circle of pupils, who strove to 
 store away in their minds every syllable oi his utterances. 
 "A good pupil," says one of their proverbs, "is like a 
 cistern lined with mortar, from which not a drop of water 
 can leak out." There were many such pupils, and their 
 feats of memory were truly astonishing. An enormous 
 mass of Rabbinic teaching, much of it exceedingly dull 
 and uninteresting, was handed down through centuries 
 of oral tradition, with very few mistakes, and may now 
 be found in the Jewish book. The Talmud. So likewise, 
 the disciples of Jesus were able to remember almost the 
 exact words of many of their Master's more important 
 saymgs. No doubt in their leisure hours they repeated 
 them to one another, and helped to refresh each other's 
 memories. Surely no utterances were ever easier to 
 remember. The difficult thing would have been to 
 forget them. His sentences were short and crisp. His 
 figures of speech were homely and striking. He loved 
 proverbs and paradoxes. "Let not thy right hand know 
 
CHERISHING SAYINGS OF JESUS 47 
 
 • 
 what thy left hand doeth." "He that would save his 
 life shall lose it." "He that loseth his life shall find it." 
 Such sayings as these are unforgettable. They worked 
 their way once for all into the very souls of men. Many 
 of Jesus' sayings were poetical in form, and poetry is 
 always easier to remember than prose. The following 
 saying, for example, really consists of two stanzas of 
 Hebrew poetry. 
 
 " Ask and it shall be given you; 
 Seek, and ye shall fmd; 
 Knock, and it shall be opened unto you. 
 
 " For every one that asketh, receiveth; 
 And he that seeketh, findeth; 
 And to him that knocketh, it shall be opened." 
 
 Note the parallelism in thought between the lines of each 
 stanza. Finally, and best of all, Jesus loved to illustrate 
 His meaning with stories, — and such stories ! Each one 
 was a perfect picture, not a single word lacking, not a 
 single word too many. Certainly the disciples could 
 have had little difficulty in remembering such stories as 
 the Sower, The Hidden Treasure, The Lost Sheep, or 
 The Good Samaritan. With what loving care they 
 cherished these stories and all the sayings of Jesus, 
 seeking to pass them on to others just as they first fell 
 from their Master's lips. For years, perhaps for decades, 
 after Jesus' death His teachings were handed down to 
 new converts in oral form. They were repeated 
 at the meetings of the disciples, just like the stories of 
 His deeds and the events in His life, except that they were 
 guarded even more carefully from omissions and mistakes. 
 
 The First Written Collections op the Words of 
 
 Jesus 
 
 Notwithstanding all this care and effort, some errors 
 began to creep into even this transmission of the teachings 
 of Jesus. The disciples could not help remembering 
 best, those sayings which they themselves best understood 
 
48 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 and appreciated. Other sayings equally important, 
 gradually faded from their minds, or else lived on in a 
 more or less distorted form. Often alas, it would be 
 the boldest, the noblest, the most original of the Great 
 Teacher's utterances which would be the most imperfectly 
 understood. As the image of a lovely face may be marred 
 by flaws in a mirror, so the great thoughts of Jesus were 
 sometimes imperfectly transmitted as a result _ of the 
 moral weakness or the spiritual dullness of the disciples. 
 A good example of this process of partial distortion may 
 perhaps be found in Matt. 10:5-6. "These twelve 
 Jesus sent forth, and charged them, saying Go not into 
 any way of the Gentiles, and enter not into any city of 
 the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the 
 house of Israel." No doubt, Jesus regarded himself 
 as specially called to save the "lost sheep of the house of 
 Israel," and he may have advised his disciples on their 
 first missionary tour not to attempt at that time to preach 
 to Gentiles. But Jesus, Himself, both preached to 
 Samaritans, and told the story of the good Samaritan; and 
 we cannot believe that He ever commanded his disciples 
 not to enter into any Samaritan city. This was merely 
 the mistaken inference of some Jewish Christian who 
 shared the prejudices of the average Jew, in his attitude 
 toward the people of this despised and hated province, 
 Samaria, and who was perhaps offended also by the 
 Gentile missions of Peter and Paul. Doubtless this 
 narrow minded Christian really believed that these 
 missions among the Samaritans and among the Gentiles 
 were contrary to the wishes of Jesus. As a result of these 
 imperfections of character and memory, there came to 
 be conflicting versions of the same saying. Disputes 
 arose in the meetings of the disciples. Some one would 
 say that Jesus taught such and such a thing; others 
 would insist on a different wording and interpretation. 
 The burning question wotdd arise: what did Jesus really 
 say regarding this matter? Thus it came about that 
 written collections of Jesus' sayings began to be prepared. 
 The most important of the;;e collections was written by 
 
CHERIvSHING SAYINGS OF JESUS 49 
 
 the Apostle Matthew. He had been with Jesus almost 
 from the beginning of his work. After Jesus' death he 
 seems to have spent all his life in Judea, where naturally 
 the sayings of Jesus were best remembered. Many 
 copies of Matthew's collection were quickly made and 
 distributed among the churches in Palestine. Since it 
 was written in Aramaic, the mother-tongue of Jesus and 
 His first disciples, it was at first of no use to Greek-speak- 
 ing Christians. Before long, however, it was translated 
 into Greek, and copies of this Greek version were widely 
 distributed. Many a little group of new converts, who 
 had never been able to hear the words of Jesus, except 
 v/hen some traveling apostle came to visit their church, 
 were now able to read them for themselves. 
 
 The Gospel op Matthew , 
 
 Thus there had come into existence two books about 
 Jesus; first, Mark's story of His life (see Chapter five), 
 and second, Matthew's collection of His sayings. Many 
 churches had a copy of both, and a passage from each was 
 frequently read at their regular meetings. Then came 
 the thought, would it not be a good thing to combine 
 these two books into one ? "In one " they said, ' 'we have 
 a collection of Jesus' sayings, but it tells us very little as 
 to the occasions when Jesus uttered them. In the other 
 is a story of the events of Jesus life, but it tells us little 
 concerning the words which He spoke." It was to meet 
 the need for such a combination, that the book was 
 written which we call the Gospel of Matthew. The 
 name of the real author we do not know. He must have 
 been a man of ability and education. He was a Christian 
 Jew, and was particularly anxious to tell his story in such 
 a' way as to attract Jews. He was especially fond of 
 pointing out how Old Testament prophesies had been 
 fulfilled in the life of Jesus. Suppose we call him Matthew 
 the Second. His book came to be known as Matthew's 
 Gospel, because a large part of it consisted of extracts 
 from Matthew's collection of sayings. In fitting these 
 extracts into the frame work of Mark's story, he simply 
 
50 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 used his own judgment. For example he found in the 
 older collection, an address which was evidently spoken 
 to Jesus' own disciples; on the other hand, he found m 
 Mark's story, the account of how Jesus went up into a 
 mountain, and chose twelve of His followers to be 
 Apostles; but Mark said nothing about a sermon in this 
 connection. In the new book, Matthew the Second 
 inserted the address to the disciples just at this point. 
 Thus it has come to pass that it is always called the 
 Sermon on the Mount. Probably some of the passages 
 which this author included were really spoken on other 
 occasions, for example, the passage in Matt. 6:19-34, 
 which bids us not to be anxious about daily bread, is not 
 found in Luke's version of this sermon, (Luke 6:20-49), 
 but appears further on in the book. The second Matthew, 
 however, liked to group together the sayings^ of Jesus 
 in long sermons, each of them bearing on a certain general 
 subject. On the whole, these arrangements of his are 
 very logical, and the various passages are skilfully fitted 
 together. His version of the Sermon on the Mount, for 
 example, will always hold a unique place in the hearts 
 of men. 
 
 In addition to the older collection of sayings, and the 
 Gospel of Mark, the second Matthew included in his 
 book certain other stories. The most important are 
 those of Jesus' birth and infancy (Matt. 1-2). No one 
 knows where he found these stories. Until recently they 
 were generally accepted as historical facts. Some 
 scholars, how^ever, regard them merely as popular tra- 
 ditions which grew up among Christians at a later time. 
 We may leave this problem for professional scholars to 
 solve. Fortunately for us, we need feel no uncertainty 
 regarding the main facts of Jesus' life and teaching. 
 Although the early disciples were himaan like otirselves, 
 and had their faults and weaknesses, we owe them an 
 incalculable debt. Thanks to the painstaking and 
 loving care with which they wrote those simple, honest 
 narratives, we may still look back through the centuries 
 of forgetfulness and misunderstanding to the real Jesus. 
 
CHERISHING SAYINGS OF JESUg 51 
 
 The chief value of the Gospel of Matthew is its record 
 of the sayings of Jesus. In the beatitudes, we may still 
 find the secret of true happiness. In those heart-searching 
 words which condemn the sinful thought as well as the 
 sinful act, and in those others which insist that our prayer 
 and our every act of worship shall be absolutely sincere, 
 our eyes are opened to a new ideal of goodness and religion. 
 Finally in those tender words about God's care for all 
 His creatures, and especially for His human children, 
 we may still learn to know our Heavenly Father whose 
 love Jesus came to reveal. 
 
52 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. General topic. How the good news of Christianity is 
 transmitted to others who are ignorant of it. 
 
 (a) Suppose the Sermon on the Moimt instead of being first 
 preached by a living person, had been miraculously handed 
 down from heaven in written form, would it have exerted mUch 
 influence in the world? Give reasons. 
 
 (b) How could Jesus be sure that after His death, His teach- 
 ings would not be wholly forgotten? 
 
 (c) What inference can we draw from the Gospel of Matthew 
 regarding the character of the Apostle Matthew? 
 
 (d) What effect must have been produced in the characters 
 of these disciples by constantly remembering and repeating to 
 others, the sayings of Jesus ? 
 
 (e) ' How is Christian truth transmitted to other persons, 
 today? 
 
 2. If you have time, read the whole Sermon on the Mount. 
 (Matt. 5-7). State what part of it you like the best. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. Why did not Jesus write down His sajongs. 
 
 2. After His death how did new converts among the Chris- 
 tians learn what Jesus had taught? 
 
CHERISHING SAYINGS OF JESUS 53 
 
 3. Why were Jesus' sayings easy to remember ? 
 
 4. How did it first come about that written collections of 
 Jesus' sayings were made? 
 
 5. Mention one example of an erroneous report of what 
 Jesus said. 
 
 6. By what disciple was the most important collection of 
 Jesus' sayings prepared? 
 
 7. How does it happen that many passages in ovir Gospel 
 of Matthew are closely similar to passages in the Gospel of 
 Mark? 
 
 8. Why is it that the author of our Gospel of Matthew 
 cakes so much pains to show that Jesus' life was a fulfilment 
 of Old Testament Prophecy? 
 
 9. What 'are some of the most important contributions of 
 ihis Gospel to our knowledge of Jesus? 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 A COMPASSIONATE PHYSICIAN 
 
 The Gospel of Luke, and the Book of Acts 
 
 (Written about 80-90 A. D.) 
 
 The Apostle Paul Inquiring for a Doctor 
 Among the cities where important, events took place 
 in early Christian history we should not forget the little 'M 
 seaport town of Troas, on the northwestern coast of Asia 
 Minor. Here Patil came with Silas and Timothy, at 
 the beginning of what is known as his second missionary .:*S1 
 journey. He had successfully estabHshed churches in , 
 southern Galatia, and was planning to preach the Gospel | 
 elsewhere. For some reason, it did not seem wise, at « 
 chat time, to go to Ephesus, the leading city of Asia ! 
 Minor, so with his companions he came down to Troas, | 
 evidently with the idea of setting sail for some region ,» 
 further west but not knowing just what province would 
 offer the greatest opportunities. Here he seems to have 
 been seized with an attack of his chronic illness, and 
 decided to send for a physician. His friends were directed 
 to a man named Luke. Pew events in. Paul's life led to 
 more important consequences than this seemingly trivial ; 
 incident. Doctor Liike proved to be a gentleman of 
 education and refinement. He was a Greek by race; in 
 religion, however, he was possibly already a believer in 
 the God of Israel. Very likely it was at the synag;ogue 
 in Troas that Silas or Timothy heard about him. In 
 every Gentile city there were many Greeks who attended 4 
 the Jewish synagogue. At any rate we may suppose 
 that Luke came to see Paul and prescribed for his ailment, 
 while Paul no doubt told Luke about Jesus the great 
 Physician, who could heal the souls as well as the bodies 
 of men. Luke listened with eager ears. Never had he 
 
 54 
 
A COMPASSIONATE PHYSICIAN 55 
 
 heard a sweeter story. Nor did he hesitate long before 
 accepting for himself the new Gospel, and declaring him- 
 self a believer in Jesus as his Master. Shortly afterward, 
 Paul's health began to improve and once more the little 
 party began to discuss the question, "Where shall we go ?" 
 One day while talking about the matter in the presence of 
 their new friend Luke, the latter said to them, "Why 
 don't you go over to Macedonia? I myself used to live 
 there; in fact Philippi is my native city. I know many 
 who would listen to yotir message. If you will take up 
 your work in Macedonia, I wiU go with you as far as 
 Philippi, and do what I can to help you." Pattl was 
 much impressed by this suggestion, and that night he 
 dreamed that a certain man from Macedonia, or in other 
 words, probably Luke himself, stood by his bed. "Come 
 Over into Macedonia and help us," the dream messenger 
 said. When Paxil awoke, he told his experience to his 
 friends. "I dreamed last night that I saw you, Luke. 
 You came and said to me, Come over into Macedonia 
 and help us." The friends all agreed that this dream 
 had been sent from God as a special call to them to begin 
 their mission in that province. So, with Luke in their 
 party, they sailed from Troas to Neapolis, on the coast 
 of Macedonia, and thence walked ten miles inland to 
 Philippi, where Paul began his great missionary campaign 
 on the continent of Europe. 
 
 Luke's Visit to Jerusalem. New Facts about Jesus 
 
 This acquaintance between Paul and Luke, led to 
 exceedingly important consequences for both of them; 
 and through Luke, as well as through Paul, profoundly 
 influenced the history of the world. When Paul left 
 Philippi, Luke seems to have remained in that city. 
 No doulat he took up the practice of his profession, and 
 at the same time became a leader in the newly organized 
 church. About seven years later, Paul came back to this 
 city, for a short visit. He was raising a collection in all 
 the Gentile churches for the poor in the church at Jeru- 
 salem. (See Chapter 4). He wanted the Philippians 
 
56 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 to make a contribution, and also to appoint one of their 
 number to go along with him to Jerusalem with other 
 delegates from all the leading churches. The Philippians 
 responded generously and named Luke as their representa- 
 tive. "We can imagine Luke's joy. Not only would he 
 be able to renew his friendship with his beloved teacher, 
 Paul, but he would also see the land where Jesus had lived, 
 and would be able to talk with many who had actually 
 known Jesus in the flesh. Luke himself tells us much 
 about this epoch-making journey in chapters 20-28 of 
 the Book of Acts. From the moment when they 
 landed in Palestine, Luke found himself thrown in 
 with people who could tell him about the early days of 
 the church, and about the life of Jesus. They stayed a 
 few days in Caesarea, and were entertained at the home 
 of Philip the Evangelist, who had been one of the seven 
 men appointed for special service, very early in the history 
 of the church at Jerusalem. (Acts 6 : 1-6, 21 : 8.) In 
 Jerusalem also, they were entertained at the home of a 
 certain "early disciple," named Mnason. How eagerly 
 Luke must have made use of these opportunities. "Did 
 you really know Jesus when He was on earth? Tell 
 me about Him." This was the request which must have 
 been upon his lips. No doubt he went to aU the places 
 where Jesus had been ; to the upper room in John Mark's 
 home, where Jesus had eaten the last supper with His 
 disciples; to the Mount of Olives, whence the Triumphal 
 Procession had set out with their hosannas, and up which 
 Judas had climbed with the priests and their band of 
 hirelings. Surely he went out to Bethany also, to see 
 Mary and Martha and their friends. 
 
 Through these conversations Luke found out much 
 about the Master's life which was not generally knowTi 
 among the churches. In this we have another illustration 
 of the fact that every disciple remembered and passed 
 on to others that side of Jesus' life and character which 
 he himself coiild best appreciate. As a physician Luke^ 
 could appreciate especially well the tenderness and com- 
 passion of Jesus as shown in healing those who were sick 
 
A COMPASSIONATE PHYSICIAN 57 
 
 « 
 
 in body or soul. A doctor sees more than other men see, 
 of the sadness and sorrow in the world. And the world 
 in which Luke lived was even sadder and more sorrowful 
 than ours today. There were no hospitals for the sick, 
 no asylums for the insane. Nor did people in general 
 seem to feel much pity for those who were unfortunate, 
 or helpless, or stricken with pain. The rich and the happy, 
 for the most part, went on with their gayeties quite 
 indifferent to the anguish and the broken hearts on every 
 side. As a physician Luke had tried to do his part to 
 make the world less sad. But at best he could do com- 
 paratively little. Medical science in those days was in 
 its infancy; they had only a few simple remedies. They 
 were almost entirely ignorant of proper methods of 
 sanitation. Great epidemics frequently swept over the 
 land leaving death and desolation in every city and 
 village and the doctors were absolutely helpless to check 
 their advance. Luke's experience as a physician, there- 
 fore, made him particularly interested in Jesus as a 
 successful healer of the sick, and the friend and helper 
 of the unfortunate. This same medical experience also 
 helped Ltike to appreciate the friendliness of Jesus to 
 people of all races. His power of sympathy had been 
 increased, and it is through sympathy that we realize 
 that black people and yellow people after all are huma:n 
 beings like ourselves; "subject to the same diseases, 
 healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the 
 same summer and winter." No doubt Luke asked the 
 older disciples questions like these. "Was Jesus kind to 
 foreigners? Did he teach his disciples to be kind to 
 foreigners? Tell me more about his compassion for all 
 who were in trouble?" It was perhaps in response to 
 some such question as the above, that some disciple 
 related to him the story which Jesus had told about a 
 Samaritan who was kind to a poor traveller who had 
 fallen among robbers. When Lake heard this story and 
 others like it which at that time were not known among 
 the churches outside of Judea, he must, have felt himself 
 to be the discoverer of a gold mine. Neither he nor 
 
58 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 his fellow Gentiles had begun to realize what a wonderfvd 
 Teacher and what a wonderful Personality Jesus had been. 
 The half had never been told them. For the sake of his 
 friends back in Philippi and elsewhere, very likely he 
 wrote down on scraps of papyrus, all that he learned. 
 
 The Gospel of Luke 
 
 It was probably a good many years after this journey 
 to Jerusalem that Luke finally wrote the Gospel which 
 bears his name. He perhaps felt that there were others, 
 who had themselves known Jesus, or who had been in 
 close touch with the early disciples from the beginning, 
 who were therefore better qualified than he to write a 
 story of Jesus' life. In the course of time, as we have 
 seen, books about Jesus were indeed prepared by com- 
 petent writers, the best of them being the Gospel of Mark 
 and Matthew's collection of sayings. Luke had a copy 
 of each of these, and appreciated their great value. Yet 
 he could not help feeling disappointed in them. Like 
 the author of the Gospel of Matthew, whose work he 
 had not seen, he felt the need of a more complete "Life 
 of Jesus," in which the sayings of Jesus would be fitted 
 into the framework of the events in His life, each saying 
 being connected with the original occasion which called 
 it forth. Even if He had teown of Matthew's Gospel, 
 he would still have been disappointed;, for he would 
 have searched through it in vain for just those deeds 
 and words of Jesus which he himself most loved. In 
 order to give to the churches this fuller information, he 
 finally wrote his Gospel. He dedicated it to a friend 
 and fellow-Christian named Theophilus. (Luke 1:1-4). 
 The framework of his Gospel, like that of the second 
 Matthew, was the, narrative of Mark. Into this frame- 
 work, the sayings are fitted, but not in the form of a few 
 long sermons as in Matthew, but scattered here and there, 
 in many different connections. In this arrangement 
 he was perhaps guided not only by his own judgment, 
 but by actual information, gained during that visit to 
 Jerusalem, and later. Certainly the sayings are often 
 
1 
 
 f 
 
 f 
 
 1 
 
 -V 
 
 
 
 ^^^H^HP^!^' 
 
 J 
 
 
 H 
 
 _i 
 
 iHI 
 
 inn 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 ■ 
 
 Kb 
 
 ^^dlHJJ^^^^l 
 
 THE GOOD SAMARITAN: LUKE'S IDEAL OF HIMSELF 
 
 AS A PHYSICIAN. 
 
 From the model now in the hall of the Polyclinic Hospital 
 
 Donated by Mrs. John Q. A. Ward. 
 
A COMPASSIONATE PHYSICIAN 59 
 
 exceedingly appropriate in the connection which Luke 
 gives. He himself tells Theophilus that he has "traced 
 the course of all things accurately from the first." In 
 accordance with this phrase, "from the first," he places 
 at the beginning of his Gospel, an account of Jesus' 
 birth and childhood. 'This is quite different from the 
 account of Jesus' birth in the Gospel of Matthew, and 
 seems to contain a number of reminiscences of certain 
 facts; for example, Jesus' birth in a stable. His gradual 
 growth in body and mind; and His visit at the temple 
 in Jerusalern, when He was twelve years old. The 
 supreme service of Luke's Gospel, however, is in giving 
 us additional information regarding the deeds and say- 
 ings of Jesus during His active career as a teacher. Had 
 it not been for Luke, the parables of the Good Samaritan 
 (Luke 10: 25-37), the Lost Piece of Silver (Luke 15: 8-10), 
 the Lost Son (Luke 15: 11-32), the Poor Widow and the 
 Unjust Judge (Luke 18 : 1-8), the Pharisee and the Publican 
 (Luke 18: 9-14), and many other sayings would have been 
 wholly lost ; likewise the story of the sinful woman weeping 
 at Jesus' feet, the story of Zaccheus entertaining Jesus 
 in Jericho, and the story of the penitent thief on the cross. 
 All these are just such stories as we should expect from 
 "Luke the beloved physician." They are all of them 
 stories of the compassionate Jesus. In short, the Gospel 
 which Luke has given us is, indeed, as Dr. Wells has said, 
 
 " Luke the Physician's Gospel! — comforting. 
 Gracious and tender : laying gentle touch 
 Upon the festering anguish of the world, 
 Pouring in oil and wine; its ministries 
 Halt at no bounds of nation or of race. 
 But offer healing to a world diseased, — 
 Kind Ltike, the Gospel of the Heart of Christ!" 
 
 The Book of Acts 
 
 Theophilus must have been greatly pleased with this 
 beautiful Gospel of his friend Luke. In fact every one 
 was pleased with it. So cordial was the welcome which 
 it everywhere received, that the author was encouraged 
 
60 I'HE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 to write another book. There was a need for a history 
 of the chtirch from the time of the death of Jesus. In 
 the first place such a book would help to correct mis- 
 understanding regarding the Christians in the minds of 
 unbelieving Greeks and Romans. All kinds of slanders 
 had been circulated about them. It was charged that 
 they were atheists, .and that they were plotting against 
 the Roman government. Many Christians had been put 
 to death by Roman officials because of these misunder- 
 standings. So Luke wrote the "Acts of the Apostles," 
 telling the great story with his usual carefulness and skill. 
 He took special pains to show that in the early history of 
 the church, the Roman ofi&cials regarded it as an entirely 
 innocent organization, and protected its leaders from the 
 violence of ignorant and vicious mobs. In this book, as 
 in the Gospel, we see the physician's point of view coming 
 to the front. Luke is careful to show that the early 
 disciples continued the deeds of healing which had been 
 performed by Jesus. He tells how Peter and John 
 healed the lame man at the Beautiful Gate of the Temple; 
 how Philip healed the lame and the palsied and the 
 demented in Samaria; how Paul healed the poor abused 
 slave-girl in Philippi, the boy Eutychus who fell 
 from the third story window in Troas, and the father of 
 Publius, who lay sick of a fever in the island of Melita. 
 In this book also as in the Gospel, we see the same sym- 
 pathy with men of all nations and races. In fact the 
 main theme of the book is the spread of the Gospel from 
 Jerusalem to Samaria, and then ' ' to the uttermost parts 
 of the earth." What a delight it must have been to 
 Luke, to record that noble address of Paul to the Athenians 
 on Mars' Hill, in which the apostle declares that "God 
 hath made of one, all nations of men!" 
 
 Influence of the Writings of Luke 
 
 To what extent Luke's history of the church modified 
 the opinions of intelligent Roman officials regarding 
 Christianity, we do not know. But his two, books have 
 each exerted an enormous influence on the world, from 
 
A COMPASSIONATE PHYSICIAN 61 
 
 that day to this. They have helped to make Christianity 
 a reHgion of sympathy and of healing. In many cities 
 we have a St. Luke's hospital dedicated to the beloved 
 physician who has told us more than anyone else about 
 Jesus as the compassionate Healer. It is Luke's influence 
 in considerable measure which has sent medical mis- 
 sionaries into "the uttermost parts 'of the earth," to 
 minister to all nations of men. We are living today in 
 the midst of a wonderful revival of the spirit of sym- 
 pathy. Hosts of men and women are devoting their 
 lives to help banish a little of the world's wretchedness; 
 and make it a happier world for us all. These men and 
 women received their inspiration chiefly from that portrait 
 of Jesus which we owe to the great and tender-hearted 
 Luke, 
 
62 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1. General Topic: How to make the world happier, 
 (a) Judging from the personal qualities which Luke exhibits 
 in his writings, what kind of a doctor do you think he was? 
 
 (b) With what classes of people did Luke sjTupathize, as 
 shown in his Gospel? 
 
 (c) Did he sympathize with sinners? If so, was this right, 
 and why? (Look up Luke 15:1-32.) 
 
 (d) In the Hght of this story about Luke, what is the best 
 way to make the world happier? 
 
 2. Light thrown on the Scripture by this chapter? 
 
 (a) Compare Matthew 6:9-15, with Luke 11:1-3. Which 
 Gospel probably gives us the true connection in which the 
 Lord's prayer was first spoken? 
 
 3. Of the parables which Luke alone gives, which two do 
 you like the best ? Suggested reading, Ltike 14-15. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. Where and under what circumstances did Paul and Luke 
 become acquainted? 
 
A COMPASSIONATE PHYSICIAN , 63 
 
 2. How did Luke spend the next seven years ? 
 
 3. How did Luke happen to visit Jerusalem? 
 
 4. Why was he glad to go? 
 
 5. What was probably one of his chief activities while he 
 was in Palestine? 
 
 6. What two sides of Jesus' life and character could Luke 
 appreciate especially well? Why? 
 
 7. What two written records did Luke make use of in pre- 
 paring his Gospel? 
 
 8. In what respect is Luke's arrangement of the sayings of 
 Jesus different from that in the Gospel of Matthew? 
 
 9. Mention some parables of Jesus which Lxike alone records. 
 
 10. Mention some incidents in Jesus' life, which Luke alone 
 records. 
 
 11. Where did he get this additional information? 
 
 12. Mention one special reason why Luke wrote the Book 
 of Acts. 
 
 13. How does the Book of Acts reveal the point of view 
 of a physician? . 
 
 14. What is the main theme of the book? 
 
 15. How have the writings of Liike influenced the world? 
 
 Suggestions for Notebook Work 
 
 CHp from your cheap Testaments (see notebook work for 
 Chapter three), those parables of Jesus, related only by 
 Luke. This will be easier if you have for reference a 
 copy of the Harmony of the Gospels by Stevens and Burton, 
 The complete list of references for these parables, is as follows : 
 Two parables on Cotmting the Cost ; Lk. 14 : 28-33 ; two parables 
 about Feasts, 14:7-14; The Beseeching Friend, Lk. 11:5-8; 
 The Widow and the Unjust Judge, Lk. 18: 1-8; The Creditor 
 and the Two Debtors, Lk. 7:36-50; The Lost Piete of Silver, 
 Lk. 15:8-10; The Lost Son, Lk. 15:11-32; The Unfruitful 
 Figtree, Lk. 13:6-9; The Unjust Steward, Lk. 16:1-12; The 
 Good Samaritan, Lk. 10 : 29-37 ; The Pharisee and the Publican, 
 Lk. 18: 9-14; The Rich Fool, Lk. 12: 16-21; The Rich Man and 
 Lazarus, Lk. 16:19-31 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 MESSAGES OF ENCOURAGEMENT FOR 
 PERSECUTED CHRISTIANS 
 
 I Peter (64 A.D.), Hebrews (about 80 A.D.), and Revelation (about 
 
 95 A.D.) 
 
 Christianity Forbidden by the Roman Government 
 
 In the preceding chapter we saw that one of Luke's 
 aims in writing the Book of Acts was to win the good 
 will of intelligent Romans for the Christian religion. 
 In the early years of Christian history the disciples had 
 little to fear from the regular ofificials of the Roman 
 government. There was indeed much persecution: 
 Stephen was stoned; James was put to death by King 
 Herod Agrippa, "to please the Jews." Paul says of his 
 own career, "five times received I forty stripes save one. 
 Thrice was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned." 
 These early persecutions, however, were usually caused 
 by hostile mobs, instigated' by Jews, or by others who for 
 special reasons hated the Christians. Paxil was frequently, 
 protected from these attacks by Roman governors. He' 
 always stoutly insisted that these rulers were ordained' 
 of God for the punishment of evil doers. Under the 
 wicked emperor Nero, however, the government itself 
 turned against the Christians. This came about as 
 follows. In the Spring of 64 A.D., the city of Rome was 
 devastated • by a terrible conflagration. A rumor was 
 circulated that Nero himself, had started the fire. The 
 rumor was probably false; nevertheless to placate the' 
 fury of the people, Nero found it necessary to find some 
 one else on whom he cotdd lay the blame. It was perhaps 
 his beautiful but unscrupulous queen Poppaea who 
 suggested the Christians. She was a Jewess and shared 
 the special prejudices of her people against the Christians. 
 
MESSAGES FOR PERSECUTED CHRISTIANS 65 
 
 * 
 
 From Nero's standpoint, it was a happy thought. The 
 Christians were already unpopular. To the average 
 Roman, the name Christian meant much the same thing 
 as the term "anarchist" does in these days. Hence 
 when Nero said, "the Christians did it," the people ac- 
 cepted the suggestion, and clamored for vengeance. 
 The Roman historian Tacitus gives an account of 
 what followed. "First those who confessed were 
 arrested; then on their information a great multitude 
 was convicted, not so much of the crime of incendiarism 
 as of hatred of the human race. In their death they 
 were made the subjects of sport, for they were covered 
 with the hides of wild beasts and worried to death by 
 dogs, or nailed to crosses or set fire to, and after dark 
 were burned for evening lights. Nero had offered his 
 own gardens for this exhibition, and also exhibited a 
 game at the circus, sometimes mingling in the crowd in 
 the dress of a charioteer, sometimes standing in his 
 chariot. Consequently there arose a feeling of compas- 
 sion towards the sufferers, although they were guilty; 
 for they seemed to be cut oif not for the public good, but 
 rather as victims of the ferocity of one man." Tacitus 
 says nothing about any persecution of the Christians 
 outside the city of Rome itself; but the wave of persecu- 
 tion, which was set in motion in Rome, must have spread 
 quickly to rnany provinces. From this time on, whenever 
 in any commtmity the feeling against them became bitter, 
 their enemies had only to report their names to the Roman 
 officials and they would be arrested and perhaps put to 
 death. Of course in some places, they were unmolested 
 for long periods of time. In rare cases, whole communities 
 might be so largely Christianized that the church officials 
 would be the leading men in the village. For the most 
 part, however, the lot of the Christians grew more and 
 more painful. The Emperor Domitian, who reigned 
 from 81 A. D. to 96 A. D., was particularly hostile to the 
 Christians. In his personal disposition, he was vain 
 and jealous, and he insisted that sacrifices should be offered 
 to his image in every province. This blasphemy locked 
 
66 THE STORY OP OUR BIBLE 
 
 and horrified the Christians more than anything that ha;d 
 previously happened. 
 
 Peter's Letter to Persecuted Christians in Asia 
 
 Minor 
 
 Two or three years before the persecution under 
 Nero began, the Apostle Peter had come to Rome. 
 Possibly he came at the request of Paul. Or he may have 
 come as the representative of the church in Jerusalem, 
 to assure the heroic old missionary of their sympathy 
 with him in his imprisonment. It is quite certain;, at 
 any rate,- that Peter and Paul were associated together 
 for a short time in the city of Rome. Of the two men, 
 Paul seems to have been put to death first, after which 
 Peter gathered Paul's helpers about him, and became the 
 leader of the. Christians. There is an old tradition that 
 when the terrible days of persecution began, the Chris- 
 tians begged Peter to flee to some safe retreat, and that 
 he finally yielded to their arguments. Just outside the 
 city, however, the Lord Jesus met him. Palling on his 
 face, the old apostle cried out, "Quo vadis, Domine?" 
 (Whither goest thou. Master) and the Master replied, 
 "If thou desert my people, I am going to Rome to be 
 crucified a second time." So Peter returned to the city. 
 In this tradition there is at least this much of truth, that 
 Peter did remain in Rome, with his feUow disciples, 
 cheering and comforting them, amidst agony and death, 
 until at last he himself, like his Master, was crucified. 
 
 These last months at Rome were surely the crown 
 of Peter's life. How tenderly he must have comforted 
 those whose loved ones were being tortured and slain 
 because they would not deny Christ! At the secret 
 gatherings of the Christians how he thrilled their hearts, 
 as he charged them to be faithful, if need be, even unto 
 death! Fortunately it is not necessary for us to rely 
 entirely on our imaginations in this matter. We probably 
 have a letter which Peter wrote to the Christians in Asia 
 Minor, who were also svtffering from persecution. In 
 the New Testament it is entitled the First Epistle of Peter. 
 
MESSAGES FOR PERSECUTED CHRISTIANS 67 
 
 • 
 This letter teaches the Christians that the persecutions 
 which they are suffering are opportunities for the develop- 
 ment of character. Just as gold is refined in the fire, so 
 through persecution they may become more like Christ. 
 "Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial 
 among you which cometh upon you to prove you, as 
 though a strange thing happened unto you; but inasmuch 
 as ye are partakers of Christ's sufferings, rejoice. . . . For 
 Christ also stiffered for you, leaving you an example, that 
 ye should follow in his steps ; who did no sin, neither was 
 guile found in his mouth ; who when he was reviled, reviled 
 not again; when he stiffered threatened not, but committed 
 himself vaito him who judgeth righteously." 
 
 This letter was addressed to the provinces of Pontus, 
 Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia. It was probably 
 delivered by Silvanus, Patd's old fellow-worker, who was 
 now with Peter. He no doubt sailed from Rome, to 
 some seaport on the coast of Pontus in the Black Sea. 
 Thence he made a circuit of the above named provinces, 
 carrying the letter with him everywhere and bringing 
 new courage and hope to the tempted, the fearful and 
 the heartbroken, in every Christian community. 
 
 Christianity Worth Suffering For 
 
 There is another letter in the New Testament which, 
 like I Peter, was intended to encourage Christians to 
 endure persecution bravely. This is the Epistle to the 
 Hebrews. Some ten or fifteen years have passed since 
 the persecution under Nero. The Christians in Rome and 
 elsewhere are not just now being called on to suffer 
 martyrdom. But day by day, they are enduring all 
 kinds of minor troubles on account of their religion. Old 
 friends will not speak to them. They are publicly insulted 
 in the street. Boys shout foul names at them in the 
 market place. They cannot find work to do, and thus 
 lose money, and come to poverty. In some ways these 
 daily annoyances and trials were more dangerous to the 
 cause of Christ than fierce and bloody outbreaks like that 
 under Nero. Human heroism always shines out most 
 
68 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 nobly in a short and sudden crisis. But many who would 
 gladly have died for Christ gradually lost their zeal for 
 Him, as year after year brought them only these dis- 
 heartening experiences. > 
 
 At that time there were stiU living in various cities of 
 the Empire a number of Paul's old helpers. One of 
 them, perhaps Barnabas, perhaps ApoUos, or perhaps that 
 noble woman Priscilla, who helped Paul in Corinth and 
 Ephesus, wrote the letter which we call the Epistle to 
 the Hebrews. It is more like a sermon than an ordinary 
 epistle. The "Hebrews" to whom it is addressed were 
 probably a group of Jewish Christians living in the city 
 of Rome. The main idea of the letter is the glory of our 
 religion. Christianity, we are told, is the goal to which 
 all past history has been leading. "God, having of old 
 time spoken unto the fathers in the prophets, . . . hath 
 at the end of these days spoken unto tjs in his Son:" 
 Chapter after chapter shows how everything in the Old 
 Testament points forward to Christ and His Kingdom. 
 We are the heirs of all past ages; surely in such a cause 
 we can endure a little suffering. Only, to appreciate these 
 glories, we need faith ; that is, we need confidence in the 
 reality of the "things which are not seen, but are eternal." 
 It was through faith in these tmseen glories that the 
 heroes of old endured their trials of "mockings and scourg- 
 ings, yea, moreover, of bonds and imprisonment: were 
 stoned, sawn asunder, slain with the sword." This 
 section on faith, chapters eleven and twelve, is the climax 
 of the whole letter. "By faith, Abraham went out, not 
 knowing whither he went. ... By faith, Moses forsook 
 Egypt,'. . . for he endured as seeing him who is invisible." 
 Thus the writer leads us down through Hebrew history, 
 to the final conclusion: "Let us also, seeing we are com- 
 passed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, lay aside 
 every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, 
 and let us run with patience the race that is set before 
 us, looking unto Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, 
 who for the joy that was set before him, endured the 
 
MESSAGES FOR PERSECUTED. CHRISTIANS 69 
 
 * 
 
 cross, despising shame, and hath sat down at the ri^ht 
 hand of the throne of God." 
 
 The Book of Revelation: Its Characteristics 
 
 The next period of especially severe persecution, 
 occuned, as we have seen, some twenty or thirty years 
 after Nero, during the reign of Domitian. At a gathering 
 of the Christians in the city of Ephesus, during this 
 period, one of the members drew from his girdle a new 
 book, which a friend had sent to him from a neighboring 
 city. At this particular meeting there were no strangers 
 present, otherwise the book would never have been shown, 
 The messenger who had brought it to Ephesus, had given 
 this urgent injunction: Keep it safely hidden. Do not 
 let any one have it except those whom you can trust. 
 Above all, keep it out of the hands of the Romans. This 
 book is known in the New Testament, as Revelation. 
 It is a mysterious book. It belongs to a mysterious 
 class of books, called "apocalypses." In the story of 
 the Old Testament, we shall find another apocalypse; 
 the Book of Daniel. There were many others, both 
 Jewish and Christian, which were not finally included 
 in the Bible. They were aU written in times of oppression, 
 and religious persecution, and express the indignation 
 of the sufferers and the hopes in which they found comfort. 
 They all predict the near approach of the Judgment Day, 
 when the persecutors of God's people will be condemned 
 to eternal punishment. They were all written in mys- 
 terious and symbolic language, partly no doubt, because 
 it would have been imsafe to express in plain language 
 the sentiments and expectations which they contained. 
 This explains why that Christian in Ephesus was 
 so careftd to let no one see this new apocalypse, the Book 
 of Revelation, except his trusted fellow disciples. 
 
 Where did this strange book come from? We cannot 
 answer with certainty. The author gives his name as 
 John : but whether or not he was the Apostle John, we 
 do not know. We can only say that he lived somewhere 
 in Asia Minor, during the reign of the Emperor Dbmitian. 
 
70 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Letters from Jesus: Angels, Beasts, and Trumpets 
 The first three chapters of Revelation contain a series 
 of seven letters, one to the Christians in each of seven 
 cities in the province of Asia. Each letter represents 
 what the writer believed the living Jesus would have 
 said to each church. The main thought in all these 
 letters is the same: The Lord Jesus knows what per- 
 secutions you are enduring. He knows your triumphs 
 and your sins. He bids you to repent, and henceforth 
 to be faithful, even unto death. "To him that over- 
 cometh," Jesus will give "the crown of life." 
 
 Chapters 4-20 are filled with mystical visions of angels, 
 and trumpets, and beasts. The author describes himself 
 as taken up to heaven, and there beholding ''the things 
 which must come to pass hereafter." Many of these 
 symbols it is impossible for us now to interpret. The 
 main point of this part of the book, however, is very 
 clear. The end of the world is at hand. Christ is coming 
 to overthrow the reign of Satan, and will mete out terrible 
 punishments to Satan's representatives on earth, that 
 is to the cruel Romans. After this wiU come the millen- 
 nium, that is a period of a thousand years, during which 
 Christ Himself will reign over all mankind. 
 
 The whole section breathes a spirit of burning indigna- 
 tion against Rome. The city of Rome is regarded as 
 wholly given over to every conceivable villainy. The 
 word Rome, to be sure, does not occur anywhere in the 
 book. But the many allusions to "Babylon," are to be 
 understood as referring to Rome. In the Old Testament, - 
 Babylon was a synonym for wickedness; and the early 
 Christians frequently spoke of Rome as the Babylon of 
 their own day. The following passages from Revelation 
 illustrate the writer's hatred of Rome. " I saw a woman 
 sitting upon a scarlet-colored beast, full of names of 
 blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns." (The 
 woman and the beast both represent Rome. The ten 
 horns represent the ten emperors, from Julius Caesar to 
 Domitian.) "And the woman was arrayed in purple and 
 scarlet and decked with gold and precious stone and pearls, 
 
MESSAGES FOR PERSECUTED CHRISTIANS 71 
 
 • 
 
 •having in her hand a golden cup full of abominations. 
 And upon her forehead a name written, MYSTERY, 
 BABYLON THE GREAT. And I saw the woman 
 drunken with the blood of the saints and with the blood 
 of the martyrs of Jesus. . . . The seven heads are the 
 seven mountains on which the woman sitteth. " (17: §-9.) 
 
 In one of these passages, which describe the wickedness 
 of Rome, there seems to be a hidden reference, to Nero 
 himself, the first persecutor and the most cruel pensecutor 
 of all the emperors. "Here is wisdom. He that hath 
 tmderstanding, let him count the number of the beast; 
 for it is the number of a man ; and his number is six hun- 
 dred and sixty and six." (Rev. 13:18). The ancient 
 Greeks and .Hebrews used the letters of their respective 
 alphabets, to stand for numbers. Now if the words 
 Nero Caesar, are written in Hebrew, and the letters are 
 read as numerals, they make the sum of 666., 
 
 It is easy to see why such a book was written in this 
 obscure and symbolic language; and why, even in its 
 symbolic form, a Christian might well have dreaded 
 being taken by the Roman authorities with a copy of it 
 in his possession. 
 
 A Vision of Heaven 
 
 The last two chapters in the book (21-22), are in the 
 form of a vision of the Christian's eternal home in Heaven. 
 The writer tells of the beauty of this eternal city, the new 
 Jerusalem; of its pearly gates; and golden streets; of 
 the river of life; of the trees whose leaves are for the 
 healing of the nations ; and in the midst of it all, the throne 
 of God. Of course, all these word-pictures are figures of 
 speech. No one knows what kind of a place Heaven 
 will be. But these figures stand for certain spiritual 
 truths. We do believe that in that future world, we 
 will know our friends, and that we will live in closer 
 fellowship with God. These beliefs are expressed more 
 beautifully in the poetical language of Revelation, than 
 anywhere else. When those early Christians lay in 
 prison awaiting the day of execution; when they thought 
 
72 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 of the dear ones they must leave behind; when they 
 thought of the shame and the torture which would be 
 inflicted upon them amidst the cruel jeers of the miiltitude, 
 then they wotild remember this book. All their copies 
 no doubt lay hidden in secret hiding places, but they 
 could repeat together such words as these: "And I heard 
 a voice out the throne, saying, Behold the tabernacle 
 of God is with men, and he shaU dwell with them, and 
 be their God; and he shall wipe away every tear from 
 their eyes; and death shall be no more; neither shall 
 there be mourning, nor crj^ng, nor pain any more; the 
 first things are passed away. He that overcometh shall 
 inherit these things; and I will be his God, and he shall 
 be my son." It was in part through the inspiration of 
 these great and splendid promises that the Christians 
 were enabled to go so bravely and smilingly to meet the 
 sword, and the cross, and the flames. 
 
MESSAGES FOR PERSECUTED CHRISTIANS 7.3 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 General Topic: Different ways of finding comfort in trouble. 
 
 1. Suppose we classify the various kinds of trouble in the 
 world as below; to which class did the persecution of the 
 Christians belong? . 
 
 (a) Natural calamities, such as earthquakes. 
 
 (b) The consequences of our own wrong-doings. 
 
 (c) The consequences of the wrong-doing of others. 
 
 2. Mention some troubles in the world today, which come 
 under the third heading. 
 
 3. Which do you think was the most comforting to the 
 persecuted Christians, Peter's letter, the letter to the Hebrews, 
 or the Book of Revelation? 
 
 4. Finish the following sentence, in the style of the eleventh 
 chapter of Hebrews: By faith, the early Christians . . . 
 
 5. Was it right for the Christians to hate the Roman 
 government? 
 
 6. What predictions in the Book of Revelation proved to 
 be mistaken? 
 
74 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 7. What is the chief value of Revelation for us today? 
 
 8. Mention a favorite verse, or passage, in the books 
 discussed in this chapter. Suggested readings, I Peter 4, 
 Hebrews 11, Revelation 1-3, 21-22. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What was the first great persecution of the Christians 
 by the Roman government? 
 
 2. Why was the Emperor Domitian especially hostile to 
 the Christians? 
 
 3. What great Christian leader perished in Rome, during 
 the persecution under Nero? 
 
 4. To whom did Peter write a letter from Rome ? 
 
 5. What is its title in the New Testament ? 
 
 6. What was the purpose of the letter? 
 
 7. What kind of persecution was being endured by the 
 Christians to whom " Hebrews " was written? 
 
 8. What are the main ideas of this letter? 
 
 9. Where, when and by whom was the Book of Revelation 
 written ? 
 
 10. To what class of books does it .belong? 
 
 11. Why is it written in symbolic language? 
 
 12. How did the author of Revelation feel towards Rome? 
 
 13. How was his attitude in this respect difEerent from 
 Peter's? 
 
 14. What events did John believe were soon to come to 
 oass ? 
 
 15. What spiritual truths are expressed in his poetical 
 description of heaven? 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 WHAT IS TRUE CHRISTIANITY? 
 The General Epistles 
 
 Written about 80-100 A. D. 
 
 What New Testament Books are Called General 
 ■ Epistles? 
 The term General Epistles is usually applied to the 
 following New Testament books : James, I and II Peter, 
 I, II, and III John, and Jude. They are called ' ' general 
 epistles," because they were not addressed to any particu- 
 lar individual or church, but were intended for general 
 circulation among the Christians. I Peter we have 
 already discussed in Chapter 8. It is not strictly a 
 general epistle, as it was intended especially for the 
 Christians in one particular region, Asia Minor. 
 
 Misinterpretations of Paul's Letters 
 Most of these general epistles were written during the 
 last ten or twenty years of the first century, A.D. Nearly 
 all of the apostles had by this time passed away. At 
 such a time the Christians naturally turned for guidance, 
 to the writings which the apostles and earlier leaders 
 had left behind them. Every church tried to secure a 
 collection of Paul's letters, and if possible a copy of one 
 or more of the Gospels. These writings were eagerly 
 studied, and were sometimes misunderstood. New and 
 strange ideas thus sprang up regarding the nature of 
 the Christian life. It was especially easy to misinterpret 
 the teachings of Paul; for his sentences are sometimes 
 long and obscure, and hard to understand. 
 
 Mistaken Ideas about Faith 
 Paul had laid great stress upon faith as the essential 
 characteristic of a disciple of Christ. ' ' We walk by faith. ' ' 
 
 75 
 
76 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 "We are justified by faith, not by works of the law." 
 (See Chapter 2.) He meant that no one can be saved 
 from sin by a merely superficial reformation. The whole 
 disposition must be changed; the heart must be turned 
 toward Christ. If any person will thus keep his heart 
 turned toward Christ, or in other words, have faith in 
 the aims, the spirit, and the friendship of Jesus, he will 
 as a natural result become Christ like. 
 
 Rightly understood, this idea of Paul is profoundly 
 true, and one of the most inspiring truths in all the Bible. 
 But at the time of which we are speaking, there were 
 certain shallow minded persons who claimed to be saved 
 by faith, but whose "works" were not at all of the sort 
 that faith ought to produce. They gossiped about their 
 neighbors ; they were jealous of the honors paid to others. 
 In the presence of important . church officers, their 
 language would be exceedingly pious, but with children 
 or servants, or poor people, their angry passions were 
 unrestrained. They also showed partiaHty in their 
 church gatherings, toward rich people. If a man came 
 in with a gold ring, and wearing fine clothing, they said 
 to him, "Sit here in a good place." But they would say 
 to a poor man, "Stand over there, or sit here tmder my 
 foot stool." 
 
 Plain Words about Christian Conduct 
 The Epistle of James 
 
 About this time, there lived in some community of 
 Christians, a certain teacher named James, who saw 
 clearly the hypocrisy of this kind of faith. James was 
 a plain spoken, practical sort of a man, and gifted with 
 a certain homely eloquence. He finally expressed his 
 indignation, in the Epistle which bears his name. 
 Through this letter or tract, James sought to give his 
 fellow Christians some common sense advice regarding 
 everyday life. He warns against sins of the tongue. 
 He rebukes partiality to the rich, and shows his deep 
 sympathy for the poor and oppressed. Above all, he 
 scornfully denounces those Christians who boasted of 
 
WHAT IS TRUE CHRISTIANITY 77 
 
 » 
 
 having faith, but who did not manifest this faith in actual 
 deeds. "If a brother or a sister be in rags," says James, 
 "and in lack of daily food, and one of you say to them, 
 'Go in peace, be ye warmed and filled;' and yet ye give 
 them not the things needful for the body; what doth it 
 profit? Even so, faith, if it have not works, is dead." 
 Evidently, to James, the most essential thing in the 
 Christian life was "works." Nothing less substantial 
 would answer. "Pure religion, and tindefiled, before 
 our God and Father," he says, "is this, to visit the father- 
 less and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself 
 unspotted from the world." 
 
 False Teachings about Freedom; Opposed by Jude 
 AND II Peter 
 
 There were other so-called Christians at this time, who 
 misinterpreted Paul's idea of freedom. Paul had written, 
 "for freedom hath Christ set us free." That is, a Chris- 
 tian does right, not because he is compelled, but because 
 he wants to do right. (Gal. 5:1.) But these men who 
 claimed to be followers of Paxil, taught that when a person 
 has once become a Christian, he is free to follow any 
 impulse which may enter his mind, without the slightest 
 restraint. Their daily lives were even worse than the 
 lives of the hypocrites whom James rebtiked; and thej 
 actually quoted sayings of Paul, to justify their indulgenca 
 in all sorts of intemperate and licentious acts. 
 
 We have in the New Testament two letters or tracts, 
 which were aimed at these false preachers of freedom. 
 One is the little tract known as the Epistle of Jude. 
 Who this Jude was, or where he lived, we do not know. 
 But he had been deeply stirred and shocked by these 
 wicked and dangerous teachings. "Woe imto them," 
 he says, of these men, "for they went in the way of Cain. 
 They are clouds without water, carried along by winds; 
 auttimn trees without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by 
 the roots; wild waves of the sea, foaming out their Qwn 
 shame ; wandering stars, for whom the blackness of dark- 
 ness hath been reserved forever." 
 
78 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 The other tract against these men is known as II Peter..- 
 It is quite generally believed that this was not written, 
 by Peter, but by some Christian leader who hved many 
 years after Peter's death. It was common in those days 
 for writers to publish their compositions under the 
 name of some great man of old. They probably did this, 
 not with the intention of deceiving any one, but simply 
 to honor the memory of those in whose name they wrote/ 
 and to show what these great men of .old probably would 
 have said, had they been alive in later times. 
 
 The purpose of the author of II Peter was the same as- 
 that of Jude, namely to warn against these outrageous 
 misinterpreters of Paul. In Paul's letters, he says, are 
 "some things hard to be understood, which the ignorant 
 and unstedfast wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, 
 unto their own destruction." "Wherefore, beloved," 
 he says, "give diligence that ye may be found . . . witla- 
 out spot and blameless in the sight of God." 
 
 Loving Our Fellowmen 
 
 There was another type of false teaching which was 
 growing up at this period, very different from those 
 described above. There were certain persons who not 
 only abstained from intemperance and licentiousness,- 
 but who also insisted that all physical pleasures were 
 sinful. They went about with long faces, and never 
 joined in the social festivities of their fellow Christians. 
 They frequently observed fasts, and never ate meat on 
 any occasion. Moreover they insisted that no one could 
 be a true Christian, or have any true knowledge of God,- 
 except by living as they lived. Because of this claim to 
 a special knowledge of God, the name "Gnostic" was 
 applied to them, which is derived from the Greek word 
 meaning "know." 
 
 Now these' Gnostics were usually good men at heart;' 
 indeed they often were unusually earnest' and sincere. 
 Nevertheless their mistaken notions regarding the real 
 meaning of- Christianity had a tendency to spoil their 
 characters. They grew proud and censorious. They 
 
WHAT IS TRUE CHRISTIANITY 79 
 
 • 
 
 criticized harshly all who did not fast as often as they 
 did. They gradually won followers and produced many 
 church quarrels and much bitterness. 
 
 These Gnostics were perhaps most numerous in the 
 province of Asia, especially in the vicinity of Ephesus. 
 Now there Hved in Ephesus in the years between 80 and 
 100 A.D., the author of the New Testament writings 
 known as the Gospel and the Epistles of John. It has 
 generally been supposed that these were written by the 
 Apostle John. In none of these writings, however, is 
 the author's name stated. Whatever the name may 
 have been, the man himself was one of the greatest 
 leaders in the history of the Christian Church. Of the 
 three Epistles of John, the second and third are merely 
 short notes, on less important matters. But in the tract 
 known as the First Epistle, he opposes the doctrines of 
 the Gnostics, and seeks to remedy some of the mischief 
 which they had caused. The main point of the t/act, 
 the point on which he insists again and again, is summed 
 up as follows: "Every one that loveth . . . knoweth 
 God." In other words, the true way to know God, is not 
 by observing fasts, but by loving our fellowmen. The 
 real source of moral evil, is not physical pleaure which, in 
 moderation, is usually harmless and innocent, but rather, 
 an unloving and selfish spirit. If these Gnostics, there- 
 fore, wish to show themselves specially holy, let them 
 cease to stir up anger and hatred among their fellow 
 Christians. Let them be kind and charitable. In short, 
 the writer pleads with all his readers to cultivate the 
 spirit of love, as the essence of the Christian life. "Be- 
 loved, let us love one another; for love is of God. Who- 
 soever loveth is begotten of God, and knoweth God. 
 He that loveth not, knoweth not God, for God is love." 
 
80 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. . Paul said, " A man is not justified by the works of the 
 law " (that is, "by good deeds), " but by faith in Jesus Christ. 
 (Gal. 2: 16.) 
 
 (a) Did Paul mean that good deeds are not important? If 
 not, what did he mean? 
 
 (b) How was this teaching of Paul misinterpreted in the time 
 of James? 
 
 2. In what sense is it true that the Qiristian life is a life 
 of freedom from law? 
 
 3. Compare James' definition of " Pure religion," (James 
 1 : 27) with John's description of the true knowledge of God • 
 (I. John 4: 7). 
 
 (o) In what way are they alike? 
 
 (6) What does John include, which James leaves out? 
 
 _ (c) Which is the best definition or simimary of true Chris- 
 tianity? 
 
 4. What is one of your favorite passages in the General 
 Epistles? Suggested readings: James 2; I John 3. 
 
WHAT IS TRUE CHRISTIANITY 81 
 
 * 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What New Testament books shotild be included under 
 the term " General Epistles?" 
 
 2. Why are they so designated? 
 
 3. What was the piirpose of the Epistle of James? 
 
 4. What false idea is opposed in the Epistles of Jude and 
 II Peter? 
 
 5. How did this false idea arise? 
 
 6. Who wrote II Peter? 
 
 7. TeU what you can about the Gnostics? 
 
 8. What evils resulted from their teachings? 
 
 9. What is the chief message of I John? 
 
CHAPTER X 
 A SPIRITUAL GOSPEL 
 John's Story of the Life of Jesus 
 
 (Written about 100 A. D.) 
 
 The Gospel op John: When, where, and by whom 
 
 written ? 
 In the previous chapter, we saw that the Gospel and 
 Epistles of John have generally been regarded as the 
 work of the Apostle John. According to an early chtirch 
 tradition, this apostle spent the closing years of his long 
 life, in the city of Ephesus. A large number of eminent 
 scholars have confidence in the accuracy of this tradition- 
 and beHeve that John, the son of Zebedee was the author 
 of these writings. Many other scholars, however, believe 
 that they were not written by John. In any case the 
 story of the experiences which led the author to write 
 the Gospel woiid be much the same. In this chapter, 
 for convenience sake, we shall refer to the author as 
 John. Whoever he was, he lived in the city of Ephesus. 
 about 100 A.D. 
 
 The Passing of the Eye- Witnesses of Jesus 
 Let us go back to the time when there remained very 
 few who had actually seen the Lord Jesus, while He was 
 on earth. Imagine that one of these men lived in your 
 village. Perhaps he was not one of the Twelve Apostles. 
 Possibly he was only a child when Jesus lived. Yet 
 when we ask him "Did you really see Jesus?" he can 
 answer, "Yes, I saw Him." Perhaps he can add, "I 
 felt His hand upon my head, when my mother lifted me 
 up for his blessing." How gladly we would have ques- 
 tioned this old man about that experience so long ago. 
 He would have seemed to us like a link connecting us 
 
 -82 
 
A SPIRITUAL GOSPEL 83 
 
 • 
 
 with Jesus. But the time came at last when this man 
 was seen no more. At this thought there settled down 
 upon many a loyal Christian heart a sense of desolation. 
 The stream of time seemed to be sweeping Jesus away 
 from them. Seemingly, their only comfort now, was to 
 look back to him and dream about Him as we do in our 
 modern^ song: 
 
 " I think when I read that sweet story of old. 
 When Jesus was here among men. 
 How he took Uttle children like lambs to His fold 
 I should Uke to have been with Him then." 
 
 True they had been taught that Jesus had risen from the 
 dead, and that he. had promised to be with them "always 
 even unto the end of the world." But there were many 
 to whom this teaching somehow did not mean very much. 
 The real Jesus for their minds, was the Jesus who had 
 walked with His disciples in bodily form, along the shores 
 of Galilee. , 
 
 There was another reason why' these later disciples 
 no longer felt that Jesus was near to them. We have 
 seen that the earliest disciples had believed that Jesus 
 would quickly return, to judge the wicked, and establish 
 His heavenly kingdom. This hope was one of their 
 sweetest joys. Anyone who has counted the days before 
 the home coming of some dear one, can understand how 
 the dreams of those Christian disciples were centered 
 on one thing, the coming of Jesus. "Jesus is coming 
 soon. Perhaps He will come tomorrow. Come, Lord 
 Jesus." This expectation helped them to feel that Jesus 
 was near and real. But the years passed, and the decades, 
 and Jesus did not return in visible form. Gradually 
 the disciples ceased to look for him. There even arose 
 scoffers who ridiculed the idea tha^t Jesus would ever 
 return. "Where is the promise of His coming?" they 
 asked. Very few of the Christians expected Him to return 
 in their own life time. Thus, just as the earthly Jesus 
 seemed to them to be vanishing farther and farther in the 
 distant past, so the returning Jesus was now disappearing 
 
84 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 in a vague and indefinite future. They were in danger 
 of losing Jesus altogether. 
 
 A Man who Discovered the Living Jesus 
 This sense of loss was being felt very keenly by many 
 Christians about 100 A.D., when John Hved in Ephesus. 
 There was a time when he himself had felt it. To him, 
 as to others, at such times, Jesus was only a wonderful 
 historical character who lived long ago. Gradually, 
 however, there came to him a strange experience. He 
 somehow became aware of a Presence, walking with him 
 day by day. He could not see or hear this Presence 
 with his physical senses yet it was as real to him as the 
 sohd earth beneath his feet. In times of trial and tempta- 
 tion, he could turn to that Presence and receive comfort 
 and strength. In moods of sadness the thought of that 
 Presence would flash into his mind, like the sunshine 
 breaking through the clouds, and all the world would 
 again be bright. Every good impulfee and true idea 
 seemed to him now to be a whisper of that Presence. 
 He had re-discovered the living Jesus. "Jesus is alive." 
 At the thought his heart was filled with happiness. He 
 could not but proclaim the news to his fellow Christians; 
 "Jesus is alive." He was filled with a new enthusiasm 
 for preaching the Gospel to those outside the chiurch. 
 He had a message for them which was worth proclaiming; 
 "Jesus is alive." If people asked, "How do you know 
 He is alive," he did not merely answer, "The apostles 
 saw Him when He arose from the dead." He simply 
 said, "I myself hold fellowship with Him day by day." 
 The great fact of his life was this acquaintance, through 
 personal experience, with the ever-living Christ. 
 
 A Gospel of the Living Christ 
 
 In order to bring home to the men and women of his 
 own time, this message of the living Christ, John wrote 
 a new account of the life of Jesus. As a means of setting 
 forth this truth, the Gospel of John is one of the most 
 original and extraordinary books ever written. The 
 
Property of the Metropolitan Museiina of Art. 
 
 AMONG THE LOWLY. 
 From a painting by L'hennitte. 
 
A SPIRITUAL GOSPEL 85 
 
 Christians of that day were probably not expecting a 
 new record of Jesus' life. The first three Gospels con- 
 tained all the most important facts. But the thought 
 came to John; "I have known Jesus personally, all these 
 years, just as truly as Peter knew Him of old. He has 
 taught me many new and wonderful truths. Why not 
 write a new story of his earthly life, and write it in such 
 a way as to bring out these new truths which He has 
 revealed to me?" 
 
 So John wrote his new Gospel. He does not give 
 us many new facts regarding Jesus, beyond what we 
 find in the older Gospels. But he re- tells these facts 
 in a new form, bringing out more clearly what they 
 really meant, in the light of his acquaintance with the 
 living Jesus. He brings out this new meaning partty 
 through allegorical narratives. An allegory is a story, 
 in which every detail symbolizes some deeper spiritual 
 truth, as in Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress." John finds 
 these deeper allegorical meanings in the narratives of 
 the miracles of Jesus. For example, in the story of the 
 feeding of the multitudes, the loaves represent Jesus 
 Himself, who is "the bread of God which cometh down out 
 of heaven and giveth life unto the world." 
 
 Another method which John used for bringing out new 
 meanings in the old, well-known facts, is that of conversa- 
 tions put into the mouth of Jesus Himself. John did not 
 mean that Jesus actually uttered the very words of these 
 conversations, but that they represent the spirit of His 
 whole life, as the living Jesus had revealed it to him. For 
 example, the language of the following sentence is probably 
 that of John: "God so loved the world, that he gave his 
 only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him 
 should not perish, but have eternal life." (John 3: 16.) 
 But though Jesus Himself probably never uttered these 
 exact words, they are nevertheless a perfect summary of 
 the inner spirit of His life. There were a number of 
 great and vital religious truths, which John sought to 
 teach by means of these methods. We shall study some 
 of them in the next chapter. Chief among them, however; 
 
86 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 is the message of the living Christ. This , message is 
 indirectly implied, as we have seen, in the very fact that 
 John ventured to express his convictions in the form of a 
 Gospel narrative. From the first chapter to the last, 
 we are constantly made to feel the influence of that Pres- 
 ence, which had become the great fact of John's life. 
 
 "Blessed are they that have not Seen, and yet 
 HAVE Believed " 
 
 This message about the living Christ is also set forth 
 not merely indirectly, but explicitly, in a large number of 
 passages. It is the meaning of the words in the story of 
 Jesus' conversation with the Samaritan woman at Jacob's 
 Well. "Every one that drinketh of this water shall thirst 
 again; but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall 
 give him, shall never thirst ; but the water that I shall give 
 him shall become in him a well of water springing up 
 into eternal life." That is, fellowship with Jesus satisfies 
 our deepest needs; nor can this fellowship between Jesus 
 and His disciples ever be broken. It is a well of water 
 "springing up into eternal life." It continues through 
 the centuries. The same message is expressed in the 
 figiu-e of bread, "I am the bread of life. He that cometh 
 to me shall not hunger, and he that believeth in me shall 
 never thirst." Again in the farewell discourse to His 
 disciples in the Upper room (John 14-17), Jesus says, "I 
 will not leave you desolate; I will come to you. Yet a 
 little while, and the world beholdeth me no more; but 
 ye behold me; because I live, ye shall live also." (John 
 14:18,19.) 
 
 The message is presented even more directly to the 
 Christians of later generations in the story of doubting 
 Thomas (John 20:24-39). This disciple had said 
 that he would not believe in the Resurrection of Jesus, 
 unless he could "put his finger into the print of the 
 nails," with which Jesus had been crucified. After- 
 ward Jesus appeared to Thomas with the other disciples 
 and Thomas said to Him, "my Lord and my God." 
 Jesus answered, "Because thou has seen me, thou hast 
 
A SPIRITUAL GOSPEL SI 
 
 believed; blessed are they who. have not seen and yet 
 have believed." This is a direct and tender appeal tc 
 the men and women of John's own time. They found it 
 hard to believe that the living Jesus was present with 
 them, because they could not see Him or touch Him, 
 as could the earlier disciples. "It is indeed harder tc 
 believe in Me now," says the living Jesus who speaks 
 through the Gospel of John. "But if you will only over- 
 come your unbelief, and will talk with Me in prayer just 
 as though you could see Me and hear Me, with your 
 physical eyes and ears, you will indeed come to know Me, 
 and will know Me even better than those who only saw 
 Me in the flesh." 
 
 Through this message of the living Christ, John also 
 solved the difficulty of the promised return of Jesus. 
 To those who asked "when will this promise be fulfilled,' 
 when will Jesus return to judge the wicked, and reward 
 his disciples," John replied, "Jesus has returned. The 
 judgment is taking place all the time. Whenever a man 
 has the opporttmity to believe in Jesus, but chooses dark- 
 ness rather than light, he thereby judges himself. This 
 is the judgment, that the light is come unto the world, and 
 men loved the darkness rather than the light." Nor 
 will Jesus ever be any nearer to His disciples than He 
 is today, if they will only recognize His presence. "Some 
 of the disciples therefore said one to another, What is 
 this that He saith to us. A little while and ye behold 
 Me not ; and again a Httle while and ye shall see Me ? 
 We know not what He saith." (John 16: 17-18). - These 
 disciples in this passage represent those Christians in 
 John's own time who could not understand what Jesus 
 had meant by His promise to return in a very short time 
 to His people. And the answer of the living Jesus, as 
 it had been revealed to John, is as follows: "Verily, 
 verily, I say tmto you, ye shall be sorrowful, but your 
 sorrow shall be turned into joy. . . . Ye therefore now have 
 sorrow ; but yoiur sorrow shall be turned into joy, and your 
 joy no one taketh away from you." In other words, when 
 Jesus was crucified, the disciples were sorrowful. But in 
 
88 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 the joy of the Resurrection morning, Jesus returned to 
 them never again to depart. 
 
 It is this message of the hving Jesus which has given 
 John's Gospel its wonderful influence in all subsequent 
 ages. Its author understood perfectly the doubts and 
 perplexities of those who must "walk by faith and not 
 by sight," and he has helped the Christians of each new 
 generation to discover Jesus for themselves, as their 
 personal Saviour and Friend. 
 
A SPIRITUAL GOSPEL 89 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. Why was it right for John to declare that " Jesus said " 
 thus and so, when the literal wording was really his own? 
 For a concrete example, read John 3: 16, which is clearly a 
 sentence of John himself, although ascribed by him to Jesus. 
 
 2. How did John endeavor to convince other men, that he 
 had really known the living Christ?" 
 
 3. Which would you yourself prefer: to see Jesus with your 
 physical eyes, or to know him spiritually as John did? 
 
 4. What is the allegorical meaning of the story of the raising 
 of Lazarus? (John 11:1-44). 
 
 5. Are there still new meanings in the old teachings of Jesus, 
 which no one has yet understood? 
 
 6. If so, how will these new meanings be made known to 
 mankind? 
 
 7. What parts of John's Gospel do you like best ? Suggested 
 readings: John 1, 3, 4. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. In what city and at about what date, was the Gospel 
 of John written? 
 
90 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 2. How did it happen that John ventured to write a new 
 narrative of Jesus' life? 
 
 3. In what respect is the Gospel of John different from the 
 first three Gospels? 
 
 4. Mention two ways in which John brought out new mean- 
 ings in the old facts about Jesus. 
 
 5. Explain the allegorical meaning of the feeding of the five 
 thousand? 
 
 6. In what sense is the following sentence a saying of 
 Jesus? " God so loved the world, that He gave His only be- 
 gotten son." 
 
 7. What is the chief message of John's Gospel? 
 
 8. Mention two or three passages, in which this message 
 is clearly stated. 
 
 9. How did John interpret the proniises of the second com- 
 ing of Jesus, which are recorded in the earlier Gospels. Mark, 
 Matthew and Luke? 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 JESUS THE DIVINE SAVIOUR 
 
 The Gospel of John 
 
 (Written about 100 A. D.) 
 
 Arguments of the Jews against the Christians 
 In order to gain some ftirther information regarding 
 the circumstances which led John to write his Gospel, 
 let us visit in imagination the Jewish synagogue in the 
 city of Ephesus, oh a Sabbath morning in the year 100 
 A.D. The services are conducted in the Greek language 
 and in the rear seats there are a number of Gentiles who 
 have been drawn to the meeting by curiosity, or by a real 
 interest in this religion of one unseen God. On another 
 street, not far away, there is a house where the Christians 
 in that part of the city are accustomed to meet. Many 
 of these Greeks who are sitting here in this synagogue 
 this morning, have likewise attended the meetings of the 
 Christians. Some of the Jews also have secretly visited 
 the Christians. This explains the character of the 
 rabbi's sermon. .After the reading of the Scriptures, 
 he begins his exposition. The whole address is an attack 
 on the Christians. "I hear that some of you have been 
 attending the meetings of the Christians," he says. "Do 
 not be deceived by their false teachings. They say that 
 Jesus was both God and man, and they worship him as 
 equal with God. That is blasphemy. What says the 
 Law? 'Hear O Israel, Jehovah our God is one,' and, 
 'Thou shalt have no other gods before me.' Moreover, 
 the facts show that Jesus was a mere man, and not at all 
 what the Christians claim. At first he never pretended 
 to be anything but a disciple of John the Baptist; indeed 
 John was a much greater prophet than he. It was really 
 John who originated the custom of baptism, and the 
 
 91 
 
92 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Christians have merely adopted it. As for the miracles 
 which they say he performed, how do we know these 
 stories are true ? We all know how easily ignorant people 
 are deluded; and all his disciples were uneducated laborers, 
 fishermen and the like. None of the educated men of 
 Jerusalem ever believed in him. In fact he never came 
 to Jerusalem until the last week of his life. He spent 
 his time in the obscure'out-of-the-way province of Galilee. 
 If he was indeed the Messiah, and equal with God, why 
 did he not go to Jerusalem at the very outset, and present 
 his claims before the Sanhedrin, and the other learned 
 rabbis there? Another thing; if Jesus was God, how is 
 it that he did not know that one of his own disciples was 
 a traitor? Finally, if he was God, why could he not save 
 himself from being put to death on the cross? You see 
 how preposterous these Christian teachings are. Do not 
 be deceived by them. The true religion, is the old religion 
 of Israel. Christianity is merely an imitation and a 
 counterfeit." 
 
 How THIS Opposition Hurt the Christians 
 
 Such anti-Christian attacks as these seem to have been 
 very common in the Jewish synagogues of those days. 
 Naturally, the Christians heard about them. They 
 continually ran across these arguments, in talking with 
 non-Christians. Many a time they wotild be nearly 
 successful in winning some young Greek to belief in Jesus, 
 when suddenly they would find his respectful interest - 
 changed to scorn. "You should have heard the rabbi 
 yesterday," he would say to them. "He proves that 
 your Christianity is either a delusion or a fraud." Thus 
 they were constantly hindered in their missionary work. 
 Moreover, many of the Christians themselves were be- 
 wildered by the argtmients of the Jews. They were 
 unable to answer all of them, and their minds were filled 
 with doubts, and their hearts with sadness. For the main 
 point of all these arguments was that Jesus was not divine; 
 but to these early Christians, the one great motive .of 
 their religion, the motive which had given them new 
 
JESUS THE DIVINE SAVIOUR 93 
 
 « 
 power to conquer sin and live righteously, was love for 
 Jesus as their divine Saviour. It was the thought of this 
 divine man of GaHlee which had touched their hearts to 
 the very depths, and had lifted them out of degradation 
 into lives of purity and love. Before they had heard of 
 Jesus, many of them indeed had believed in God. But 
 they had had only a very hazy idea as to the character 
 of God, and they had felt towards Him, only a vague fear 
 and awe. But this God in human form, who healed the 
 sick, and pitied the sinful, and blessed the children, and 
 died on the cross for the sins of others, . . . this God could 
 win their deepest love, and transform their whole char- 
 acters. Now if Jesus after all, were only a man like other 
 men! At the thought the very sunlight seemed to fade 
 out of the sky! Life was no longer worth living if this 
 story of Jesus after all was only a sweet dream. 
 
 How John Answered the Arguments of the Jews 
 
 "These signs are written, that ye may believe that Jesus 
 is the Christ the Son of God; and that believing ye may have 
 life in his name." (John 20:30-31.) In these closing 
 words, John states clearly one of the main purposes of his 
 Gospel. He planned to answer the arguments of the 
 Jews, and to tell the story of Jesus' life in such a way 
 that no fair-minded reader could fail to believe in Him as 
 divine, and believing, "have life in his name." Thus in 
 answer to the argument that Jesus carried on his work 
 almost entirely in Galilee, John tells of many visits to 
 Jerusalem which are not mentioned in the earlier Gospels. 
 In answer to the statement that Jesus was at first only 
 a disciple of John the Baptist, this Gospel brings out 
 very emphatically that John regarded Jesus as "one 
 greater than I." "He must increase; I must decrease." 
 In answer to the charge that no educated men had believed 
 in Jesus, John tells about Nicodemus, "the ruler of the 
 Jews," who came to Jesus by night; and John declares 
 that there were many others among the rabbis who like 
 Nicodemus were secret disciples of Jesus. They were 
 afraid to let it be known, however, lest their associates 
 
94 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 might persecute them. The main argument of the Jews, 
 however, was that the Christians were ascribing to a 
 human being, honors which rightly belonged only to the 
 one true God, the Maker of Heaven and Earth. They 
 were worshipping Jesus as equal with God, and this was 
 blasphemy. In answer to this, John tells very fully 
 just what Jesus taught regarding Himself. He shows 
 that Jesus never claimed to be equal with God, except 
 as a. representative of a king is entitled to all the honors 
 which are due to the king who sent him. Jesus was 
 divine, in the sense that He was the one supreme Mediator 
 between God and man. All his powers however were 
 from God, who dwelt in Him, and spoke through Him. 
 "The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth 
 the Father doing." (5: 19.) "I can of myself do nothing; 
 as I hear, I judge." (5: 30.) "My teaching is not mine 
 but His that sent me. " (7:16.) " I do nothing of myself, 
 but as the Father taught me, I speak these things. And 
 He that sent me is with me; He hath not left me alone; 
 for I do always the things that are pleasing to Him." 
 (8:28-29.) 
 
 In this sense of the word, indeed, all good men may be 
 said to be divine. That is, God dwells in them, and speaks 
 through them, and they are to some extent mediators 
 between God and men. This is suggested in John'S; 
 quotation from the eighty-second Psalni.\"I said. Ye 
 are Gods." (John 10: 34-35.) The Psalmist was speak- 
 ing of the judges and rulers of his day, and he meant that 
 to the people they stood in the place of God, represented 
 God. But Jesus represented God as no other human 
 being ever had done, or ever can ; for His life was absolutely 
 sinless, inexpressibly perfect. Hence in Him we see a 
 perfect picture of the character of God. God is just like 
 Jesus Christ: a just judge, a tender Saviour, a loving 
 Friend. As the perfect representative of God, Jesus is 
 therefore the Light of the world. John believed that 
 He "was in the beginning with God." The true way to 
 honor God, then, is to believe in Jesus, and worship Him, 
 
JESUS THE DIVINE SAVIOUR 95 
 
 For, "he that honoreth not the Son, honoreth not the 
 Father that sent Him. ' ' 
 
 Proofs of the Divinity of Jesus 
 
 Some might still object, how can you prove that Jesus 
 was in truth the supreme Mediator between God and man. 
 John brings forward in his Gospel a number of proofs. 
 He appeals to John the Baptist. "There came a man 
 sent from God whose name was John. He was not the 
 light (of the world), but he came to bear witness of the 
 light." The Gospel also appeals to the Old Testament, 
 prophecies of Christ. "If ye believed Moses, ye would 
 believe me, for he wrote of me. But if ye believe not his 
 writings how shall ye believe my words." 
 
 But there is one final argument which to John is worth 
 more than all the others, and that is the argument from 
 his own experience, and the experience of his fellow Chris- 
 tians. "We know that Jesus is the divine Saviour," 
 he^ says, in substance, "because through Him we have 
 been saved." It is this testimony from personal ex- 
 perience which John puts in the mouth of Peter in his 
 account of the crisis at Capernaum. "Upon this many 
 of his disciples went back and walked no more with him. 
 Jesus said therefore unto the twelve. Would ye also go 
 away? Simon Peter answered him. Lord, to whom shall 
 we go? thou hast the words of eternal life." Peter and 
 his fellow disciples had been lifted into a new life of faith 
 and love and self-forgetfulness through the inspiration of 
 the words of Jesus. This same experience had come to 
 the later disciples of John's time, through reading Jesus' 
 words, or hearing them repeated. Jesus had done for 
 them what no other man had done, or could do. They 
 knew from experience that in Him were "the words of 
 eternal life." 
 
 This argument is expressed with wonderful force and 
 persuasiveness in the story of the blind man whose eyes 
 were opened by Jesus. Allegorically, the blind man 
 represents any Christian who has been cured of the 
 blindness of sin through faith in Jesus. The Pharisees 
 
96 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 use all their arguments and threats to lead him to say 
 that he is a different person from the blind beggar of the 
 day before. But still he persists, "I am he." Finally 
 they say to him, "Give glory to God; we know that this 
 man is a sinner." The cured man answered, "Whether 
 he is a sinner, I know not ; one thing I know, that, whereas 
 I was blind, now I see." 
 
 " He stood before the Sanhedrin; 
 The scowling Rabbis gazed at him; 
 He recked not of their praise or blame; 
 There was no fear, there was no shame. 
 
 " For one upon whose dazzled eyes 
 The whole world poured its vast surprise, 
 The open heaven was far too near 
 His first day's light too sweet and clear 
 To let him waste his new-gained ken 
 On the hate-clouded face of men. 
 
 " But still they questioned, Who art thou. 
 What hast thou been? What art thou now? 
 Thou art not he who yesterday 
 Sat here and begged beside the way: 
 For he was bHnd: — And I am he; 
 For I was blind but now I see. 
 
 ' They were all doctors of renown 
 The great men of a famous town 
 With deep brows wrinkled, broad and wise; 
 Beneath their wide phylacteries, 
 The wisdom of the East was theirs; 
 And honor crowned their silver hairs. 
 
 ' The man they jeered and laughed to scorn. 
 Was unlearned, poor, and humbly bom. 
 But he knew better far than they, 
 What came to him that Sabbath Day. 
 And what the Christ had done for him 
 He knew and not the Sanhedrin." . John Hay. 
 
JESUS THE DIVINE SAVIOUR 97 
 
 , • 
 
 So tne simple-hearted reader of John's Gospel, as he read 
 this story, was comforted. He might not always be able 
 to answer the arguments of the rabbis. He was not 
 trained in learned arguments. 
 
 "But what the Christ had done for him, 
 He knew, and not the Sanhedrin," 
 
98 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. ^ Were there any elements of truth in the arguments of 
 the Jews? 
 
 2. Which of John's arguments for the divinity of Jesus 
 seems to you the strongest ? 
 
 3. If a man is not a Christian, and is unwilling to obey 
 Christ's teachings, will he be convinced by any of these argu-- 
 ments? 
 
 4. What persons did John chiefly hope to convince, thtough 
 his Gospel; Jews, or heathen Greeks, or doubting Christians? 
 
 5. What arguments of the Jews does John answei m the 
 following passages? 
 (a) John 1 : 25-27. 
 
 (6) John 12:42-43. 
 
 6. Mention other favorite passages or verses in John's 
 Gospel. Suggested readings : John 6, 9, 14. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. Mention some of the arguments of tke jews against the 
 Christians? 
 
JESUS THE DIVINE SAVIOUR 99 
 
 * 
 
 2. What harm was caused by these attacks of the Jews? 
 
 3. How did John answer these arugments? 
 
 4. According to John's Gospel, did Jesus claim to be equal 
 with God? 
 
 5. If not, in what sense was He divine? 
 
 6. In what way was He different from all other good men? 
 
 7. To what proofs did John appeal, in order to convince his 
 readers of the divinity of Jesus? 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 THE STORY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT 
 The Writings of the Early Christians 
 
 The twenty-seven books of the New Testament were 
 all written, for the most part, during a period of about 
 fifty years, that is, between 50 and 100 A.D. They may 
 be divided roughly into four groups, which represent in 
 a general way, four steps in the history. 
 
 First of all, we have a group of letters by the Apostle 
 Paul, written between 50 and 60 A.D., or thereabouts. 
 Next there appeared the first three Gospels caUed the 
 Synoptics, namely Mark, Matthew and Lioke; and with' 
 them we may class the Book of Acts. They were probably 
 written between the years 60 and 80 A.D. Next there 
 came another group of letters, many of them "general 
 epistles" or tracts. Most of them were written between 
 the years 80 and 100 A.D., although I Peter was probably 
 written much earlier (about 64 A.D.), and II Peter some- 
 what later (perhaps about 110 A.D.). With this group 
 we may for convenience sake include the Book "of Revela- 
 tion, although only the first three chapters are in the 
 form of letters. Most of these writings are the work of 
 the successors of the apostles. 
 
 The latest book of importance, of those now in the New 
 Testament, was the Gospel of John. There were other 
 books by Christian leaders, written during this period, 
 and later; but in beauty of language and greatness of 
 thought, the writings of the New Testament tower far 
 above them all. 
 
 Differences Between the Various Books 
 The New Testament books were written in many 
 different places, as for example in Ephesus, Palestine, 
 
 100 
 
STORY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT 101 
 
 and Rome. They were written by ten or twelve different 
 persons. These writers were very different from each 
 other in temperament and training. Paul was a learned 
 Jewish rabbi. Luke, John and the author of Hebrews 
 were also men of education, and wrote in polished Greek. 
 The author of the Book of Revelation, on the other hand, 
 made mistakes in grammar, and many of the other writers, 
 as for example Matthew and Mark, had received little 
 training in literary composition. In temperament, Paul 
 was impetuous and quick-tempered. James was a man 
 of practical common sense. John was a quiet dreamer. 
 Most of these writers were by nationality Jews, but Luke 
 was a Greek. Finally, the various New Testament books 
 were called forth by the most diverse circumstances. 
 Paul's letters were simply letters; it never occurred to 
 him that any of them would be preserved after they had 
 served their immediate purpose. Matthew wrote his 
 Gospel for Jews: Mark was perhaps thinking especially 
 of the Romans; Ltike, of Greeks. John was seeking to 
 help the Christians of the third generation after Jesus. 
 All these differences of authorship and circumstances of 
 origin, have left their mark upon the books. 
 
 The Unity of the New Testament 
 Nevertheless, in spite of these differences, these books 
 are bound together, in a very real unity. There runs 
 through them all a remarkable love for a remarkable 
 Person. The authors were all dominated by a passionate 
 loyalty to Jesus, the carpenter of Nazareth, and by the 
 supreme desire to spread abroad among men. His ideas, 
 and His way of Hving. It was the influence of Jesus which 
 caused Paul to undertake those astonishing missionary 
 campaigns, in the midst of which he wrote his letters. 
 It was the intense desire to perpetuate the teachings and 
 the personal influence of Jesus, which led to the writing 
 of the Gospels. Ahd of all these writings, none shows a 
 more unbounded devotion to Jesus, or a more intimate 
 appreciation of the divine greatness of His character, than 
 the latest of them, the Gospel of John. Thus the story of 
 
STORY OP THE NEW TESTAMENT 103 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. How would you use the facts which we have learned in 
 the preceding chapters, to explain the meaning of any partictdar 
 passage in the New Testament, as for example, Matt. 16:28, 
 " There are some of them that stand here, who shall in no wise 
 taste of death, till they see the Son of Man coming in his 
 kingdom." 
 
 2. Write below, the names and dates of the various New 
 Testament writings, as nearly as possible in chronological 
 order, beginning with I Thessalonians, as follows: 
 
 Date Book Author 
 
 1. About 51 A.D. I Thessalonians Paul 
 
 2 
 
 3 
 
 4 
 
 6. 
 
 7. 
 
 8. 
 
 9. 
 10. 
 11. 
 12. 
 13. 
 14. 
 15. 
 
i04 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 16. 
 
 17 
 
 18 
 
 19 
 
 20 
 
 21 
 
 22 _., , .. 
 
 23 
 
 24 .....: 
 
 25 
 
 26 
 
 27. 
 
 3. Suppose you were required to select one Synoptic Gospel, 
 one letter of Paul, and two others out of the remaining New 
 Testament books,, and allow the rest to be lost, which four 
 would you chose? 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 BARDS AND BALLAD-SINGERS, 
 Beginning the Story of the Old Testament 
 
 The only Bible which Jesus knew was the Old. Testsi- 
 ment, for none of the New Testament books were written 
 until after His death. We know, however, from the 
 facts recorded in the Gospels that Jesus eagerly studied 
 in the synagogue, at the temple, and by Himself the 
 Jewish sacred writings found in our Old Testament. 
 
 In former chapters we have seen that the earliest 
 New Testament writings were not those which now come 
 first in our Bible. This is also true of the books of the 
 Old Testament.. We have seen that behind the Gospels 
 of Matthew and Luke lay two earlier books — the Gospel 
 of Mark and another book now lost, Matthew's Col- 
 lection of the Sayings of Jesus. In a similar way, back 
 of the Books of the Old Testament lay many earlier 
 books now lost, but it is possible for scholars to detect 
 quotations from them by studying the differences in 
 language and style. We will therefore begin the Old 
 Testament with the story of some of the earliest of these 
 lost books. 
 
 The Early Hebrew Nomads 
 
 About fourteen hundred years before Christ, there 
 was a group of shepherd tribes, leading their flocks 
 from oasis to basis, on the borders of the desert south 
 and east of Canaan. Under the leadership of a noble 
 sheik named Abraham, these nomads had come across 
 the desert from the northeast. The people who in- 
 habited Canaan called Abraham and his followers 
 Hebrews, that is, " the people from the other si(iv.. 
 
 105 
 
106 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 The nomads called themselves " the sons of Israel." 
 After a time certain tribes belonging to this group 
 were driven by hunger to take refuge in Egypt. For 
 a time they were permitted by a friendly king to pasture 
 their flocks in the district of Goshen, the open range 
 on the northeastern comer of the land. But a later 
 king laid upon them the heavy hand of Egyptian power, 
 and compelled them to render forced service on his great 
 building enterprises. A leader was raised up for them, 
 however, who had had the advantage of education in 
 the Egyptian royal palace. His name, Moses, implied 
 that he was an Egyptian, but in birth, in spirit and in 
 heart, he was a true Hebrew. He appealed to his kins- 
 men in the name of the God Jehovah, who was believed 
 to dwell in the sacred mountain Sinai, near which these 
 tribes had probably often fed their flocks. They endured 
 their troubles for many years but finally tmder the 
 leadership of Moses, and trusting in Jehovah's help, 
 they made a dash for freedom. Their trust was quickly 
 and surprisingly vindicated; for a providential east 
 wind swept dry for a few hours one night the shallows 
 near the upper end of the Red Sea (lit. Sea of Reeds, 
 probably Lake Timsah). Thus they were able to escape 
 from the Egyptian soldiers who were pursuing them, and 
 bade a long farewell to Egypt and its rulers. Returning 
 to the semi-desert regions south and east of Canaan, they 
 took up again, for a time, nomadic life. 
 
 This wonderful deliverance made a deep impression on 
 the Hebrews. Immediately after leaving Egypt, Moses 
 led them to Mount Sinai, where they offered sacrifices 
 of thanksgiving to Jehovah. They also made a covenant, 
 promising to worship no other gods except Jehovah. 
 The memory of these experiences and the sense of belong- 
 ing as a people to so just and mighty a God, undoubtedly 
 lifted them above the tribes around them. They seemed 
 to have more of what we call now " civic spirit," and a 
 greater readiness to forget their selfish interests as in- 
 dividuals for the sake of the common welfare. 
 
BARDS AND BALLAD-SINGERS 107 
 
 ♦ 
 
 Songs Around the Campfire 
 
 The earliest Old Testament literature was produced 
 by these Hebrew nomads. They had no books in those 
 days. They did not even know the art of writing, 
 yet they had begun to develop an oral literature, consist- 
 ing of songs and ballads, that is, stories in poetic form. 
 As they sat around their campfires at night, one member 
 of the circle would often sing songs, and repeat ballads. 
 Sometimes they would have with them a professional 
 bard. These men went from tribe to tribe, and from 
 campfire to campfire, reciting their songs and stories, 
 in return for food and lodging. 
 
 Scraps of these ancient poems are found in the Old 
 Testament. One of them may be called the Song of 
 the Well. The Hebrew maidens used to sing this song 
 when they went to draw water. We may perhaps 
 compare it with our modem song " The Old Oaken 
 Bucket." In many languages, there are similar songs 
 which express the gratitude of a thirsty man for a drink 
 of clear, cold water. As desert dwellers the Hebrews 
 deeply appreciated the value of water, so that this was 
 without doubt a very popular song. The stanza quoted 
 in the Old Testament is as follows: 
 
 Spring up, O well, 
 
 Sing ye to it: 
 
 To the well which the chieftains dug, 
 
 Which the nobles of the people delved, 
 
 With the leader's wand, with their staves. (Num. 21 : 17-18.) 
 
 The majority of these ancient fragments are from 
 war songs. Nomadic life was far from being peaceful. 
 Pasturage was scarce, and every spring and well and 
 green meadow was the scene of many a bloody conflict. 
 There was no estabUshed government, and the only 
 law was the law of blood revenge; " Eye for eye, and 
 tooth for tooth." (Lev. 24:20.) There is a fragment 
 of poetry in Genesis, called the Song of Lamech, which 
 celebrates the vengeance of some desert warrior. 
 
108 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Adah and Zillah, hearken to my voice, 
 
 Wives of Lamech, give ear to my sa3dng. 
 
 A man I slay for wounding me, 
 
 Yea, a youth for bruising me. 
 
 If Cain shall be avenged seven fold, 
 
 Lamech shall be seventy and seven. (Gen. 4: 23-24.) 
 
 Most of these war songs, however, reflect a nobler 
 spirit than that of mere personal revenge. We can trace 
 the influence of the experiences of the Hebrews in Egypt 
 in a strong feeling of loyalty to the nation as a whole. 
 This is the spirit of a song attributed to Moses, which 
 praises Jehovah on behalf of the nation for the great 
 deliverance at the Red Sea: 
 
 Sing ye to Jehovah, for he is greatly exalted. 
 
 The horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea. (Ex. 1 5 : L) 
 
 Another ancient fragment with a similar spirit is called 
 the Song of the Ark. This Ark was a sacred box or 
 chest which was supposed to represent in some special 
 sense the actual presence of Jehovah. It was customary 
 for the warriors to carry it with them into battle. When 
 they had the Ark, they felt that Jehovah was fighting 
 for them, by their side. And they sang a battle song, 
 as they advanced with the Ark against the enemy: 
 
 Rise, Jehovah, let thine enemies be scattered: 
 
 Let those who hate thee, flee before thy face. (Num. 10: 35.) 
 
 Songs of a Nation's Heroes 
 
 Like all the desert dwellers on the borders of Canaan, 
 the Hebrews looked with longing eyes on the fertile 
 valleys. One imsuccessful attempt was made to invade 
 the country from the south, while Moses, their great 
 leader, was alive. Shortly afterwards they established 
 themselves on the table lands east of the Jordan. After 
 Moses' death, they crossed the Jordan, and gained a 
 foothold in the settled territory. With that remarkable 
 national spirit growing out of their memories of their 
 nation's past, it is not surprising that they soon became 
 
BARDS AND BALLAD-SINGERS. 109 
 
 » 
 
 masters of the land. As for the earlier inhabitants, 
 some were lolled and others were reduced to serfdom. 
 With others the Hebrews made friendly alliances, and 
 learned from them how to till the soil and build houses. 
 But upon all the* other tribes who were gradually absorbed 
 into the nation, the Hebrews stamped their own peculiar 
 characteristics and religion. They continued to be 
 the people of Jehovah, the God who had led them up 
 out of the land of Egypt. 
 
 We have one very old Hebrew poem, the Song of 
 Deborah, which comes to us from the period of the 
 settlement in Canaan. With the exception of the brief 
 fragments mentioned above, this is probably the oldest 
 piece of writing in the Bible. It celebrates a great 
 victory of the Hebrews over the earlier inhabitants 
 of Canaan. Previous to that victory the original Canaan- 
 ites were still in control of the cities and the fertile 
 lowlands. In the northern part of the country there 
 was a strong Canaanite king named Sisera, who at one 
 time seemed on the point of reducing the Hebrews in 
 that region to slavery. But a brave woman named 
 Deborah went about among the different tribes, and 
 stirred up the old Hebrew spirit. In substance, her 
 message was as follows: " Let us forget that we are 
 Ephraimites, or Reubenites or Zebulonites, or whatever 
 our tribe may be, and remember only that we are Hebrews, 
 the people of Jehovah, who brought us up out of the, 
 bondage of Egypt." The result Was that most of the 
 tribes united against the common foe, and won a great 
 victory on the Plain of Esdraelon. After the battle, 
 some poetic genius celebrated the victory in a triumph 
 song which is one of the most perfect compositions of 
 its kind in Hterature. (Judges 5.) 
 
 A Nation Learning to Write 
 
 When the Hebrews entered Canaan, they learned 
 the art of writing. Happily for the world, what they 
 learned was the new alphabetical writing which had 
 
110 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE ■ 
 
 been for the first time pu,t into practical use by the 
 Phoenicians. The cumbrous systems of picture-writmg, 
 which were used by the Egyptians and Babylonians, 
 were not favorable to the growth of literature but were 
 used chiefly for recording laws and business transactions. 
 An alphabet, however, consists of only a few letters of 
 different shapes, through which any spoken word can 
 be reduced to writing. 
 
 Along with the newly discovered alphabet there soon 
 came more convenient writing materials. Formerly 
 " to write " had meant to engrave on wood or stone. 
 That is the original meaning of the Hebrew and Greek 
 words translated " write." Men, however, learned to 
 write with pen and ink on rolls of leather. The ability 
 to read and write became more common. . Thus in tirne 
 it came to pass that some Hebrew bard, or ballad-singer, 
 wrote down his collection of songs, in order to aid hia 
 memory. Two of these rolls or books of early Hebrew 
 songs were widely copied and became well known. 
 One was called " The Book of Jashar " or the Book 
 of Righteous Israel, and the other " The Wars of 
 Jehovah." There are quotations from these two books 
 in the Old Testament (Num. 21: 14-15; Josh. 10: 12-13; 
 2 Sam. 1:18.) Possibly they contained the Song of 
 Deborah, and other early poems now quoted in the 
 Old Testament books. 
 
 Religion and the Civic Spirit 
 
 The religion of such poems as the Song of Deborah 
 is essentially a civic religion. This was the unique' 
 characteristic of the Hebrews after their common suffer- 
 ings in Egypt and their wonderftil deliverance. They 
 thought of Jehovah as the God of the whole nation, 
 and as a God who would frown on any act of selfishness, 
 whereby a single individual might be benefited at the 
 expense of the general welfare. The essential spirit 
 of this rehgion was on the side of justice and fair play. 
 
 Even in these early poems, therefore, we begin to see 
 
^^ 
 
 Brick of Hammurabi, Recording 
 the Building of a Temple. 
 
 Cretan Pictographic Writing 
 from Phsestos. 
 
 
 ^;L>) 
 
 
 1 I 
 
 II VI V ;,('.( 
 
 ;,,;;!, ; 
 
 '\,' 
 
 
 Clay Tablet, with Linear Script. 
 Palace of Minos, Cnossos, Crete. 
 
 The Rosetta Stone. 
 
 ANCIENT SYSTEMS OF WRITING. 
 From Goodspeed's "Ancient World." 
 
BARDS AND BALLAD-SINGERS 111 
 
 « 
 
 the secret of that extraordinary moral and religious 
 influence which the Hebrew people were destined to 
 exert upon mankind during all the centuries to follow. 
 In teaching men to deny themselves for the common 
 good, they were to lift the world toward God. 
 
112 THE STORY OP OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1. What wars are referred to in the early book of poems 
 entitled " The Wars of Jehovah "? 
 
 2. Why are they called Jehovah's Wars? 
 
 3. How does the Song of Deborah differ from the Song of 
 Lamech, from the moral point of view? (Gen. 4: 23-24, and 
 Judges 5.) . 
 
 4. Of what value is poetry as a means of cultivating patri- 
 otism? 
 
 5. Which of the songs mentioned in this chapter do you Uke 
 best ? Suggested readings : Judges 5. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. With what part of our Bible was Jesus familiar? 
 
 2. How did the deliverance from Egypt influence the 
 character of the Hebrew people? 
 
 3. What was the earHest Hebrew literature? 
 
 4. Mention two fragments of the early Hebrew campfire 
 songs quoted in the Qld Testament. 
 
 5. How did the Song of Deborah come to be written? 
 
 6. Prom whom did the Hebrews learn the art of writing? 
 
 7. How was the Phoenician system of writing different 
 from the earlier Egyptian and Babylonian systems? 
 
 8. Mention the names of two of the earliest Hebrew books. 
 
 9. What moral quaUty is manifested in the early Hebrew 
 songs? 
 
BARDS AND BALLAD-SINGERS 113 
 
 A Chronological Chart 
 
 In the latter part of this quarterly, there is a blank chart, 
 which, when filled in, will bring clearly before the eye the most 
 important events in Hebrew history, and the various writings 
 of the Old Testament in their chronological order. In con- 
 nectioii with this and each succeeding chapter, the events and 
 writings referred to are to be inserted in their proper place in the 
 chart. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 OLD STORIES TOLD IN A NEW WAY 
 The Earliest Histories of the Hebrews 
 
 Questions about the Origin of Things 
 There are certain questions which awaken the curiosity 
 of every one. How did this wonderful world come' into 
 existence? How is it that you and I happen to be here? 
 How did things in general come to be as they are ? Some 
 of these difficult questions have been partially answered 
 by scientists, such as Newton and Darwin. In ancient 
 times there was little or no science ; yet in every country, 
 there were certain answers to tl\ese questions, handed 
 down from generation to generation, and generally 
 accepted as true. Among the Hindus, it used to be 
 said that the world was hatched out of an enormous egg. 
 It is not difficult to see how ideas of this kind grew up. 
 First of all, some one suggested that the world might 
 have been created in this way or another. His idea was 
 accepted by others and passed on from lip to lip. Fathers 
 told it to their children. After a few generations it 
 acquired the authority of antiquity. " This is what 
 we have been taught by our ancestors," people said. 
 "It must be true." 
 
 The Nations who Taught the Hebrews 
 
 When the Hebrews entered Canaan they naturally 
 were inclined to adopt the ideas and beliefs of the earlier 
 inhabitants of the country, whose knowledge in regard 
 to most matters was far beyond theirs. They also 
 came in contact with other civilized nations, especially 
 the Babylonians. The two leading civiUzed nations 
 of that day were the Babylonians and the Egyptians. 
 
 ^114 
 
OLD STORIES TOLD IN A NEW WAY 
 
 115 
 
116 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 A glance at the map (page 115) wil^ show that any 
 people living in Canaan would inevitably come into 
 close relationship with both these nations; for there 
 was only one convenient caravan route between them, 
 and that route passed through Canaan. There was 
 mdeed a more direct route, but it led across the 
 barren desert of interior Arabia, which was hundreds of 
 miles wide. Hence the great caravans were accustomed 
 to go up the Euphrates river some himdreds of miles, 
 cross the desert where it was narrowest to Damascus, 
 and then pass down through the narrow lane of arable 
 land, about seventy-five miles wide, which lay between 
 the desert and the southwestern shore of the Medi- 
 terranean Sea. That narrow stretch of land was Canaan. 
 Visitors from Babylonia were therefore frequently seen 
 in Hebrew towns and villages. Apparently they exerted 
 a greater influence than the Egyptians, perhaps on accoimt 
 of their closer kinship in race and language. 
 
 For more than two thousand years before the Hebrews 
 entered Canaan, the Babylonians had an elaborate system 
 of writing. They used clay tablets as writing material. 
 The characters were inscribed on the clay while it was 
 soft, and then the tablet was allowed to dry and harden 
 in the sun. The writing is described by modem scholars 
 as cuneiform, that is, wedge-shaped. If you will try the 
 experiment, you will find that the marks produced on clay 
 by a sharp-pointed cube are naturally wedge-shaped^ 
 In recent years great numbers of these old clay tablets 
 covered with writing have been dug up in the ruins of 
 Babylonian cities and are now preserved in museums. 
 Scholars, after years of patient labor, have at last de- 
 ciphered this language. 
 
 The Questions of the Hebrews and the Answers 
 OF the Babylonians 
 
 As the Hebrews became acquainted with these rulers 
 of the east they learned something of their answers to 
 those eternal questions which men have been asking 
 
OLD STORIES TOLD IN A NEW WAY 117 
 
 since the beginning of time. We know that they were 
 influenced in this way because on the clay tablets, some 
 of which were inscribed long before the Hebrew nation 
 existed, we find stories which are strikingly similar to 
 certain stories in the Bible. 
 
 For example, Babylonian traders in the inns of Pales- 
 tinian towns used to tell a story of the creation of the 
 world and also about a great flood which the gods sent 
 upon the earth. It was told as the answer to the question 
 ,why we human beings die, instead of living on forever. 
 Scholars have found clay tablets containing practically 
 the whole Babylonian story of the flood. It runs as follows : 
 The gods had determined to destroy mankind, in order 
 to prevent men from attaining immortality, but one 
 of them, named Ea, sent a warning to a man named 
 Utnapishtim, warning him of the flood, and instructing 
 him to build a ship, and to take into it his family, and 
 a pair of each kind of animals. Then came the terrible 
 storm of rain, says Utnapishtim. The earth was covexed 
 with water; for six days and nights the rain fell, until 
 all living things were destroyed, except those on the 
 ship. Even the gods were terrified, and climbing to 
 the highest heaven, cowered like dogs as they looked 
 over the edge. But after six days and six nights the 
 storm ceased, and the ship rested on the top of the moun- 
 tain Nisir. Then after seven days more, 
 
 " I sent forth a dove and let it loose 
 The dove went forth, but came back, 
 Because it found no resting-place, it returned. 
 
 Then I sent forth a raven and let it loose. 
 
 The raven went forth and saw that the waters had decreased; 
 
 It ate, it waded, it croaked, but did not return. 
 
 Then I sent forth everything in all directions and offered a 
 
 sacrifice. 
 The gods inhaled the odor. 
 The gods inhaled the sweet odor, 
 The gods gathered Uke flies above the sacrifice." 
 
118 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Canaanite Traditions 
 Besides these stories which came from Babylonia, 
 there were many others which the Hebrews received 
 from the Canaanites. Some of them had to do with 
 the many shrines or temples, where the Canaanites 
 offered sacrifices to the gods. These temples were 
 usually built over certain rocks or near trees, which the 
 Canaanites regarded as sacred. Each temple was dedi- 
 cated to some special god, who was the Baal or lord of 
 that part of the country. " Why do you regard that 
 tree as sacred?" the Hebrews would ask. " Because 
 Ashtarte (or some other deity) dwells in it," the 
 Canaanites would answer. " She appeared here once, 
 in visible form, to the man who first built this temple. 
 That is why we offer sacrifices here." Thus the Hebrews 
 were educated in the traditional beliefs of the leading 
 nations among whom they lived. 
 
 , One God or Many Gods 
 
 Not all of this education was of a wholesome kind. 
 The moral atmosphere among the idlers in, the public 
 square of such a town as old Canaanite Gibeon, in the 
 year 1000 B.C., was far from elevating. All of these 
 stories which the Hebrews heard in such places took for 
 granted that it is right to worship many gods; but the 
 Hebrews had promised to worship only Jehovah. 
 
 This worship of the one God of the whole nation was 
 essentially ennobling. It was a civic religion, and tended 
 toward righteousness. It led men to look at aU questions 
 from the broad standpoint of the whole nation. On 
 the other hand, in each Canaanite village the Hebrews 
 found a shrine dedicated to some petty local deity, the 
 ' Baal " or " lord " of that village and of the surrounding 
 farms. The religious spirit at these shrines was narrow 
 and selfish. The ceremonies were frequently impure, 
 cruel and revolting. The best men among the Hebrews 
 were therefore bitterly opposed to the worship of any 
 gods except Jehovah. 
 
THE SUMERIAN ARMY IN ACTION. 
 
 mkrWA 
 
 ^X"l 
 
 
 
 MA £ kflk 
 
 ~3a 
 
 BABYLONIAN CYLINDERS. 
 From Goodspeed's "Ancient World." 
 
OLD STORIES TOLD IN A NEW WA^Y 119 
 
 Retelling the Old Stories 
 One of the hardest problems these men had to face 
 was how to counteract the influence of the stories about 
 the gods, which the Hebrews had learned from the Baby- 
 lonians and Canaanites. They might perhaps have 
 denounced them; but that would only have increased 
 the curiosity of people about them. Fortunately the 
 wisest men in those early days followed a better plan. 
 They retold these stories in their own way. Disregarding 
 those things which were false and base, they were on the 
 alert for illustrations of sublime truths. We have the 
 results of their work in the great stories of the book of 
 Genesis. 
 
 In all these stories, they struck out all reference to 
 " the gods," and left only Jehovah as the one majestic 
 creator and ruler of the world. In the story of the Garden 
 of Eden, and of the Flood, they explained that troubles 
 come upon men, not because of the " jealousy " of the 
 gods, as the Babylonians had said, but because men 
 disobey Jehovah. And what a contrast in the story 
 of the Flood, between the Babylonian description of 
 " the gods hovering like flies above the sacrifice " and 
 the Hebrew portrayal of the one just and holy God! 
 
 These men also saw something worth while in the 
 stories which originally came from the Canaanites. They 
 therefore retold these stories also, in a nobler form'. 
 They explained the various sacred shrines in Canaan 
 not as abodes of heathen gods, but as places where Je- 
 hovah at one time or another had appeared to Abrahani, 
 Isaac and Jacob. The sacred stone at the temple of 
 Bethel, for example, was sacred not because a heathen 
 deity lived inside of it but because Jacob had used that 
 stone as a rest for his head as he slept there one night, 
 a fugitive. In his sleep he saw a ladder reaching to 
 heaven and Jehovah at the top of it. So when he awoke 
 he set up that stone as a sacred pillar, and poured oil 
 on it. That is why (so this author taught) the Israelites 
 
120 THE STORY OP OUR BIBLE 
 
 worship Jehovah by this pillar at Bethel, avA pour 
 sacrificial oil upon it. (See Gen. 28: 10-22.) 
 
 So well did the wise story-tellers do their work that 
 these new stories almost completely supplanted the old, 
 and in their new form were a most powerful help to the 
 cause of righteousness and truth. 
 
OLD STORIES TOLD IN A NEW WAY 121 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. To what source of information would you turn for an 
 answer to the question, " How was the world created?" Would 
 you turn to the Bible? If not, why not? 
 
 2. What was the " Oak of Moreh," mentioned in Gen. 
 12 : 6-7, and why does Ihe author talce pains to tell us that 
 Abraham btiilt there ati altar to Jehovah? 
 
 3. Why is story-telling a good way to help men to do right? 
 
 4. How would you explain the fact that to some of the 
 Hebrews the old Babylonian and Canaanite stories were a de- 
 grading influence, while to the authors of the stories in Genesis 
 they were illustrations of inspiring truths? 
 
 5. Mention your favorite story from the Book of Genesis. 
 Suggested chapters: Gen. 1-4. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. Where did the Hebrews get their stories of the Creation 
 and of the Flood? 
 
 2. Where do we now find the old Babylonian versions of 
 these stories? 
 
 3. What resemblances do we find between the story of th«s 
 Flood in the Bible and in the Babylonian records? 
 
 4. What differences do we find? 
 
122 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 5. What evil influence did the Hebrews encounter when 
 they entered Canaan? 
 
 6. What was the purpose of the story of Jacob's dream at 
 Bethel? 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 STORIES OF A NATION'S HEROES 
 The Earliest Historical Writings of the Hebrews 
 After the deliverance from Egyptian oppression, the 
 next event which most powerfully bound the Hebrew 
 people together was the triumph over the Philistines. 
 (About 1050 to 950 B.C.) This triumph is chiefly 
 connected with the name of David, and also with the 
 names of Samuel, Saul and Jonathan. The Philistines 
 were a powerful nation on the west coast of Palestine. 
 The Hebrews had just succeeded in establishing them- 
 selves in the central part of the country when they found 
 their existence as a people endangered by the crushing 
 attacks of these tyrants on the coast. But once again 
 the wonderful civic spirit of the Hebrews saved them 
 from destruction. Under the leadership of Samuel, 
 Saul and Jonathan, the scattered tribes forgot their 
 selfish jealousies, and were united into a kingdom. Under 
 Saul and David, after a long and heroic struggle, the 
 Philistines were subdued; and finally the tact and military 
 genius of David made Israel a power among the nations. 
 Through all the generations since that time, the Hebrews 
 have looked back upon the reign of DaAdd as the golden 
 age in their history; and their supreme, national hope 
 has been for a son of David to arise, who should re- 
 establish a united and glorious Hebrew kingdom. 
 
 Biographies of Saul and David 
 
 In the years immediately following David's death, 
 aU hearts were filled with glowing pride in their national 
 achievements. The tmiversal happiness and enthusiasm 
 welled up through the hearts and lips of poets into 
 
 123 
 
124 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 songs, such as the one preserved in Gen. 49. It found 
 another outlet in the writing of beautiful prose stories, 
 telling of the great exploits of their national heroes. 
 
 In I Samuel, chapters 9-14, there is a series of quota- 
 tions from a stirring narrative about Saul and Jonathan. 
 In the remaining chapters of I Samuel, and in II Samuel, 
 there is a group of stories about David. These two 
 biographies were probably written during the reign of 
 Solomon. 
 
 These books, the one about Saul, and the other about 
 David, rank among the literary masterpieces of the world. 
 Their authors were men of genius like the Greek poet 
 Homer, who perhaps was living at about this same period. 
 From beginning to end they rivet the attention and stir 
 the deepest emotions of the heart. They also show the 
 ennobling influence of that loyalty to the nation as a 
 whole, which was so remarkable a characteristic ; of the 
 Hebrews. For example, as compared with the stories 
 told by the writers of other nations of that time, the 
 moral standards of these early Hebrew writers were very 
 high. This is illustrated in the history of David. In 
 the stories of other nations, we find only the most ex- 
 travagant praises of their heroes. The Hebrew narrative 
 about Davidi on the contrary, does not cover up the 
 fact that this great man had his faults and shortcomings. 
 The BibUcal writer tells the whole story of David's 
 murder of Uriah, and declares that David's action "dis- 
 pleased Jehovah." The supreme object of this writer's 
 love and loyalty was not any single individual, not 
 even David, but Israel, and Israel's God. 
 
 The Disruption and its Consequences 
 David's son Solomon was a man of a different type. 
 He used his office as king to gratify his own selfish 
 ambitions. After the death of Solomon, he was succeeded 
 by his son Rehoboam, whose reputation for tyranny 
 resulted in the revolt of the northern tribes, who formed 
 a separate kingdom called Israel. Thus the nation was 
 
STORIES OF A NATION'S HEROES 125 
 
 • 
 
 broken into two parts, and the sense of national unity- 
 was greatly weakened. When there were two kingdoms, 
 Israel in the north, with its capital at Samaria, and 
 Judah in the south, with its capital at Jerusalem, the 
 people began to lose their loyalty to the nation as a 
 whole. Naturally, also, they became less loyal to the 
 God of the whole nation, and the degrading worship 
 of the petty local " Baals " began to increase. We 
 even find Ahab and Jezebel, in the northern kingdom, 
 introducing the worship of a. foreign god, Baal Melkart, 
 a Phoeniciain idol. (About 875 B.C.) 
 
 The Prophetic History of Jehovah's People 
 
 This crisis brought to the front the fiery prophet Elijah, 
 who fearlessly rebuked King Ahab and his queen for 
 their worship of the heathen Baal, and for their injustice 
 to their subjects. Other prophets rallied to the support 
 of Elijah and his successor Elisha. Sometimes these 
 prophets organized themselves into bands, and lived 
 together as religious communities. They would build 
 their own house, till their own fields, and eat together in 
 one common dining-room. One day, in one of these 
 communities,' probably in Judah, a very wise suggestion 
 was made. We may imagine that the prophets were 
 talking together after dinner, about their work. " Why 
 not teach our countrymen to be loyal to Jehovah the 
 God of our nation, by writing for them our national 
 history? We will show them what a glorious past Ues 
 behind us, and how wonderfully Jehovah has guided 
 and helped us from the very beginning." 
 
 This suggestion was acted upon Avith enthusiasm, and 
 the prophets began to gather material which they could 
 use. Much of it was in the form of oral stories, handed 
 down from memory, from father to son, — stories of 
 the Creation and the Flood and other stories now found 
 in the Book of Genesis. They also found written material, 
 such as the songs in the Book of Jashar, and the Wars 
 
126 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 of Jehovah, and the written biographies of Saiil and 
 David. 
 
 It appears that two such histories were prepared, one 
 in Judah, and then another at a somewhat later date, 
 in the northern part of the country, perhaps in the tribe 
 of Ephraim. These were finally woven together into a 
 single narrative, which is sometimes called the Judean- 
 Ephraimite history. Quotations from this history make 
 up the larger part of the present Old Testament books 
 from Genesis to I Kings. The original history is not 
 now in existence, but most scholars are in practical 
 agreement as to the passages in our Old Testament books 
 which were taken from it. Putting these selections 
 together, we probably have a considerable part of the 
 entire work in its original form. 
 
 Historical Value and Religious Aim of the 
 Prophetic History 
 
 The 'ruling purpose of the entire history was not merely 
 to give information regarding past events, but to teach 
 religious truth. It is, however, a priceless mine of his- 
 torical information. Naturally, those parts appear to 
 be most accurate which tell of events which happened 
 not long before the time when the history was written, as 
 for example, the career of David, but even the stories 
 which came down to the writers from antiquity probably 
 contain memories of historical facts. We find that the 
 story of Joseph is supported in part by statements on 
 the Egyptian monuments, which refer to a foreigner 
 who rose to power in Egypt about the time when Joseph 
 is supposed to have lived. But the story of Joseph was 
 included in the history, not merely to satisfy curiosity 
 regarding that ancient period, but to hold up before the 
 people of Israel those splendid ideals of purity and un- 
 selfishness and faithful devotion to the common good 
 which Joseph represented. 
 
 One great idea runs through the whole work; the idea 
 of the civic spirit in religion. Israel is the chosen people 
 
STORIES OF A NATION'S HEROES 127 
 
 of Jehovah; every Israelite must therefore be loyal to 
 his nation and to his nation's God. The authors told 
 how Jehovah had made three beginnings, as it were, in 
 His effort to provide a race of men to love and worship 
 Him. He began with Adam, but Adam proved a failure. 
 He tried again with Noah, and even Noah's descendants 
 became corrupt. So at last, he chose the faithful Abra- 
 ham to be the ancestor of a better people. All kinds 
 of difficulties arose, which seemed about to thwart the 
 plan, as when Jacob and his sons were compelled to 
 leave Canaan and go down to Egypt. But through such 
 leaders as Joseph, Moses, Joshua, Samuel and many 
 others, Jehovah helped them to triumph over all their 
 enemies. Thus at last came the glorious reign of David, 
 when Jehovah's promise to Abraham began to be fulfilled. 
 " I will make of thee a great nation, and I will surely 
 bless thee, and make thy name great." (Gen. 12: 2.) 
 
 The influence of this historj^ upon those Hebrews among 
 whom it was first circulated must have been greater 
 than we can realize. People were held spellbound 
 by the stories of Adam and Eve, of Noah, of Abraham 
 and of Jacob. They wept over Joseph; they were thrilled 
 by the mighty deeds of Jehovah through Moses, and 
 Joshua and Gideon, and by the great victories of Saul 
 and David. Many of these old stories had been heard 
 before, in one form or another, but men had never realized 
 how much they meant. Now they saw that the whole 
 course of past history was one splendid call to them to 
 forget their selfish desires in loyalty to Israel and Israel's 
 God. 
 
128 THE STORY OP OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1. Why is history a valuable aid in helpitlg people to 
 be patriotic? 
 
 2. What do you think of the story of the tribe of Dan? 
 (Judges 17-18.) 
 
 3. Judging from this story of Dan, what further develop- 
 ment was needed to perfect the civic religion of these early 
 historians? 
 
 4. What is your favorite story of those referred to in this 
 chapter? Suggested reading: I Sam. 9-11. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. Who were the Philistines? 
 
 2. How did the scattered Hebrew tribes finally succeed 
 against them? 
 
 3. Who were the chief leaders in this struggle ? 
 
 4. What was the effect of David's victories on Hebrew 
 patriotism? 
 
 5. In what writings did this patriotism first express itself? 
 
 6. What led to the disruption of the kingdom into two parts ? 
 
 7. What evil results followed? 
 
 8. What did Ehjah do? 
 
 9. By whom was the first connected history of Israel written ? 
 
 10. What oral and written material was used in it? 
 
 11. In what Old Testament books do we find quotations from 
 this history? 
 
 12. What was its chief pvurpose? 
 
STORIES OF A NATION'S HEROES 129 
 
 Notebook Work 
 
 _ Clip from worn-out copies of the Old Testament the original 
 biography of Saul, as follows: 
 ISam. 9: 1—10: 16: 11: 1-11. 15; 13-14. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 JUSTICE THROUGH LAWS 
 
 Old Testament Law-Books 
 
 In the first five books of the Old Testament, especially 
 from Exodus to Deuteronomy, we find a large body of 
 laws. As in the case of the historical narratives, some 
 of these laws came into existence at an early date in 
 Hebrew history, and others centuries later. The period 
 of time during which the earlier laws were enacted and 
 put into written form is about the same as that which saw 
 the development of historical writing, from the earliest 
 songs and prose stories, down to the composition of the 
 connected prophetic histories. (1400 to 800 B.C.j 
 
 Early Ten-Finger Law-Codes among the Hebrews 
 
 The Hebrews at Mount Sinai received from Moses, 
 as Jehovah's representative, a decalogue or code of 
 ten commandments, which in their covenant with 
 Jehovah they promised to obey. Why were there just 
 ten of these commandments, rather than nine or twelve? 
 Probably for the simple reason that there are ten fingers 
 on the two hands. These nomad shepherds had as yet 
 no system of writing, and hence were compelled to rely 
 on memory alone for keeping these laws in mind, and 
 the ten fingers have been used as an aid to memory in 
 all ages. As a Hebrew boy or girl repeated the ten 
 injunctions, he would count them off on his fingers. If 
 by chance he skipped one, the faithful fingers would 
 reveal the mistake, for there would still be one finger 
 left when he supposed he had finished the list. It was 
 an easier task for him than for our Sunday-school boys 
 and girls today, because in those days, all of the command- 
 
 120 
 
JUSTICE THROUGH LAWS 131 
 
 ments were short, with none of the explanatory additions 
 which we find in their present form. The original ten 
 commandments were perhaps as follows: 
 
 1. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. 
 
 2. Thou shalt make thee no molten gods. 
 
 3. Thou shalt not take the name of Jehovah thy 
 
 God in vain. 
 
 4. Remember the sabbath day to keep it holy. 
 
 5. Honor thy father and thy mother. 
 
 6. Thou shalt not kill. 
 
 7. Thou shalt Not commit adultery. 
 
 8. Thou shalt not steal. 
 
 9. Thou shalt not bear false witness. 
 10. Thou shalt not covet. 
 
 This decalogue was engraved on stone tablets at a 
 very early date and the tablets kept at some temple. 
 For a long time after that, however, there were no other 
 . copies of it, save in the memories of the people. 
 
 This ten-finger, or decalogue arrangement was followed 
 in all the earliest Hebrew laws. The original " Ten 
 Commandments " are not the only decalogue in the Old 
 Testament. It is possible to distinguish fourteen or 
 fifteen separate decalogues in the oldest sections of 
 Exodus and Leviticus. These were all prepared in that 
 early period before the art of writing had become common 
 among the Hebrews. In later times, of course, written 
 copies were circulated everywhere. 
 
 The Influence of Babylonian Laws on the Laws 
 OF THE Hebrews 
 
 At the beginning of their history, the Hebrews did not 
 need many laws. Most laws are made necessary t>y 
 disputes regarding property; and in their desert life, the 
 Hebrews did not possess much property. Moses, himself, 
 at one time used to. settle all the questions which arose 
 among them. (See Exodus 18.) Later, however, he 
 appointed other judges to decide the less important of 
 
132 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 the many cases which arose and only the more difficult 
 questions were referred to him.- After the Hebrews 
 settled in Canaan and began to own land and houses 
 and cattle as well as tents and sheep, other laws were 
 necessary for their guidance in their new life. They 
 seem to have adopted many of the laws which they found 
 already in force among the Canaanites. The Canaanites 
 in turn had been influenced by the laws of the Baby-. 
 lonians, which on the whole were surprisingly just. 
 In the year 1901, a large block of stone was unearthed 
 by excavators, on which were inscribed in long columns 
 the laws of the Babylonian king, Hammurabi, who lived 
 about 2000 B.C., or nearly a thousand years before Moses. 
 We find certain resemblances between laws in the Old 
 Testament, and laws of the Code of Hammurabi, just as 
 we have found resemblances between the stories of the 
 Creation and the Flood in the Old Testament, and 
 similar stories on the Babylonian clay tablets. 
 In Hammurabi's code, we find the following law: 
 
 " If a man has hired an ox, and has caused its death, by 
 
 carelessness or blows, he shall restore ox for ox to the 
 
 owner of the ox." 
 
 In Ex. 22: 14, we find a law somewhat similar: 
 
 " If a man borrow an animal from his neighbor, and it 
 be htirt or die while its owner is not with it, the man 
 must make restitution." 
 
 In Hammurabi's code we find this law: 
 
 "If a man has deposited com for safe keeping in 
 another's house, and it has suffered damage in the 
 granary, or if the owner of the house has opened the 
 store and taken the com, the owner of the house shall 
 return him double." 
 
 While Ex. 22: 7 requires: 
 
 " If a man deliver to his neighbor money or personal 
 property to keep, and it be stolen out of the man's house, 
 if the thief be found, he shall make double restitution. 
 If the thief be not found, then the master of the hoiise 
 
STONE COLUMN ON WHICH HAMlMimABrS LAW 
 CODE IS INSCRIBED. 
 
 From a photograph by Underwood and Underwood. 
 
JUSTICE THROUGH LAWS, 133 
 
 shall come before God (that is, before the priest), to 
 prove whether or not he hath his neighbor's goods." 
 
 Tiiese are certainly striking similarities and seem to 
 show that the laws of the Babylonians were known to 
 the Hebrews of those days. 
 
 The Moral Standards of the Hebrew Laws 
 All these early codes of the Hebrews, however, show 
 the unique moral spirit which was developed among them, 
 as a result of their experiences in Egypt and in the wilder- 
 ness under their great leader Moses. They were rightly 
 called the laws of Moses, even though not all of them 
 came directly from his lips. We find in them high ideals 
 of conduct, which were unknown among the other nations 
 of that time. The moral uniqueness,, of the early Hebrew 
 codes is especially clear when we compare them with 
 the Code of Hammurabi. While that great ruler declared 
 that his purpose was to " make justice shine in the land," 
 we find, nevertheless, that many of his penalties are 
 cruel. He makes distinctions between the nobles and 
 the common people, and punished far more severely 
 any injury to a noble. As for slaves, a master might 
 maim or kill his own slave, with impunity. The Hebrew 
 laws on the contrary do not recognize any distinction 
 between nobles and common people, and more than that, 
 extend their protection even to slaves. (See Ex. 21 : 26.) 
 In short, the Hebrew laws, far more than the Babylonian, 
 recognize that 
 
 "A man 's a man for a' that," 
 no matter whether he is rich or poor, a noble or a peasant, 
 a free-man or a slave. 
 
 Later Revisions and Additions 
 
 In later centuries, these early laws were revised from 
 time to time and many additions were made. The 
 Book of Deuteronomy is one of the most important of 
 these revisions. It retains all the older provisions for 
 
134 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 justice and kindness to the poor and oppressed, and 
 adds similar ordinances in the same spirit. For example, 
 
 " When thou buildest a new house, thou shalt make a parapet 
 for thy roof, that thou bring not blood upon thy house, in case 
 any man should fall from it." (Deut. 22 : 8.) 
 
 As time went on there was also a great increase in the 
 number of laws about religious ceremonies. There was 
 a natural tendency to make the ritual in the temple at 
 Jerusalern more and more elaborate. Written rules 
 were carefully worked out by the priests prescribing how 
 each minute detail should be performed. 
 
 But though many men, during many centuries, had 
 a hand in the making of these laws, they were always 
 called " the laws of Moses." Later Hebrew generations 
 believed that they were all given to the people by Moses, 
 either at Sinai or on the plains east of the Jordan, just 
 before his death. It was a natural thought, therefore, 
 to combine the law-codes and the narratives of the early 
 history of Israel into a single document. The laws would 
 be more impressive in this historical setting. Editors 
 and scribes, therefore, took that part of the Judean- 
 Ephraimite history which covered the period from the 
 Creation to the settlement in Canaan, and also certain 
 historical narratives by later priestly writers, and inserted, 
 at what they considered the proper places, the whole 
 body of these laws. It is this combination of laws and 
 historical narratives which we find in the Old Testament, 
 as the Pentateuch, or the five books of Genesis, Exodus, 
 Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. The Pentateuch 
 was known to the Jews as the Torah, or the Law. 
 
 In a true sense, this body of laws may very properly 
 be called by the name of Moses, for to a large extent it 
 carries out the aims and spirit of that great teacher of 
 reverence toward God, and champion of justice among 
 men. 
 
JUSTICE THROUGH LAWS 135 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. Do you consider that the most important moral duties 
 are necessarily ten in number, as in the original Ten Com- 
 mandments? 
 
 _ 2. _ Write out below a list of the moral commands and pro- 
 hibitions which you yourself consider most important. 
 
 3. Judging from his laws, what kind of a man was the old 
 Babylonian King Hammtirabi? 
 
 4. What do you think of the plan of the Hebrew editors to 
 insert the laws in the midst of the early historical narratives, 
 as we find them in the Pentateuch? Did it increase the moral 
 impressiveness of both? 
 
 5. How important do you consider laws about burnt 
 offerings as compared with laws demanding just dealings 
 among men? 
 
 6. Mention some Hebrew law which seems notable for its 
 justice. Suggested reading: Ex. 20-23. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. Why were the earliest Hebrew law-codes arranged in 
 decalogues, or groups of ten? 
 
 2. Who was the earliest Hebrew law-giver? 
 
 3. Why did the people need additional laws, after the set- 
 tlement in Canaan? 
 
136 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 4. What is meant by the Code of Hammurabi? 
 
 5. How did this code iafluence Hebrew laws? 
 
 6. Mention certain resemblances between the Code of 
 Hammurabi and one of the early Hebrew laws. 
 
 7. Mention some differences also. 
 
 8. How are we to explain the moral superiority of the early 
 Hebrew laws? 
 
 9. What writings were combined by later editors to form 
 otir Old Testament books Genesis to Deuteronomy? 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 A CENTURY OF GREAT REFORMERS 
 
 Amos and His Successors 
 
 We have traced the origin of the writings which were 
 finally combined in the Torah and which we call the 
 Pentateuch. The larger part of the historical narratives 
 in these writings was by prophets, followers of Elijah 
 and Elisha. We will now learn something of a whole 
 series of books by the Hebrew prophets, which are foiind 
 in other parts of the Old Testament. These writings 
 were gathered together by the later Jews in a second 
 collection called " The Prophets " which they reverenced 
 very highly. 
 
 The Earliest Prophets 
 
 The word prophet is applied to a number of important 
 Biblical characters, such as Elijah and Isaiah. What 
 was the original meaning of the terms, " prophets " and 
 " prophesy," and how did it happen that these men called 
 prophets played so prominent a part in Hebrew history? 
 
 In the earhest times, there was little difference between 
 the Hebrew prophets and the same class of men in other 
 nations of that day, for we must not make the mistake 
 of supposing that there were no prophets in any nation 
 except among the Hebrews. We can best understand 
 what sort of men they were by thinking of the " whirling 
 dervishes" in Mohammedan countries today. These 
 dervishes work themselves into a state of extraordinary 
 excitement through music and dancing, and often throw 
 themselves into a kind of trance. In this condition, 
 it is believed by the people that they are possessed by 
 some spirit or deity. In I Kings 18: 26-28, we read how 
 some of the earliest prophets leaped about the altar of 
 
 137 
 
138 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 their god, uttering their cries, and gashing themselves 
 with knives. These were prophets of Baal, rather than 
 of Jehovah, but in II Kings 3: 15, we find that EHsha 
 also resorted to the influence of music to bring on a con- 
 dition of excitement. 
 
 All of the early prophets in Israel and elsewhere earned 
 their living as professional soothsayers. People- came to 
 them, just as men visited the oracles in Greece, for help 
 in finding lost articles and for advice regarding love 
 affairs, journeys, business adventures and military cam- 
 paigns. No doubt Elijah and Elisha supported them- 
 selves in this manner. 
 
 As time went on there came to be a vital difference 
 between certain prophets in Israel and the great mass of 
 the prophets in Israel and in other nations. These hew 
 prophets, of whom Elijah was a forerunner, were not 
 mere fortune-tellers, but preachers. The true meaning 
 of the word prophet is "one who speaks for another."; 
 that is, the true prophets were spokesmen for Jehovah. 
 They told the people that Jehovah was not pleased with 
 their manner of living. These men were to the nation 
 what the voice of conscience is to each individual. If 
 they were alive today we would call them reformers; 
 for they tried to do for the Hebrews what true reformers 
 today are trying to do; that is, to make the world a better 
 place to live in and to hasten the triumph of. love and 
 justice' for all. The great epoch during which these 
 men lived and worked began about a hundred years after 
 Elijah's time, or about 750 B.C. 
 
 The most important fact in the year 750 B.C., from 
 the standpoint of Hebrew history, was the new world- 
 empire Assyria, with its capital at Nineveh then rising 
 to the zenith of its power. It had already conquered 
 the old Babylonian kingdom and its emperors were 
 looking westward with covetous eyes, to the rich countries 
 along the Mediterranean. Sooner or later, driven by 
 the lust of conquest, their armies would be knocking at 
 
A CENTURY OF GREAT REFORMERS 139 
 
 the, gates of Damascus, Tyre and perhaps Samaria and 
 Jerusalem also. 
 
 A New Epoch in Israel's History 
 
 Let us imagine ourselves visiting the city of Samaria 
 sometime about the year 750 B.C. It is a beautiful 
 city, crowning a low hill, and surrounded by fertile and 
 lovely valleys. We find many fine houses and beautiful 
 streets. Many of the nobles and wealthy merchants 
 have both summer and winter houses. The country 
 is prosperous. The reigning king, Jeroboam II, has 
 been on the throne for nearly fifty years, and has been 
 victorious over all the petty foes of the Israelites, such 
 as the Ammonites and the Philistines. As a result, 
 the upper classes have grown wealthy. Their homes 
 are filled with all the luxuries of Babylon, such as inlaid 
 ivory furniture, silken robes, rare and costly wines and 
 perfumes. At the same time, we notice that Samaria 
 has its poorer quarters, its slums. Here we find people 
 living in wretched hovels. The children's faces are pale 
 and gaunt with hunger. Clearly enough, a few unscrupu- 
 lous nobles have been enriching themselves at the expense 
 of the great mass of the people. They have cheated in 
 business, and have oppressed the poor; they have bribed 
 the judges who might otherwise have restrained them. 
 Yet because they bring rich offerings as sacrifices to the 
 shrines, they feel confident that Jehovah will protect 
 them. But with such evils as these eating away the 
 strength of the nation, what will happen when the As- 
 syrians lay siege to the gates of Samaria ? 
 
 A New Book on the Library Table 
 
 Let us imagine ourselves guests at the home of one of 
 King Jeroboam's nobles. Let us call him Azariah. As 
 we are educated people, he shows us his collection of 
 books, which are in the form of leather rolls. Here is 
 the book of Jashar, with its war-ballads. Here is the 
 History of Israel from Adam to David. And here is 
 
140 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 a new book. At the beginning we find the following 
 title: The Words of Amos, Who was Among the Shepherds 
 of Tekoa, Which he saw Concerning Israel in the Days of 
 Jeroboam the Son of Joash, King of Israel. " What is this 
 book, my friend?" we ask. " Why, that is a coUectionof 
 the speeches of a new prophet who made a sensation 
 over at the royal temple at Bethel last year. You know 
 the king each year attends the Passover feast at Bethel 
 and all the fashionable folks go there to sacrifice. This old 
 prophet came up from Judah. He had been a shepherd 
 most of his life, and still wore the shepherd's costume. 
 He came stalking in among the richly dressed people 
 and made speeches there for several days. Finally he 
 spoke against King Jeroboam; and of course the chief 
 priest Amaziah drove him away. So he wrote out what 
 he had to say, and a great many of us have copies. I 
 was interested because I thought the man might be 
 starting a revolution. He kept saying that ' the sword 
 would devour in our cities.' Jeroboam hasn't treated 
 me properly, and I would like nothing better than to 
 see some prophet send him flying from his palace, as 
 Elisha overthrew the dynasty of Ahab. I am disap- 
 pointed in the book, however. It is fuU of crazy nonsense 
 about the wrongs of the poor. He also seems to have 
 objections to our sacrifices. I cannot imagine what 
 can be lacking in them. I myself send a hundred fat 
 rams to Bethel every year, and some of the other nobles 
 send many more." 
 
 It is quite plain that Azariah has no very clear appre- 
 ciation of the aims of this new prophet. So let us read 
 the book for ourselves. Among the more prominent 
 ideas we find one which is not new, namely, that Jehovah 
 is displeased with injustice, especially injustice toward 
 the lowly. We are thrilled, however, by the eloquence 
 with which the idea is expressed, and we are astonished 
 by the boldness with which the prophet threatens the 
 wrongdoers, especially those of the wealthy and powerful 
 
A CENTURY OF GREAT REFORMERS 141 
 
 class, with destruction for their sins. (See Amos 2:6; 
 5:11-12.) 
 
 A Revolutionary Idea 
 
 This idea that Jehovah will avenge injustice toward 
 the weak had already been proclaimed by the early 
 story-tellers and law-givers and by Moses himself. There 
 is another prominent idea in the book, however, which is 
 absolutely new, original and revolutionary. This idea 
 is as follows: Jehovah does not require ceremonial sacrifices, 
 but only justice and righteousness. " Thus saith 
 Jehovah," declares Amos, in sentences of surpassing 
 force and grandeur. 
 
 " I hate, I despise your feasts. 
 
 And I wiU not smeU the savor of your festivals, 
 
 And with your cereal-offerings I will not be pleased, 
 
 And the peace-ofEerings of your f atlings I will nof regard with 
 
 favor. 
 Banish from me the noise of your songs. 
 For to the melody of your' lyres, I wiU not listen. 
 But let justice roll on as a flood of waters, 
 And righteousness, like an unfailing stream." (Amos 5 : 21-24.) 
 
 Three Great Successors of Amos: Hosea, 
 Isaiah, Micah 
 This century in which Amos lived (800-700 B.C.) 
 was one of the great epochs in the history of God's revela- 
 tion of Himself to mankind. It is illumined and glorified 
 by the names of four supremely great prophets, of whom 
 Amos was the first. The other three were Hosea, Isaiah 
 and Micah. Hosea, like Amos, delivered his message 
 in northern Israel. He was a native of the North, whereas 
 Amos came from Judah. Isaiah and Micah were also 
 natives of Judah and spent their lives in the southern 
 kingdom, in the latter part of the century. All four' 
 of them agreed with Amos that God requires, not sacri- 
 fices, but righteousness. Hosea expressed it in memorable 
 words which were quoted by Jesus : 
 
142 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 "It is love that I delight in (saith Jehovah), and not sacrifice, 
 And knowledge of God, and not bumt-offerings." (See Hosea 
 6:6, and Matt. 12:7.) 
 
 Isaiah takes up the message as follows : 
 "What care I for the vast number of your sacrifices, saith 
 
 Jehovah. 
 I am sated with ' bumt-offerings of rams and the fat of fed 
 
 beasts. 
 And in the blood of btillocks and lambs and he-goats I take 
 
 no pleasure . " ■ (Isa. 1:11.) 
 
 Perhaps the most perfect expression of this teaching 
 of these great religious pioneers is found in the sermons 
 of the prophet Micah: 
 
 " It hath been shown thee, O man, what is good, 
 
 And what Jehovah ever demands of thee: 
 
 Only to do justice and love mercy, 
 
 And to walk humbly with thy God. ' ' (Micah 6 : 6-8.) 
 
 Righteousness vs. Ritual in Later Centuries 
 
 The prophets apparently made little immediate im- 
 pression on the ideas and habits of their fellow-men. 
 Religion still consisted largely in bumt-offerings at Bethel 
 and Gilgal, and elsewhere. The later Jerusalem priests 
 built up a more and more elaborate system of animal 
 sacrifices. It is the common fate of great and original 
 leaders that their followers modify their deepest and 
 noblest ideas in conformity with the commonly accepted 
 opinions of the time. They cherish the great master's 
 words but ignore his plain meaning. Nevertheless the 
 prophets did not speak in vain. The revised law-book, 
 Deuteronomy, which was written in the next century 
 after Amos, aboUshed all the temples outside of Jerusalem 
 and stipulated that no sacrifices should be offered exceplfr 
 •in the temple at Jerusalem. The great Prophet of Naza- i 
 reth set His stamp of approval on the good Samaritan who- 
 showed mercy on his wounded fellow-traveller, rather 
 than on the priest and the Levite who offered burnt- 
 offerings every day, but who " passed by on the other 
 
A CENTURY OF GREAT REFORMERS 143 
 
 side." In our own time, the writings of these prophets 
 are being studied as perhaps never before in the history 
 of the world. We are accepting for our own nation the 
 ideal which Amos held up before the nation of Israel. 
 
 " Let iustice roll on as a flood of waters, 
 And righteousness as an unfailing stream." (Amos 5 : 24.) 
 
144 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. Find out all you can about the early life of Amos, from 
 the following passages in his book : (Amos 1 : 1 ; 7 : 14-15.) 
 (a) What was his native viUage? 
 
 (6) What was his occupation before he became a prophet? 
 
 2. What kind of a man was Amos personally: bold, timid, 
 stem, tender, tmcouth or polished? 
 
 3. Why did he choose Bethel, as the place to deliver his 
 
 message? 
 
 4. Of the four prophets mentioned in this chapter, which 
 one set forth most perfectly the truth that God does not re- 
 quire sacrifices, but only right conduct? 
 
 5. Does this truth have any close application to men and 
 women today? What is sometimes offered to God today, 
 instead of right conduct in everyday life? 
 
 6. What are some things which Amos wotild criticize in 
 Dur nation today? 
 
 7. Of the passages from Amos, which i re quoted in this 
 chapter, or which you may have read in the Bible itself, which 
 io you most admire? Suggested readings: Amos 1-2, 5, 7-8. 
 
A CENTURY OF GREAT REFORMERS 145 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 I. What class of persons in certain modem countries are 
 similar to the earliest Hebrew prophets? 
 
 _ 2. Into what physical and mental condition was it con- 
 sidered necessary for them to bring themselves, in order that 
 the deity might speak through them? 
 
 3. How did they earn their living? 
 
 4. How did certain of the Hebrew prophets lift themselves 
 far above the prophets and soothsayers of other nations? 
 
 5. What persons in our country are like the later great 
 Hebrew prophets? 
 
 6. What were the beliefs of all the Hebrews regarding 
 sacrifices, prior to about 750 B.C. ? 
 
 7. What were some of the evils in the Hebrew nation about 
 this time? 
 
 8. What great danger threatened the nation from outside? 
 
 9. Mention the most important points in the message of 
 Amos to his countrymen. 
 
 10. What part of his message was wholly new and original? 
 
 II. What other prophets took up the same message during 
 this same century? 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 A FORGIVING HUSBAND WHO TOLD OF GOD'S 
 
 MERCY 
 The Book of Hosea 
 
 A Village Love-Story 
 While the young man Amos was keeping sheep in Tekoa, 
 a lad named Hosea was growing up in a village in Northern 
 Israel, probably across the river Jordan in the land of 
 Gilead. He was afiEectionate, sweet-spirited, strong in 
 mind and body. Not far away, perhaps in a neighboring 
 village, there lived a maiden named Gomer. She also 
 was lovable in many ways. One day she met Hosea, 
 and they loved each other. We can imagine the happi- 
 ness of their courtship. Near the probable site of Hosea's 
 village, there is a hill whose bold bluffs overlook the 
 broad valley of the Jordan. We can imagine Hosea 
 and Gomer walking together in the beautiful days of 
 spring or summer, along the brow of this hill, and looking 
 off across those broad, fertile fields and vineclad slopes 
 of Northern Israel, and promising to be true to each other 
 so long as life should last. 
 
 An Unhappy Marriage 
 
 After the wedding day Gomer began to reveal an un- 
 suspected weakness of character. She had always been 
 allowed to have her own sweet will in everything, and 
 had never learned the lesson of self-control. So now she 
 showed herself unfit for the serious responsibilities of 
 married life. When children were bom, she no doubt 
 neglected them. No doubt she wasted her husband's 
 money, and bitterly reproached him because he could 
 not buy jewels for her, and fashionable garments sjach as 
 
 146 
 
A FORGIVING HUSBAND 147 
 
 some of her former girl friends possessed. She had no 
 sympathy for Hosea's deeper purposes and ideals. Hosea 
 felt in his heart that he had a mission in life. He had 
 become a prophet, and like Amos was urging his country- 
 men to forsake their evil ways and obey the righteous 
 commands of Jehovah. Gomer, however, cared for 
 none of these things. Her thoughts were all on the pleas- 
 ures of the passing moment. By and by the evil shadow 
 of a tempter fell across her path. Luxuries were promised 
 her, if she would forsake this tiresome preacher and his 
 simple home. So it came to pass that they were separated. 
 
 A Love which Could Not be Conquered 
 
 Thus Hosea's home was wrecked, and his heart was 
 heavy. He had tried so faithfully to be kind to Gomer, 
 and how faithless she had proved! Many times he wished 
 with all his heart that he had never seen her. Years 
 passed, and he saw nothing of her. Then one day, per- 
 haps as he was passing through another village on a 
 preaching tour, he found her. Poor woman! her life 
 had not been as she had planned. She had sought for 
 pleasure and had found pain. She was now a slave. 
 No doubt she tried to avoid Hosea when she saw him 
 approaching, but his quick eyes were too swift for her. 
 To his surprise, he felt in his heart a great wave of the 
 old love. She was still his Gomer, the maid whom he 
 had loved in Gilead. " Come, Gomer," he said, as she 
 stood before him with downcast eyes. " Let us go home." 
 " I cannot," she answered, "I am a slave." Inquiring 
 for her master, Hosea arranged to buy her for about 
 the usual price of a slave, " fifteen pieces of silver, and 
 eight bushels of barley and a measure of barley." Then 
 he took her back with him, and she came once again 
 through their little cottage door. Did she stay? Was 
 she faithful to him, now? Had she learned her lesson? 
 We can only say that after being so generously and nobly 
 forgiven, surely she must have proved faithful; we 
 
148 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 have, however, no definite information to confirm us in 
 this conclusion. 
 
 Hosea's Discovery: the Forgiving Love op God 
 
 Whether or not Gomer learned her lesson, there was 
 also a lesson for Hosea in all this, and he was great enough 
 to see it. As a result of the impulse to forgive this woman 
 who had been false to him, the thought flashed into his 
 mind that Jehovah would be no less ready to forgive 
 His people, in spite of the fact that they had worshipped 
 other gods, and had disobeyed His laws. A change now 
 showed itself in the tone of Hosea's addresses to the 
 people. He continued to denounce unsparingly the sins 
 of his countrymen, yet he grew more tender toward them. 
 (See Hosea 4: 1-2.) 
 
 Again and again Hosea declared that Jehovah would 
 surely punish the nation for these dreadful wrongs. Like 
 Amos, he foresaw that the armies of the great empire 
 Assyria were likely to invade Palestine, bringing with 
 them all the horrible atrocities of ancient warfare. This, 
 he believed, would be Jehovah's way of ptmishing guUty 
 Israel. (See Hosea 13:16.) 
 
 This punishment, however, according to Hosea, would 
 not mean that Jehovah had ceased to love His people. 
 On the contrary he taught that Jehovah sends punishment 
 with a breaking heart. 
 
 " How can I give thee up, Ephraim! " (saith Jehovah.) 
 " How can I give thee over, Israel! " (Hosea 11:8.) 
 Hosea also declared that through punishment Jehovah 
 was seeking to cure His people of their sin. Led away 
 as exiles by the King of Assyria, their hearts might 
 perhaps be won back at last to their God. In short, 
 Hosea's sad experience with Gomer made him the great 
 prophet who first proclaimed God's infinite love even ior 
 sinners, and His readiness to forgive the penitenc. 
 
,A FORGIVING HUSBAND 149 
 
 The Great Need of the People of Israel: True 
 Worship 
 
 There was another lesson which grew out of Hosea's 
 own bitter personal experience. Since God loved Israel 
 with so marvelous a love, then failure to love Him and 
 worship Him in return is the greatest of all sins. In 
 this matter Hosea supplemented the teachings of his 
 great contemporary, Amos. The attention of the latter 
 prophet had been chiefly fixed on the wrongs of men 
 against other men. His heart had burned with indigna- 
 tion and pity, in view of the glaring acts of injustice 
 which were constantly practiced by the rich and powerful 
 at the expense of the poor and lowly. Hosea also 
 preached against the lies, the thefts and the murders 
 of his countrymen, but he saw more clearly than Amos 
 that the root-sin from which all these others sprang was 
 that they had turned their hearts away from God. They 
 were lacking in true worship. " There is none among 
 them who calls to me " (saith Jehovah). (Hosea 7:7.) 
 
 ' ' They do not return to Jehovah their God. ' ' (Hosea 7 : 10.) 
 
 "They have never cried to me with their heart." (Hosea 
 7:14.) 
 
 There was an abundance of so-called worship, but it 
 was carried on merely for the sake of the material blessings 
 which they thought would follow. It was like the " cup- 
 board love " of kittens purring for cream. 
 " They have never cried to me with their heart: 
 
 But they are ever howliag beside their altars for com and 
 new wine." (Hosea 7: 14.) 
 
 When they thought they could secure these material 
 blessings by idolatrous worship, then they worshipped 
 other gods. (Hosea 2: 5.) 
 
 Even as Gomer had cared only for pleasures, and had 
 abandoned Hosea because he could not lavish money 
 upon her, so the people of Israel thought only of material 
 enjoyments. Just as Gomer had failed to appreciate 
 the higher blessing of a hfe-long comradeship with a 
 
150 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 noble soul like Hosea, so the Israelites cared nothing 
 for the one supreme blessing of life, loving companionship 
 with God. Hosea saw that the deepest and most urgent 
 need of the people was a renewal of true spiritual worship ; 
 not outward forms and ceremonies, but a genuine " crying 
 unto Jehovah," a genuine seeking after God in prayer. 
 From this would follow, as a natural result, right conduct 
 between man and man. In his dreams of a better future, 
 when Israel should have been chastened through suffer- 
 ing, the sweetest thought to Hosea is that Israel and 
 her God would then be reconciled. 
 
 The Influence of Hos!ea 
 
 In order to gain a wider hearing for his message, Hosea 
 wrote down in a book a series of extracts from his oral 
 addresses. Many copies of this book doubtless found 
 their way to the library tables of the time, along with 
 the " Words of Amos." If the prophetical books of 
 the Old Testament were arranged in chronological order, 
 Amos and Hosea would stand side by side at the head 
 of the list. Of the two, Amos was probably written several 
 years earlier. 
 
 Hosea no doubt hoped, as did Amos, that his book 
 would help to bring his countrymen to their senses in 
 time to ward off the approaching disaster. He certainly 
 succeeded in making a deep impression upon a few in- 
 dividuals. But the nation as a whole went rapidly 
 from bad to worse. The powerful Jeroboam II died in 
 740 B.C. A period of anarchy immediately set in; many 
 of Hosea's addresses were written during this period of 
 anarchy; assassinations followed each other in quick 
 succession, and the nation fell an easy prey to the As- 
 syrian conquerors. In 725 B.C. the Assyrian emperor 
 Shalmaneser laid siege to the city of Samaria, and after 
 three years in 722 B.C. it was captured by Sargon, his 
 successor. The sword did indeed " whirl in Samaria," 
 as Hosea had foretold. Over twenty thousand of its 
 
A FORGIVING HUSBAND 151 
 
 * 
 
 inhabitants were led away as captives, never to return. 
 In the words of Amos, 
 
 " The virgin Israel had fallen, no more to rise." 
 
 Had it not been for the little kingdom of Judah, which 
 still remained intact, the religion of Jehovah might at 
 this time have perished from the earth. Fortunately, 
 however, a few refugees, believers in the message of Amos 
 and Hosea, brought with them into Judah as their most 
 cherished possessions, whatever writings by the prophets 
 they may have had, including " the Words of Amos, " 
 and " the Words of Hosea." These writings played a 
 great part in the future history of Judah. Other prophets, 
 such as Isaiah and Micah, were inspired by them, took 
 up their message, and carried on in Judah the work 
 which had been begun in Northern Israel. The book 
 of Hosea was especially influential. Jesus himself quoted 
 from it, and the glad tidings of ,the Father's love for His 
 sinful children, which was the heart of Jesus' message, 
 was but the crown and completion of Hosea's great 
 discovery of Jehovah's love for sinful Israel. 
 
152 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. Compare the two prophets Amos and Hosea. In what 
 ways were they alike, and in what, unlike? 
 
 2. Do you approve of Hosea's action in taking Gomer 
 back into his home? Did he not thereby encourage other 
 women to be false to their husbands? 
 
 3. In the light of Hosea's teaching, do you believe in 
 praying for material and physical benefits, such as for rain 
 in time of dry weather, or for recovery from sickness? 
 
 4. What should be our chief object, in prayer? 
 
 5. Which prophet do you like the better, Amos or Hosea? 
 
 6. Mention one or two of Hosea's greatest utterances. 
 Suggested readings Hosea: 1; 3; 2 (in this order); and 11. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. When did Hosea live ? 
 
 2. In what part of Palestine was he bom ? 
 
 3. Mention two important truths which he sought to 
 teach to his countrymen. 
 
A FORGIVING HUSBAND 153 
 
 # 
 
 4. Through what experience did he himself come to under- 
 stand these truths? 
 
 5. What does Hosea mean by saying, " Jehovah said to 
 Hosea, go marry a wife with instincts toward unfaithfulness," 
 etc.? 
 
 6. Through what disaster were the predictions of Amos 
 and Hosea qmckly verified? 
 
 7. What was the date of the capture of Samaria by Sargfon? 
 
 8. How was Hosea's influence perpetuated? 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 THE COUNSELS OF A STATESMAN-PROPHET 
 
 The Writings of Isaiah 
 
 Amos and Hosea spoke their messages of warning in 
 the northern kingdom, while that nation was hastening 
 toward its tragic fall. Meanwhile, similar dangers were 
 threatening her sister kingdom, Judah, in the south. 
 The same Assyrian armies that besieged and captured 
 Samaria in 722 B.C. might easily have gone on and 
 captured Jerusalem. The native strength of Judah, 
 as of Northern Israel, was being eaten away by vice and 
 injustice. In the early part of the century (from 782 
 to about 737 B.C.), Judah was fortunate in having an 
 able and upright king, whose name was Uzziah. We 
 read in II Kings 15:3, that he "did that which was 
 right in the sight of Jehovah." No doubt he restrained 
 to some extent the evil tendencies of his corrupt nobles. 
 The years passed, however, and Uzziah grew old and 
 feeble, while Assyria became more and more aggressive. 
 What would become of the nation after Uzziah's death? 
 Would the crown prince Jotham prove to be a wise king 
 like his father? No one knew. 
 
 During these closing years of Uzziah's reign, a young 
 lad named Isaiah was growing to manhood in Jerusalem. 
 He was probably a member of a prominent family, 
 perhaps even related to the king. He may have Hstened 
 to addresses by Amos and Hosea, while visiting in the 
 North. At any rate, he had copies of their writings, 
 and was deeply influenced by them. For a long time he 
 brooded over the dangers which were threatening his 
 beloved Judah. Then came the year of King Uzziah's 
 death. One day, during that year of anxiety and sus- 
 
 154 
 
COUNSELS OF A STATESMAN-PROPJIET 155 
 
 pense, Isaiah went to the temple to worship. As he 
 stood praying, there came to him the great experience 
 of his life. (Isa. 6.) 
 
 In the dim light of the temple interior, he seemed to 
 see Jehovah himself sitting on a lofty throne. At first 
 the vision brought to him only a deep sense of his own 
 sin and unworthiness. He cried out, " Woe is me, for 
 I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst 
 of a people of unclean lips." Soon, however, the vision 
 seemed to purge away his sins, as fire purges away what- 
 ever is foul and unclean. With this new sense of God's 
 forgiveness came an impulse to go and tell his country- 
 men of the Holy One of Israel, whom he himself had seen 
 with the eyes of his soul. He felt like shouting from the 
 housetop, " Jehovah can save us if we will but turn to 
 Him and trust in Him." In all this he was hearing the 
 voice of Jehovah in his heart, saying " Whom shall I 
 send, and who will go for us?" And he answered, " Here 
 am I; send me." Thus Isaiah became a prophet, and 
 came to the help of his people in their hour of need. 
 
 Isaiah's Message as a Preacher 
 
 In many ways Isaiah's work was a continuation of the 
 work of his predecessors. Like Amos, he denounced 
 the deeds of injustice wherewith the rich nobles oppressed 
 thq poor,' and foretold the inevitable punishment unless 
 they should repent. Like Amos, he declared that what 
 Jehovah desires is not burnt offerings but right conduct 
 toward all men. Although these ideas were not original 
 with Isaiah, he expressed them in his own way, and in 
 language unsurpassed for beauty and force. As a splen- 
 did example of his eloquence, we may take his Song of 
 the Vineyard. This was probably delivered at some 
 public festival, when the people were being entertained 
 by professional singers and story-tellers. (See Isa. 
 5:1-24.) 
 
 , Isaiah also took up Hosea's message of the loving 
 iforgiveness of God. He had himself experienced that 
 
156 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 forgiveness in the vision of God which made him a 
 prophet. So he calls to his people in tender accents : 
 
 " Come now, let us reason together, saith Jehovah; 
 Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall become white as snow; 
 Though they be as red as crimson they shall become as wool." 
 (Isa. 1:18.) 
 
 Like Hosea, he believed that the nation would be 
 chastened by Jehovah's punishment, and that a " right- 
 eous remnant " would come forth from the fires of war 
 and exile, to be in very truth Jehovah's holy nation. 
 (See Isa. 1 : 25-26.) 
 
 Isaiah himself did what he could to organize the nucleus 
 of this " righteous remnant," by gathering a group of 
 disciples, and carefully instructing them in the true 
 religion of Jehovah. (See Isa. 8: 16-17.) No doubt they 
 used to gather in his house in groups to listen to his 
 teaching, and to ask him questions. 
 
 Isaiah as a Statesman 
 
 In these ideas, Isaiah was merely carrying on the work 
 of his predecessors. One important service which he 
 rendered to his countrymen was, however, original with 
 him and that was the wise and statesmanlike counsel 
 which he gave to those in authority when outside enemies 
 threatened to attack the nation. At such times most of 
 the leading men in Judah were eager to make alliances 
 with other nations against the enemy. Judah was 
 frequently involved in the long series of conspiracies 
 against Assyria, which at that time was the chief enemy 
 of all of the smaller nations. Messengers came again 
 and again to Jerusalem from the Philistines, from Tyre 
 and Sidon, from Egypt and from far distant Babylon, 
 which at that time was a subject state under Assyria. 
 
 Egypt was at the bottom of most of these plots, for she 
 was jealous of the Assyrian power. She would have 
 preferred to send her own tribute-collectors among these 
 small principahties. The king of Judah, during most 
 of this period, was Hezekiah (from 715 to 686 B.C.) 
 
An Assyrian Relief. Battle Scene, the Storming of a City. 
 
 TYPICAL ASSYRIAN SCENES. 
 
 From Goodspeed's "Ancient World." 
 
COUNSELS OF A STATESMAN-PROPHET 157 
 
 He was on the whole a good ruler, but he was foolish 
 enough to listen to many of these delegations of envoys. 
 It must be remembered, however, that these were years 
 which tried men's souls. No one could be sure but 
 that within a few months the Assyrian army might be 
 laying siege to Jerusalem. Before the eyes of every 
 one there hovered the dreadful spectre of the city in 
 flames, blood flowing like rivers in the streets, and the 
 soldiers of the enemy, more like wild beasts than men, 
 ravaging, without mercy, in every home. We can easily 
 understand why Hezekiah and his subjects frequently 
 became panic-stricken, and were tempted to believe the 
 fair-sounding promises of the envoys, especially those 
 from rich and powerful Egypt. All the more, however, 
 must we admire the calmness, and the deep-rooted faith 
 in God, with which Isaiah through all these troubled 
 years gave his nation the following wise counsel: " Trust 
 in God, and keep out of these alliances." 
 
 Isaiah reasoned that most of these nations were broken 
 reeds on which to lean; and that an3rway their promises 
 were worthless. Judah would be thrown to the wolves, 
 the moment her professed allies covld gain any advantage 
 by it. Furthermore, these alliances would involve the 
 nation in wars which might otherwise be avoided. It was 
 a small country situated back in the hiUs, away from the 
 main highways of trade, and did not possess great wealth 
 to attract the invader. Let the people remain quiet in 
 their mountain fastnesses, minding their own business 
 and trusting in God, and the storms of war might pass 
 to one side. (See Isa. 30: 1-7; 31: 1-3.) 
 
 To some extent Isaiah's advice seems to have been 
 heeded. At any rate, during these years, Jerusalem 
 escaped pillage, although in 701 B.C. many of the smaller 
 towns in Judah were captured and ravaged by the 
 Assyrian emperor, Sennacherib. 
 
158 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Isaiah's Statesmanship Vindicated 
 The most dramatic incident in Isaiah's career as a 
 statesman occurred in the year that Sennacherib set 
 out on a campaign against Egypt. While passing down 
 the seacoast west of Judah, he sent messengers to Jeru- 
 salem, demanding the surrender of the city. Probably 
 he did not like the idea of leaving so strong a fortress 
 as Jerusalem in his rear, and hence determined to frighten 
 the city into a surrender, if possible, and then break down 
 its walls. In dismay, Hezekiah turned to Isaiah. Once 
 again the prophet was calm when everyone else was 
 in a panic. AH these years, he had been saying that 
 if Judah would keep out of alliances with other nations, 
 and trust Jehovah, they would be kept in peace and safety. 
 Now came the test of his faith. At this time Judah had 
 been following Isaiah's advice and was not -entangled 
 in any coaHtion. Would Jehovah do His part ? Isaiah's 
 faith did not flinch from the test. He advised Hezekiah 
 to pay no attention to Sennacherib's insolent demands. 
 " He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow 
 therein." Jehovah, he said, had indeed used Assyria 
 in times past as an instrument to punish sinful Israel. 
 But now Jehovah would punish Assyria herself, for her 
 arrogant pride. (Isa. 10:15.) 
 
 Isaiah's predictions were fulfilled. Sennacherib quickly 
 returned to Nineveh, partly because he found that the 
 Egyptian forces were stronger than he had supposed; 
 and also because a terrible pestilence attacked his own 
 army as they were encamped near the low marshes on 
 the Egyptian border. 
 
 The Book of Isaiah 
 Like^ Amos and Hosea, Isaiah from time to time put 
 some of his addresses into written form. In his later 
 years he also wrote a brief account of some of his .earlier 
 experiences as a prophet. These writings were carefully 
 cherished by his followers, especially after his death, 
 and many copies were made. Sometimes there would 
 
COUNSELS OF A STATESMAN-PROP^HET 159 
 
 be a little space left at the end of a book-roll. It is 
 probable that the owner of the roll, to save expense, 
 would frequently use this space for copying some sermon 
 or address by another prophet than Isaiah. . Thus as 
 time went on, the book grew; and in its present form it 
 seems to be in reality a collection of prophetical writings 
 by a number of different authors. It was still known, 
 however, as the book of Isaiah, although the words of 
 the original Isaiah are probably found only in the first 
 thirty-nine chapters, and, chiefly, in chapters 1-13, and 
 28-32. In later chapters we shall learn more of the 
 other writings which were eventually included in the book. 
 
160 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1. Compare the different ways in which Amos, Hosea and 
 Isaiah came to be prophets. What experience was common 
 to each of the three ? (See Amos 7 : 14-15 and chapter seventeen 
 of this text book; also Isa. 6 and the first part of this chapter). 
 
 2. "In resting and quietness shall be yovac strength." 
 Did Isaiah mean that if the nation of Judah would trust God, 
 no trouble would ever come to them? If not, what did he 
 mean? 
 
 3. How is the above promise of strength illustrated in 
 the fact that Isaiah himself was able to give wise counsel to 
 the people, when others lost their heads? 
 
 4. How should faith in God be a source of physical health 
 and of healing in time of sickness? 
 
 5. If Isaiah were a citizen of the United States today, 
 what side would he take on the question of a strong navy? 
 Would he be in favor of from two to four new battleships each 
 
 year? 
 
 6. Your favorite verse or passage? Suggested chapters; 
 Isaiah 1, 5, 30. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 1. What event in the history of Judah caused Isaiah, as 
 a youth, to feel especially anxious for his nation? 
 
COUNSELS OF A STATESMAN-PROPHET 161 
 
 2. What experience led him into the work of a prophet ? 
 
 3. "What truths proclaimed by Amos and Hosea did Isaiah 
 continue to proclaim? 
 
 4. What was Isaiah's special service to his nation, in addition 
 to his work as a preacher? 
 
 5. What foreign policy did Isaiah persistently advocate 
 for his nation? 
 
 6. What were the reasons for this policy? 
 
 7. Was Isaiah's advice followed? 
 
 8. When and how was the wisdom of this < advice trium- 
 phantly vindicated? 
 
 9. What portions of the present book of Isaiah came from 
 Isaiah himself? 
 
 10. How did it come about that passages were added from 
 later writers? > 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 A GREAT PROPHET AND HIS FAITHFUL 
 SECRETARY 
 
 Baruch's Record op Jeremiah's Life 
 
 After the four great prophets, Amos, Hosea, Micah, 
 and Isaiah, there followed a time when the people went 
 back to their old ways. This was when the wicked king 
 Manasseh was on the throne of Judah. (686-641 B.C.) 
 Micah and Isaiah had been fortunate in seeing many 
 of their teachings accepted and obeyed, especially during 
 the reign of Hezekiah. But Manasseh was a bad son 
 of a good father. Under his leadership, the people even 
 persecuted those who followed the teaching of the proph- 
 ets. Most of those who were persecuted remained 
 steadfast. But it was not until the latter half of the 
 century (after about 640 B.C.), that the voice of the 
 prophets again became a power in the land. In 639 
 B.C., a new king named Josiah came to the throne. He 
 was at that time only eight years old; but the queen- 
 mother was a friend of the prophets and encouraged them 
 in their work, and Josiah was trained in the same attitude 
 from the beginning. At this time, new dangers were 
 threatening the nation from outside her borders. Al- 
 though the Assyrian empire had passed the zenith of 
 its glory and was destined within a few decades to 
 disappear from the stage of history, there were other 
 strong and aggressive nations ' whose ambitions meant 
 trouble for little Judah. Egypt was becoming more 
 dangerous, for after centuries of misrule and anarchy 
 a strong djoiasty had come into power. Most important 
 of all, the old kingdom of Babylon was coming to the 
 front. This new Babylonian empire conquered Assyria, 
 
 162 
 
A GREAT PROPHET 163 
 
 and Babylon, instead of Nineveh, became the world's 
 chief city. Its pomp and glory made it one of the wonders 
 of the world. The danger of foreign invasion helped to 
 arrest the attention of the people of Judah, and won a 
 hearing for the prophets as the spokesmen of Jehovah. 
 There were four prophets during this period, whose 
 writings are preserved under their names in the Old 
 Testament. These are Zephaniah, Nahum, Habakkuk 
 and Jeremiah. Of these four, only Jeremiah belongs in 
 the same class with the great names of the preceding 
 century. He alone was a genius of the first rank. His 
 career extended over forty years, from about 625 to 580 
 B.C. 
 
 Jeremiah's Prophetic Call and His Early Addresses 
 Jeremiah was bom in Anathoth, a little village about 
 an hour's walk north of Jerusalem, within the borders 
 of the tribes of Benjamin. Undoubtedly he possessed 
 copies of the writings of the earlier prophets and studied 
 them diligently. He seems to have been influenced most 
 deeply by Hosea. As he read these books, and then 
 observed the life and conduct of the people of his own 
 time, he saw that the same evils still flourished against 
 which those great men had fought. Gradually he came 
 to feel it laid upon him as a sacred duty that he should 
 take up their work and proclaim anew their message. 
 So he went up from his home in Anathoth and in the 
 public squares of Jerusalem began his career as a preacher. 
 Two of the addresses which he delivered in these years 
 have been preserved in the early part of the book which 
 bears his name. In the first few lines of quotation below, 
 the prophet puts into words the better impulses of the 
 nation, which he hopes to be able to arouse, and then he 
 gives the answer of Jehovah. 
 
 The prayer of the Israelites: 
 "A voice is heard on the bare heights, the supplications of the 
 
 weeping Israelites: 
 Behold we come to thee, for thou art Jehovah our God. 
 
164 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 We would lie down in shame and let confusion cover us. 
 
 For we and our fathers have sinned against our God, from 
 
 otir youth even to this day, 
 And we have not heeded the voice of Jehovah our God." 
 
 The answer of Jehovah: 
 " If thou wilt return, Israel, thou mayest return to me. 
 And if thou wUt put away thy vileness, thou shalt not 'ue 
 banished from my presence." (Jer. 3:21-4: 1.) 
 
 Partly as a result of Jeremiah's splendid appeals a great 
 reformation was carried out in Judah. At the command 
 of the good king Josiah, all idols and idolatrous altars 
 were destroyed in conformity with the revised law book, 
 Deuteronomy (see II Kings 23). Jeremiah evidently 
 was not entirely satisfied with this reformation, for it is 
 not mentioned in any of his writings. 
 
 Probably it seemed to him too external and too much 
 a matter of outward form rather than of inward thoughts 
 and motives. Yet for king Josiah himself, Jeremiah felt 
 a warm regard as one " who executed law and justice, 
 and judged the cause of the poor and needy." (Jer. 
 22:15-16.) 
 
 Another Relapse in Judah. The Final Harvest 
 OF Folly 
 
 In 608 B.C., Josiah's noble reign was ended. He was 
 killed in a battle with the Egyptians near' Megiddo, in 
 central Palestine. His son Jehoiakim was placed on 
 the throne by the Egyptians as their vassal. He was 
 just like his grandfather Manasseh, selfisli, dishonest, 
 and vain. All the evil elements in the nation were now 
 set free, to do their worst. The new king was chiefly 
 interested in his new and costly palace on which he 
 compelled his subjects to labor without pay. He was 
 utterly without wisdom in his foreign policy, and at that 
 time wisdom was sorely needed. The Egyptian rule in 
 Palestine came to an end in 605 B.C., through the great 
 battle of Carchemish, on the Euphrates. Here Necho, 
 the Egyptian king, was defeated by Nebuchadrezzar 
 
A GREAT PROPHET 165 
 
 * 
 
 of Babylon, and for the next half century Babylon was 
 mistress of southwestern Asia. On the whole, the 
 Babylonians ruled justly. Nebuchadrezzar ranks with 
 the leading monarchs of history. Had the leaders of 
 Judah been willing to submit to his authority, Jerusalem 
 might have survived for an indefinite period. But 
 Egypt began again to stir up rebellion among the minor 
 nations in Palestine. Jeremiah warned the king and 
 people against listening to the promises of the Egyptians. 
 Nevertheless, in 600 B.C., Jehoiakim rebelled. In 598, 
 Nebuchadrezzar was besieging Jerusalem with a powerful 
 army. Jehoiakim died during the siege, and his brother, 
 Jehoiachin, surrendered. He was taken away to Babylon 
 as a captive along with about thirty thousand others, 
 men, women and children. Nebuchadrezzar did not 
 destroy the city itself. Another brother of Jehoiakim, 
 named Zedekiah, was left as a vassal ruler. 
 
 One would think that Judah would now have learned 
 her lesson, but there was a group of selfish, unprincipled 
 nobles who seemed bent on their country's complete 
 ruin. The king, Zedekiah, was a well-meaning man, 
 and a friend of Jeremiah, but he was weak. In 588 
 B.C., encouraged by fine-sounding promises from Egypt, 
 the nation joined with the Ammonites, the Moabites, and 
 the Phoenicians in another coalition against Babylon. 
 Jeremiah protested against such an alliance, but in vain. 
 In 586 B.C., Jerusalem was captiured by the Babylonians 
 a^d burned. The temple was destroyed and the walls 
 of the city were levelled to the ground. Zedekiah's 
 eyes were put out, and again many thousands of the 
 inhabitants were led away as exiles. It was nearly a 
 century before hope and prosperity began to return to 
 the discouraged, poverty-stricken land. 
 
 These two decades were as a living death to Jeremiah. 
 He was an ardent patriot, but he was compelled to witness 
 his nation's ruin. As he was not carried away into exile 
 by the Babylonians, he saw everything from the first 
 siege of Jerusalem, in 597, until the end. He was natur- 
 
166 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 ally a lover of peace, and craved the sympathy and good- 
 will of his fellow men, yet his conscience compelled him 
 to continue his stem denunciations. (Jer. 20 : 8-10.) 
 
 Even his own people in Anathoth turned against him, 
 and joined in a plot to kiU him. During the last siege 
 of Jerusalem, he was hated and despised as a traitor. 
 Once he was thrown into a dungeon to perish, and was 
 saved only by the friendliness of a negro servant. His 
 closing years were spent among the Jews in Egypt, 
 and according to tradition he was killed by his fellow- 
 exiles, whose idolatrous practices he had rebuked. Thus 
 he" spent his life in an apparently fruitless effort to save 
 his people from their sins. To the very end, his life 
 was one long story of hardship and suffering. 
 
 Jeremiah's Valuable Helper. Baruch, the 
 Prophet Scribe 
 
 That Jeremiah was able to keep up the fight so long and 
 so faithfully, was due in large part to the fact that during 
 at least the last twenty years of his life he had a remark- 
 able partner in his work. In the latter part of Jehoiakim's 
 reign, about 600 B.C., Jeremiah was positively forbidden 
 to speak any more to the people, but he was not the man 
 to retire from the fight when he could still speak through 
 the written page. Like the apostle Paul, he was not 
 skilful with the pen, but he had a friend named Baruch, 
 who had been trained as a scribe, and who was himself 
 a prophet and a good public speaker. So Jeremiah 
 dictated to Baruch a number of his addresses. Then on 
 a 9ertain fast day, when a large gathering had assembled 
 in the temple court, Baruch took the written roll, and 
 read it before the people. He made a deep impression 
 on his hearers, all the deeper because of the reverence 
 with which all writings were then regarded. Some of 
 the better class of nobles who were in the gathering 
 borrowed the roll and read it before the king. It was 
 a chilly day in winter, and a charcoal fire was burning 
 in an open brazier near the king's chair. From time to 
 
ix GREAT PROPHET 167 
 
 time, as the reader finished a column of the writing, 
 Jehoiakim reached forward and cut off that portion of 
 the roU, and in spite of the protests of some who were 
 present, threw it on the fire. Thus the entire roll was 
 burned. Jeremiah, however, dictated a second and 
 longer manuscript, containing the addresses that had 
 been burned and a number of others. No doubt BarUch 
 was able to read these addresses to many groups of 
 listeners. This was the beginning of a long partnership. 
 It was surely fortunate that these two men were thus 
 brought together. To a large extent, Baruch became 
 Jeremiah's mouthpiece. 
 
 The Book of Baruch 
 
 Although Jeremiah's work seemed comparatively fruit- 
 less while he was alive, yet few if any of the prophets 
 wielded a greater influence on subsequent generations. 
 This was due to a book which Baruch prepared about his 
 great friend and teacher. The nucleus of this book was 
 the second collection of addresses which he had made 
 after Jehoiakim burned the first one. To these addresses, 
 Baruch added others including probably some extracts 
 from a diary which Jeremiah had kept. Furthermore, 
 he wrote a brief biography of the man, telling of the most 
 important events in his career. He told of the conflict 
 with the false prophets, who kept saying to the people. 
 " Peace, peace, when there is no peace." (Jer. 6: 14.) 
 
 He told of a sensational speech which Jeremiah once 
 made in the temple court, when he actually likened the 
 temple itself to a den of robbers, because of the rich and 
 wicked nobles who were frequently seen offering sacrifices 
 there and who thought the city was safe from Jehovah's 
 punishment, because " the temple of Jehovah is here." 
 Jeremiah, on the contrary, declared that the temple itself 
 would be destroyed, along with the rest of the city, if 
 its leaders continued to steal and lie, and murder and 
 commit adultery. Baruch tells us that Jeremiah was 
 arrested and put on trial for his life as a result of this 
 
168 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 speech, and only escaped because he had one influential 
 friend among the nobles. (See Jer, 26:1-24.) This 
 remarkable biography also tells of the dramatic object 
 lessons with which Jeremiah sought to compel the at- 
 tention of the people and to impress the truth upon 
 their minds. It teUs how he had smashed an earthen- 
 ware jug before them, as a symbol of the total destruction 
 whjch their sins were bringing upon Jerusalem; how he 
 made a wooden yoke and wore it publicly, as a symbol 
 of the inevitable rule of Nebuchadrezzar, against which 
 it would be madness to rebel; and how when a false 
 prophet took the wooden yoke and broke it, Jeremiah 
 returned the next day with an iron one. (See Jer. 
 27: 1 — 28: 17.) Finally the book contained an account of 
 some of the many hardships and persecutions which the 
 prophet suffered during those last years in the besieged 
 city, in the desolated land, and among the exiles in Egypt. 
 This biographical sketch, with the addresses by Jere- 
 miah, Baruch put together in a book of considerable 
 length, which (with some additions from later scribes) 
 is known to us today as the book of Jeremiah in the 
 Old Testament. It could be called, quite as truly, the 
 book of Baruch. Judging from the sections which 
 were written by Baruch, he was a man of great intellectual 
 ability, as well as nobility of character. His anecdotes 
 about Jeremiah are skilfully told, and bring clearly before 
 us the prophet's personality.' The book was a priceless 
 contribution to the great cause which they both had 
 served so long and faithfully. 
 
A GREAT PROPHET 189 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. In what respect does Jeremiah remind you, 
 (a) of Amos? 
 
 (6) of Hosea? 
 
 (c) of Isaiah? 
 
 2. Which of the following characteristics do you especially 
 notice in his literary style : pathos, conciseness, musical rhythm, 
 figurativeness ? 
 
 3. In what ways was Baruch a help to Jeremiah? 
 
 4. Why was Jeremiah's later influence greatly increased 
 by Baruch 's biographical narrative? 
 
 5. In what respect is the " book of Baruch " (that is the 
 Old Testament book of Jeremiah) Uke the Gospel narratives 
 in the New Testament? 
 
 6. Mention any verse or passage from Jeremiah which 
 you specially admire. Suggested readings : Jer. 8 : 18 — 9 : 1 ; 
 26:1-24:27:1—28:17. 
 
170 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. How long a period intervened between Isaiah and 
 Jeremiah? 
 
 2. Outline briefly the history of Judah, during this period. 
 
 3. What events prepared the way for a revival of the work 
 of the prophets? 
 
 4. Where was Jeremiah bom? 
 
 5. Was he nattu-aUy bold or shy, stem or tender, sociable 
 or fond of solitude? 
 
 6. How was Jeremiah connected with the reformation 
 under Josiah? 
 
 7. In what way was Jeremiah's life peculiarly sad? 
 
 8. Mention some hardships which he had to endure? 
 
 9. How does it happen that we know so much about Jere- 
 miah's personal history? 
 
 10. How and when did Jeremiah and Baruch first come 
 to be associated? 
 
 11. How long were they together? 
 
 12. Of what elements is the book of Jeremiah in the Old 
 Testament made up ? 
 
 Notebook Work 
 Clip out from your copies, of the Old Testament the 
 following sections from the book of Jeremiah, which probably 
 come from Baruch's biography. Jer. 26 : 1-24 ; 36 : 1-32 ; 34 : 1-22 ; 
 37: 1-38; 28a; 39: 15-18; 40: 7-16; 41: 1-17; 42: 1-22; 43: 1-13; 
 44: 1-30. The above is probably the original order. 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 
 LESSONS FROM A NATION'S MISFORTUNES 
 
 The Historical Books from Joshua to II Kings 
 
 The great historical narratives of the Hebrews were 
 for the most part the product of groups of writers, working 
 in co-operation. The first of these was a group of proph- 
 ets, in the period after Elijah, who wrote the Judean- 
 Ephraimite history. (See chapter XV.) The next im- 
 portant group lived about two centuries later, about 
 650 B.C. It is to this group that we are chiefly indebted 
 for the books of Joshua, Judges, I and II Samuel, and I 
 and II Kings in their present form. These men were 
 closely associated' and played an important part as re- 
 ligious leaders in the history of Judah. They probably 
 lived as a little community, in some large house, or group 
 of houses, in Jerusalem. They began their life as a com- 
 munity during the wicked reign of Manasseh. They helped 
 in the reforms of Josiah. They were at work during the 
 evil days of Jehoiakim. Jeremiah must have known them, 
 and may sometimes have been a guest at their house, 
 although he did not entirely sympathize with their 
 ideas. Finally, when Jerusalem was destroyed, some 
 of the members of their organization were carried away 
 to Babylon, where for a time they were able to continue 
 their writing. As a group, they are generally called 
 the Deuteronomists. 
 
 This word is applied to them, because their chief 
 purpose in writing history was to persuade their country- 
 men to obey the laws in the revised book, now called 
 Deuteronomy. They were probably among the leaders 
 who persuaded King Josiah to adopt it. 
 
 This explains why they began their history with 
 
 171 
 
172 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Joshua. According to their ideas, the substance of the 
 law had been given to the nation just before the death of 
 Moses, and the settlement in Canaan, under Joshua. 
 Hence they were not interested in the history before 
 that time. 
 
 They sought to show, through history, that all the 
 troubles of the nation were the consequences of dis- 
 obedience to God's commands as these had been revealed 
 in that law-book. The whole course of their national 
 history seemed to them a proof of their belief. " When 
 we obeyed this law," so they argued, " we were prosperous 
 and happy." " When we were disobedient, especially 
 when we worshipped idols, calamities came." 
 
 Their Methods of Work 
 
 We may imagine that these co-operative historians had 
 a common room in which to do their work. They would 
 have writing-tables, blank rolls of leather for writing, 
 and pens and ink. To this headquarters each one 
 brought every scrap of writing which he could find which 
 woidd throw light upon the history of the nation. Thus 
 they had a copy of the old Judean-Ephraimite history, 
 and made large use of it. Their chief desire, of course, 
 was to find illustrations in the history for the ideas they 
 were trying to teach. There was undoubtedly joy among 
 them when some member brought in a history of the 
 prophet Samuel. He had picked up the manuscript 
 while on a trip to the northern part of the country. In 
 the house of some friendly prophet, not far perhaps from 
 Samuel's old home, Shiloh, our traveller had discovered 
 this written roll, and had hastened back to Jerusalem to 
 make a copy of it. It told among other things how Saul 
 had been deposed from his kingship, because he had 
 disobeyed Jehovah's command by offering sacrifices 
 in an unlawful manner. " Good!" said all the workers 
 when it was read to them. " We can use every word of 
 that in our history! If Saul had obeyed this law 
 
LESSQNS FROM A NATION'S MISFORTUNES 173 
 
 (Deuteronomy), his descendants might have been kings 
 of Israel today." 
 
 These Deuteronomic writers were not experts in judging 
 of the accuracy of the records they fotmd. They were 
 not trained in such matters. They would sometimes 
 copy into their own book two different accounts of the 
 same event without even noticing the contradictions 
 feetween them. It is fortunate for us, therefore, that 
 they did not write the narratives in their own words, 
 except when they cotild find nothing from an earlier writer 
 which brought out the religious doctrines they were 
 tr3ring to teach. As far as possible, they copied word 
 for word the older records, many of which were very 
 accurate. This was their most important service for 
 posterity. What a discovery it would be, if someone 
 should tmcover, some day, the ruins of this old literary 
 work-shop under the streets of modem Jerusalem, and 
 should find, amidst the mold, the original manuscripts 
 which were gathered from all parts of the land. Many 
 a disputed question would be answered. 
 
 The Books of Joshua and Judges 
 
 We first meet with the work of the Deuteronomists 
 in the book of Joshua. This was the point at which their 
 interest in the history began. The Judean-Ephraimite 
 history had given a very accurate account of the settle- 
 ment of the Hebrews in Canaan (see chapter XVI), 
 and the Deuteronomists copied long passages from it. 
 This older history told how under Joshua's leadership 
 the Hebrews had gained a foothold in the land; but it 
 was made clear that for many decades, they had a hard 
 struggle with the earlier Canaanites, so that it was not 
 until the time of David that all the old Canaanite cities 
 were conquered. But to the Deuteronomists it was 
 simply inconceivable that an upright leader like Joshua, 
 the trusted servant of Moses, should not have been 
 rewarded by Jehovah with an immediate victory over 
 all the Canaanites. 
 
174 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 So we find passages in the book of Joshua, evidently 
 from their hand, which contain statements such as these: 
 " So Jehovah gave to Israel all the land which he promised 
 with an oath to give to their fathers, and they took pos- 
 session of it, and dwelt in it., . . . Not a man of all 
 their enemies stood before them; Jehovah delivered all 
 their enemies into their power." (Josh. 21:43-45.) 
 
 But how could they explain those earlier statements 
 regarding the hard struggles with the original Canaanites 
 which continued for a century or two. " Those," they 
 answered, " were the result of the disobedience of the 
 people after the death of Joshua, which made it necessary 
 for Jehovah again and again to give them back into the 
 power of their old enemies, to punish them." So the 
 Deuteronomists wrote a second book, the book of Judges, 
 in which they continued the story in accordance with 
 this theory. Into this book they inserted the earlier 
 narratives about the champions who lived after Joshua's 
 time, using for each story the same introductory form of 
 words. (See Judges 4: 2; 6: 1; 10: 7; 15: 1.) 
 
 The Books of Samuel 
 
 The two books known as First and Second Samuel 
 are really a single composition and are so printed in the 
 Hebrew Bible. They take their name from the prophet 
 Samuel, who is one of the leading characters in the early 
 part of the narratives. There is no reason to suppose 
 that anything in either of the books was written by 
 Samuel himself. The two books together cover a period 
 of about seventy-five years, from the birth of Samuel 
 to the closing years of David. They are made up largely 
 of quotations, from the biography of Samuel, mentioned 
 above, and from the early biographies of Saul and David, 
 mentioned in chapter XV. 
 
 In these books of Samuel the; Deuteronomists did not 
 find it necessary to add many supplementary statements 
 of their own. The older manuscripts from which they 
 quoted all brought out clearly and forcibly the truth 
 
LESSONS FROM A NATION'S MISFORTUNES 175 
 
 which they were seeking to teach. Saul was rejected 
 as king, by Jehovah, because he disobeyed Jehovah's 
 commands. David's lapses into sin brought upon him 
 a long train of disasters. If even David was thus 
 punished, who, notwithstanding his grave faults, was on 
 the whole a good man, how much more would the sins of 
 the people of Judah lead to a stem retribution! 
 
 The Books of Kings 
 
 The first and second books of Kings, like the books of 
 Samuel, are really a single work, continuing the thread of 
 the history from the death of David to the destruction 
 of Jerusalem by Nebuchadrezzar. For this period the 
 Deuteronomists were not able to find so many good 
 historical records. Solomon, however, had established 
 the office of the royal scribe, and from the court records 
 left by these officials, the dates of the most important 
 events could be learned. The priests in the temple at 
 Jerusalem kept similar records of events of special interest 
 to them. There was also a short book of stories about 
 the prophet Elijah, and another about his successor, 
 Elisha. 
 
 In this part of their history the Deuteronomists con- 
 tinued to emphasize the certainty of Jehovah's rewards 
 and retributions. Those kings who " did evil in the 
 sight of Jehovah" were represented as speedily punished, 
 while those who did right were described as prosperous. 
 They were especially severe on those kings who neglected 
 the temple at Jerusalem, and patronized the local shrines 
 elsewhere. They explained the early downfall of the 
 northern kingdom as due to the fact that Jeroboam I 
 had set up shrines at Bethel and Dan, thus keeping the 
 people from worshipping at Jerusalem. In this they 
 were not altogether just. For while the influence of 
 these local shrines had been on the side of idolatry, yet 
 no one, until the prophets Amos and Hosea, had realized 
 this fac'c; nor had the worship at these shrines been for- 
 bidden, <dntil the Deuteronomic revision was adopted; 
 
176 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 but they supposed that this prohibition had been in force 
 from the beginning. 
 
 As reHgious teachers, the Deuteronomists were more 
 nearly right than as historians, and we are stirred by the 
 earnestness of their moral and religious purposes. For- 
 tunately, we are able to get our knowledge of the historical 
 facts from the earlier sources which they quoted. 
 
LESSONS li^ROM A NATION'S MISFORTUNES 177 
 
 * 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. What wotild be a suitable title for the Deuteronomic 
 history as a whole, as it is fotind in Joshua to II Kings ? 
 
 2. Do you think that the downfall of the Hebrew kingdoms 
 was caused entirely by the sins of the people ? 
 
 3. Is it true that the wicked are always ptinished, the good 
 always rewarded? 
 
 4. How is goodness rewarded, and wickedness punished, 
 today? 
 
 5. Mention your favorite verse or passage in the books 
 discussed in this chapter. Suggested readings: I Samuel 
 15 (from the Samuel biography), I Kings 17-19 (from a book 
 of stories about Elijah.) 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What is the connection between the revised law book 
 Deuteronomy, and the historical books Joshua to II Kings? 
 
 2. Why did the Deuteronomists begin their historical 
 writing just at this point, that is, with Joshua? 
 
 3. How long were these men associated together? 
 
 4. What earlier writings did the Deuteronomists use? 
 
 5. What was the chief religious teaching of the Deuter- 
 onomists? 
 
178 (THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 6. What events in the history of Israel seemed to them 
 to prove this teaching ? 
 
 7. How accurate are the Deuteronomists, historically, 
 as compared with the earlier historians, from whom they quote? 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 COMFORTERS AND GUIDES IN DARK DAYS 
 
 EZEKIEL, HaGGAI, ZeCHARIAH, AND OTHERS 
 
 Before the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 B.C., the 
 message of the prophets had been largely a stem one. 
 The people had needed to be rebuked for their sins, and 
 warned regarding the consequences which were sure to 
 follow. When Jerusalem finally lay in total ruin, how- 
 ever, the time had come for a different note to be sounded. 
 In place of denunciation, the survivors of the catastrophe 
 were now in need of hope and comfort. The land was 
 exhausted from the long siege. Many had been slain 
 in battle. Some thirty thousand others, men, women 
 and children, had been compelled to tread the long and 
 bitter pathway of exile, from Judah to Babylonia — a 
 thousand mile journey on foot. Multitudes of others 
 fled to Egypt for safety, and many remained there per- 
 manently. Those who remained in Judah probably 
 suffered most of aU. For more than a century the land 
 was in- disorder. Bands of robbers preyed at will upon 
 the helpless farmers and shepherds. Starvation, blood- 
 shed and torture were everyday experiences. In their 
 despair, the people were saying that Jehovah had for- 
 gotten His people or had whoUy forsaken them. Those 
 who were scattered in foreign lands were tempted to 
 give up entirely the religion of Jehovah, and become Kke 
 the heathen among whom they lived. So it is not sur- 
 prising that the prophetical writings from the period 
 after the fall of Judah are very different in tone and 
 purpose from those of the earlier time; and that messages 
 of comfort and promises of a return from exile take 
 the place of demyaciation. 
 
 179 
 
180 (THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Among the first to strike the new note was Jeremiah. 
 In one of his later sayings he declared that a better day 
 was surely coming, when Jehovah would write His law, 
 not on stone tablets, but on the hearts of His people. 
 He also made clear his belief that the sunlight of peace 
 and prosperity would again shine upon the land. 
 
 A Jewish Prophet " by the Rivers of Babylon " 
 
 Among the exiles who were taken to Babylonia by 
 Nebuchadrezzar, after the first siege of Jerusalem (597 
 B.C.), was a young priest named Ezekiel. He began 
 his work as a prophet soon after reaching the new country. 
 The Jews were not prisoners, but were allowed to live 
 together in a group of small villages, supporting them- 
 selves by farming and commerce. Near their settlement 
 ran the Kabaru canal (" the river Chebar, in Ezekiel "). 
 The -waters of these canals were used in the irrigation 
 of the wonderfully fertile soil. No doubt boats also 
 passed up and down the canal, laden with merchandise. 
 There was no reason, therefore, why the Jewish exiles 
 should not take up the thread of their life, and continue 
 their national customs and religion much. as before they 
 were taken captives. At first they were slow in adapting 
 themselves cheerfully to the new conditions. Jerusalem 
 was not finally destroyed until 586 B.C., and previous 
 to this date, these exiles kept hoping that almost any 
 day they would be able to return to the home-land. In 
 his earlier addresses, Ezekiel tried to combat these 
 false hopes. But when the news finally came that Nebu- 
 chadrezzar had captured and destroyed Jerusalem, even 
 burning the temple of Jehovah, their spirit seemed utterly 
 broken. From this time on, therefore, Ezekiel set him- 
 self to the task of encouraging these disheartened men 
 and women. They needed something to "live for, some- 
 thing to look forward to; and the prophet now insisted 
 with all earnestness that the time would surely come 
 when Jehovah would bring back to Judah her exiled 
 sons and daughters and restore their nation to its former 
 
COMFORTERS AND GUIDES 181 
 
 glory, leading them in victory against all their enemies. 
 He drew up an elaborate program of the future restora- 
 tion of the nation, as he hoped that it would come to 
 pass. In this program, Ezelael shows his priestly train- 
 ing. The center of everything in the new age was to 
 be the temple of Jehovah in Jerusalem. For the con- 
 struction of this temple he actually gives a full set of 
 plans and specifications. (Ezek. 40-43.) 
 
 Ezekiel also had felt the influence of the earlier proph- 
 ets, and in many sayings dwelt on the necessity of right 
 conduct toward other men. To us, these latter sayings 
 are the most valuable, such as his promise of Jehovah's 
 blessing upon the man who will " wrong no one, restore 
 the debtor his pledge, take nought by robbery, give his 
 bread to the hungry, and clothe the naked." (Ezek. 
 18:5-9.) 
 
 Ezekiel's Predictions Fulfilled. The Rebuilding 
 OF the Temple 
 
 In the years 520-516 B.C., the temple at Jerusalem 
 was actually rebuilt. At that time, Persia instead of 
 Babylonia was the imperial nation in Asia. Cyrus the 
 Great had conquered Babylon in 538 B.C., and had given 
 permission to the exiles in that land to return to their 
 homes. Some of the more patriotic Jews took advantage 
 of this edict, and coming back to Judah, helped to bring new 
 life and hope to the discouraged people there. Finally in 
 520 B.C., a movement was started to rebuild the temple. 
 The leaders in this movement were two prophets, Zech- 
 ariah and Haggai. Zechariah was probably one of the 
 exiles who had returned from Babylon. Haggai's ad- 
 dresses are preserved in the two chapters of his short 
 book. He was not especially profound or original in 
 his ideas, but as a practical leader, he served his people 
 well. 
 
 " Thus speaketh Jehovah of hosts (says Haggai) ; 
 This people say, the time is not come for Jehovah's 
 house to be built ... Is it a time for you to dwell in 
 
182 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 your ceiled houses, while this house lieth waste? . . . 
 Thus saith Jehovah of hosts, Consider your ways. Go 
 up to the hill-country, and bring wood, and build the 
 house, and I will take pleasure in it, . . . saith Jehovah." 
 (Hag. 1:2-8.) 
 
 So they organized the first church building society 
 on record. Wood was brought in from the surrounding 
 forests; the carpenters went to work with a wiU, and 
 after about four years the new temple was finished. It 
 was a long, hard struggle for the poverty-stricken people 
 of Judah; and they never could have carried it through 
 to completion had not Haggai and Zechariah kept cheer- 
 ing them on. 
 
 "Are We to Have our Own King Again?" 
 
 There was another matter in which these two prophets 
 were deeply interested, and that was the re-establishment 
 of Judah as an independent kingdom, with a descendant 
 of David on the throne. The year 520 B.C., and the 
 two or three years immediately thereafter, seemed op- 
 portune for such a step. The Persian empire was ap- 
 parently falling to pieces. Cambyses, the son of Cyrus, 
 had proved a weak ruler, and had finally committed 
 suicide. A certain Darius had been nominated for the 
 throne by the nobles, but nearly every province was 
 in revolt against him, and it seemed unlikely that he 
 could ever become the master of the situation. In Judah 
 the Persian authorities had already appointed as governor 
 a certain Zerubbabel, who was related to the Davidic 
 family. To the proud Jews, King Zerubbabel sounded 
 far better than Governor Zerubbabel. Both Haggai 
 and Zechariah were enthusiastic leaders in this movement. 
 They promised Jehovah's blessing upon the undertaking, 
 and painted bright pictures of the future, under Zerub- 
 babePs rule. 
 
 All these hopes were doomed to disappointment. 
 Months and years passed, and Zerubbabel could never 
 claim any title higher than governor. Judah remained 
 
COMFORTERS AND GUIDES 183 
 
 • 
 
 a Persian province. But Zechariah, at any rate, was 
 great enough to rise above this disappointment, and 
 continued to cheer and encourage his people. He was 
 careful &,lso to emphasize the conditions which must 
 be fulfilled, to make it possible for Jehovah to bless them. 
 " These are the things that ye shall do. Speak ye 
 every man the truth with his neighbor; render peaceful 
 decisions in your gates; and let none of you devise evil 
 in his heart against his neighbor; and love no false oath; 
 for aU these are things which I hate, saith Jehovah." 
 (Zech. 8: 16-17.) Evidently Zechariah also had caught 
 the spirit of the great prophets who had preceded him, 
 from Amos to Jeremiah. What he chiefly hoped for was 
 not the outward splendor of a king, but the more real 
 and lasting glory of truth and kindness and justice in 
 their national life. 
 
 Predictions of Happier Days, by Unnamed 
 Authors 
 
 One way in which the Jews of this period sought com- 
 fort and inspiration was in the reading of the earlier 
 prophetic writings. WhUe these earlier writings were 
 deeply reverenced, it was often felt that the stem 
 rebukes and warnings with which these were filled 
 were not entirely applicable to the poor and oppressed 
 people of the later time. Occasionally a scribe would 
 feel moved to add a few words in a more hopeful and 
 comforting tone at the bottom of a column or at the 
 end of a roll, to bring the manuscript, as it were, down 
 to date. We find such short passages in many places, 
 sprinkled through the writings of these prophets who 
 wrote before the destruction of Jerusalem. One such 
 passage is found at the end of the book of Amos. 
 
 The author probably lived in the ruined city of Jeru- 
 salem, perhaps about the year 500 B.C. Reading his 
 copy of the " words of Amos," he came to the closing 
 sentence : 
 
184 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 " Behold the eyes of the Lord Jehovah are upon the sinful 
 kingdom, 
 And I will destroy it from the face of the earth." 
 
 His soul had been thrilled by the splendid earnestness 
 of the book; but this closing sentence left him with a 
 heavy heart. " Have we not been punished enough?" 
 he said to himself, as he thought of the battered-down 
 walls of the city, and the wretched collection of hovels 
 where once beautiful mansions had stood. Stirely the 
 day is coming when Jehovah will bless, not ptmish. He 
 took his pen and wrote a few more hopeful words as 
 follows: 
 
 " In that day wiU I raise up the tabernacle of David 
 that is fallen, and close up the breaches thereof; and I 
 will raise up its ruins, and I will build it as in the days of 
 old. Behold the days come, saith Jehovah, that the 
 plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of 
 grapes him that soweth seed; and the mountains shall 
 drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt. And I 
 will bring back the captivity of my people Israel, and 
 .they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them; 
 and they shall plant vineyards, and drink the wine thereof; 
 they shall also make gardens, and eat the fruit of them. 
 And I will plant them upon their land, and they shall 
 not more be plucked up out of their land which I have 
 given them, saith Jehovah thy God." (Amos 9: 12-15.) 
 Among the best-known of these later passages which 
 were probably added in this way, are Isaiah 9 : 1-17, 
 and 11:1-10, which seem to come from the same author. 
 These sections portray an ideal ruler. Perhaps they 
 were written by someone in the time of Haggai and 
 Zechariah, who hoped for great things from Zerubbabel. 
 In foNTier times these two passages were generally in- 
 terpreted as predictions of the coming of Jesus. Jesus, 
 however, chose to be a teacher, rather than an earthly 
 ruler. Yet if a judge, or mayor, or governor, to-day, 
 should wish to fulfil the duties of his office in the spirit 
 
COMFORTERS AND GUIDES 185 
 
 of Jesus, he might well take the following passage for 
 his daily reading: 
 
 " The spirit of Jehovah shall rest upon him, 
 A spirit of wisdom and insight, 
 A spirit of counsel and might, 
 
 A spirit of knowledge and the fear of Jehovah." 
 (Isa. 11:2) 
 
186 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1. Before the destruction of Jerusalem, the people were 
 generally optimistic, and the true prophets seemingly pessi- 
 mistic; after the destruction of Jerusalem, the people were 
 pessimistic, and the true prophets, optimistic. Explain, 
 
 2. Compare the following passages with reference to the 
 kind of future blessing chiefly hoped for: Amos 9:12-14; 
 Isa. 9:2-7; Ezekiel 42: 1-7; Zechariah 8: 1-3. Which of them 
 is' 
 
 (a) Material? 
 
 (6) Priestly? 
 (c) Moral? 
 
 3. Mention any passage in the writings discussed in this 
 chapter, which specially appeal to you. Suggested readings: 
 Ezek. 37. Isa. 11:1-9; Isa. 4:2-6; Zech. 8 : 1-17. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What striking difference is noticeable between the 
 prophetical writings before 586 B.C. and those after that 
 date? 
 
 2. Describe the life of the Jewish exUes in Babylonia. 
 
 3. What prophet lived and preached among them? 
 
 4. How did he comfort his fellow-exiles? 
 
 5. What two prophets encotiraged the people of Judaii 
 to rebuild the temple? 
 
 6. When was this second temple built? 
 
COMFORTERS AND GUIDES 187 
 
 • 
 
 7. Who was Zerubbabel? 
 
 8. What predictions were made regarding him by Haggai 
 and Zechariah? 
 
 9. Why did it seem to them an opportune time for re- 
 establishing an independent kingdom of Judah? 
 
 10. Why may we suppose that Isaiah 9:2-7, and 11: 1-9, 
 were written at about the same period with Haggai and Zech- 
 ariah? 
 
 11. How did these and similar passages find their way 
 into books written by earUer prophets? 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 A NEW MESSAGE FOR THE OPPRESSED 
 The Second Part of Isaiah 
 
 The Servants of Jehovah 
 In times of general disorder and misfortune, there are 
 always a few men who are unscrupulous enough to make 
 capital out of the troubles of their fellow-men, and thus 
 become prosperous. This was the case in the dark cen- 
 turies following the destruction of Jerusalem. A little 
 clique of Jewish nobles acquired power and influence 
 by currying favor with their Babylonian and Persian 
 rulers. Thus they were able to oppress without mercy 
 their fellow-citizens whose lot was already hard enough. 
 The poor were robbed of their little fields and houses, 
 and many were sold into slavery. 
 
 These down-trodden ones, on the other hand, remem- 
 bered the bitter denunciations of Amos and the other 
 prophets against the oppressors of an earlier day. They 
 remembered, also, the just laws which had been handed 
 down from the olden time; and the books containing 
 these laws, and the addresses of the prophets, were widely 
 read. It is probable that little groups of people began 
 to meet together in each other's homes to read these 
 books, and to express their indignation against the rich 
 nobles who were wronging them. The people who thus 
 formed the habit of meeting together were called by 
 various names. Sometimes they were called "the poor." 
 Another name which they seem to have applied to them- 
 selves was " the servants of Jehovah." 
 
 Of course they were persecuted. It is always more 
 politic, at least for the time being, to submit tamely to 
 extortion and injustice. Because these men would not 
 
 188 
 
A NEW MESSAGE FOR THE OPPRESSED 189 
 
 submit, insults were hurled at them as they passed down 
 the street. Slanders were circulated about them. And 
 whenever any special misfortune came upon them, 
 there were many to cry, " Aha! Aha! Where is their 
 God?" 
 
 Why do Innocent Persons Suffer? 
 These things were all the harder to hear because they 
 had been trained in the doctrines of the Deuteronomists. 
 They had been taught to believe that God always punishes 
 the wicked, and rewards the upright. Yet, in their case, 
 special devotion to Jehovah had apparently brought 
 special siiffering; while wickedness, on the other hand, 
 seemed the sure pathway to fortune. They could find 
 no ansv/er to the question of their persecutors: " Where 
 is thy God." . . . In their meetings there were even some 
 who declared: 
 
 " Every one that doeth evil 
 Is good in the sight of Jehovah, 
 And he delighteth in them; 
 Or where is the God of justice." (Mai. 2: 17.) 
 
 A partial solution for these perplexities -was offered 
 by the man who wrote the Book of Malachi. This 
 book was probably written within a few decades after 
 the rebuilding of the temple (about 475 B.C.). The 
 name of the author we do not know. The word Malachi 
 means " my messenger," and was placed on the title 
 page by some scribe, who took it from the third chapter, 
 the first verse. One of the chief purposes of this writer 
 was to help these earnest men among " the poor " to 
 hold fast to their faith in God's justice. He told them 
 that their sufferings were only temporary. There would 
 be a future day of recompense, when the wicked should 
 be punished, and the righteous rewarded. 
 
 The Second Isaiah 
 Sometime during this same period, probably within 
 a few decades after the rebuilding of the temple, there 
 
190 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 lived one of the greatest of the prophets of Israel. Great 
 as he was, we do not even know his name. He is generally 
 referred to as the " second Isaiah," because his writings 
 are found in the latter part of the book which bears 
 Isaiah's name (chapters 40-66). Scholars are not even 
 agreed as to whether he lived in Jerusalem or among 
 the exiles in Babylon. Certainly his heart was always 
 in Jerusalem, and like the author of Malachi, he was' 
 probably a leader among the " servants of Jehovah." 
 But though the world knows so little about his personal 
 history, it can never forget his message. Like Amos and 
 Hosea, he was one of the great prophets. His deep 
 spiritual insight enabled him to understand in part, at 
 least, the true reason why a just God sometimes permits 
 innocent persons to suffer. 
 
 Like the author of Malachi, he believed with all his 
 heart in a coming judgment, when God would bring to 
 an end all oppression. Nothing in the Old Testament 
 breathes a fiercer indignation against injustice. 
 
 " Jehovah hath seen it, and is displeased. 
 And He is angry because there is no justice. 
 He saw that there was no man 
 And was astonished that there was none to interpose. 
 
 According to deserts will he recompense 
 Wrath to his adversaries, disgrace to his foes; 
 They shall see the name of Jehovah from the west, 
 And his glory from the rising saa. 
 
 Aid so as a Redeemer he shall shortly come to Zion 
 To turn away rebellion from Jacob." (Isa. 59: 15-20.) • 
 
 But in the meantime, these promises of future deliver- 
 ance were of little comfort to those who were the chief 
 sufferers from present wrongs. For such stifferers he 
 had a great message, namely, that their sufferings, if 
 patiently borne, might benefit others ; and that by sharing 
 in such unselfish suffering, we ourselves attain the greatest 
 happiness and the highest glory of life. Scattered through 
 
A NEW MESSAGE FOR THE OPPRESSED 191 
 
 m 
 
 the latter part of Isaiah are a series of passages in which 
 the author describes " the servant of Jehovah." They 
 are generally called "the servant passages." In all 
 these passages, the author is holding up before his people 
 his ideal- for them as individuals, and as a religious 
 body. The true servant of Jehovah, he says, is a teacher 
 who leads men to the knowledge of God. 
 
 " Behold my servant whom I uphold, 
 My chosen, in whom I take delight; 
 I have put my spirit upon him, 
 That he may set forth law to the nations." (Isa. 42 : 1). 
 
 As a teacher, he will be quiet, unassuming, and patient; 
 he will have sympathy for the weakness of his listeners. 
 
 " He will not cry aloud nor roar, 
 Nor let his voice be heard in the street. 
 A crushed reed he will not break, 
 And a dimly burning wick he will not quench." 
 
 (Isa. 42:2-3.) 
 
 As a result of his teaching, the servant of Jehovah will 
 inevitably be persecuted. 
 
 " My back I gave to smiters. 
 And my cheek to those who plucked the beard. 
 My face I hid not from instilt and spitting." (Isa. 50 : 6.) 
 
 But this persecution will not be endured in vain. 
 In the sublime fifty-third chapter of the book, the author 
 shows that this patient, heroic endurance of persecution 
 may atone for the sins of others and vdn to lives of 
 righteousness even the men who were wronging them. 
 
 The author of this matchless poem nowhere explains 
 just how it is that the sufferings of the righteous may 
 atone for the sins of the wicked. Perhaps he means 
 that when a good man forgives an injury his forgiveness 
 becomes as it were, a flower of good growing out of the 
 evil, and thus turns aU into good at last. At any rate, 
 the faithful " servants of Jehovah " to whom this chapter 
 was first addressed, must have been strangely comforted. 
 They could now see that their sufferings were not in 
 
192 THE STORY OP OUR BIBLE 
 
 vain. By patiently enduring the evils which were heaped 
 upon them, they were helping Jehovah to conquer evil. 
 Christians have always loved this chapter, more per- 
 haps than any other in the Old Testament. For although 
 the author had in mind primarily those of his own day, 
 yet it is only in Jesus Christ that we see the perfect 
 servant of Jehovah, and the perfect fulfilment of this 
 great ideal of unselfish suffering for the good even of the 
 least deserving. 
 
A NEW MESSAGE FOR THE OPPRESSED 193 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1. Which prophet explains most satisfactorily why good 
 people sometimes stiffer: the author of Malachi, or the Second 
 Isaiah? 
 
 2. " And his grave was made with the wicked " (Isa. 
 53:9). Was this detail fidfilled when Jesus was buried? In 
 what sense is this chapter a prophecy of the sufferings and 
 death of Jesus? 
 
 3. Which of the following historical characters most re- 
 minds you of the " servant of Jehovah," portrayed by the 
 second Isaiah: JefEerson, Washington, Nathan Hale, Lincoln? 
 
 4. How can we be " servants of Jehovah "? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What kind of men were most prosperous among the 
 /eople of Judah during the period after the destruction of 
 Jerusalem? 
 
 2. What kind of men were those who came to be known as 
 the poor, or the servants of Jehovah? 
 
 3. How were their experiences contrary to the teaching 
 of the Deuteronomists? 
 
 4. What perplexity thus arose in the minds of these " ser- 
 vants of Jehovah?" 
 
 5. When was the book of Malachi written? 
 
 6. How does it attempt to answer the perplexing questions 
 referred to above? 
 
 7. What is the date of the addresses in Isaiah 40-66 ? 
 
 8. How do they explain the fact that good men often suffer 
 hard^p and persecution? 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 A NEW KIND OF PATRIOTISM 
 
 The Hopes of the Second Isaiah 
 
 We have seen in earlier chapters that patriotism was 
 an essential element in the religion of the Hebrews. 
 They looked upon Jehovah as the God of the nation, and 
 of individuals only as they belonged to the nation. They 
 believed that as the God of the nation Jehovah required 
 each man to forget his selfish interests and work for the 
 general welfare. In the early days, this belief was as- 
 sociated with crude and imperfect ideas. They thought 
 that each nation had its own god and that Chemosh, the 
 god of the Moabites, or Nebo and Marduk, gods of the 
 Babylonians, were just as truly existent as Jehovah the 
 God of Israel. They believed that each god was the special 
 guardian of his own people, arid would show them special 
 favors. This idea is even found in some of the prophetical 
 writings of the Old Testament. The great prophets from 
 Amos onward began to break away from this idea. 
 Amos declared that Jehovah had guided the history of 
 other nations beside the Israelites. (Amos 9 : 7.) All of 
 these prophets maintained that Jehovah was using the 
 great empire of Assyria, and other foreign nations, to 
 punish his people Israel for their sins. This implied that 
 Jehovah was really the one true God of aU mankind. 
 
 After the fall of Jerusalem, however, the old narrow 
 type of religious patriotism received a fresh impulse. 
 Many Jews regarded all foreign nations- as enemies of 
 Jehovah. There was a special bitterness against the 
 nations immediately surrounding Judah, such as the 
 Moabites, the Ammonites, the Philistines, and worst 
 of all, the Edomites, These nations had taken advantage 
 
 ^94 
 
A NEW KIND OF. PATRIOTISM 195 
 
 o£ the helpless condition of the people of Judah, after the 
 capture of Jerusalem, and had cruelly plundered and 
 ravaged them. In the Book of Ezekiel, we find a series 
 of chapters, declaring Jehovah's wrath against foreign 
 nations. (Chapters 25-32.) The Book of Obadiah 
 (with its single chapter, the shortest book in the Old 
 Testament) expresses the most passionate hatred of 
 the Edomites. The book of Joel is a description of Je- 
 hovah's day of Judgment, which, according to this writer, 
 was to bring a terrible punishment upon all the enemies 
 of Israel. 
 
 The Second Isaiah as a Patriot 
 
 Nowhere in the Old Testament do we find a more 
 passionate love of country than in the second part of 
 the Book of Isaiah. In this respect, the author of these 
 chapters was a typical Hebrew. Like most of the other 
 prophets of this period, his favorite theme is the coming 
 restoration of his country's prosperity. " Comfort ye, 
 comfort ye, my people, saith your God." He begins 
 his book: 
 
 " Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and declare to her 
 That her hard service is accomplished, her guilt is expiated, 
 That she hath received from Jehovah's hand double for 
 all her sins." (Isa. 40 : 1-2.) 
 
 He is full of the thought that the exiled sons and daughters 
 of Judah are shortly to return to the home land, from 
 all the countries to which they have been scattered. 
 (Isa. 49:12-13.) Iii his descriptions of the coming 
 glory, he is more tender, and more rapturous than any 
 other prophet. (Isa. 55:12-13.) Through all these 
 glowing promises there breathes the faith that Jehovah 
 is the God of Israel, and that Israel is Jehovah's chosen 
 people. (Isa. 41 : 8-10.) 
 
 Israel Chqsen by Jehovah to Bless Mankind 
 
 Although this prophet held fast to his faith that his 
 beloved nation was in a special sense the people of Jehovah, 
 
196 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 yet the experiences of those days inevitably broadened 
 his ideas. After all, Judea was only a little province 
 in a great empire. Very likely he had travelled, and 
 had seen with his own eyes the glories of Egypt, or Baby- 
 lon, or Persia. At any rate, he frequently came into 
 contact with such foreigners as the governor of the prov- 
 ince, or his officers, and realized their ability and their 
 many virtues. Nevertheless when he compared the 
 religion of Israel, as taught by the prophets, with the 
 religion of these foreigners, the contrast was striking. 
 He saw these people actually worshipping images of 
 wood and stone; bowing down to them as to real deities. 
 It seemed to him actually funny; and he brings out the 
 humor of it, in such passages as the following, in which 
 he addresses the foreigners: 
 
 " To whom, then wiU ye Hken God, 
 And what likeness place beside him ? . • 
 
 An image! a craftsman cast it, 
 And a smelter overlays it mth gold! " (Isa. 40: 18-19.) 
 
 " One cuts down cedar trees for his use 
 And chooses a cypress or oak. 
 Half of it, he bums in the fire 
 And upon its coals, roasts flesh, 
 He eats the roast and is satisfied! 
 He warms himself, and says Aka! 
 The rest of it he makes into a god. 
 He bows down to his image and worships it, , 
 And prays to it and says: 
 Deliver me, for thou art my god." (Isa. 44: 14-17.) 
 
 In contrast with these dead idols the prophet never tires 
 of dwelling on the infinite greatness and majesty of 
 Jehovah, Ruler of the universe. 
 
 But how did it happen that this supreme God of heaven 
 and earth had singled out one small nation, the Jews, 
 to be in a special sense His own? Here the prophet made 
 another great spiritual discovery. "Israel is indeed 
 chosen by Jehovah, the infinite God, ' he said in substance, 
 
A NEW KIND OF PATRIOTISM 197 
 
 « 
 "but chosen for what? For special favors ? For special 
 protection against the sorrows and misfortunes which 
 are the common lot of all?" " No," he answered, " but 
 rather chosen for a special service for mankind ; namely, 
 to bring to all other nations the knowledge of this true 
 God, Jehovah." This thought comes out clearly in 
 the " servant ideal," which he held up before his fellow- 
 worshippers in the synagogues. The servant of Jehovah, 
 he taught, is to bring not only Israel but the world to 
 God. 
 
 " It is too little a thing to be myservant " (saith Jehovah). 
 
 " Aiid to restore the survivors of Israel; 
 Therefore I will make thee the light of the nations, 
 That my Salvation may reach to the ends of the earth." 
 (Isa.49:6.) 
 
 In other passages, the author speaks of the entire nation 
 as Jehovah's servant. 
 
 Not only did the second Isaiah hold this ideal before 
 the eyes of his countrymen as something to be realized 
 in the future, but he also contended for it as a principle 
 of everyday life. There were many foreigners living in 
 Jerusalem at this time. Some of them would gladly 
 have become worshippers of Jehovah, but many of the 
 Jews were bitter in their hatred of all foreigners, and 
 wished to exclude them from the temple worship. The 
 second Isaiah, on the other hand, was eager to welcome 
 them, and took their part in words like the following : 
 
 " Let not the foreigner who hath joined himself to Jehbvah say, 
 Jehovah will surely separate me from his people. 
 For my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples. ' ' 
 (Isa. 56:1-8.) 
 
 Other Prophets with a World-wide Vision 
 In this broad and liberal attitude, the prophet unfortu- 
 nately found few followers. During the next few cen- 
 turies, the Jews as a people grew more and more narrow 
 and prejudiced. Considering what they suffered, we 
 can hardly blame them. Yet there were some who 
 
1-98 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 learned from this great unknown prophet a better attitude 
 toward other nations and races, and a nobler ideal for 
 their own nation, Israel. A short passage from one of 
 these spiritual disciples of the second Isaiah is found 
 in the second chapter of the book' of Isaiah. (Isa. 2 : 1-7-) 
 It expresses the noble and inspiring hope that a time will 
 come when the whole world will learn through Israel 
 to worship Jehovah, and when as a result, all war shall 
 be done away, and a universal reign of peace be ushered 
 in. 
 
 " And many peoples shall go and say, 
 
 Come let us go up to Jehovah's mount, 
 
 To the house of the God of Jacob, 
 
 That he may instruct us in his ways 
 
 And that we may walk in his paths. 
 
 For from Zion proceeds instruction. 
 
 And Jehovah's word from Jerusalem. 
 
 " He will arbitrate between many peoples. 
 And render decisions for numerous nations. 
 They shall beat their swords into plowshares. 
 And their spears into pruning-hooks. 
 Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, 
 Neither shall they learn war any more." 
 
 (Isa. 2:1-4) (Micah 4: 1-3.) 
 
 An equally remarkable passage is found in the nine- 
 teenth chapter of Isaiah (19: 18-25). The writer of 
 these verses was perhaps a descendant of one of those 
 Jewish exiles who had taken refuge in Egypt after 586 
 B.C. He had found. good friends among the Egyptians. 
 They had treated him kindly, in spite of the fact that 
 he was a foreigner and a Jew. Thus he came to realize 
 the foolishness and injustice of race prejudice. He 
 rose to the noble thought that there were good men in 
 all races, and that Jehovah had chosen for some special 
 service in the world, not merely the Jews, but each and 
 every race and nation. He believed that the Egyptians 
 would some day become worshippers of Jehovah, and 
 the Assyrians also, By the Assyrians he meant all 
 
A NEW KIND OF PATRIOTI^SM 199 
 
 the inhabitants of. the Tigris-Euphrates valley, which 
 at that time was probably under the rule of Persia. He 
 believed that in the good time to come, these great nations 
 would no longer spend their energies in wasteful wars, 
 but rather in building good roads, and in bringing manifold 
 blessings to the world. 
 
 " In that day shall there be a highway out of Egypt 
 to Assyria, and the Assyrian shall come into Egypt, and 
 the Egyptian into Assyria; and the Egyptians shall 
 worship with the Assyrians." 
 
 " In that day shall Israel be the third with Egypt and 
 with Assyria, a blessing in the midst of the earth; for 
 that Jehovah of hosts hath blessed them, saying. Blessed 
 be Egypt, my people, and Assyria, the work of my hands, 
 and Israel, mine inheritance." (Isa. 19:23-25.) 
 
200 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Question^ and Topics 
 1. Suppose the second Isaiah, and the other broad-minded 
 writers described above were living in America today: 
 (a) How would they tell us to treat the immigrants? 
 
 (b) What would be their attitude toward foreign missions? 
 
 (c) What would be their attitude toward war? 
 
 2. How do yoti explain the fact that the same circumstances, 
 namely, contact with foreigners, caused some Jews to grow more 
 narrow and prejudiced, and others more sympathetic and 
 broad minded? 
 
 3. Translate Isaiah 19:24 into modem terms, applying 
 it to present-day conditions. FiU in the blanks in the following 
 with three modem nations; or else write your own version. 
 
 In that day shall be the third with , 
 
 and with a blessing in the midst of the earth. 
 
 4. From the prophetical writings discussed in this chapter, 
 select your favorite passages. In addition to the quotations 
 printed above, the following chapters are suggested: Isa. 
 40; 1-12. 42:1-12. 55:1-13. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 1. What was the usual belief of the Hebrews in early times, 
 regarding the relation between their nation and Jehovah? 
 
A NEW KIND OF PATRIOTISM 201 
 
 • 
 
 2. What was the more common attitude on the part of 
 the Jews toward foreign nations, after 686 B.C.? 
 
 3. What prophets," during this period, wrote denunciations 
 of foreign nations? 
 
 4. According to the second Isaiah, in what sense was Israel 
 Jehovah's chosen people? 
 
 5. What did the second Isaiah teach regarding the question 
 of admitting foreigners to the temple worship ? 
 
 6. By whom, and on what occasion, centuries later, were 
 his words on this subject quoted? (See Mark 11: 17.) 
 
 7. Mention three great Original discoveries of the second 
 Isaiah. 
 
 8. " They shall beat their swords into plowshares." Where 
 in the Bible is this sentence found? 
 
 9. Explain how it happens to be found in two different 
 places. 
 
 10. How did the writer expect that this reign of peace 
 would,be brought about? 
 
 11. " In that day Egypt shall be a blessing in the 
 
 midst of the earth." How did this passage come to be 
 written? 
 

 CHRONOLOGICAL CHART 
 
 
 Important Events 
 
 Poems 
 
 and 
 
 Historical 
 
 Narratives 
 
 Laws 
 
 Prophetical 
 Writings 
 
 1600 
 to 
 
 1400 
 B.C. 
 
 Nomadic 
 
 
 
 
 1400 
 
 to 
 
 1300 
 
 B.C. 
 
 life. 
 
 
 
 
 1300 
 
 to Exodus 
 1200 from 
 B.C. Egypt. 
 
 
 
 
 12001 
 to 
 
 1100 
 B.C. 
 
 Philistine 
 
 
 
 
 1100 
 to J 
 1000' 
 B.C. 
 
 wars. 
 Organization 
 
 
 
 
 1000 f of Kingdom. 
 
 to J 
 
 900 1 Division 
 B.C.J of Kingdom. 
 
 
 
 
 900 
 
 to , Reign 
 800 of 
 B.C. Ahab. 
 
 
 
 
 800 
 
 to Pall 
 700 of 
 B.C. Samaria. 
 
 
 
 
 700 Reign of 
 to Manasseh. 
 600 ■ Reform 
 B.C. under Josiah. 
 
 
 
 
 , Destruction 
 
 cQQ of Jerusalem. 
 
 jg Q Temple rebuilt. 
 
 
 
 
 500 
 
 to Walls rebuilt 
 400 by Nehemiah. 
 B.C. 
 
 
 
 
 400 
 
 to 
 
 300 
 
 B.C. 
 
 
 
 
CHAPTER XXV 
 PRAYERS FOR HELP IN TIME OF OPPRESSION 
 
 The Book of Lamentations and the 
 Early Psalms 
 
 One of the most essential parts of the equipment of 
 a modem church is a supply of hymnals. We use them 
 for various purposes. They contain the words and music 
 for congregational singing; and most of them have at 
 the end " responsive readings " and sometimes printed 
 prayers. Some churches have a special prayer-book in 
 addition to the hymn-book. 
 
 The Hebrews also had' their hymn and prayer-books 
 for use in their temple services, and other services of 
 worship. Had we gone into one of these gatherings, 
 however, we would by no means have found one of these 
 books ready for use as in our church pews today. The 
 art of printing was then unknown and hymnals and 
 prayer-books could not be purchased by the hundred. 
 It was necessary for those who wished to join in the wor- 
 ship to memorize the hymns and prayers. Probably the 
 only copy in the room would be in the possession of 
 the leader of the worship. He would read the service to the 
 people every week, line by line, until it was thoroughly 
 learned. To make this task of memorization easier, 
 many of these hymns and prayers were written in acrostic 
 form — that is, the successive lines or stanzas began with 
 successive letters in the Hebrew alphabet. 
 
 The Book of Lamentations 
 
 •Two of these ancient collections of hymns and prayers 
 are preserved in the Old Testament ; the largest and most 
 familiar is the book of Psalms. There is another and 
 
 203 
 
204 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 older collection, however, called the book of Lamenta- 
 tions. It consists of a series of five elegies, or dirges, 
 lamenting the woes which befell Jerusalem when it was 
 captured by Nebuchadrezzar and during the discouraging 
 years that followed. The siege of a city in ancient times 
 was horrible beyond expression, and that of Jerusalem 
 by the Babylonians was no exception. In the pitiless 
 famine of the last months, 
 
 " Little children and sucklings swooned in the streets. 
 Theysaid to their mothers, Where is grain?" (Lam.2: 11-12.) 
 
 When the end came with its blood and flame, the city 
 was left a smoking ruin with only a handful of broken- 
 hearted inhabitants. 
 
 The months passed and a new springtime came, bring- 
 ing with it the anniversary of the capture of the city. 
 The survivors could not but recall with fresh vividness the 
 sufferings of those last weeks of the siege, and the final 
 agony when nearly all that they held dear had been lost for- 
 ever. On the day of the first anniversary it is probable 
 that many of those who were left in Jerusalem gathered 
 near the ruins of the temple, to offer sacrifices and to pray 
 to Jehovah to have mercy on their land. Thereafter 
 this anniversary and certain other days each year were 
 observed as fast-days by many of the Jews. 
 
 For these fast-day services the five dirges which we 
 have as the five chapters of the book of Lamentations 
 were probably written. In our English Bible this book 
 is headed, " The Lamentations of Jeremiah." In the 
 original Hebrew, however, there is nothing to indicate 
 that Jeremiah wrote them. The author, or authors, 
 certainly had in mind the needs of the public worship, 
 for at least four of the poems are composed as acrostics, 
 to aid the memory. 
 
 The Prayers op David 
 
 After the destruction of Jerusalem those who were 
 especially poor and oppressed gathered in groups and not 
 
PRAYERS FOR HELP IN OPPRESSION 205 
 
 only studied the law and the prophets, but also sang and 
 prayed together. We can imagine the second Isaiah 
 leading their worship. (See Chapter XXIII.) Of course 
 they needed hymn and prayer books for their meetings. 
 Early in the history of their movement these " servants 
 of Jehovah " had a collection of hymns and prayers, 
 called the Prayers of David. This does not mean 
 that King David, who lived five centuries earlier, had 
 written them, but rather that the collection as a whole 
 was dedicated to that famous poet-king of Israel. Some 
 of the hymns may have been written in the earlier days 
 of the kingdom, but many more were added by the 
 " servants of Jehovah " themselves. About one-half of 
 the Old Testament book of Psalms is taken from this 
 collection. These Psalms in ovii English versions are 
 marked by the heading a " Psalm of David." The 
 Hebrew means literally " to David" — -that is, belonging 
 to the David collection. 
 
 There was a remarkable variety of hymns and prayers 
 in this great " David " collection. There were nature- 
 songs, Hke Psalm 19, which expresses a deep appreciation 
 of the glory of God as revealed in the sun and stars : 
 
 " The heavens declare the glory of God, 
 And the firmament showeth his handiwork." (Psalm 19: 1.) 
 
 There were prayers of repentance, as Psakn 51; 
 
 " Create in me a clean heart, O God, 
 And renew a right spirit within me. 
 Cast me not away from thy presence 
 And take not thy Holy Spirit from me." (Psalm 51 : 10-11.) 
 
 Finally there were hymns of splendid moral aspiration, 
 such as Psalms 15 and 24: 
 
 " Jehovah, who shall sojoxim in thy tabernacle, 
 Who shah dweU' in thy holy HU? 
 He that waUceth uprightly and worketh righteousness 
 And speaketh truth in his heart." (Psalm 15: 1.) 
 
206 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Prayers for Deliverance 
 The majority of these " David " Psalms reflect plainly 
 the experiences of those days when these early worshippers 
 were persecuted by the rich and arrogant nobles of Judah, 
 and their supporters. There are frequent references to the 
 enemies of Jehovah's true servants. The authors generally 
 use the first person; but the words " I," " me " or "mine " 
 usually stand for the whole group of the true followers 
 of Jehovah, rather than for the individual speaker. Such 
 passages as the following, therefore, are not merely vivid 
 pictures of some one man's experience, but of the suffer- 
 ings of these faithful men and women as a class: 
 
 " Whoever sees me derideth me; 
 They sneer as they toss the head. 
 ' He depended upon Jehovah,' (they say) 'Let him delivei 
 
 him, 
 ' Let him save him since he delighteth in him.' " (Psahn 22- 
 7-8.) 
 
 " Deliver me not over unto the will of my adversaries. 
 For false witnesses are risen up against me. 
 And such as breathe out cruelty." (Psahn 27: 12.) 
 
 _ In addition to such prayers for protection, which con- 
 tinue through page after page, many psalms of this group 
 are jubilant in thanksgiving for past deliverances and 
 full of trust for the future. 
 
 " Jehovah is my light and my salvatic«n, 
 Whom shall I fear? 
 Jehovah is the strength of my life. 
 Of whom, shall I be afraid?" (Psahn 27: 1.) 
 
 The Shepherd Psalm 
 
 Perhaps the noblest product of these experiences of 
 persecution is the twenty-third psalm. This exquisite' 
 Httle poem is so calm and peaceful with its green pastures 
 and still waters, that one might be tempted to suppose 
 that the author had never known troubles; that his life 
 had always been as placid as the Hmpid pools of a meadow 
 
PRAYERS FOR HELP IN OPPRESSION 207 
 
 stream on a summer day. But this would be a mistaken 
 inference. Such a heartfelt appreciation of the peace 
 and security and safe guidance which the divine Shepherd 
 alone can give is the product , only of many a time of 
 hardship and danger and distress. Moreover, he speaks 
 of " mine enemies," in the familiar phraseology of this 
 period. The author was, perhaps, a Judean shepherd, 
 living near Hebron, or Tekoa, or Bethlehem, and pasturing 
 his little flock of sheep and goats on the hillside near the 
 village. He was a leader of the " poor " who met in 
 the village from week to week to pray, and to keep alive 
 the ideals and the aspirations of the great prophets of 
 their nation. The unjust oppressors who lived in that 
 district determined to teach this brave man a lesson. 
 He was harassed in all possible ways. He was threatened. 
 He was kept in poverty and in debt and on the verge of 
 slavery by constant extortion. He saw his wife and little 
 ones himgry and cold. Robbers were permitted to 
 attack him and plunder his small possessions with im- 
 punity, and he narrowly escaped death at their hands. 
 Yet through all these years of anxiety and heart-break 
 he clung to his faith in Jehovah, and to his surprise he 
 discovered that in the very darkest hotirs there came to 
 him a great reward which outweighed all the hardship. 
 For it was in just these dark hours that the sweetest 
 sense of God's presence and fellowship welled up in his 
 heart like a song, and it dawned upon him that this 
 great fellowship was a supreme prize which no outward 
 mishap could take away. It was like a table spread 
 before him in the very presence of his enemies. He was 
 indeed under the care of a divine Shepherd who would 
 never fail him. 
 
 " Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, 
 I will fear no evil, for thou art with me. 
 Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me." (Psalm 23 : 4.) 
 
208 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1. Explain the meaning of the postscript in Psalm 72: 20, 
 " The prayers of David the son of Jesse are ended." 
 
 2. Examine the following typical selections from the 
 Prayers of David, and note their attitude toward unjust op- 
 pression: Psalms 12, 109, 23, 27. 
 
 (a) Which writers protest against oppression? 
 
 (b) Which are vindictive toward their oppressors? 
 
 (c) Which are able to rise above their resentment through 
 trust in God? 
 
 3. Which of these attitudes do you approve, and which do 
 you condemn? 
 
 4. What do you think of the appropriateness of the title, 
 "The Prayers of David"? Do these poems represent the 
 point of view of monarchs, or of the common people? 
 
 5. How can you account for'the fact that a movement of 
 revolt against oppression produced so much beautiful poetry; 
 for example, such hymns as Psalms 8, 15, 19, 29, 51, 103? 
 
PRAYERS FOR HELP IN OPPRESSION 209 
 
 6. What is your favorite of the Psahns mentioned in this 
 chapter? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What events stimulated the use of hymns and prayers 
 in pubUc worship among the Jews after the destruction of 
 Jerusalem? 
 
 2. How did the worshippers learn the hymns and prayers so 
 as to be able to repeat them together? 
 
 3. What two hymn and prayer-books are found in the Old 
 Testament? 
 
 4. For what occasions were the poems in the book of Lamen- 
 tations written? 
 
 5. In what gatherings were the " David " hymns and 
 prayers first used? 
 
 6. Why are so many of them prayers for protection 
 against enemies? s 
 
 7. Who were these " enemies "? v 
 
 8. Tell the story of the author of the twenty-third Psahn. 
 
 Notebook Work 
 
 Take two cheap or worn copies of the Bible and clip out 
 and paste in your notebook five of these early Psalms that you 
 enjoy most, giving to each, appropriate titles. 
 
CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 HYMN-BOOKS WITHIN HYMN-BOOKS 
 
 The Story of the Book of Psalms 
 
 About seventy years after the rebuilding of the temple 
 (516 B.C.) a committee of Jews from Jerusalem went to' 
 seek aid for their distressed coimtry from their more 
 prosperous kinsfolk who lived in Persia. They had par- 
 ticularly in mind a certain man named Nehetniah, who 
 occupied an important position as cup-bearer and personal 
 adviser to Artaxerxes, the king of Persia. When they 
 fotmd Nehemiah in the Persian capital, Susa, they told 
 him how the city of his ancestors still lay for the most 
 part in ruins, with no walls to protect its inhabitants and 
 open to the attacks of all its enemies. Like most of the 
 Jews who at this time were living in foreign lands, he had 
 not realized that the fatherland had as yet recovered 
 only in a slight degree from the crushing blow which had 
 been struck by Nebuchadrezzar a century and a half 
 before. Responding to the appeal of the committee 
 with all the ardor of a noble soul, Nehemiah secured a 
 leave of absence from the Persian king and permission 
 to join with his countrymen in rebuilding the walls of 
 Jerusalem. A few weeks later he arrived in Jerusalem, 
 and .within a few months in the face of extraordinary 
 difficulties the great task was finished. The walls were 
 restored and the city was safe. The committee had come 
 to the right man. 
 
 In addition to the building of the walls, Nehemiah 
 introduced important internal reforms. He restrained the 
 powerful and unscrupulous nobles who had been in secret 
 alliance with the external enemies and had been grinding 
 into slavery the poor among their fellow-citizens. Nehe- 
 
 . 210 
 
HYMN-BOOKS WITHIN HYMN-iBOOKS 211 
 
 miah's achievements ushered in a new era of prosperity 
 for Judah. 
 
 Pilgrimages and Pilgrim Soisros 
 
 One restilt was a new Enthusiasm in the hearts of the 
 people for the worship of God. The gatherings formeriy 
 known as " the poor " were still kept up, special build- 
 ings were erected for their use and came to be known as 
 synagogues. There was also a new interest in the services 
 of the temple. Worshippers came not only from Jerusalem 
 but from all parts of Judah. According to the law in 
 Deuteronomy all Jews were to come to Jerusalem three 
 tiines a year to join in the great religious festivals such as 
 the Passover, Pentecost, and the Feast of Tabernacles. 
 Before Nehemiah's time these pilgrimages were unsafe, 
 as the whole country was in disotder, and a crowd of 
 pilgrims in Jerusalem would only have been the signal 
 for robbers. But now the number of visitors increased 
 each year. 
 
 These festivals were joyful occasions. People from the 
 same vUlage would come up together, and take lodgings 
 together in Jerusalem. All the way thither the jouniey 
 was enlivened by songs and jokes and laughter. During 
 their' stay in the city, when they were not "seeing the 
 sights," the boys and girls would play together while 
 their fathers and mothers gossiped. The culminating 
 event of these festivals was of course the service of wor- 
 ship in the temple. Some, no doubt, entered into the 
 spirit of the worship more deeply than others, but all 
 were intensely proud of their beautiful city, with its 
 newly built walls. 
 
 " Beautiful in elevation, the joy of the whole earth, 
 Is Mount Zion, on the sides of the north. 
 The dty of the great King." (Psalna48:2.) 
 
 Such occasions as these inevitably inspired songs. 
 There is an exquisite group of songs in our book of Psalms, 
 each of which bears the title, " A Song of the Pilgrimages." 
 
212 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 (Psalms 120-134,) They are closely similar to each other 
 in literary form and poetical spirit and probably rnost 
 of them are by the same author. Very likely the pilgnms 
 used to sing these songs on the moonlight nights on their 
 journey toward Jerusalem and in the streets and squares 
 of the city itself during the festivals. They reflect the 
 delight of the author in all the innocent social joys of 
 those days. We can almost hear the laughter of children 
 at the family reunions. 
 
 " Lo, children are a heritage of Jehovah." 
 
 " As arrows in the hand of a mighty man, so are the children 
 of youth. 
 Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them." (Psahn 
 127:4-5.) 
 
 We can feel the patriotic longing with which every 
 loyal Jew looked forward to these journeys and their 
 pride in the splendid city which was the center of so much 
 love. 
 
 " I am glad when they say to me, 
 Let us go to the house of Jehovah; 
 When our feet are standing 
 Within thy gates, Jerusalem." (Psahn 122: 1-2.) 
 
 Perhaps the most noteworthy characteristic of ■ these 
 poems is the beautiful trust which the author feels in 
 God's care. We look off with him from the city gate 
 across the Kidron vaUey to the Mount of Olives on the 
 east or to the hills on the south or west and we hear him 
 say: 
 
 " They that trust in Jehovah, 
 Are as Mount Zion, which cannot be moved, but abideth 
 forever. 
 
 " As the moimtains are round about Jerusalem, 
 So Jehovah is round-about his people. 
 From this time forth and forevermore." (Psahn 125: 1-2 ) 
 
"OUR FEET ARE STANDING WITHIN THY GATES, 
 O JERUSALEM." 
 
HYMN-BOOKS WITHIN HYMN-BOOKS '213 
 
 Church Choirs and Their Anthems 
 _ This new interest in the temple worship led to a great 
 improvement in the services. Instrumental music on 
 harps and flutes was provided to accompany the hymns. 
 A regular temple choir was established and was given 
 the entire control of the services of prayer and singing. 
 Different families or guilds were appointed frorh time to 
 time as choir leaders, as, for example, the " sons of Korah," 
 and the ' ' sons of Asaph. ' ' 
 
 These choir leaders were continually on the watch for 
 new hymns in order to give variety to the services. No 
 doubt they used the " Prayers of David " and perhaps 
 also the " Songs of the Pilgrimages. ' ' They also made new 
 collections of their own. There was a collection by the 
 sons of Korah, from which Psalms 42-49 and 84-87 in our 
 Old Testament are taken, and another collection by the 
 sons of Asaph. (Psalms 50 and 73-83.) 
 
 The Psalms of the sons of Korah are especially note- 
 . worthy and include some of the most beautiful in the 
 Old Testament. They express an intense devotion to 
 the services of worship in the temple as the place where 
 men may find new strength for the burdens and duties of 
 life. Unlike some modem church choirs, these sons of 
 Korah were evidently not merely g;ood musicians, but 
 also were filled with a deep and genuine love for God. 
 " How amiable are thy tabernacles 
 
 Jehovah of hosts! . . ^ ^, , ^, ^',tu t. 
 
 My sotil longeth, yea, even faintetn for the courts of Jehovah. 
 
 Mv heart and my flesh cry out unto the living God. 
 
 Yea the sparrow hath found her a house. 
 
 And the swallow a nest for herself, where she may lay her 
 
 FwnTwne altars, O Jehovah of hosts, 
 
 Like the Songs of the Pilgrimages, these songs of the 
 sons of Korah are aglow with gratitude to God for the 
 opace and prosperity which he has sent upon their 
 Svedland. (See Psalm 85.) 
 
214 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 A Committee on a New Hymn-Book 
 Each of these collections of hymns had its admirers 
 just as today some people are fond of the Moody and 
 Sankey "Gospel Hymns," while others prefer the old 
 Church Hymns. Each synagogue had its own preference; 
 In those days this state of things was inconvenient. 
 Visitors at a synagogue service were frequently unable 
 to join in the hymns because in their own home synagogue 
 they had used and memorized a different colkction. 
 They felt as we feel today when we visit a strange church 
 and cannot find a hymn-book in the pew. At the time 
 of the great religious festivals in the temple there were 
 very few hymns in which everybody could join, so it is 
 possible that a regular committee was appointed by the 
 temple authorities to prepare a new hymn-book. 
 
 These rrien included in their new .book the best of all 
 the preceding collections and they added a considerable 
 number of other hymns and prayers which they found in 
 circulation. Among these were the well-known : 
 
 " Lord, thou hast been our dwelling-place in all generations/' 
 (Psakn 90.) 
 
 and 
 
 " He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High, 
 Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty." (Psakn 91.) 
 
 Among the best of the new hymns was a long one, which 
 in our Old Testament is divided into a number of short 
 Psalms. (Psalms 95-100). The most familiar of these 
 is Psalm 100, beginning 
 
 " Make a joyful noise unto Jehovah, all ye lands." 
 
 All these hymns, from all these various sources, were 
 copied into a new and much larger hymn and prayer- 
 book, which was divided into five sections. This book 
 came into universal use among all Jews, and is preserved 
 to us as our Old Testament book of Psalms. The spirit 
 in which this committee worked is indicated by the hymn 
 
HYMN-BOOKS WITHIN HYMN-BOOKS ^15 
 
 * 
 
 which they placed at the beginning of their new book, as 
 a kind of introductory meditation : 
 
 '' Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the 
 ungodly, 
 
 Nor standech in the way of sinners, 
 
 Nor sitteth in the seat of the scoffers. 
 
 But his delight is in the law of Jehovah, 
 
 And on his law doth he meditate day and night. 
 
 And he shah be like a tree, planted by the streams of water, 
 
 That bringeth forth its fruit in due season. 
 
 Whose leaf also doth not wither; 
 ' And whatsoever he doeth shall prosper." (Psahn 1: 1-3.) 
 
 These great poems have been on the lips of more men 
 and women throughout the centimes than any other 
 words ever written, except the sayings of Jesus. " They 
 have furnished the bridal hymns, the battle songs, the 
 pilgrim marches, the penitential prayers, and the public 
 praises of every nation in Christendom since Christendom 
 was bom." The book of Psalms has been called " the 
 mirror of the soul," because there is no noble emotion, no 
 depth of longing which does not find expression in it. 
 Hence it is that as St. Augustine said, " the Psalms are 
 read in all the world, and there is nothing hid from the 
 heat thereof." 
 
216 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1. Compare Psalms 14 and 53; what fact do you observe, 
 and how do you account for it? 
 
 2. If we had to memorize our hymns, as the Jews did, in 
 order to sing them together, how would this affect our church 
 services? 
 
 3. How. should we be benefited bj going to church? 
 
 4. How may we give as well as get in a church service? 
 
 5. What is -your favorite Psalm of those mentioned in this 
 chapter? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. How did " the Lord restore the prosperity of Zion "? 
 
 2. In addition to the rebuilding of the walls, what reforms 
 di.d Nehemiah carry out? 
 
 3. What was the effect of these events on the temple 
 worship ? 
 
 4. Why did pilgrimages to Jerusalem now become a promi- 
 nent part of Jewish life? 
 
 5. Why did everybody enjoy these pilgrimages? 
 
 6. What was the title of the collection of songs, from which 
 Psahns 120-134 were taken? 
 
 7. Tell the probable story of the experiences which led to 
 the writing of these* songs. 
 
HYMN-BOOKS WITHIN HYMN-BOOKS 217 
 
 « 
 
 8. Mention two of these sentiments which are most fre- 
 quently expressed ia these Pilgrim songs. 
 
 9. Who were the " sons of Korah "? 
 
 10. Explain how these various earlier prayer and hjmm- 
 books were finally combined in oiir book of Psalms. 
 
 Notebook Work 
 
 Take two cheap or worn copies of the Bible and clip out all 
 the Psalms of the sons of Korah, putting them together in the 
 notebook with a suitable heading. 
 
CHAPTER XXVII 
 
 APPEALING TO HISTORY IN A CHURCH 
 
 QUARREL 
 
 I AND II Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah 
 
 " The Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans," 
 says the Gospel of John (John 4:9), in its account of the 
 conversation between Jesus and the woman of Samaria. 
 When did this bitter feud begin ? For the earliest begin- 
 nings we must go back to the settlement in Canaan, when 
 the tribe of Judah and certain minor clans settled in the 
 south, and the other tribes settled in the north. The two 
 sections of the nation were kept apart for many years by 
 a strip of Canaanite territory. Under Saul, IDavid and 
 Solomon they were drawn together into a united kingdom; 
 but after Solomon's death the northern tribes revolted 
 and set up a kingdom of their own, of which the city of 
 Samaria soon became the capital. 
 
 Then came the hostile armies of Assyria and Babylonia 
 and first Samaria (722 B.C.) and then Jerusalem (586 B.C.) 
 were besieged, captured, and in large part destroyed. 
 This common misfortune drew the two sections together 
 for a time. "When the temple at Jerusalem was rebuilt 
 the Samaritans came there to worship. As the cere- 
 monial law was gradually developed by the Jerusalem 
 priests into the form now found in the Pentateuch (see 
 Chapter XVI), the Samaritans accepted it without ques- 
 tion and tried to obey it. 
 
 Previous to Nehemiah's visit Samaria seems to have 
 become the political and commercial center of the land 
 and was perhaps the headquarters of the tyrannical nobles 
 who oppressed the poorer people. They and their allies 
 among the Ammonites, Edomites, Moabites and also 
 
 ^218 
 
RUINS OP A GR^CO-ROMAN TEMPLE AT SAMARIA. 
 From a photograph by Underwood and Underwood. 
 
HISTORY IN A CHURCH QUARREL 219 
 
 among the nobles of the Jews themselves, were therefore 
 bitterly opposed to the rebuilding of the walls of Jerusalem. 
 The Samaritan governor, whose name was Sanballat, was 
 the leader in the opposition against Nehemiah. Thus 
 the old jealousy was revived. About a century after 
 Nehemiah, or just before Alexander the Great conquered 
 the Persian empire, there was another quarrel between 
 the two sections of Palestine which led to a reHgious 
 separation. 
 
 The Samaritan Temple 
 
 The Samaritan woman said to Jesus, " Our fathers 
 worshipped in this mountain [that is, Mount Gerizim, 
 near Samaria] but ye say that in Jerusalem is the place 
 where men ought to worship " (John 4: 20). This was 
 the bone of Contention between the Jews and the Samari- 
 tans, and it came about as follows : 
 
 A certain prominent priest, named Manasseh, married 
 Nicaso, the daughter of Sanballat, governor of Samaria. 
 This was perhaps the grandson of the Sanballat who 
 opposed Nehemiah. At once there was a protest in 
 Jerusalem. Many demanded that Manasseh either di- 
 vorce his wife or else resign his office. They would not 
 have a son-in-law of a Sanballat occupying a prominent 
 position in their temple. Sanballat accordingly said to 
 Manasseh, " What do we care for those people! Have we 
 not a sacred mountain in Samaria, whose traditions are 
 far older than Jerusalem? Come, I will build a new 
 temple for you on Mount Gerizim. You shall be high 
 priest. Some of your fellow-priests will leave Jerusalem 
 and come with you. We also have priestly families here 
 in Samaria. The result will be that most of the people, 
 not only of Samaria but of Judah also will come and 
 worship at our temple and that will leave the Jerusalem 
 temple without worshippers and without any support." 
 
 The Claims of the Opposing Parties 
 Thus it came about that there were two rival temples 
 and that their respective adherents hated each other. 
 
220 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 In every village gate where Jews and Samaritans came in 
 contact the debate was carried on with hot words and 
 angry gestures. The Jews, of course, appealed to the law 
 of Deuteronomy, which forbade sacrifices outside of 
 Jerusalem. Unfortunately for them that law-book no- 
 where explicitly mentioned Jerusalem by name. It had 
 been written as though by Moses before the settlement 
 in Canaan, and hence instead of saying " Jerusalem," 
 the writers had said, " the place which Jehovah shall 
 choose." (See Deut. 12:5.) The Samaritans now de- 
 clared: "That means Mount Gerizim, not Jerusalem. 
 Instead of our going to Jerusalem, you should come to 
 Mount Gerizim to sacrifice." Of course this greatly 
 incensed the Jerusalemites. They retorted by saying 
 that the priests at the Samaritan temple were not pure- 
 blooded members of the tribe of Levi; that in fact they 
 were not even pure-blooded Israelites. They asserted: 
 " When the Assyrians conquered Samaria they brought ia 
 thousands of heathen colonists; in fact, you Samaritans 
 are little better than heathen." (See II Kings 17: 24-41, 
 which was probably added to II Kings at this time.) 
 But the Samaritans were able to answer that their claims 
 to a pure Hebrew ancestry were at least as good as those 
 of the Jews. Did not the book of Kings clearly say that 
 when Nebuchadrezzar conquered Jerusalem he carried to 
 Babylon all but the very poorest and the meanest of the 
 people? (See II Kings 25: 12.) And it was well known 
 that these people who had been left in the land had 
 freely intermarried with foreigners. 
 
 So the quarrel went on with all its imfortunate conse- 
 quences. It inevitably strengthened the tendency to 
 regard religion as a mere matter of priestly ceremonies. 
 It also increased the narrowness and prejudice of the 
 Jews in their attitude toward foreigners. The mechanical, 
 lifeless religion of the scribes in Jesus' time may have 
 been in no small measure the product of this church 
 quarrel. 
 
HISTORY IN A CHURCH QUARREL 221 
 
 The Chronicler 
 
 Both the Jews and the Samaritans appealed to history 
 to prove that their temple alone was properly authorized 
 by Jehovah. Unforttinately for the contestants the his- 
 tory as it stood did not seem to favor one side more 
 than another. Hence at least one other history was 
 written which was not so impartial. 
 
 About seventy-five or a hundred years after the build- 
 ing of the Samaritan temple there lived in Jerusalem a 
 certain Levite who was called " the Chronicler," because 
 he wrote the Old Testament books I and II Chronicles. 
 He seems to have been a member of the temple choir, 
 perhaps one of the " sons of Asaph." Of course he was 
 a supporter of the Jerusalem temple as against the 
 Samaritans, and it vexed him that his fellow- Jews were 
 so often beaten in argument. " I will write a history," 
 said our friend, " out of which no Samaritan can get 
 comfort and which wiU forever settle this question in 
 favor of the Jews." So he wrote a history which, in our 
 Bibles, is divided into four books, I and II Chronicles, 
 Ezra and Nehemiah. The first two of these books carry 
 the narrative down to the time of the destruction of 
 Jerusalem by Nebuchadrezzar (586 B.C.). The remain- 
 ing two, Ezra and Nehemiah, give the writer's ideas re- 
 garding the restoration of prosperity to the land during 
 the succeeding centuries. 
 
 The history reveals the author's purpose on almost every 
 page. There are many long genealogies extending from 
 Adam down to the Chronicler's own time to show that 
 the Jews, rather than the Samaritans, were of pure Hebrew 
 blood. David and Solomon, who founded the Jerusalem 
 temple, are painted as saints. Nothing is said about their • 
 faults. The northern kingdom, on the other hand, is put 
 in a bad light. 
 
 In the latter part of the history (our books of Ezra and 
 Nehemiah) the Chronicler was chiefly interested to show 
 that the temple at Jerusalem had been rebuilt, not by 
 the people who had been left in the land (who had married 
 
222 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 foreigners), but by returned exiles from Babylon who 
 were supposed to have been pure-blooded Israelites. 
 
 According to the Chronicler's representation of the 
 matter the testimony of history was aU on the side of 
 the Jews. Clearly we should not regard such a history 
 as altogether reliable. Not that the Chronicler delib- 
 erately falsified the history, but he lived in a biased 
 atmosphere. Nevertheless, his writings are of value. 
 They throw a flood of light on the history of his own 
 time. Moreover, he was sincerely and enthusiastically 
 devoted to the worship of Jehovah. 
 
 The Memoirs of Nehemiah 
 
 The Chronicler copied much of his material from older 
 sources of information. Large parts of I and II Chronicles 
 are taken word for word from the books of Samuel and 
 Kings. Of the book of Nehemiah also a considerable 
 section (chapters 1-2 and 4-6) were taken from A book 
 of memoirs written by Nehemiah himself, telling of his 
 experiences in rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem. The 
 literary style of these chapters is very different from that 
 of the Chronicler. They express the energetic, unselfish 
 spirit of Nehemiah and give us a vivid picture of his 
 heroic struggles on behalf of his city. They must be 
 reckoned among the best historical records that have 
 come down to us from antiquity. 
 
 The following is a good example of Nehemiah's clear.! 
 vigorous style: 
 
 " When our enemies heard that their plan was known to us, 
 andjthat God had brought it to nought, we all of us returned to 
 the wall each' to his own work. And from that time on, while 
 half of my servants were engaged in the work, half of them 
 heldthelances,_theshields, the bows and the coats of mail. . . . 
 Those who built the wall and those who bore burdens were 
 also armed, each with one of his hands engaged in the work, 
 while the other was ready to grasp the spear; and each of the 
 builders had his sword girded by his' side, and so builded. 
 And he who sounded the trumpet was by me. And I said to 
 
HISTORY IN A CHURCH QUARREL 223 
 
 the nobles and the rulers, and to the rest of the people, ' The 
 work is great and extensive, and we are separated upon the 
 wall far from each other. In w:hatever place you hear the 
 sound of' the trumpet, gather to us, our God will fight for us.' 
 So we. were active in the work, while half of them held the 
 lances, from the gray of morning untU the stars came out." 
 (Neh. 4:15-21.) 
 
 The Chronicler was probably chiefly interested in these 
 memoirs because they told of Nehemiah's successful 
 opposition to the Samaritan governor, Sanballat. They 
 are of surpassing interest to us today because they are 
 almost our only source of information regarding one of 
 the noblest leaders in Hebrew history: a man of humble 
 faith, a loyal patriot, a champiot " the weak and in all 
 things a knightly gentleman. 
 
224 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1. Imagine a Samaritan writer composing a history cover- 
 ing the same period as the Chronicler. Mention some pomts 
 at which he would have differed fromjhe Chronicler. 
 
 2. Suppose the Chronicler had been seeking to reconcile 
 
 the Samaritans, what steps might he have taken? 
 
 3. Do you think that^Nehemiah's work at Jerusalem helped 
 to stir up more bitterness between the Jews and Samaritans. 
 or was it in the interest of peace? ' 
 
 4. In what ways was this quarrel between the Jews and the 
 Samaritans similar in its effects to the sectarian controversies 
 between churches today? 
 
 5. What are some steps which are being taken today to 
 bring about Christian unity and international peace? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What was the chief dispute between the Jews and the 
 Samaritans in the time of Jesus? 
 
 2. How did it happen that the Samaritans built a temple on 
 Mount Gerizim? 
 
 3. Why had these two sections of the people been hostile 
 to each other, long before the outbreak of this quarrel over 
 two rival temples? 
 
HISTORY IN A CHURCH QUARREL 225 
 
 4. What were some of the argiunents of the Samaritans 
 against the temple at Jerusalem? 
 
 5. What were some of the arguments of the Jews against 
 the temple on Mount Gerizim? 
 
 6. What facts can we infer about " the Chronicler " ? 
 
 7. What was one of his chief purposes in writing his history ? 
 
 8. What Old Testament books were written by him? 
 
 9. How did he modify the history as told in the books of 
 Kings? 
 
 10. How did he attempt to refute the Samaritan charge 
 that the Jerusalem priests were descended from foreigners who 
 had intermarried with Jews after the capture of Jerusalem by 
 Nebuchadrezzar ? 
 
 11. From what trustworthy record did the Chronicler copy 
 his accovint of the rebvdlding of the walls of Jerusalem? 
 
 12. Where is this part of his narrative to be found? 
 
CHAPTER XXVIII 
 TWO KINDS OF PATRIOTISM 
 
 The Stories of Esther and Jonah 
 
 - Among the later writings of the Old Testament are 
 two stories which breathe a typically Jewish spirit of 
 intense patriotism. They represent, however, very dif- 
 ferent kinds of patriotism, and different ideas regarding 
 the true place of Israel among the nations. 
 
 We will look first at the book of Esther. The 
 heroine of this story, after whom the book is named, 
 was a beautiful Jewess, living in Persia among the Jewish 
 exiles, in the home of her uncle Mordecai. By a strange 
 turn of fortune, this maiden, Esther, became the queen- 
 consort of Ahasuerus, the Persian king. Now at that 
 time the king had a wicked prime minister named 
 Haman, who in his arrogance required all common men 
 to do obeisance before him whenever they were in his 
 presence. There was one man, however, among the 
 king's subjects, who refused to do homage before him, 
 and that was Mordecai, the Jew, Esther's uncle. Haman 
 was greatly enraged, and secured from the weak and 
 cruel despot Ahasuerus, an infamous decree to put to 
 death on a certain day, not only Mordecai, but all the 
 Jews in all the empire of Persia. Of course, neither the 
 king nor Haman were aware that Esther was related 
 to Mordecai, or even that she was a Jewess. Haman 
 further planned a special vengeance on Mordecai, and 
 erected a special scaffold about ninety feet high on which 
 to hang him. 
 
 In the meantime, however, Mordecai had told Esther 
 of the dastardly plot against their people, and urged 
 her to intercede with the king. ' ' Who knowest, ' ' he said, 
 
 226 
 
TWO KINDS OF PATRIOTISM 227 
 
 * 
 " but that thou art come to the kingdom for such a time 
 as this." Esther repHed that to go into the king's 
 presence uninvited might mean death; nevertheless 
 she promised to take the risk, and " if I perish, I perish." 
 Her adventure proved a success. 
 
 Through her skill and tact she won the king over to 
 her side and against Haman. The latter was hanged 
 on the very scaffold he had built for Mordecai, and 
 Mordecai was made prime minister in his place. As 
 for the Jews they were given permission to defend them- 
 selves and kill their enemies. So when the day came 
 on which they were to be massacred, they were the 
 slayers and not the slain. 
 
 The germ of this story was probably derived originally 
 from the Babylonians, who told it at their New Year's 
 celebration. In its Babylonian form, it was a story about 
 the gods Marduk and Ishtar. The Jews during their 
 exile in Babylonia adopted the Babylonian New Year's 
 feast, calling it the feast of Purim. They also continued 
 to tell the old Babylonian story, only changing the god 
 Marduk and the goddess Ishtar into human beings 
 Mordecai and Esther. 
 
 In its present form, however, the story is not a mere 
 popular tale but a fascinating patriotic romance, told 
 with a purpose, by a man of remarkable literary talent. 
 He lived in a time when the Jews were suffering an 
 tmusual degree of persecution from the Greek authorities. 
 This aroused in him, in turn, a passionate hatred for the 
 enemies of his people. There is much in the story, as 
 he tells it, which falls below our Christian ideals. It is 
 not pleasant to read his account of how many thousands 
 were slain by the Jews. On the other hand, we can con- 
 done such feelings to some extent, when we consider 
 the cruel tyranny which provoked them. The unselfish 
 courage of Esther is nobly portrayed and there is some- 
 thing manly too in Mordecai's steadfast refusal to be a 
 servile, fawning courtier before Haman. We may imagine 
 
228 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 that the author of our story was very much such a man 
 as Mordecai. 
 
 The Book of Jonah 
 
 The author of the story of Jonah was a prophet. He 
 had remarkable gifts as a teacher and preacher. Like 
 the author of Esther, he had travelled in foreign lands. 
 It is probable that he had lived in Egypt. There was 
 a large colony of Jews at that time in Alexandria, the 
 new capital of Egypt which had been built by Alexander 
 the Great and named for himself. At any rate, this 
 man had come into contact with foreigners. He had 
 seen their vices and sins. He knew their selfishness, 
 deceitfulness, and injustice. But he was a believer 
 in the teachings of the second Isaiah and instead of hold- 
 ing aloof from these people he made friends with them 
 and told them in their own language about the religion 
 of the one God, Jehovah, and about his holy and righteous 
 laws. Most of his fellow Jews, however, criticized him 
 sharply for these things. " Why do you associate with 
 these Gentile dogs? " they said to him. " Do you not 
 know their vile and wicked deeds? Have they not 
 persecuted the people of Israel? Has not Jehovah 
 pronounced the sentence of death upon them all, through 
 the prophet Ezekiel? " (See Ezek. 38-39.) To this 
 he wotdd answer, " Yes, I know their evil deeds; but 
 perchance they will repent, if we teU them of Jehovah 
 and His commands. Then it will not be necessary for 
 Him to destroy them." ' This brought forth a reply 
 which deeply shocked our prophet. " We do not want 
 them to repent. We do not want Jehovah to forgive them." 
 It was this attitude of his fellow Jews which led him to 
 write the story of the prophet Jonah. 
 
 The Story of Jonah, and Its Message 
 
 The word of Jehovah, he says, came to the prophet 
 Jonah, bidding him to go to the city Nineveh, and preach 
 to the people there. But Jonah disobeyed Jehovah. 
 
^ TWO KINDS OF PATRIOTISM 229 
 
 Going down to Joppa on the coast of Palestine, he took 
 passage in a ship which was setting sail for Tarshish, 
 an ancient Phoenician colony in Spain. In other words, 
 instead of going to Nineveh, he was trying to go as far 
 in the opposite direction as possible. But Jehovah 
 sent a storm upon the sea, and the ship was in danger of 
 being destroyed. The sailors were therefore obliged 
 to throw Jonah overboard, as being the cause of the storm. 
 
 Now Jehovah had prepared a great fish, so the story 
 goes, which swallowed Jonah, and after three days 
 threw him out again on the shore. Thus Jonah had 
 another chance to obey Jehovah's command, and this 
 time he went to Nineveh, and cried in the streets of the 
 city: " Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be destroyed." 
 The result was a great revival in the city of Nineveh. 
 The people there, both small and great, repented of their 
 wicked deeds, and besought God's mercy. The king 
 himself joined in, and " put on sackcloth" and pro- 
 claimed a fast. So when Jehovah saw that the Nine- 
 vites had truly and sincerely repented, he forgave them, 
 and did not destroy the city. But strange to say, this 
 displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry. " Then 
 Jonah went oat of the city, and sat on the east side of 
 the city, and there made him a booth, and sat under it 
 in the shade, till he might see what would become of 
 the city." 
 
 While Jonah was thus sulking in his booth, or hut, 
 like a spoiled child, Jehovah caused a certain plant called 
 a kikayon, or castor-oil tree, to grow up near by. In our 
 English version it is called a gourd. And Jonah became 
 fond of the graceful plant with its welcome shade. It 
 seemed like a friend to him in his bitterness. But on 
 another day Jehovah sent a worm to gnaw at the roots 
 of the plant and it withered away. And now Jonah 
 was even more angry at Jehovah than before. Then 
 God said to Jonah, in substance. You were fond of the 
 gourd, which was but a wild plant, growing up and 
 tDerishing in a day, and you were sorry to see it die. 
 
230 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Can it be that you are willing without a moment's hesita- 
 tion to condemn to destruction this great city of Nineveh? 
 You had bestowed no care or labor on this plant; yet 
 you felt an affection for it. Do not forget that I created 
 these people of Nineveh; and should I not love them? 
 And remember, also, that in this great city there are 
 more than a hundred and twenty thousand little children, 
 besides many dtimb beasts. Can they be expected to 
 know the difference between right and wrong that I 
 should pour out fire and brimstone upon them and 
 destroy thern? 
 
 Through this great and beautiftd story the author 
 wished to teach his fellow Jews that aU men are by natiure 
 God's children, whatever their race or nationality; that 
 Israel is not to hold aloof from other races, still less to 
 hate them; but to share with them her knowledge of the 
 true God, and to feel towards them something of the same 
 love and compassion which God feels toward all his 
 children. 
 
TWO KINDS OF PATRIOTISM 231 
 
 ♦ 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. Imagine the author of Esther as an American living 
 in California : How would he feel toward the Japanese ? Would 
 'you approve? 
 
 2. Imagine the author of Esther as a negro: How wouJd 
 he feel regarding his own race? Would you approve? 
 
 3. In what respect does the book of Jonah show a nobler 
 spirit than Esther, in its attitude toward foreigners? 
 
 4. What would the author of the book of Jonah think 
 today regarding foreign missions? Regarding our treatment 
 of immigrants? 
 
 5. Which story do you like best, simply as a story? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. At about what date was the book of Esther written? 
 
 2. What experience had the author had with foreigners, 
 and what was his attitude toward them? 
 
 3. What was the connection between the story of Esther 
 and the Feast of Pmim? 
 
 4. Give in a few words an outline of the story. 
 
 5. What facts may we reasonably infer regarding the early 
 life and experiences of the author of the book of Jonah? 
 
 6. Give a brief outline of the story. 
 
 7. What lessons does it teach? 
 
CHAPTER XXIX 
 
 HEBREW LOVE SONGS AND A HEBREW 
 
 LOVE STORY 
 
 The Song of Songs and the Book of Ruth 
 
 What strikes us as strangest in the marriage customs 
 of the Old Testament is the fact that marriages were 
 supposed to be arranged entirely by the parents of the 
 bride and groom. It would seem that there could not 
 have been much of what we call courtship or wooing. 
 Often the two persons to be married never saw each 
 other prior to the wedding. This seems to us most 
 unnatural. What if the young man did not care for 
 the girl his parents had selected for him? What if the 
 girl were to find herself yoked up for life with an ugly 
 tempered, domineering tyrant, old enough to be her 
 father? As time went on, many young people rebelled 
 against these customs. This was especially the case 
 after the Jews began to come in closer contacts with the 
 Persians and the Greeks. Human nature is much the 
 same in every age. Hebrew lads and lassies fell in love 
 with each other, just as our lads and lassies do; nor did 
 their love always follow the lines marked out by their 
 parents. Father and mother may say: " Daughter, 
 we have arranged for your betrothal. You are to be 
 married to outr old neighbor Bildad." But daughter 
 is strangely lacking in gratitude and entirely lacking in 
 enthusiasm for Bildad. In fact she is decidedly rebel- 
 lious. An angry tear steals into her eye. Before the 
 betrothal takes place there is a scene in the family council. 
 " I will not marry that old man," says daughter, and 
 stamps her foot. To her mother she says: "Father 
 should be ashamed. Why is he so cruel? " " Very 
 
 232 
 
LOVE SONGS AND A LOVE S^ORY 233 
 
 well," says father; " if this daughter of folly will not 
 marry our neighbor, she shall not marry at all. Mother, 
 let not that idle scapegrace of an Isaac come any more 
 to this house." 
 
 After such quarrels, father and mother would sigh 
 for the " good old days," when sons and daughters did 
 as they were told and asked no questions. 
 
 The Song of Songs 
 
 There is one book in the Old Testament which seems 
 to prove conclusively that human nature was the same 
 in ancient Palestine as now. Love and passion were 
 just as powerful and romance was just as sweet. Even 
 though the customs were unfavorable, Hebrew youths 
 knew how to woo, and Hebrew maids knew how to 
 give their hearts. This book is the Song of Songs. 
 The author probably lived between 300 and 200 B.C. 
 The book does not profess to be religious. It was 
 included in the Old Testament only because of the 
 tradition that Solomon wrote it. It is really a collection 
 of love and marriage songs. /Some of these poems, 
 perhaps all of them, were intended to be sung at weddings. 
 In Syria, today, there are usually several days of feasting 
 after a wedding, during which time the groom is called 
 the king, and the bride the queen. There are songs 
 and dances in their honor. This perhaps explains the 
 references to "Solomon," and. "the Shulamite," in 
 the Song of Songs. " Solomon " was the groom, and 
 the " Shulamite " was the bride: 
 
 The meaning and beauty of these love-lyrics is partially 
 obscured because they are joined together as though 
 they were a single poem. There is nothing to indicate 
 where one poem ends and another begins. They may 
 be disentangled to some extent, however, by studying 
 the changes in theme and setting. For example, here is 
 a quotation from one of the most beautiful, which may 
 be entitled 
 
234 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Love in Springtime 
 
 " My lover spoke, and said to me, 
 Arise, my sweet-heart, my beauty, and come away 
 For lo, the winter is past; 
 The rain is over and gone; 
 The flowers appear on the earth; 
 And the time of the singing is come, 
 And the turtledove's voice is heard in our land. 
 
 " The fig tree ripens her figs. 
 And the vines are in blossom; 
 They give forth their fragrance. 
 Arise, my sweetheart, my beauty, and come away." 
 
 (Song of Songs 2: 8-13.) 
 
 If used at wedding festivities, the above song would 
 naturally be sung by the bride. The book as a whole 
 seems to contain other songs for the groom and the 
 wedding attendants. Some of these songs are among the 
 most beautiful love poems of all literature. 
 
 The Book op Ruth 
 
 The author of the sipry of Ruth probably lived in 
 an earlier age than the poet who wrote the Song of Songs. 
 Even in his time the " good old days " were already 
 past. Love and custom were frequently in sharp con- 
 flict. This man was one of the truest and noblest souls 
 in all the history of Israel. He had a wonderful insight 
 into the secrets of the human heart and the deepest 
 needs of human life. He knew perfectly well that 
 young lives crave love, and that love resents the 
 cold restraints of prudence and tradition. He knew 
 that love is of infinitely greater worth than material 
 prosperity. On the other hand, he had lived long enough 
 to realize that people are sometimes led into sad mis- 
 takes by following a temporary infatuation. He also 
 realized that more is at stake in a marriage than the 
 individual happiness of two persons. The weal or 
 woe of the whole community is involved. He was a 
 
RUTH THE MOABITESS. 
 
 From " Dramatic Stories from the Bible," by Emma 
 Florence Eaton, by permission of the author. 
 
LOVE SONGS AND A LOVE STORY 235 
 
 great believer, therefore, in family loyalty and wished 
 young people to be guided by this motive more than 
 by their self -centered impulses, in the selection of a wife 
 or husband. 
 
 With these convictions in his heart, he came upon 
 the_ tradition of Ruth. It had been cherished for cen- 
 turies in Bethlehem, the birthplace of David, as an 
 interesting chapter in that great man's family history. 
 Out of that tradition this writer created a story which 
 is immortal. The substance of it is as follows : 
 
 On account of a famine in Judah, a certain Bethlehemite 
 named Elimelech was compelled to migrate to the land 
 of Moab, with his wife Naomi, and his two sons. Thus 
 it came about that these two sons married Moabitish 
 women, named Orpah and Ruth. Soon, however, a 
 new trouble befell the family, for Elimelech died, and his 
 sons also. 
 
 For a time the three women lived together in their 
 common sorrow, but soon it seemed best for Naomi 
 to return to Bethlehem where she owned a little property. 
 So the three set out together on the long walk of more 
 than thirty miles around the northern end of the Dead 
 Sea. Before they had gone far, Naomi besought the 
 two girls to return to their own people. She explained 
 to them that by so doing they would have a better chance 
 to get for themselves desirable husbands. And Orpah 
 did finally bid her mother-in-law farewell. Ruth, how- 
 ever, would not go back. She felt herself bound to 
 Naomi by too many sacred memories. " Entreat me 
 not to leave thee," she said, " and to return from follow- 
 ing 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. Jehovah do so to me 
 and more also, if aught but death part thee and me." 
 So the author goes on to tell how the two women came 
 to Bethlehem; how they were in great poverty; and 
 
236 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 how Ruth; to obtain food for the two of them, went out 
 to glean behind the reapers in the barley-harvest. 
 
 Now it happened that the fair young gleaner came_ to 
 the field of a certain man named Boaz, a wealthy relative 
 of Naomi through her former husband Elimelech. About 
 noon, Boaz himself came out from the village to the yellow 
 barley field to see how the work was going. As he 
 talked with the foreman of the reapers he noticed the 
 young woman standing with his own harvest girls 
 and gathering the scattered handfuls of grain. " Whose 
 maiden is this ?" said Boaz. " It is Ruth the Moabitess," 
 the man replied, " who came back with Naomi from 
 the country of Moab." Now Boaz had already heard 
 from the neighbors about Ruth's splendid fidelity to 
 her mother-in-law and as he saw her grace and beauty, 
 his heart was drawn to her. So in a few moments, Ruth 
 looked up and saw him standing near her, tall and 
 handsome, and with eyes full of kindness. " Do not 
 go to glean in another field, my daughter," he said, 
 " but stay here by my maidens." Then he added: 
 " It hath been fully showed me all that thou hast done 
 unto thy mother-in-law, since the death of thy husband. 
 Jehovah recompense thee, arid a full reward be given 
 thee of Jehovah the God of Israel under whose wings 
 thou art come to take refuge." 
 
 Soon after that it was dinner time and a table was 
 set for the young men and maidens in a shady comer 
 of the field. Boaz sat down with the others in the good 
 old simple manner, and he beckoned Ruth to sit beside 
 him in the merry company. He saw to it that she had 
 all that she needed, and more beside, to take home to her 
 mother. 
 
 That night when she went home and told Naomi of 
 her experiences, she was full of talk about the kind 
 gentleman with the handsome bronzed face. She now 
 learned that this man was a near kinsman of the family. 
 According to the law of those days when a man died 
 childless it was the duty of the nearest kinsman to marry 
 
LOVE SONGS AND A LOVE STORY 237 
 
 • 
 
 the widow. The children would bear the first husband's 
 name. Now there was living in Bethlehem a man who was 
 even more closely related than Boaz to the family of Naomi. 
 But that good lady, shrewd and kind old matchmaker that 
 she was, soon laid her plans. Ruth was to marry Boaz. 
 They were in love with each other, that was plain. In such 
 cases, according to the Hebrew custom, it was proper to 
 send Ruth to make the first advances. So the girl, follow- 
 ing Naomi's instructions, went trembling on her sweet 
 errand. And Boaz said to her: " Blessed be thou of 
 Jehovah, my daughter, thou hast shown more kindness 
 in this last instance than at the beginning, since thou 
 hast not gone after young men, whether poor or rich." 
 Boaz meant that she might have been expected to prefer 
 a youngei: man than he; but that by following the old 
 custom, and choosing a near relative of her first husband, 
 she had shown a beautiful loyalty to her family, just as 
 when she had come with Naomi all the way from Moab. 
 So Ruth and Boaz were married. It was in accord- 
 ance with the accepted customs, yet it was a love- 
 match too. And from this ideal marriage came a son, 
 who in turn became the grandfather of David. Follow 
 the path of duty — this is the author's message. Be 
 unselfishly loyal to those family ties which are already 
 upon you; and you may be sure that love and romance 
 and happiness will all come to you in their own good time. 
 
238 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. If you were to set the Song of Songs to music, what 
 kind of a melody would you choose? Mention an example, 
 if you can, from modem tunes. 
 
 2. Suppose you were arranging the story of Ruth as a 
 play: Could you have one of the characters sing the poem 
 " Love in Springtime," from the Song of Songs? If so, at 
 what point, and from the lips of what character, would it 
 be most appropriate? 
 
 3. What was it that chiefly attracted the love of Boaz for 
 Ruth? 
 
 4. Judging from the story of Ruth, what is the surest 
 pathway to a happy marriage? 
 
 5. What do you think would be the answer of the author 
 of the story of Ruth to the following questions : 
 
 (a) Is it ever right for two people who do not love each 
 other to be married? 
 
 (b) Is "We love each other " always a sufficient reason 
 for saying, " We ought to be married "? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. At about what date was the Song of Songs written? 
 
 2. How may the different songs which make up the book 
 be distinguished from each other? 
 
 3. To what class of poems do all of these songs belong? 
 
LOVE SONGS AND A LOVE STORY 239 
 
 4. How did the marriage customs of the ancient Hebrews 
 frequently come into conflict with the natural impulses of 
 young people? 
 
 5. TeU, briefly, the story of Ruth the Moabitess. 
 
 6. What was the purpose of the writer in telling this story? 
 
 7. In what respect was the marriage of Ruth and Boaz 
 an ideal one? 
 
CHAPTER XXX 
 
 WISE MEN WHO TAUGHT IN THE GATE 
 
 The Story of the Book of Proverbs 
 
 It seems strange to us to speak of a " city gate " as 
 a place in which to teach. The difficulty is explained 
 by the fact that the Hebrews applied the word " gate " 
 to the broad area in front of the actual opening in the 
 city wall. The " city gate " corresponds, therefore, to 
 the public square in a modem town. 
 
 Suppose we visit one of these " gates " in imagination. 
 It is early morning. ' Everything is noise and confusion. 
 Here are merchants peddling their wares: wheat, dates, 
 honey, wine and other things to eat or drink; or perchance 
 wool and flax and other materials for the manufacture 
 of clothing. Customers, men and women, are haggling 
 with the traders in true Oriental style; each one is pro- 
 claiming in a loud, shrill voice and with many gestures 
 that the price he is asked to pay or take is a robbery 
 and an outrage. Besides the merchants, there are 
 ■judges. Here sits one of the city elders with a long 
 white beard. Before him are two farmers who are dis- 
 puting about the boundary line between' their fields. 
 Each has brought his witnesses. There is a fringe of 
 curious spectators looking on. 
 
 In fact everything is happening here which may be 
 expected to happen when a crowd of people get together. 
 Out in the middle of the area some children are playing 
 a noisy game, perhaps something like our " duck on the 
 rock." Every now and then a mangy yellow dog noses 
 his way through the crowd looking for scraps of food. 
 On the whole, it is not what we would call an attractive 
 place. The ground is littered with all kinds of dirt. 
 
 .240 
 
WISE MEN WHO TAUGHT IN THf) GATE 241 
 
 Our nose is assaulted by a variety of odors. But the 
 ancients did not seem to object to these things as much 
 as we do. At any rate they loved to be where they 
 could see their neighbors and hear the news. 
 
 The Wise Man 
 
 In one comer of the city gate, we notice a dignified 
 figure ; an old man with a circle of friends. He is watching 
 the varied scenes before him and occasionally talking 
 with those about him. "Who is that old man?" we 
 ask. ' ' That is one of the wise men, ' ' we are told. These 
 wise men in ancient Israel were students, and artists, 
 and teachers. As students their business was to study 
 human life. They loved to " sit in the gate " and watch 
 the merchants, and the judges, and the boys and girls. 
 As artists they sought to describe what they saw in 
 proverbs; that is, in short sentences, pithy and unfor- 
 gettable. This was a form of literary art much admired 
 by all Oriental nations and not altogether neglected even 
 among us today. Benjamin Franklin's " Poor Richard's 
 Almanac " is our best-known example. 
 
 As teachers, the mission of the wise men was to give 
 to younger and less experienced people the benefit 
 of their practical good sense, and their tried and tested 
 conclusions. A large number of their sayings are pre- 
 served in certain Old Testament books, especially the 
 book of Proverbs. 
 
 Let us sit for a little while beside the wise man in this 
 city gate and look at the human kaleidoscope through his 
 eyes. We shall be surprised to see how interesting it is. 
 
 Here, for example, comes young Mr. Know-it-all. 
 He wears stylish clothes, and throws out his chest, and 
 walks with a swagger. His father and mother and all 
 his aunts and uncles have always told him that he was 
 the most clever person in the world; and of course he 
 agrees with them. He will listen to no advice. In fact 
 he is offended if any one ventures to offer it. 
 
242 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 " Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit? " says otir friend. 
 " There is more hope for a fool than for him." (Prov. 26: 12.) 
 
 We also see that the wise man has a keen sense of humor. 
 He loves to smile at the little foibles of human nature. 
 For example, he has been listening to one of those shout- 
 ing, wrangling groups of traders and bargain-hunters, 
 and this is his dry comment : ' 
 
 " Bad, bad, says the buyer. 
 But when he is gone his way, then he boasts." (Prov. 20: 14.) 
 
 The wise man is also much amused at the great reputation 
 some people acquire, just by keeping still and looking 
 wise: 
 
 " Even a fool, if he holds his peace, is considered wise. 
 When he keeps his mouth shut, he is called prudent." (Prov. 
 17:28.) 
 
 But though he is so keen to puncture conceit with his 
 wit, and so ready to laugh men out of their petty follies, 
 we find nevertheless that the wise man has a tender heart. 
 He sympathizes with the mother who has waited so 
 long for news from her boy, who went away from home. 
 He knows that 
 
 " Hope deferred maketh the heart sick." (Prov. 13 : 12.) 
 
 And he is almost as happy as she is when a letter comes 
 from him at last : 
 
 " As cold water to a thirsty soul, 
 So is good news from a far coimtry." (Prov. 25: 25.) 
 
 He has a ready sympathy for those who are anxious 
 and troubled and discouraged: 
 
 " The spirit of a man will endure misfortune. 
 But a broken spirit who can bear? " (Prov. 18: 17.) 
 
 Best of all he knows the value of friendly encouragement: 
 
 " Care in the heart of a man, maketh it stoop. 
 But a kind word maketh it glad." (Prov. 12: 25.) 
 
WISE MEN WHO TAUGHT IN THE.GATE 243 
 
 He himself has spoken many such kind words to those 
 who are broken in spirit and has given them new heart 
 for the battle of life. 
 
 The Wise Man as a Teacher 
 
 With this keen insight into human nature, it was natural 
 that many should come to the wise man for advice. 
 There were tricksters in those days, just as no^iy, and 
 there were " greenhorns " to be cheated. One favorite 
 method of separating simpletons from their money was 
 to persuade ' them to act as surety for a loan. "Just 
 shake hands with me before witnesses," the smooth- 
 tongued stranger would say, " and I will guarantee not 
 only to repay the money, but to make us both rich beside. 
 A friend of mine is coming with a caravan of wonderful 
 silks from Damascus, which he will sell me for a mere 
 song. All I need is a htuidred shekels, and I can sell 
 the silks for a thousand." So the poor fool would shake 
 hands with the stranger, which corresponded to our 
 modem custom of putting one's name on a note ; and the 
 man would immediately take the money and disappear, 
 leaving his victim to repay the loan. "Be on your 
 guard against these sharpers," the wise men were con- 
 stantly saying. (See Prov. 22: 26-27.) 
 
 In addition to this practical shrewdness in money-mat- 
 ters, the wise men were often able to set the feet of their 
 young hearers on the paths of uprightness, and lead them 
 to the highest happiness and peace. Their eyes were 
 open to the dangers of intoxicating liquor. 
 
 " Wine is a mocker, strong drink is a brawler, 
 And whosoever erreth thereby is not wise." (Prov. 20: 1. 
 See also 23 : 29-35.) 
 
 They were not blind to the temptation to greed, nor 
 to the wrongs which were inflicted upon the poor by the 
 rich. They therefore lifted up their voice in a plea 
 for justice and mercj . 
 
244 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 " He that oppresses the poor, reviles his Maker, 
 But he who has mercy on the needy honors Him." (Prov. 
 14: 31. See also 21: 13, and 23: 10-11.) 
 
 What seems to have distressed the wise men most of 
 all, as they looked out upon life, was the heart-breaking 
 estrangements which they saw between men who should 
 have been friends. One of the most notable characteristics 
 of the book of Proverbs is the large number of exhorta- 
 tions tt) self-control, and charity, and forgiveness, which 
 it contains. 
 
 " A fool utters all his anger. 
 But a wise man keeps it back." (Prov. 29: 11.) 
 
 " He who covers up transgression seeks love; 
 But he who harps on a matter, alienates his friend." (Prov. 
 17:9.) 
 
 Since the wise men felt so strongly on this point, 
 we are not surprised to find that they kept their most 
 scathing condemnations for tale-bearers and trouble- 
 makers. Too often they had seen men who had been 
 dear friends, passing each other with averted faces. 
 Some lying scandal-monger had been sowing his evil 
 seed! If you have anything to say against a man, say 
 it to his face, the wise men urged. Don't talk about 
 him behind his back! 
 
 " He who winks with the eye, causes trouble: 
 But he who reproves openly makes peace." (Prov. 10- 10. 
 See also 25: 23, and 26: 20.) 
 
 The Later Wise Men: The Book op Proverbs 
 
 As regards the date when the earliest of the sayings 
 of the wise men were written, it is quite impossible to 
 corne to any conclusion. The collection of sayings 
 which has come down to us as the book of Proverbs 
 was probably completed after the Greeks entered Pales- 
 tine, that is, after 333 B.C. Like the book of Psalms, 
 it was made up of several earlier and smaller collections! 
 
WISE MEN WHO TAUGHT IN THE GATE 245 
 
 * 
 
 Later tradition called Solomon the author, on account 
 of his reputation for wisdom. The wise men were at 
 the zenith of their popularity and influence during this 
 Greek period in Jewish history. The people had lost 
 faith in the prophets, excepting those of former times, 
 whose writings had come down to them. Hence no one 
 tried to speak as a prophet. So it came about that /the 
 wise men became for a time the chief moral and religious 
 leaders of the people. They really were prophets under 
 another name. They no longer confined themselves 
 to the coining of short proverbs but composed longer 
 discourses more like the addresses of the prophets, calling 
 upon men to seek wisdom, and to walk in the path of 
 righteousness. The first nine chapters of the book 
 of Proverbs are largely made up of these more extended 
 discourses. 
 
 These later wise men were also like the prophets in 
 claiming that God had inspired their words. They 
 grasped the sublime thought that all human wisdom is 
 from God, and that God sends to every man just as 
 much of the light of his truth as the man is able and will- 
 ing to receive. Hence, 
 
 " The path of the righteous is as a dawning light, 
 That shineth more and more unto the perfect day." (Prov. 
 4: 18.) 
 
246 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. How does it Happen that the words " The Proverbs of 
 Solomon " stand at the beginning of the tenth chapter of the 
 book of Proverbs? (10: 1.) 
 
 2. How do you think the wise men were able to gain so 
 thorough a knowledge of human nature? 
 
 3. Do the Proverbs deal chiefly with the relations between 
 men and men, or with the relations between men and God? 
 
 4. To what extent would you call the wise men religious 
 as well as moral teachers? 
 
 5. Mention one or more proverbs of those quoted in this 
 chapter, which you especially admire. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What part of an Oriental town corresponded to our 
 " public square"? 
 
 2. What kind of persons were the " wise men " among the 
 ancient Hebrews? 
 
 3. Why did they like to " sit in the gate" ? 
 
 4. Give an example of a humorous sa3dng by the wise men 
 recorded in our book of Proverbs. 
 
 5. Give an example of some saying showing their sym- 
 pathetic understanding of human nature. 
 
 6. Give an illustration of their practical common sense. 
 
WISE MEN WHO TAUGHT IN THE GATE 247 
 
 7. Mention two kinds of wrong-doing which they frequently 
 ■condemned. 
 
 8. How did it come about that during the Greek period 
 of Old Testament history the wise men were the chief religious 
 teachers of the Hebrews? 
 
 9. What chapters in the book of Proverbs were probably 
 written latest? 
 
 10. At about what date did the book come into existence 
 in its present form? 
 
 11. How did the name of Solomon become associated with 
 the book? 
 
 Notebook Work 
 
 Clip out from some cheap or worn copy of the Old Testament 
 all the proverbs you can find which condemn anger and strife 
 and which tell how to live peaceably. Paste them in your 
 notebook, in what seems to you the best order. Read with 
 special care chapters 10-29. 
 
CHAPTER XXXI 
 
 A MAN UNJUSTLY CONDEMNED 
 The Author of the Book of Job 
 
 When San Francisco was destroyed by an earthquake, 
 in the year 1906, many people explained the catastrophe 
 as a punishment sent on the city by the Almighty, 
 because of its wickedness. In all ages and to some extent 
 even today, men have been inclined to interpret any 
 unusual calamity as the result of wrong-doing. In our 
 every-day life also, we are easily biased against the 
 poor, the ragged and the " down and out." "It is 
 probably their own fault," we say, while on the other 
 hand, it is hard for us to believe that a rich, successful 
 and prosperous citizen can possibly be a scoiindrel. 
 Half unconsciously we assume that aU pain and sorrow 
 must be the direct consequence of ,sin and that good 
 fortune is always the reward of virtue. 
 
 Among the ancient Jews this assumption was the 
 generally accepted belief. When Jesus and his disciples 
 came one day upon a wayside beggar, who had been 
 blind from his birth, the disciples asked the Master, 
 " Rabbi, who hath sinned, this man or his parents, 
 that he was bom blind?" A more heartless doctrine 
 never existed. Jesus did not accept it. To be sure, 
 like many such mistaken beliefs it contained a half 
 truth. Much of the world's sorrow is no doubt caused 
 by wrong-doing. But as a result of this extreme and 
 one-sided idea, men are led to stifle their natural sym- 
 pathies, and to become the more cold and suspicious 
 toward a fellow-creature, the greater and more pitiable 
 his distress. 
 
 248 
 
A MAN UNJUSTLY CONDEMNED 249 
 
 A Great-Souled Man- 
 
 The author of the book of Job was a victim of this 
 cruel belief. He probably lived within a century of 
 Nehemiah's time, either before or after. We can infer 
 something about the facts of his life from his book. In a 
 general way, although not in detail, his own experiences 
 are probably reflected in the main character of the book. 
 He belonged to the class of " wise men." No doubt 
 he had many pupils and occupied a position of honor 
 in the community. Few teachers ever inspired their 
 hearers with nobler ideals, for he was fiUed with a great 
 love for justice and mercy and truth. The thirty-first 
 chapter of his book is one of the greatest descriptions 
 of a righteous man to be found in aU literature. It is 
 too little known and appreciated. It has been said that 
 its sentences " prick the conscience like needles." The 
 man who wrote it was one of God's noblemen. He was 
 ptire in heart, a friend of the fatherless and the widow, 
 a champion of the oppressed. He reverenced all human 
 beings, even slaves, as created in the image of God. 
 He was just and honorable in all things. He walked with 
 God, and was conscious of God's presence with him from 
 day to day. 
 
 The Coming op Adveristy 
 
 Into this quiet, happy life as a respected friend and 
 neighbor and a revered moral counsellor, came misfortune. 
 Perhaps it was an epidemic of disease sweeping away his 
 children. Perhaps it was the loss of his property. 
 Perhaps it was some bodily infirmity. We can only 
 infer from his book that it was very painful and that 
 the facts regarding it were known by all. 
 
 Such a misfortune would have been hard enough to 
 bear at any time and under any circumstances. But far 
 worse than the misfortune itself, to this man's sensitive 
 nature, was the social ostracism and unfeeling con- 
 demnation, to which in those days such a sufferer found 
 himself subjected. His neighbors whispered among them- 
 
250 THE STORY OP OUR BIBLE 
 
 selves as he passed them. His old friends became cold 
 to him. When wistftdly he stretched out his hands 
 towards them, they rebuffed him. Formerly he had 
 been a leader. 
 
 " When I went forth to the gate unto the city, 
 When I prepared my seat in the broad place, 
 The young men saw me and hid themselves; 
 The aged rose up and stood; 
 The princes refrained from talking 
 And laid their hand on their mouth." (Job 29 : 7-8.) 
 
 Now, however, he is treated with disrespect and even 
 contempt. 
 
 " But now, I am become their song. 
 Yea, I am a byword unto them; 
 They abhor me, they stand aloof from me, 
 And spare not to spit at the sight of me." (Job 30:9-10.) 
 
 Those who had grudges against him invented lies about 
 him, which were widely believed. Like the Jewish 
 officer Dreyfus in the French army, or the apostle 
 Paul among his own people, he was reduced to the posi- 
 tion of an outcast and a pariah. 
 
 The Need of God's Sympathy 
 
 Such men as Paul could still turn to God, when for- 
 saken by their fellowmen, and find comfort in the 
 assurance that God understood all. But the author of 
 Job was denied that supreme solace, for he himself had 
 been trained in the beliefs of his time, and supposed 
 that God was punishing him. To be sure, God was 
 supposed to know all things, and it would seem that 
 He must know that this man was not what his neighbors 
 said. But why then was God sending this suffering? 
 So the man could only keep saying to himself, " Even 
 God does not understand! Why does He think that I 
 am wicked? What have J done? Why does He not 
 love me any more? " 
 
A MAN UNJUSTLY CONDEMNED 251 
 
 * 
 
 He was haunted by the desire to meet God somehow 
 face to face, so that he cotdd explain to Him his side of 
 the case. 
 
 " that I knew where I might find Hitn, 
 That I might come even to His throne. 
 
 " I would order my cause before him, 
 And fin my mouth with arguments. 
 I would know the words which he would answer me. 
 And imderstand what he would say to me. 
 WoTold he contend with me in the greatness of his power? 
 Nay but he would give heed unto me." (Job 23: 2-6.) 
 
 Sometimes he dreamed of a future life beyond the grave 
 when he would see and talk with God, and the clouds 
 of misunderstanding between them would all be rolled 
 away. 
 
 " If a man die shall he hve again? 
 All the days of my warfare would I wait; 
 Thou wouldst call, and I would answer thee, 
 Thou wouldst yearn for me, the work of thy hands." (Job 
 14: 14-15.) 
 
 Thus he became one of those who first taught the world 
 the value of the hope of immortality. 
 
 Finding God by a New Path 
 
 He did not need to wait for a future life, however, 
 before his longings were satisfied. In the midst of his 
 despair the thought came to him, perhaps the old doctrine 
 was not wholly true. Perhaps we should not suppose 
 that all human sorrow is the result of sin and is to be 
 interpreted as punishment from God. God is infinitely 
 greater and wiser than we; surely He may have a purpose 
 in sending pain, which we cannot map out in our liftle 
 human creeds. Who are we to think that we can under- 
 stand the plans and purposes of God? 
 
 " Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? 
 Declare, if thou hast understanding. 
 
252 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Whereupon were the foundations of the earth fastened 
 Or who laid the cornerstone thereof: 
 When the morning stars sang together, 
 And all the sons of God shouted for joy? 
 
 " Or who shut up the sea with doors 
 When it brake forth and issued out of the womb: 
 When I made clouds the garment thereof, 
 And thick darkness a swaddling-band for it? 
 
 " And marked out for it my bound, 
 And set bars and doors, 
 
 And said. Hitherto shalt thou come but no further, 
 And here shall thy proud waves be stayed. ' ' (Job 38:6-11.) 
 
 As he reflected, other facts came to mind which bore 
 out this new idea. He had known others who had 
 suffered much and had been called sinners, but he now 
 began to believe that they too had been innocent. He 
 knew, that some of those upon whom fortune seemed to 
 smile were really scoundrels. The more he thought 
 about it, the more certain he became that that old and 
 universally accepted belief was a mistaken one. 
 
 " But then, it follows," he thought, " that my own 
 troubles are not necessarily a sign of God's displeasure. 
 I may believe that God after all does understand; He 
 is not punishing me; He loves me still." So like some 
 sobbing child who has mistakenly supposed that his 
 father has rebuked him, this troubled heart found peace 
 in the Divine Father's arms: " My child," God seemed 
 to say, " it was you who did not understand." 
 
 The existence of evil in the world is one of the problems 
 which mankind has not yet solved. This great man, 
 through his own experience and his own longings, was 
 led to take one important step towards its solution. 
 He was at least able to refute the old theory that good 
 fortune is always a reward for right conduct and that 
 evil fortune is always retribution for wrong-doing. Did 
 he ever ask the further question, "What then is the true 
 explanation of sorrow and pain? " Probably not. In 
 
A MAN UNJUSTLY CONDEMI^ED 253 
 
 all likelihood he was content to have demolished that 
 old doctrine which had led him to suppose that God 
 did not understand him. No matter what misfortune 
 might come, or how he might be accused by men, he 
 could never again be estranged from God; for now he 
 sould say, " My Father knows that I am guiltless. " 
 
254 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. In addition to sickness and loss of property, the following 
 have been frequently considered evidences of a vicious dis- 
 position : insanity, drunkenness, crime. To what extent should 
 they be classed as misfortunes? 
 
 2. What great message has the author of Job for. all who 
 are unjustly condemned and despised? 
 
 3. Hdw may we explain the wiUingness of prophets and 
 reformers to face criticism for the sake of what they believe 
 to be right? 
 
 4. Mention one or two favorite verses or passages from the 
 book of Job. (Suggested readings, Job 29-31.) 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. At about what time in the history of Judah was the 
 book of Job written? 
 
 2. What was the orthodox belief of the Jews at this time 
 regarding pain and trouble? 
 
 3. What kind of a man was the author of Job ? 
 
 4. Why did Job's friends and neighbors think him a sinner? 
 
 5. Why did he suppose that God also misjudged him, and 
 considered him a sinner? 
 
 6. For what did he chiefly long? 
 
 7. Why did he dream of a life after death? 
 
 8. How did he come at last to a truer idea of God's at- 
 titude toward him? 
 
 9. What comforting faith did he fhns gain? 
 
CHAPTER XXXII 
 
 A MAN WHO THOUGHT FOR HIMSELF 
 
 The Story of the Book of Job 
 
 Into the hands of the man whose life-story is told 
 in the preceding chapter, there fell one day a small 
 book which greatly stirred him. It was a story about 
 a certain righteous man named Job who lived in the 
 land of Uz, east of Canaan. At the beginning of the 
 story Job was very prosperous. He had great posses- 
 sions, such as lands, houses, sheep and cattle. He was 
 also happy in his family life, having many sons and 
 daughters. Nor did this prosperity make him proud, 
 but he continued to live as an humble and upright servant 
 of Jehovah. 
 
 One day, however, there was a council in heaven 
 and all the angels came to report to Jehovah what they 
 had been doing. Among them was one called " the 
 Satan." In those days this word "Satan" was not used 
 as meaning the Evil One, but rather as the designation 
 of a heavenly official whose special duty, as people sup- 
 posed, was to report to Jehovah any evil that needed 
 to be investigated. On this occasion, the Satan brought 
 an accusation against Job, declaring that his seeming 
 goodness was prompted by selfish motives. " Doth 
 Job serve God for naught? " he asked. " Take away 
 his prosperity and he will curse thee to thy face." So, 
 in order to give Job a chance to prove these charges 
 false, Jehovah gave permission to the Satan to bring 
 trouble upon him. 
 
 It came to pass, therefore, that all his flocks and herds 
 were destroyed and all his property swept away. His 
 sons and daughters were slain; and at last, Job himself 
 
 J255„ 
 
256 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 was stricken down with leprosy, the most dreaded of .all 
 diseases. His wife besought him to curse God and die. 
 Three friends came to comfort him, EHphaz the Temanite, 
 Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite, and they 
 were so horrified by his condition that they sat in silence 
 for seven days. But through it all Job remained patient 
 and loyal to Jehovah. " Jehovah gave," he said, " and 
 Jehovah hath taken away. Blessed be the name of 
 Jehovah." 
 
 The Origin of a Great Literary Masterpiece 
 
 With the teachings of this story, the wise man of 
 whom we are speaking found himself in agreement. 
 It showed that God sometimes allows even innocent 
 persons to suffer. He also, like Job in the story, had 
 learned to cling to his faith in God no matter what 
 troubles may come. He did not believe, however, 
 that such trust ought to consist in submission to the 
 mistaken ideas of other men about God and God's 
 dealings. 
 
 As he pondered over the story he felt within him the 
 stirrings of a great idea. He determined to add to it 
 a series of dialogues between Job and those three friends 
 who came to comfort him. Possibly he got the idea 
 of the dialogues from the Greek dramas, or from the 
 famous dialogues of Plato, the great Athenian philosopher. 
 At any rate, he produced a masterpiece of the imagination 
 which is more like a drama than anything else in the 
 literature of the ancient Hebrews, and which in literary 
 greatness has only three or four equals in the literature 
 of the world. His purpose was to help other troubled 
 and disconsolate souls who had lost their sense of God's 
 presence and sympathy because of their misfortunes. 
 He would show through the mouth of Job how he himself 
 had struggled and agonized and how only by rejecting 
 the usual belief about rewards and punishments had he 
 found peace at last. He was filled with a passionate 
 
A MAN WHO THOUGHT FOR HIMSELF 257 
 
 desire to refute forever that old doctrine which had 
 cruelly tortured so many. 
 
 Job, the Three Friends, and God 
 
 The author represents the three friends as accepting 
 the orthodox belief. Hence, like the author's old neigh- 
 bors, they cannot give Job any real sympathy. In- 
 stead, they keep trying to make him confess that he has 
 been a sinner. (See Job 4:17-19, and 22:5-7.) Job 
 at last cries out against them. " Miserable comforters 
 are ye all." (Job 16:2.) In answer to the charges of 
 his friends. Job insists that he knows of no great crimes 
 to confess. 
 
 " TiU I die I- will not put away mine integrity from me. 
 My righteousness I hold fast and wiU not let it go." (Job 
 27:4-6.) 
 
 The most remarkable passages in these dialogues are 
 those which express Job's varying attitudes toward 
 God. They reveal to us the tortured writhings of those 
 dreadful days in the author's own experience when he 
 thought God was angry with him. Job is represented 
 sometimes as feeling that God is a kind of revengeful 
 Giant, or an omnipresent Spy, whose eye was constantly 
 upon him with a hostile stare. 
 
 " Atn I a demon of the abyss, or a sea-monster, 
 That thou settest a watch over me? 
 How long wilt thou not look away from me 
 Nor let me alone tiU I swallow down my spittle?" (Job 
 7: 12-19.) 
 
 Again and again Job points out the wrongs of human 
 society, and even charges God with being responsible. 
 
 " Wherefore do the wicked live, 
 Become old, wax mighty in power? " (Job 21 : 7.) 
 
 " The earth is given into the hand of the wicked. 
 He covereth the faces of the judges thereof. 
 If it be not He [that is, God] then who is it ?" (Job 9 : 24.) 
 
258 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 At the same time, along with these feelings of resent- 
 ment at a God who seemed so unjust, are mingled ex- 
 pressions of longing for reconciliation with the divine 
 Companion. Sometimes he dreams of a vindication in 
 the eyes of future generations, or better still in an in- 
 dividual life after death. Frorh beginning to end his 
 chief cry is for a hearing before God, that he might 
 defend himself and prove his innocence. In a thrilling 
 climax he declares that the very charges brought against 
 him will prove a wreath of honor. 
 
 " O that I had one to hear me. 
 Lo, here is my signature, let the Almighty answer me! 
 Oh that I had the indictment, which mine enemy hath 
 
 written. 
 Surely I would carry it upon my shoulder; 
 I would bind it to me as a crown. 
 I would account for all my steps. 
 As a prince would I go near unto him." (Job 31 :35-37.) 
 
 This great challenge is represented as bringing its 
 response: " Then Jehovah answered Job out of the 
 whirlwind." In the speech which is placed in the mouth 
 of Jehovah the greatness and mystery of the universe 
 are emphasized with unparalleled beauty and literary 
 grandeur. (See Job 38-40.) In this way Job is invited 
 to raise his eyes to the infinite horizon of God's universe 
 and in its exhaustless mystery to find room for faith. God 
 ^s not tied down in His actions to the fine-spun theories 
 of the three friends; He may not be angry even though 
 He does send pain. On the other hand, those who charge 
 God with injustice in His government of the world are 
 hasty and presumptuous. Good men do suffer and wicked 
 men do prosper; in this Job was right; but God may have 
 reasons for permitting these things which we caimot 
 fathom. 
 
 The author closed his book with the last part of the 
 old prose story in which Jehovah condemns the three 
 friends, and praises Job. The latter had at least been 
 
A MAN WHO THOUGHT FOR HIMSELF 259 
 
 # 
 
 honest, even though presumptuous, and he thus found 
 the vindication for which he longed. 
 
 Later Additions to the Book op Job 
 
 A book so bold and radical as this one naturally made 
 a sensation wherever it was circulated. Many of the 
 utterances which the author had placed in the mouth 
 of Job were regarded as blasphemous. No doubt the 
 neighbors looked with even greater horror than ever 
 upon him. " We were sure he was a wicked man; now 
 he has proved it," they said. Children went around 
 by another street to avoid passing his house. In the 
 market place, men pointed after him when he passed, 
 and said, " There goes the infidel." 
 
 There is reason to believe that some parts of the book, 
 which were most shocking to orthodox readers, were 
 cut out of the copies from which our present version is 
 descended. We would give much to have them restored 
 to us. Additions were also made. Our present book of Job 
 seems indeed like a kind of symposium, in which a number 
 of different voices are heard. It is generally agreed 
 that chapters 32-37, in which a new character, Elihu, 
 is introduced, were added by a later writer, who was 
 offended by some of the- charges made by Job against 
 the Almighty, but who did not seem to understand 
 the original author's meaning. 
 
 We, today, are perhaps better able to understand and 
 appreciate the meaning of these great dialogues than 
 any previous generation. The world is just awakening 
 to the value of independent thought on the part of each 
 individual. It is just learning that the first duty of 
 every man is to be honest with himself. " Ye are forgers 
 of lies," says Job, in disgust with the arguments of his 
 friends. 
 
 " WiU ye speak what is wrong for God, 
 And utter falsehoods for his sake? 
 Will ye be partisans for God, , 
 
260 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Be special pleaders in his cause? 
 
 Would it be well, should he search you out? 
 
 Could ye deceive him, as you would deceive a man? 
 
 Verily he would punish you. 
 
 If dishonestly you favored him." Qob 13: 4-10.) 
 
 Such a book as this is just what we need today, to help 
 us to stand on our own feet, to see with our eyes, to' 
 think our own thoughts and to follow the truth, wherever 
 it may lead. 
 
A MAN WHO THOUGHT FOR HIMSELF 261 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. Why were the neighbors of the author of Job so opposed 
 to his new ideas? 
 
 2. Did Job do wrong in doubting for a time the justice of 
 God's dealings? 
 
 3. Is it right to doubt such reUgious beliefs as the existence 
 of God, and the futtire life? 
 
 4. What passages in the book of Job do you like the best ? 
 (Suggested readings, Job 1-3, or 19, or 38-40.) 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What kind of a being was " the Satan," according to 
 the old story of Job? 
 
 2. What accusation did the Satan bring against Job ? 
 
 3. Why did Jehovah permit the Satan to bring trouble 
 upon Job? 
 
 4. What did Job say, when his wife urged him to " curse 
 God and die"? 
 
 5. What was added to this story of Job, by the great 
 thinker about whom we studied in the preceding chapter? 
 
 6. What was his purpose in writing the poetical dialogues? 
 
 7. Why does Job, in these dialogues, say to his three friends, 
 " Miserable comforters are ye aU"? 
 
 8. How does Job reply to their charges against him? 
 
 9. What accusations does Job make against God? 
 
262 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 10. What is the new idea that Jehovah brings to him " out 
 of the whirlwind"? 
 
 11. What changes were made in the book of Job by later 
 writers, and why? 
 
 Notebook Work 
 
 Write in your notebook brief explanations of the following 
 famous passages from the book of Job: (1) 19:23-25 (see 
 marginal rendering Vindicator, instead of Redeemer). (2) 
 23:3-9. 
 
CHAPTER XXXIII 
 A PESSIMIST AND AN OPTIMIST 
 
 ECCLESIASTES AND ECCLESIASTICUS 
 
 Ecclesiastes and Ecclesiasticus : what a curious paii 
 of book titles! So closely similar that one needs to 
 look twice to distinguish them. These two books are 
 also closely related in other ways than the similarity 
 of names. They were written about the same time 
 (200 B.C.), and probably in the same city, Jerusalem, 
 and quite possibly by . men who were personally ac- 
 quainted. Yet in general character no two books could 
 be more different. One of them, Ecclesiastes, was 
 written by a pessimist. The other, Ecclesiasticus, was 
 written by an optimist. 
 
 The Author of Ecclesiastes 
 
 The pessimist was probably a priest in the temple 
 at Jerusalem who wrote in his old age. He is frequently 
 referred to as Koheleth, although this was his assumed 
 title rather than his proper name. The word Ecclesiastes 
 is the Greek translation and it is translated " the 
 Preacher " in our English Bible. He was a professional 
 " wise man." We know nothing of his life except what 
 we can infer from his writings, and from the general 
 conditions of his times. 
 
 In those days, Palestine was ruled from Egypt by 
 the Greek dynasty known as the Ptolemies. Most of 
 these monarchs as individuals were good-natured and 
 well-meaning enough, but weak. Their Jewish subjects 
 had much of which to complain. The subordinate 
 officials who were placed over the Jews were a set of 
 
 263 
 
264 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 petty grafters. " The man higher up," is not a modem 
 invention. Both the man, and name for him, existed 
 in Koheleth's time. " If thou seest the oppression of 
 the poor, and the violent taking away of justice and 
 righteousness in a province, do not wonder at it, for one 
 high officer is watching above another, and there are those 
 who are still higher up." (Eccl. 5: 8.) This means that 
 the minor oflicials were practically compelled by their 
 superiors to extort money from their subjects. The 
 larger share of this money was paid over to these higher 
 officers, and to those " still higher up." 
 
 Under such a government as this the Jews naturally did 
 not find life very inspiring. Its prizes seemed to go, not to 
 the most worthy, but to those with a " pull " ; while for the 
 lack of a " puU " one was constantly in danger of suffering 
 some cruel injustice. Many indeed found inspiration 
 for worthy effort, in the hope that Israel would some 
 day be restored to her former glory as an independent 
 nation. But as the years and centuries dragged by, 
 this hope grew more and more shadowy. Under these 
 conditions, men had few incentives to progress, and life 
 lost its interest and zest. 
 
 Now our " preacher " Koheleth seems to have been 
 personally very prosperous. He probably had plenty of 
 money ; he had been given the advantages of an education, 
 and occupied a high social position; and yet, he was a 
 pessimist. He asked himself the question, " Is life worth 
 living? " ■ — and answered, " No. It is mere emptiness." 
 " Vanity of vanities, vanity of vanities, all is vanity." 
 (Eccl. 1 : 2.) He could not see that the bitter experiences 
 of life led to any good., Men can endure bravely almost 
 any amotint of suffering, if only it leads to something 
 worth while, but to him existence seemed to be a tire- 
 some treadmill, going round and round, without accom- 
 plishing anything. " The wind goeth toward the south, 
 and tumeth about imto the north. All the rivers run 
 into the sea, yet the sea is not ftdl. All things are full 
 of weariness ; man cannot utter it. The eye is not satisfied 
 
A PESSIMIST AND AN OPTIMIST 265 
 
 with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing. That which 
 has been is that which will l>e; and that which has been 
 done is that which shall be done; and there is no new 
 thing under the sun." (Eccl. 1: 6-9.) 
 
 There were indeed some in those days who were be- 
 ginning to look forward to a life after death, thinking 
 that the wrongs of this life might be set right in the 
 next. (See Chapter XXVII.) But Koheleth could 
 only say. What proof have you that man does not die 
 as the beasts die? (Eccl. 3: 11-21.) 
 
 Koheleth's Book — Ecclesiastes 
 
 The message which Koheleth seems to convey in writing 
 his book is, enjoy life as best you can from day to day. 
 He asstimed the point of view of King Solomon. With 
 vast wealth and power, Solomon, who was reputed to 
 be exceedingly wise, surely must have been able to enjoy 
 all that the world had to offer of pleasure and happiness. 
 So Koheleth speaks in the character of Solomon, and tells 
 how he put all things to the test; how he surrounded 
 himself with all conceivable pleasures : vineyards, gardens 
 and parks; men-servants and maid-servants; musical 
 instruments; men-singers and women-singers; gold, silver 
 and precious stones; and his conclusion is, that " all 
 is vanity and a striving after wind." (Eccl. 1:14, 
 2:11.) 
 
 What then is his advice to his fellowmen? Simply 
 this, that " there is nothing better for a man, than that 
 he should eat and drink and make his soul enjoy good 
 in his labor." In other words, do not sacrifice the 
 pleasure of today for some fancied goal to be attained 
 tomorrow. Do not spend your strength in toilsome 
 striving. " Be not righteous overmuch; neither make 
 thyself overwise." (Eccl. 7:16.) On the other hand, 
 he does not counsel extreme dissipation, for that in 
 turn brings pain. " Be not wicked overmuch; why 
 shouldest thou die before thy time? " (Eccl. 7: 17.) 
 
 The kernel of his whole philosophy is in the closing 
 
266 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 section, where he bids the young to enjoy themselves 
 in their youth and to snatch a few fleeting pleasures 
 while they may. For quickly the evil days will draw 
 nigh, and " the years when thou shalt say I have no 
 pleasure in them." A queer book for a " preacher " 
 to write! one might well exclaim. Some have declared 
 it entirely out of place in the Bible. On behaH of Kohe- 
 leth, however, it should be said that he was evidently 
 sincere; that he himself was not sensual or degraded; 
 and that he was saddened by the wrongs which he saw 
 inflicted on the helpless and the poor, among his fellow- 
 men. Had he lived in a different age, he might have 
 seen life differently and might have written a different 
 kind of a book. 
 
 The Author ^of Ecclesiasticus 
 
 The optimist who wrote not Ecclesiastes but Ecclesias- 
 ticus was another Jewish wise man, named Joshua ben 
 Sira. This book is not included in the regular collection 
 of Old Testament books, but was preserved in a later 
 collection known as the " Apocrypha." You may per- 
 haps flnd these " Apocryphal books " in your old family 
 Bible or in the big pulpit Bible of your church, between 
 the Old and the New Testaments; and among them you 
 will find Ecclesiasticus. 
 
 Like Koheleth, Joshua ben Sira probably lived in 
 Jerusalem, and he also may have been a priest. We 
 may reasonably suppose that the two men were ac- 
 quainted. Perhaps they were accustomed to discuss 
 together in the temple courts the deep questions of life. 
 It is certain at any rate that Ben Sira was well acquainted 
 with Koheleth's pessimistic ideas, for he plainly alludes 
 to them in his own writings. In case the two men did 
 occasionally argue together the conversation might have 
 run somewhat as follows: 
 
 " Ben Sira," Koheleth would say, " you are mistaken. 
 All things are vanity and a striving after wind. For 
 what hath a man of all his labor, and of the striving 
 
A PESSIMIST AND AN OPTIMIST 267 
 
 of his heart, wherein he laboreth under the sun? For 
 all his days are sorrows, and his task vexation; yea, 
 even in the night his heart taketh no rest." (Eccl. 
 2:22-23.) Then ben Sira would reply, "My friend, I 
 know that 
 
 " Great travail is created for every man, 
 And a heavy yoke is upon the sons of Adam; 
 From him that sitteth on a throne of glory 
 Even unto him that is humbled in earth and ashes; 
 From him that weareth purple and a crown, 
 Even unto him that is clothed with a hempen frock. " (Ecclus. 
 40: 1-4.) 
 
 "At the same time there are many other good things which 
 make life sweet. 
 
 " The life of one that laboreth, and is contented, shall be made 
 
 sweet. 
 A friend and a companion never meet amiss, 
 And a wife with her husband is above both." (Ecclus. 40 : 18- 
 
 23.) 
 
 " Seek not things that are too hard for thee 
 And search not out things that are above thy strength. 
 For the conceit of many hath led them astray; 
 And evil surmising hath caused their judgment to slip." 
 (Ecclus. 3:21-24.) 
 
 The Book of Ecclesiasticus 
 
 Ben Sira's book is probably a collection of the best 
 of his addresses to his pupils. Its spirit is absolutely 
 different from that of Koheleth, as expressed in Ec- 
 clesiastes. They are both " Wisdom " books but Ben 
 Sira's book is cheerful and optimistic in its outlook on 
 Hfe. In many ways it is like the book of Proverbs, 
 being full of pithy, practical good sense. For example, 
 it praises good health. 
 
 " Better is a poor man who has a sound and strong constitution, 
 Than a rich man who is infirm in body." (Ecclus. 29 : 14-1,6.) 
 
 It also gives homely advice regarding table manners. 
 
268 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 " Eat, as becometh a man, those things which are set before 
 thee; 
 And eat not greediJy, lest thou be hated." (Ecclus. 31: 16-28.) 
 
 The chief difference between Koheleth and Ben Sira 
 is that the latter counsels an earnest and purposeful 
 life. He sees clearly that there are certain goals for 
 which it is well worth while to strive. One of these is 
 true wisdom: 
 
 " My son, gather instruction from thy youth up; 
 And even unto hoar hairs thou shalt find wisdom." (Ecclus. 
 6: 18-28.) 
 
 Another is justice and kindness to one's fellowmen : 
 
 " Be as a father unto the fatherless. 
 And instead of a husband unto their mother. 
 So shalt thou be as a son of the Most High, 
 And he shall love thee more than thy mother doth." (Ecclus. 
 4: 10.) 
 
 Above all other satisfactions ^ih life is the reverent 
 worship of God. 
 
 " Riches and strength will lift up the heart, 
 And the fear of the Lord is above both. 
 The fear of the Lord is as a garden of blessing. 
 And covereth a man above all glory." (Ecclus. 40:26-27.) 
 
A PESSIMIST AND AN OPTIMIST 269 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 ■ 1, Read Eccl. 7 : 26-28. What do these verses per- 
 haps indicate as to Koheleth's family life? 
 
 2. Read Ecd. 1:12 — 2:26. In what verses, if any, does 
 Koheleth mention love and unselfishness as a possible source 
 of happiness? 
 
 3. Do you discover any facts in connection with the above 
 two questions which help to explain Koheleth's pessimism? 
 
 4. Of the good things in life mentioned by Ben Sira, which 
 seems to you the best? 
 
 5. Compare Ben Sira's attitude toward injustice and op- 
 pression with that of Koheleth. Which was the more praise- 
 worthy? 
 
 6. What is your favorite verse or passage of those quoted 
 in this chapter? (Suggested readings, Eccl. 1 — 2.) 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. When and where did the man probably Hve whom we 
 call Koheleth? 
 
 2. What book in the Old Testament did he write? 
 
 3. What discotiraging conditions were there in Koheleth's 
 time which helped to make him a pessimist? 
 
270 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 4. What reasons does he give in his book for calling life evil? 
 
 5. What is his advice to his fellowmen? 
 
 6. When and where did Joshua Ben Sira probably live? 
 
 7. What hook did he write? 
 
 8. Where may it be fotind in an English translation? 
 
 9. What was Ben Sira's ptirpose in writing this book? 
 
 10. What advice did he give on the following subjects: 
 good health; table manners, self-respect; kindness to one's 
 fellows; the worship of God? 
 
. CHAPTER XXXIV 
 
 GREEK-SPEAKING JEWS WHO WERE TRUE 
 TO THEIR FAITH 
 
 The Greek Old Testament and the 
 Wisdom of Solomon 
 
 When Alexander the Great conquered the Persian 
 Bfflpire, the Greeks and the Jews, the two leading races 
 ot the ancient world, came for the first time in close 
 contact with each other. Each race had much to be 
 proud of in its history and civilization, but the differences 
 between them were striking. The Greeks had beautiful 
 works of art", a beautiful literature, and a remarkable 
 philosophy. The Jews had little art, and must have 
 seemed to the Greeks scarcely civilized. Yet ia their 
 laws and in the moral and religious teachings of their 
 prophets they had something far greater than all the 
 glories of Athens. 
 
 It was natural that two races so iatensely proud should 
 clash. Among the Jews, some indeed became admirers 
 of the Greeks and the new Greek ways. They gave 
 their children Greek names, Jason instead of Joshua, 
 and James instead of Jacob. Worse still, they were 
 sometimes even ashamed of their own people and tried 
 to hide the fact that they were Jews. They ceased to 
 keep the Sabbath, and went no more to the synagogue. 
 Others, on the contrary, could see nothing but evil in 
 the Greeks, and hated their whole civilization. 
 
 The Greek Translation of the Old Testament 
 
 Within a century after the conquests of Alexander the 
 Great, it is probable that Greek was almost universally 
 spoken and understood in all the countries around the 
 
 271 
 
272 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 eastern part of the Mediterranean Sea. It became 
 the language of commerce, like English, in some parts of 
 the world today. As a result, the Jews who were engaged 
 in business in these countries forgot within a few genera- 
 tions their own language and spoke only. Greek. There 
 were large colonies of Greek-spealdng Jews in many 
 parts of Egypt, especially in the city of Alexandria. 
 There were Jews also in Antioch, the beautiful city 
 which was built by Antiochus, one of Alexander's generals. 
 There were Jews in Asia Minor and in Greece. In fact 
 the Jews were scattered throughout all these countries 
 which Alexander's armies had conquered, and for the 
 most part they spoke only Greek. 
 
 This made it necessary that the books of the Jewish 
 religion should be translated into Greek, if these Jews 
 in foreign lands were not to forget Jehovah, the God 
 of their fathers. Therefore, about the year 250 B.C., 
 the five books of the J>aw were translated into Greek, 
 by certain Jewish scholars in Egypt. According to 
 tradition they were encouraged in this work by Ptolemy, 
 the Greek ruler of Egypt, who was said to be desirous 
 of learning more about the Jewish religion. It was said 
 that not only the law but also all the other books were 
 translated at the same time, by seventy-two men, six 
 elders from each of the twelve tribes of Israel, sent 
 down to Alexandria from Jerusalem at the request of 
 Ptolemy. For this reason the Greek Old Testament 
 has commonly been called the Septuagint, or the book 
 of the Seventy. As a matter of fact, however, the work 
 was done by different men, at different times, extending 
 over a period of at least a hundred years. 
 
 In spite of the inevitable imperfections of the transla- 
 tion, this Greek Old Testament exerted a great influence. 
 It became for a time the Bible of the majority of the 
 Jews. The New Testament writers in quoting from the 
 Old Testament, in nearly all cases, used the Greek 
 version. As a result, we notice in our English Bible, 
 certain differences between the quotations as they appear 
 
GREEK-SPEAKING JEWS 273 
 
 # 
 
 in the New Testament and the original Old Testament 
 form. Proper names, for example (in the Authorized 
 Version), are spelled differently; Noe, for Noah, and 
 Esaias and Jeremias, for Isaiah and Jeremiah. Through 
 this translation many Gentiles became interested in the 
 religion of the one God, Jehovah. Thus, not only were 
 the Jews in foreign lands kept loyal to the faith of their 
 fathers, but more than that Judaism was transformed 
 into a missionary religion. When the first Christian 
 missionaries began to preach to Gentiles, they found 
 many who were already interested in their message, 
 through reading this translation of the Old Testament. 
 It was, therefore, an important step in the preparation of 
 the world for Christianity. 
 
 Religious Truths among the Greeks 
 
 With the Greek language there" came to the Jews the 
 possibility of reading books by Greek writers. Many of 
 these writings were masterpieces. While some of the 
 Jews were captivated by them, others felt nothing but 
 contempt for all things Greek. They would have scorned 
 as heathen the great thinkers of Athens, and even to 
 touch one of their books would have seemed to them a 
 pollution. 
 
 We may imagine one of these men passing through the 
 public square of a Greek city, perhaps Alexandria, and 
 stopping for a few moments to rest in the shade of a 
 fountain. A man was speaking near by, and a group 
 of listeners was gathered about him, just as in Jewish 
 cities a wise man gathered his pupils around him in the 
 " city gate." These people appeared to be Greeks, or 
 "heathen," as the Jew considered them. He could 
 not help overhearing some of the words of the speaker, 
 and they appealed to him as reasonable and true, and 
 indeed strangely like some things in the writings of the 
 prophets and wise men of his own people. The speaker 
 proclaimed the existence of one God, and ridiculed 
 idol-worship. " There is one God," he said, " supreme 
 
274 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 among gods and men, resembling mortals neither in 
 form nor in mind." 
 
 "That man has been reading our book of Isaiah," 
 thought the Jew, " where the prophet says, 'My ways are 
 higher than yotiT ways, and my thoughts than your 
 thoughts.' " So he drew nearer to the circle, and the 
 speaker greeted him with a friendly smile. After the 
 address was finished, the Jew lingered. He discovered 
 that the speaker, though a Greek, was a lover of wisdom, 
 or a " philosopher." He had never heard of the prophet 
 Isaiah, nor of any of the Jewish books, but was anxious 
 to know more of them. So they agreed to meet again, 
 and exchange books. " You bring me your Isaiah," 
 said the Greek, " and I will give you a copy of my Plato." 
 Thus was begun an acquaintance which opened the eyes 
 of the Jew to a number of astonishing facts. He found 
 that the more intelligent Greeks believed in one God, 
 as did the Jews. He found many other noble teachings in 
 the writings of such men as Plato, nor were these teach- 
 ings borrowed from the Jews, for some of these ideas 
 had seldom been thought of as yet, even in Israel. For 
 example, he came upon the idea of a life after death. 
 The author of Job had suggested this idea, and some of 
 the Psalm-writers also, but others like Koheleth had 
 ridiculed it. It was generally believed among the Jews 
 of his day that death ends all, or at any rate all that is 
 worth while in life. But Socrates, the greatest teacher 
 among the Greeks, who was put to death for his loyalty 
 to the truth, had looked forward with eagerness to a 
 future life. 
 
 This thought made a deep impression on the Jew. 
 If we are not mere creatures of a moment, then that 
 explains our strange sense of the infinite importance of 
 righteousness. The humblest human life is thus lifted 
 to a new glory and dignity. " God has spoken through 
 these great men of Greece," thought the Jew. "And 
 we Jews may learn from them. Clearly God's spirit 
 
GREEK-SPEAKING JEWS 275 
 
 is not confined to Israel, but speaks to the hearts of 
 men of all nations, or to as many as are willing to listen." 
 
 A Religious Book by a Greek-Speaking Jew 
 
 This new message of a future- life was much needed 
 just at that time. The popular book among the younger 
 Jews was Koheleth, with his advice to '■' enjoy life while 
 it lasts, for there is nothing beyond." These young 
 men invariably went further than Koheleth had intended, 
 and indulged in all kinds of dissolute vices. The whole 
 atmosphere of a Greek city like Alexandria or Antioch 
 seemed to encourage such a life. Most men were seeking 
 only to get money, in order to gratify their selfish desires. 
 Many even of the strict Jews were thoroughly selfish. 
 They were careful to keep the law of Moses, to be sure, 
 and prided themselves on being better than the heathen, 
 but their lives were taken up with mere money-making. 
 Such a religion did not command the respect of the 
 yotmger men, who openly thr,ew off all restraints. They 
 justified themselves in their wicked deeds by quoting 
 not only from the Jew, Koheleth, but also from certain 
 Greek writers, who argued that there is no God, and that 
 all things happen by chance. 
 
 Now this Jew of whom we are speaking felt that he 
 was specially qualified to combat these errors, for he 
 was acquainted with the writings of the Greeks. He 
 himself had learned from them to believe in immortality. 
 He, therefore, entered upon an heroic life as a moral 
 reformer. In the face of taunts and persecution* both 
 from bigoted Jews who reproached him for his friendship 
 with Greeks, and from the renegade Jews who ridiculed 
 all religion, he continued to stand for the highest ideals 
 of justice and love. He told his fellow- Jews that the 
 greatest of the Greeks had by no means approved of 
 selfishness and injustice, but that their teachings were 
 in harmony with the noblest teachings of the prophets 
 and wise men of Israel ; that indeed they had wonderfully 
 
276 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 supplemented the prophets by showing that this life 
 on earth is but the preparation for a life everlasting. 
 
 Finally, he wrote a remarkable book, in which he set 
 down those ideas for which he had so long been con- 
 tending. In some respects, it was a reply to the book 
 by Koheleth, Ecclesiastes. Like Koheleth, he wrote 
 in the name of Solomon. Hence the title of the book 
 is the Wisdom of Solomon. He made Solomon tell a 
 very different story, however, from that in Ecclesiastes; 
 not that, " the same event happeneth to the good and 
 bad, the wise and the foolish," but that a noble and 
 upright life is immortal; while the wages of sin is death. 
 
 " For God made not death 
 Neither deJighteth he -when, the living perish. 
 For righteousness is immortal, 
 
 But unrighteousness is the obtaining of death." (Wis. Sol. 
 1:3-15.) 
 
 This book, like that by Ben Sira, was not finally in- 
 cluded in the Old Testament, and is found only among 
 the Apocryphal books. It 'was probably a part of Paul's 
 Bible, however, and it probably wielded a great influence 
 on Paul and other early Christian leaders, and thus in- 
 directly it has been one of the great forces which have 
 helped mankind to believe in the life eternal. 
 
THE OLD CODEX AT SHECHEM. 
 From a photograph by Dwight L. Elmendorf. 
 
GREEK-SPEAKING JEWS » 277 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. How do you think Gentile Greeks first became interested 
 in the Greek Old Testament? 
 
 2. Of two Jews in Egypt, which would be most likely to 
 be true to his own. religion : one who tried to interest Gentiles 
 in the Old Testament; or one who cared nothing for such 
 missionary eflfort? Why? 
 
 3. Which Jews were most truly loyal to their own religion: 
 those who -were willing to read and learn from Greek books, 
 or those who would have nothing to do with them? Explain. 
 
 4. Do you think that we Christians may learn any religious 
 truth from the Hindus, Chinese, Japanese, and Mohammedans, 
 as the Jews learned from the Greeks ? 
 
 5. How would you answer the following common objection, 
 to foreign missions: " I do not believe in sending missionaries 
 to foreign lands. They have their own religions already,, 
 which may be better suited to them than ours"? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. Explain why it was necessary to translate the Old 
 Testament books into Greek. 
 
 2. When and where was the Pentateuch translated? 
 
 3. Over about how long a period of time did the entire 
 work of translation extend? 
 
278 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 4. On accotint of what tradition is this translation generally 
 called the Septuagint? 
 
 5. How did this translation prepare the way for Christianity ? 
 
 6. Mention three different ways in which different Jews 
 regarded Greek ideas. 
 
 7. Mention one important religious truth which the Jews 
 learned in part from the Greeks. 
 
 8. What did the author of the " Wisdom of Solomon " 
 think of the book of Ecclesiastes? 
 
 ' 9. In what language was this book written? 
 10. What was the author's chief message to his fellowmen? 
 
 Notebook Work 
 
 Find the book of the Wisdom of Solomon, in- the pulpit 
 Bible of your church, or elsewhere, and copy into your note- 
 book other quotations besides those in this chapter, teaching 
 the truth of immortality. For example, chapter 2 : 23-24, 
 5:15-16. 
 
 Would you say that this book teaches the immortality of 
 all hviman souls, or only of the good? 
 
CHAPTER XXXV 
 
 A STORY OP MARTYRDOM AND TRIUMPH 
 Daniel and I Maccabees 
 
 During the period when the Jews were ruled by the 
 Ptolemies (between 300 and 200 B.C.), the conflict 
 between the Greeks and Jews had been for the most 
 part in the field of ideas. Good had come to the Jews 
 as well as evil. Though some were led into wrong-doing 
 by the lower elements in Greek life, others received new 
 and valuable ideas regarding religious truth. 
 
 Soon after 200 B.C., however, Palestine was taken from 
 the Ptolemies by the Greek rulers of Antioch. In the 
 year 168 B.C., a young prince named Antiochus Epiphanes 
 came to the throne, and to the Jews his reign brought 
 nothing but trouble and sorrow. In the first place, he 
 was an enthusiast for Greek ideas, including the old 
 Greek religion with its worship of many gods; such as 
 Zeus, Hermes, and Athena; and it irritated him that 
 the Jews alone of aU his subjects refused to offer sacrifices 
 to Zeus. In the second place, he was in constant need of 
 money, and coveted the treasures in the Jerusalem 
 temple. When the Jews violently resisted his attempt 
 to enter and plunder the sacred place, he resolved to 
 crush out entirely this outlandish religion, which made 
 its devotees so stubborn and rebellious. Imagine the 
 horror of the Jews, when with his soldiers he placed 
 an altar to Zeus within the temple of Jehovah, and 
 sacrificed swine's flesh upon it. More than that, he sent 
 companies of soldiers throughout Judah, requiring all 
 the inhabitants to sacrifice to Zeus, and to eat swine's 
 flesh. Those who refused were put to death. It was also 
 made a crime to keep the Sabbath, or to have in one's 
 
 279 
 
280 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 possession a copy of the Law. There followed six years 
 or more of suffering and martyrdom, very similar to 
 the persecutions inflicted on the early Christians in the 
 Roman Empire. It is perhaps to these Jewish martyrs, 
 slain by Antiochus, that one verse in the eleventh chapter 
 of Hebrews refers: " They were stoned, they were sawn 
 a-sunder; they went about in sheepskins, in goatskins, 
 being destitute, afflicted, ill-treated (of whom the world 
 was not worthy) wandering in deserts and mountains 
 and caves, and the holes of the earth." (Heb. 11 : 37-38.) 
 
 God's Help for the Faithful. The Book of Daniel 
 
 In the story of the New Testament we found that the 
 Christians, in their times of persecution, were comforted 
 by a secret book, the book of Revelation. These Jewish 
 martyrs ' also had their secret book. It is preserved to 
 us as the latter half of the book of Daniel. 
 
 It was written in the darkest period of the persecution. 
 The author had seen his friends tortured before his eyes 
 because they would not permit swine's flesh to be choked 
 down their throats. He had seen mothers struck down 
 with their babes because they insisted on bringing them 
 up in the Jewish mianner. Very likely the book itself 
 was written in some one of the many caves, scattered 
 through the Judean hills. 
 
 In the early part of the book, the author tells a number 
 of old stories which had been handed down, about a 
 certain Daniel and his three friends, Jewish captives 
 in Babylon, in the time of Nebuchadrezzar and his 
 successors. These men, we read, refused to eat the food 
 which the Babylonian long set before them, and refused 
 also to worship the Babylonian idols. They were thrown 
 into fiery furnaces and dens of lions; but God was with 
 them, and saved their lives; and eventually they rose 
 to positions of honor in Babylon itself. The writer's 
 aim in telling these stories is plain. They were weU 
 calculated tc inspire the Jews of his own time to be 
 
MARTYRDOM AND TRIUMPH 281 
 
 ♦ 
 
 true to their religion in the face of all the terrible suffer- 
 ings which awaited them. 
 
 The latter half of the book consists of a series of visions, 
 in which the course of future history seems to be revealed 
 to Daniel by angels. The vision in the seventh chapter 
 is typical of them all. The author speaks of seeing 
 four beasts coming up out of the sea one after another, 
 and each devouring its predecessor. (Dan. 7:1-8.) " 
 
 This vision may be interpreted as follows: The four 
 beasts represent four great world-empires; the lion 
 represents the Babylonian empire; the bear, the Medes; 
 the leopard, the Persians; and the fourth, with "iron 
 teeth," represents the Greeks under Alexander the Great. 
 The ten horns of the fourth beast represent the successors 
 of Alexander. The little horn, " speaking great things," 
 represents Antiochus Epiphanes, with his proud boasts. 
 In this part of the vision the author has thus given a 
 bird's-eye view of history down to his own time. In 
 the remaining verses, he portrays his hope for the future. 
 " I beheld till thrones were placed, and one that was 
 ancient of days did sit: his raiment was white as snow, 
 and the hair of his head like pure wool; his throne was 
 fiery flames, and the wheels thereof burning fire. The 
 judgment was set and the books were opened. I beheld 
 even till the beast was slain, and its body destroyed, 
 and it was given to be burned with fire. I saw in the 
 night-visions, and, behold, there came with the clouds 
 of heaven one like unto a son of man, and he came even 
 to the ancient of days, and they brought him near before 
 him. And there was given him dominion, and glory, 
 and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations, and lan- 
 guages should serve him; his dominion is an everlastipg 
 dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom 
 that which shall not be destroyed." _ 
 
 In other words, the author believes that the Last 
 Judgment is close at hand. Antiochus is to be slain 
 by angels, and his body given to be btimed with fire. 
 After the Judgment, a new kingdom is to be established. 
 
282 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 better than the kingdoms of the beasts: namely the king- 
 dom of God. It is to include all nations and will last 
 forever. 
 
 The Revolt of the Maccabeans 
 
 The author of Daniel hoped for deliverance from the 
 oppressor through the direct intervention of Jehovah. 
 His hopes were fulfilled, but not exactly as he had ex- 
 pected. In this case, as so often, God worked through 
 human instruments. 
 
 The agents of Antiochus came one day to a town in 
 western Judah, called Modin. Here lived an old priest, 
 named Mattathias, with five grown sons. At the sum- 
 mons of the Greek officer the people had assembled. 
 Mattathias as the leading priest in the village was called 
 upon to officiate in a sacrifice to Zeus. He refused. 
 One of his neighbors, no doubt fearing a massacre, 
 stepped up to take his place. At this the old man's 
 anger exploded, and he hewed the Jew to pieces in front 
 of the altar, and also killed the Greek officer himself. 
 The bold deed was the signal for a widespread revolt 
 against Antiochus the tyrant. For some months a 
 kind of guerrilla warfare was waged' under the leadership 
 of Mattathias. When the old priest died, his place was 
 taken by his son Judas, one of the noblest as well as the 
 most brilliant of aU the characters in the history of 
 ancient Israel. Army after army was sent against the 
 little band of warriors with Judas, only to be driven 
 back thoroughly beaten. Finally an overwhelming force 
 invaded the land, and in the battle which followed 
 Judas was killed. Fortunately Antiochus was already 
 dead, and there were a number of candidates seeking 
 his throne. A brother of Judas, named Jonathan, was 
 able to play these rivals against each other, throwing 
 his support first on one side and then on the other. 
 Thus Jonathan was able to gain by skillful diplomacy 
 even more than Judas had gained through the sword. 
 So finally it came to pass that under still anofeier brother. 
 
MARTYRDOM AND TRIUMPH 283 
 
 ♦■ 
 Simon, the Jews had another opportunity to enjoy their 
 old-time independence and freedom, which lasted until 
 the Romans came. In these brothers, who were called 
 the Maccabees, the spirit and genius of David lived 
 again. 
 
 The Book op Maccabees 
 
 Among the Apocryphal books are two entitled First 
 and Second Maccabees. The second of these is not of 
 great value. First Maccabees, however, is a fine example 
 of a Hebrew historical narrative, comparing favorably 
 with the books of Samuel and Kings. It was written in 
 the Hebrew language but the original Hebrew text has 
 been lost and our English version is from the later Greek 
 translation. The author was probably an eye-witness 
 of many of the events which he relates. He wished his 
 fellow-Jews to realize that God's hand was as truly to 
 be seen in the thrilling triumphs and deliverances through 
 which they had just passed as in those events of their 
 nation's history, which were recorded in the older books. 
 Some indeed might say that Judas and his brothers had 
 worked no miracles, such as had taken place in the days 
 of Moses and Elijah. This was true, nor did this author 
 try to conceal it. He was exceedingly careful and ac- 
 curate in his statements. He believed that his story 
 was thrilling enough, without any exaggerations, and 
 that the power and goodness of God were just as truly 
 revealed in the unselfislmess, modesty and faith of Judas, 
 and in the generous, loyal co-of)eration of aU the brothers 
 and their helpers, as through any miracle. 
 
 The following passage is a good example of the spirit 
 and style of the entire book : 
 
 " And he [that is, Seron, the commander of the Greek 
 army] came near unto the pass of Bethhoron, and 
 Judas went forth to meet him with a small company. 
 But when they saw the army coming to meet them they 
 said unto Judas. What ! — shall we be able, few as we are, 
 to fight against so great and strong a multitude? And 
 
284 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 we for our part are faint, having tasted no food this 
 day. And Judas said, It is an easy thing for many 
 to be shut up in the hands of a few; and with heaven 
 it is all one, to save by many or by few. For victory 
 in battle does not depend upon the large size of the 
 army; but strength is from heaven. Now when he had 
 ceased speakirig he sprang suddenly upon them, and 
 Seron and his army were discomfited before him. And 
 the fear of Judas and his brothers, and the dread of them, 
 began to fall upon the nations round about them; and 
 his name came even unto the king; and every nation 
 told of the battles of Judas." (I Mace. 3: 16-26.) 
 
 In recent times there has been an awakening of interest 
 in this great Jewish hero, Judas Maccabeus, and in 
 this superb history of his victories. Such a book cer- 
 tainly deserves to be well known. Possibly the time 
 will come when it will again be printed in our ordinary 
 copies of the Bible, so that all may read it who wish, 
 and gain from it a fresh inspiration to trust God in the. 
 ordinary affairs of life. 
 
MARTYRDOM AND TRIUMPp 285 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. If the anthor of Daniel were to come back to earth, 
 wotdd he consider that the Kingdom of God had been estab- 
 lished, or are we still under the rvle of the beasts? 
 
 2. How do you think he might describe the beasts of 
 today? Is it possible that this sign ($) might be on their 
 horns? Why? 
 
 3. How is the Kingdom of God to be established in place 
 of the kingdoms of the beasts? 
 
 4. Which kind of men can help most, today, toward the 
 establishment of that kingdom: fighters, like Judas the Mac- 
 cabee, or teachers like the author of I Maccabees and the author 
 of Daniel? Explain. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. In what year did the Jews come under the rule of An- 
 tiochus Epiphanes? 
 
 2. What city was this ruler's capital, and where was it 
 located? 
 
 3. Why did he persecute the Jews? 
 
 4. What did he demand that the Jews should do? 
 
 5. When was the book of Daniel written? 
 
 6. What New Testament book is patterned after it, to 
 some extent? 
 
 7. What was the author's purpose in telling the stories 
 of Daniel in the lion's den, and of his three friends in the fiery 
 furnace? 
 
286 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 8. What is the meaning of the beasts and the horns in 
 chapter 7, especially the " little horn speaking great things" ? 
 
 9. What was the author's message to his fellow-Jews in 
 these visions? 
 
 10. Where did the Maccabean revolt begin? 
 
 11. What parts did each of the following play in this revolt : 
 Mattathias, Judas, Jonathan, and Simon? 
 
 12. How does I Maccabees show that God's hand was to 
 be seen in this revolt? 
 
 13. What kind of an historical book is I Maccabees in 
 point of accuracy? 
 
CHAPTER XXXVI 
 
 THE CANON OF THE OLD AND NEW 
 TESTAMENTS 
 The Torah 
 The earliest Bible of the Hebrews, that is, the earliest 
 writings which were regarded as divinely inspired and 
 sacred, were the written laws and legal decisions of the 
 priests. HaK-civilized nations always put their laws 
 under the direct sanction of the gods, in order that evil- 
 doers may be restrained by fear of supernatural ven- 
 geance. When the revised law book Deuteronomy was 
 adopted by King Josiah and his people, in 622 B.C., it 
 was regarded with special reverence on account of the 
 wonderfiJ. impressiveness with which the laws were 
 therein explained and enjoined upon the nation. In 
 the course of the next two centuries, Deuteronomy was 
 combined with earlier laws and also with an elaborate 
 system of later priestly regulations. These with the 
 Mstorical narratives leading up to the time of Moses 
 were finally adopted, perhaps not long after Nehemiah's 
 time, as the accepted Torah or Law of the nation. This 
 Torah, which includes the first five books of the Old 
 Testament, we call the Pentateuch. To this day the 
 orthodox jews look upon the Torah as more sacred 
 than any other part of the Bible. 
 
 The Prophets 
 
 From the first also, the utterances and writings 
 of the prophets were regarded by their followers as 
 divinely inspired. But the prophets did not always 
 agree among themselves. For example, when Ahab 
 wanted advice about going to war he found four hundred 
 
 _28L 
 
288 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 prophets who promised him success, while there was 
 one prophet, Micaiah, who foretold disaster, and accord- 
 ing to Micaiah, the four hundred had been inspired by 
 a lying spirit. (I Kings 22:1-23.) A later prophet 
 is bitter against " the prophets that make my people 
 to err — and whoso putteth not into their mouths 
 [that is, whoever does not give them food or money] 
 they even prepare war against him." (Mic. 3:6.) All 
 the great prophets ,such as Amos, Hosea, Isaiah, and 
 Jeremiah had to contend with these opposing prophets 
 whose utterances they denounced. Who was to decide 
 which of two prophets contradicting each other was in 
 the right? Who, for example, was to say whether 
 Jeremiah or his opponent Hananiah, was trtdy inspired 
 of Jehovah? (Jer. 28: 1-11.) On account of these 
 frequent contradictions the people gradually became 
 skeptical toward the claims of the prophets. It became 
 more difficult for a new prophet to get a hearing, and 
 by the beginning of the Greek period (333 B.C.) there 
 were no more prophets. During that period, those 
 who felt that God had given them something to say 
 generally came before their fellowmen not as prophets 
 but as wise men. 
 
 Everybody believed, however, that in former times 
 God had spoken through prophets; and these earlier 
 prophetic writings, including the historical narratives 
 written by prophets, they preserved with increasing 
 reverence. They thus had two collections in their 
 Holy Scriptures, namely, the Law, and the Prophets. To 
 these Jesus refers, when he says, " Think not that I came 
 to destroy the Law and the Prophets." (Matt. 5: 17.) 
 
 The Writings 
 
 When it was no longer possible for a man to get a 
 hearing as a prophet, that did not mean that God had ceased 
 to speak in the hearts of men, but only that a man with 
 a message now had to find a new way to win attention 
 and the hearts of the people. One of these new ways, 
 
THE OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS 289 
 
 « 
 
 as we have seen, was through " wisdom writings." 
 Another was through hymns, or psalms. Another was 
 through stories, such as Ruth and Jonah. Thus there 
 was gradually gathered in the synagogues of Palestine 
 and elsewhere a collection of later writings, which 
 were regarded as inspired, but not so sacred as the Law 
 and the Prophets. These were known simply as " the 
 Writings." The Greek translators called them, the 
 Hagiographa, or sacred writings. 
 
 As to just what books should be included in this 
 group, there was a difference of opinion. The Greek- 
 speaking synagogues had a larger collection than those 
 iti Palestine. For example, they included the Wisdom 
 of Solomon. In Palestine^ on the other hand, there 
 were certain scribes who objected even to Esther, Ec- 
 clesiastes and the Song of Songs. About 100 A.D., 
 a council of Jewish rabbis was held in the little town of 
 Janmia, on the borders of Judah, to decide just what 
 books should be included in this third collection, or 
 in other words, just what books should be canonical. 
 The word " canon " means literally a rule or measure. 
 Applied to the Bible, it means the list of books which 
 are accepted as inspired. They were guided in their 
 decisions by the belief that all inspiration had ceased 
 after the time of Nehemiah and Ezra. Thus they 
 included the book of Psalms, because they supposed 
 that it was written by David. On the same principle. 
 Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs were 
 included because they were supposed to have been 
 written by Solomon. The rejected books were called 
 " genuzim," or hidden books, and the rabbis seem to have 
 proceeded as far as possible to make them hidden in fact 
 as weU as in name by destroying all the copies they 
 could lay their hands on. 
 
 The Apocrypha of the Old Testament 
 
 Before this coimcil of Jamnia Christianity had already 
 come into existence and had gained a strong foothold 
 
290 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 in the Roman Empire. The early Christians used the 
 Greek translation of the Old Testament, with its larger 
 collection of " Writings," and of course they were not 
 influenced by the decision of the rabbis. They continued 
 to use these " hidden " books. Indeed they were 
 particularly fond of some of them, such as Ben Sira, 
 and the Wisdom of Solomon. In time, however, the 
 Christians discovered' the difference between their Old 
 Testament and that of the' Jews. At the suggestion 
 of the church father, Jerome (about 400 A. D.), the 
 extra books not included in the Jewish Bible were put 
 in a group by themselves, and caUed the Apocrypha, 
 that is, "the hidden books." The Roman Catholic 
 Church still accepts the Apocrypha as canonical. Luther 
 wished that First Maccabees were in the canon, and 
 Esther out of it, but the Protestant churches have 
 almost entirely ceased to read the Apocrypha. Certain 
 of these books, such as Tobit and Judith, are of little 
 value, but most Bible students agree that First Mac- 
 cabees, Ecclesiasticus, and the "Wisdom of Solomon, 
 seem on a far higher level of religious value than the 
 canonical books of Esther, Song of Songs, and Ecclesiastes. 
 Surely if the early Christians cherished these books, we 
 may well do the same. 
 
 The New Testament 
 
 For many years the early Christians had no other 
 Bible than the Greek Old Testament. After Paul's 
 death a collection of his letters was made, and many 
 churches procured copies, but those letters were not at 
 that time regarded as " Scripture." Not even the 
 Gospels of Mark, Matthew, Luke and John were at 
 first regarded as " Scripture." They were read in the 
 church services, but only as a sermon by Brooks or 
 Beecher might be read in one of our modem churches. 
 But little by little, it became clear that these letters 
 of Paul, and these Gospels, had a value for Christians 
 which even the Old Testament books did not possess, 
 
THE OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS 291 
 
 • 
 
 and that if the Old Testament books were inspired, 
 surely these new books were even more truly so. Thus 
 it came about that these Christian writings were read 
 in the chtarches as " Scripture." 
 
 As in the case of the Old Testament " Writings," 
 there was for a long time a difference of opinion as to 
 what books should be included in the New Testament. 
 Of the present books, the inspiration of Hebrews, Second 
 Peter, and Revelation was for a time disputed, while on 
 the other hand; there were, a number of books in the 
 New Testament of some of the early Christian churches, 
 whose very names are unfamiliar to most Christians 
 today: for example, " The Teaching of the Twelve 
 Apostles," "The Shepherd of Hermas," and "The 
 Epistle of Barnabas." Gradually, however, these latter 
 books came to be regarded as on a lower plane of inspira- 
 tion than the books which are now in the New Testa- 
 ment. It was believed that the age of special divine 
 inspiration ended with the death of the apostles, and 
 only those books which were supposed to be written by 
 the apostles, or under their direction, were accepted 
 as inspired. In the year 397 A.D. a church council 
 was held at Carthage which decided what books were 
 to be included in the New Testament. This list con- 
 tained only the twenty-seven books in our modem New 
 Testament, and in the same order. It is interesting to 
 note, however, that even today in the orthodox Greek 
 church the list of regular Bible lessons for public worship 
 contains no readings from Revelation. 
 
 The Inspiration of the Bible 
 
 It is clear from the foregoing facts that the present 
 list of Biblical books is not the result of an infallible 
 divine selection, but in part at least is the product of 
 fallible human judgment. Many of our present New 
 Testament books, including some of the greatest of 
 them, were written not by apostles but by later Christian 
 leaders. There is no sharp dividing line between the 
 
292 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Old Testament Apocrypha and the so-called canonical 
 books. It is quite clear that the spirit of God speaks 
 through' human lips and pens in all ages. Yet just as 
 " one star differeth from another star in glory," so one 
 book is of greater value than another, as a revelation 
 of God. The inspiration of the Bible is not a doctrine 
 to be proved by argument, but a spiritual fact to be 
 recognized by the heart. The books in the Old and 
 New ;,Testaments were originally cared for, copied, and 
 handed down to subsequent ages, becausej of the tremen- 
 dous impression they made on the men of their own 
 time; and the unique greatness of the Bible was never 
 more universally recognized than today. 
 
THE OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS 293 
 
 Review Questions on the Second and Third 
 Quarters 
 
 1. When the Old Testament historical narratives were 
 first written, were they probably regarded as divinely inspired? 
 
 2. How did they apparently come to be included in the 
 sacred canon? 
 
 3. In what sense do you yourself consider them inspired? 
 Are they infallible? 
 
 4. What parts of the Old Testament might be classified 
 as inspired fiction? 
 
 5. Which of the three main sections of the Old Testament 
 do you consider of the highest value: the Law (that is, the 
 Pentateuch), the Prophets, or the Writings? 
 
 6. If you were revising the list of Old Testament books, 
 would you include' any of the Apocrypha? Would you drop 
 any of those in the present regular Ust? 
 
 7. Select six Old Testament books which seem to you 
 to be in the highest rank. 
 
 8. Do you believe that the Bible is a " sufficient rule of 
 faith and practice"? 
 
 9. How large a proportion of the Old Testament books 
 are anonymous? 
 
 10. What can you infer from this fact, as to the spirit in 
 which the Bible was written, and as to its religious value? 
 
 11. Make a list of the Old Testament authors whose names 
 we positively know. 
 
 12. About what is the numerical proportion of these writers 
 to the whole body of those who helped to write the Old Testa- 
 ment? 
 
 13. What does this fact indicate, as to the spirit in which 
 the Old Testament was written, and as to its religious value? 
 
CHRONOLOGICAL CHART 
 
 Important Events 
 
 Stories, 
 
 Histories, 
 
 Apocalypses 
 
 Hymns 
 
 and 
 
 Songs 
 
 Wisdom 
 Books 
 
 ^^^ Destruction 
 ■to °^ Jerusalem. 
 
 t-nn Temple 
 3"^ Rebuilt. 
 
 
 
 
 500 
 
 *° Walls rebuilt. 
 
 400 
 B.C. 
 
 
 
 
 Samaritan 
 to Temple. 
 
 OQQ Greek 
 g Q Conquest. 
 
 
 
 
 300 
 
 to 
 
 200 
 B.C. 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 Persecution 
 200 by Antiochus. 
 
 to Maccabean 
 
 Revolt. 
 100 
 B.C. 
 
 
 1 
 
 
CHAPTER XXXVII 
 
 " THE BOOKS " IN A SECOND CENTURY CHURCH ' 
 
 The Bible among the Early Christians 
 
 The early Christians were eager Bible readers. A 
 passage from the Bible was read at each of their religious 
 meetings, just as in church services today. Correspond- 
 ing to the large pulpit Bible of a modem church, they 
 had a chest containing copies of the Old Testament 
 books, and in the course of time, copies of the New 
 Testament writings also. These at first were in the 
 form of written rolls. They were called Ta Biblia, 
 that is, " the books," and from this expression our 
 word Bible descended. 
 
 There had to be '' boolcs " rather than one single 
 book, because one roil could not have contained the whole 
 of either the Old Testament or of the New, without 
 becoming inconveniently bulky. Possibly three or four 
 Gospels could be written on one roll, and a number of 
 Paul's letters on another. Of the Old Testament, the 
 Pentateuch was usually on a single roll, while the other 
 writings were grouped in various ways. Liike tells us 
 that when Jesus went to the synagogue at Nazareth, 
 the attendant handed him " a book of the prophet 
 Isaiah." It would seem that Isaiah was usually written 
 on a roll by itself. 
 
 Sometime in the early Christian centuries the present 
 form of book originated, with leaves and pages, and 
 gradually displaced the older form. This was made 
 possible by a new kind of writing material called perga- 
 mentum (or parchment), from the city of Pergamos 
 where much of it was made. This new material would 
 lie flat instead of curling up like leather, and it had no 
 fibers to break like papyrus, and hence was well suited 
 
 295 
 
296 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 for book-leaves of the new kind. It was made of the 
 skins of animals, treated by a special process. 
 
 A book of this new kind was called a codex (plural 
 codices). It had space for a much larger amoimt of 
 written matter than the old-fashioned rolls; and this 
 made it possible to put into a single volume all the books 
 of the New Testament and even of the entire Bible. At 
 first there was no universally accepted order. What 
 we call the " General Epistles " were sometimes placed 
 before instead of after the letters of Paxil. 
 
 The Latin Translations of the Bible 
 
 In the earliest Christian churches, all the books in 
 the chest were in the Greek language, but in the course 
 of the first three or four centuries of our era, transla- 
 tions were made into Latin, Syriac, Ethiopic, Armenian, 
 Coptic and Gothic. The most important of these was 
 the Latin. If we could have visited a church in some 
 city of the western part of the Roman empire, such 
 as Lyons or Carthage, as early as 175 A.D., we wotild 
 probably have found Latin translations of some of 
 the Biblical books. By the year 250 A.D., it is probable 
 that all the books in both the Old and New Testaments 
 had been translated into Latin. 
 
 These early Latin translations were not the work 
 of learned men, but rather of persons with little schooling. 
 They did not know Hebrew, and not even Greek very well. 
 This fact has left its mark on one of our common Bible 
 terms. In the Greek version of the old Testament, they 
 found the word Psalmos, which means a song with stringed 
 instruments, but they did not know what the word meant, 
 so simply spelled it out in the Latin form Psahnus, 
 from which comes our word Psalm. We see that when 
 this Latin translation was made, Christianity was a 
 religion of the common people. The humble translators 
 had no desire to make a. show of their learning or rhetoric, 
 although they did their work as well as they could. Their 
 sole object was to help the lives of their fellowmen. 
 
O 
 
 o 
 o 
 m 
 
 I — ' 
 o 
 
 
IN A SECOND CENTURY CHURCH 297 
 
 « 
 
 In the fourth century a revised Latin version was 
 prepared by the Christian scholar Jerome, and a very 
 notable piece of work it was. Into it he put all the 
 wealth of his learning, his passionate love and veneration 
 for the Scriptures, and his burning zeal to make the 
 thoughts of the biblical writers clear and luminous to 
 the men of his day. After he had finished the New 
 Testament, and had begun work on the Old, he realized 
 that he ought to know Hebrew, and thus be able to 
 translate direct from the original language. So he 
 went to Palestine, to a convent in Bethlehem, engaged 
 a Jewish rabbi as his teacher, and learned the language. 
 Twelve years later (394) he finished his Latin version of 
 the Old Testament. 
 
 At first the new version was bitterly attacked. People 
 were accustomed to the words and phrasing of the earlier 
 versions, and resented any changes. Jerome was ac- 
 cused of tampering with the Word of God. He replied 
 rather tartly and said that his critics " thought that 
 ignorance was holiness." As a matter of fact, his final 
 revision of the Psalms never did come into general use. 
 Most Latin Bibles, although following Jerome's transla- 
 tion everjrwhere else, used an older version in the book 
 of Psalms. 
 
 In later centuries, however, with this exception, 
 Jerome's work was universally adopted. His transla- 
 tion (called the Vulgate) became the standard Bible 
 of the church throughout the Middle Ages and was used 
 in the great missionary campaigns which resulted in the 
 Christianizing of the countries of central and western 
 Europe. 
 
 Bible Reading among the Early Christians 
 
 It is clear that the Bible played a large part in the 
 lives of the early Christians. Not only was it read 
 publicly at the weekly services; there was also a great 
 amount of private reading by individual Christians. 
 It seems probable that nearly every Christian owned 
 
298 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 a copy of some or all of the biblical books. This_ is 
 implied by a sentence in a letter to a young Christian 
 from the great church leader Cyprian (250 A.D.): 
 " Your life," he says, " shoxild be one of earnest prayer 
 or reading [of the Bible]; now you speaking to God, 
 now God to you." 
 
 This shows that young Christians were expected to 
 form the habit of daily Bible reading. " In fact," says 
 a modem scholar, " the Bible pervaded the whole life 
 of a Christian. It was the Bible, its history, its com- 
 mandments, that he was taught as a child in his parents' 
 home. When the girls gathered in the women's hall 
 to spin, they would talk and sing about God's revelations. 
 The prayers, in private as well as in church, were full 
 of echoes from the Bible." 
 
 In the time of the terrible persecution under the 
 emperor Diocletian, there was a yotmg 'Christian, named 
 Marinus, who was an officer in the Roman army, and 
 stationed at Csesarea in Palestine. He had performed 
 his duties faithfully, and was about to be promoted 
 to the rank of captain. Then out of jealousy, one of his 
 fellow officers denounced him as a Christian. Sum- 
 moned befpre his colonel, he was asked if this was true, and 
 when he confessed that it was, he was given three hours' 
 time in which to give up his faith. So he went to the small 
 Christian church, where he found the venerable bishop. 
 The bishop hearing his story took the Bible in one hand, 
 and the soldier's sword in the other. " This is your 
 choice," he said. And the soldier, without hesitating, 
 grasped the Bible, went back and declared himself to 
 be, and to remain, a Christian. Instead of receiving 
 promotion and honor, he became a martyr. 
 
 Stories like this show us what the Bible meant to 
 the early Christians. They found in it something more 
 precious than this earthly life; the good news of a God 
 of love, and of an incarnate Saviour, and the promise 
 of a life everlasting. 
 

 o 
 
 
 Q 
 
 
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 H 
 
 >; 
 
 Ph 
 
 <! 
 
 l>i 
 
 W 
 
 H 
 
 i-l 
 
 t>^ 
 
 w 
 
 Ul 
 
 H 
 
 
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 w 
 
 
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 3 
 
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 pp 
 
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 Pi 
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IN A SECOND CENTURY CHURCH 299 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1- Mention three things which made it hard for the early 
 Christians to read the Bible. 
 
 2. Judging from the objections to Jerome's new Latin trans- 
 lation, how much was the Bible read in those days? 
 
 3. What Old Testament book was most read? 
 
 4. How was reverence for the Bible the better manifested : 
 by Jerome, or by those who found fault with his translation? 
 
 5. How did the early Christians become good Bible students ? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What is the derivation of our word " Bible "? 
 
 2. What new form of writing-material first made it possible 
 to put into one volume all the biblical writings ? 
 
 3. What is meant by a " codex "I 
 
 4. Into what languages was the Bible translated -in the 
 course of the first four centuries after Christ? 
 
 5. Explain the derivation of the word Psahn. In what 
 way is this word a witness to the fact that early Christianity 
 was a religion of the common people? 
 
 6. In preparing his translation of the Old Testament into 
 Latin, how did Jerome show himself a painstaking, accurate 
 scholar? 
 
300 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 7. What was Cyprian's counsel to a young Christian regard- 
 ing Bible reading? 
 
 8. Tell the story of Marinus the Christian soldier, and oi 
 his love for the Bible. 
 
CHAPTER XXXVIII 
 MAKING BIBLES BY HAND 
 The Work of the Scribes and Monks 
 Suppose that you or I had been a member of a Christian 
 church in the year 200 A.D. How might we have secured 
 a copy of the Bible? Today we can go to a bookstore 
 and buy one; but it was not so in those days. There 
 were bookstores, to be sure. In every large Roman 
 city there were stalls where one could buy copies of 
 Homer, or Plato, or Virgil, laboriously written out by 
 slaves. In large cities, it is possible that the books of 
 Moses or Isaiah could be thus obtained. But one would 
 have sought in vain at these stalls for a copy of Luke, or 
 John, or the letters of Patd. Sometimes reliable scribes 
 could be hired; but often copies of these writings had 
 to be made by each Christian for himself, or made for 
 him by his better educated friends, not for pay, but 
 for pure love of the cause. 
 
 Changes in the Copies 
 
 The men wlio made these written New Testament 
 books were not thinking so much of future generations, 
 as of the needs of their own generation. Their chief 
 object was to help their fellowmen, then living, to be- 
 come better Christians. Hence they sometimes intro- 
 duced changes from the original wording of the books 
 they were copying, in order to make them more helpful. 
 If a sentence did not seem clear, an explanatory clause 
 might be added. 
 
 In the case of the Gospel narratives we may well be 
 glad that the earliest Christian scribes felt free to make 
 additions to the original text. Long after the four 
 Gospels were written, people were still alive who cher- 
 ished original sayings of Jesus, and true stories about 
 Him, which had not found a place in any of the foiu- 
 
 301 
 
302 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Gospels, but which had been handed down by oral tradi- 
 tion. A few of these floating traditions or sayings were 
 added to the manuscripts of the Gospels by copyists, 
 as late as the second century A.D. 
 
 We find one of these additions in our Revised Version, 
 in the marginal note to Luke 9 : 55. In the verses just 
 preceding we read how the Samaritans in a certain 
 village refused their hospitahty to Jesus and His disciples, 
 which led James and John in anger to ask Jesus to send 
 down fire from heaven upon them and destroy_ them, 
 but " Jesus turned and rebuked them." This was 
 the end of the story as Luke wrote it. But later, prob- 
 ably in the second century, a Christian who was making 
 a copy of Luke's Gospel, came to this incident in the nar- 
 rative, and said to himself something like the following : 
 " Why Luke has left out what Jesus said to the disciples. 
 Many a time I have heard my grandfather tell this story, 
 and he got it'direct from John himself." So this Christian 
 added on his copy two sentences said to have been 
 spoken by Jesus to James and John on this occasion: 
 " Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of; for the 
 Son of Man came not to destroy men's lives but to 
 save them." These additional sentences, in the Revised 
 Version, are found in a marginal note below the regiilar 
 text, because they were not written by Luke. Never- 
 theless they were probably spoken by Jesus. 
 
 Another possible saying of Jesus, which has not even 
 found its way into the margin of our English Bible, is 
 found in some Greek manuscripts after Luke 6:4. "On 
 the same day, seeing one working on the Sabbath, he 
 said to him, Man, if thou knowest what thou doest, 
 blessed art thou; but if thou knowest not, thou art 
 accursed and a transgressor of the law." 
 
 Still another of these later additions is the story of 
 the woman taken in adultery to whom Jesus said, "Neither 
 do I condemn thee ; go, and sin no more. ' ' (John 7 : 53 — 
 8: 11.) In the Revised Version it is printed in brackets. 
 Without a doubt this is an authentic incident from the 
 
MAKING BIBLES BY HAND 303 
 
 life of Jesus. Yet it certainly was not an original part 
 of the Gospel' of John, nor of the other three Gospels. 
 In many manuscripts it stands after the end of John, 
 as an extra section all by itself. We owe a great debt 
 of gratitude to the unknown scribe who had the insight 
 to appreciate the value of this priceless story, and who 
 therefore rescued it from oblivion. 
 
 Scribal Errors 
 
 Besides these additions, some mistakes were inevitably 
 made in the work of copying. The human hand and the 
 human eye are almost certain to fall into errors. Try 
 it and see. Copy a page of ,this book, and correct it, 
 then give what you. have written to a friend and ask 
 him to make a copy of it, in turn, as a part of the experi- 
 ment; have him make all the corrections he wishes, 
 comparing his work with your copy. Then compare 
 his final draft with the original page. 
 
 Just so, mistakes crept into those old written Bibles. 
 In most cases they were unconscious variations from 
 the original. Words were omitted, or wrongly written. 
 Sometimes the eye would overlook a whole sentence. 
 Sometimes words similar in sound were mistaken for 
 each other. When we consider that there was almost 
 no punctuation, and no spacing between the words, we 
 may well be surprised that there were not more- such 
 errors. It was sometimes impossible to be certain- how 
 the letters were to be read. Suppose we should write 
 the English words " is now here" without spacing, like 
 this: ISNOWHERE. This might easily be read: "is 
 nowhere." It was especially difficult to copy the Hebrew 
 script correctly, because certain of the characters were 
 similar in form and it was hard to distinguish between 
 them. The Hebrew words were also written with almost 
 no vowels, and this added to the difficulty. It was like 
 spelling TABLE as TBL, or BOAT as BT, which might 
 also mean " bat," or " boot," or " bit." 
 
304 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 The Accuracy op the Jewish Copyists 
 
 In time, therefore, the necessity for greater care in 
 copying was recognized. On the one hand, the bibHcal 
 books were regarded with ever-increasing reverence, 
 while on the other hand, as the number of copies in- 
 creased, the differences between them grew more and 
 more confusing and troublesome. The Jewish scribes 
 were remarkably successful in overcoming this danger. 
 Sometime in the early centuries of the Christian era 
 they agreed among themselves to take a certain copy , 
 of the Old Testament as the standard, and all others were 
 lost or destroyed. Prom this one manuscript all sub- 
 sequent copies were made, and with the most scrupulous 
 care. The scribes who did this work were called Mas- 
 soretes. These men counted the words and even the 
 letters in the Old Testament, and found the middle 
 word and the middle letter. In this way, when any 
 manuscript was finished, they could tell whether or not 
 there had been the slightest change from the original. 
 Marks were introduced in the margin calling attention 
 to any. peculiarity and warning the copyist not to make 
 a mistake. But the manuscript which they selected to 
 copy from was itself faulty, and some of its mistakes 
 were obvious to any reader. Even these, however, 
 they did not venture to correct, but merely put the 
 suggested alteration in the margin. As a result the 
 Hebrew Bible has actually been handed down through 
 the centuries since that time, with practically no errors 
 or changes. In all the written Hebrew manuscripts now 
 in existence, we search in vain for variations. To all 
 intents and purposes it is as though they had all been 
 struck off by a printer from the same plates. 
 
 The Bibles Made by the Monks 
 
 As time went on, the Christians also saw the necessity 
 for greater care in copying the New Testament books. 
 Among the Christians this work came to be carried 
 

 
 
 From 
 
 GOTHIC BIBLE: SILVER LETTERS ON 
 PURPLE GROUND. 
 
 " Deutsche Kullurgeschichte," by O. Henne am Rhyn. 
 Grote, Berlin, Germany. 
 
MAKING BIBLES BY HAND 305 
 
 on by monks. Aside from the Jews and the Arabs, 
 the monasteries were the only centers of learning in the 
 early centuries of the Middle Ages. There were prac- 
 tically no laymen who could read, and few clergymen. 
 Books were scarce. To own a book was a distinction. 
 There were even some monasteries which did not own a 
 complete copy of the Bible. Had it not been for the 
 monks, the New Testament might have been lost forever. 
 We, therefore, owe them a great debt of gratitude. 
 
 Some of these monks showed wonderful skill as copyists 
 and loving devotion to their task. Many of their 
 manuscripts, as we examine them today, look just like 
 printed books. We can imagine what it must have 
 meant to write each letter, one by one, through hundreds 
 of thousands of words, without a single careless stroke. 
 
 Some manuscripts were beautifully illuminated. The 
 initial letters were decorated and the margins covered 
 with paintings. One of the most beautiful of those 
 now in existence is a portion of the translation into 
 Gothic by Ulfilas, now preserved in Upsala, Sweden. 
 It is written with silver letters on a purple ground. 
 . The monks also were careful to be accurate, and made 
 few serious mistakes, although they never worked out 
 an elaborate system for checking mistakes as did the 
 Massoretes, and never attained such an a,lmost in- 
 credible degree of perfection. This was partly because 
 they had not the requisite learning; and partly because 
 Christianity has never been quite so much a book-religion 
 as mediaeval Judaism. The Church has kept alive 
 her faith in the living voice of the Spirit, and hence has 
 never been wholly dependent upon the written Word. 
 Yet in the loving care with which they beautified their 
 Bibles, the Christian monks showed no less devotion 
 than did the Jews to fhis Book which had been their 
 greatest inspiration. 
 
306 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1. When a group of new converts came into an early Chris'^ 
 tian church, what steps were probably taken to supply them 
 with Bibles? 
 
 2. 'Of two manuscripts of the Bible, which would be most 
 read : one written in a clear, beautiful hand, or one which was 
 slovenly in appearance? 
 
 3. Of what practical use were the pictures and decorations 
 which the monks sometimes placed in the margins of their 
 Bible manuscripts? 
 
 4. Of the additions to the Gospels mentioned in this chapter, 
 which do you consider the most valuable? 
 
 5. To which of the following are we Christians today most 
 indebted: 
 
 (a.) The early Christians who added sections to the Gospel 
 manuscripts? 
 
 (b.) The monks who copied the New Testament? 
 
 (c.) The scribes who copied the Old Testament? 
 
 6. How else besides through copying manuscripts may the 
 Bible message be passed on to others? 
 
MAKING BIBLES BY HANJ3 307 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. How did the early Christians get copies of the books of 
 the Bible? 
 
 2. What was the chief aim of those who copied the New 
 Testament books, during the first two or three centuries of 
 Christian history? 
 
 3. How did mistakes creep into these manuscripts? 
 
 4. How did the Jewish scribes secure greater accuracy? 
 
 5. What name is applied to these scribes? 
 
 6. By what class of men was the New Testament chiefly 
 copied during the Middle Ages? 
 
 7. How did they show their love and reverence for the 
 Bible? 
 
CHAPTER XXXIX 
 THE BEGINNINGS OF OUR ENGLISH BIBLE 
 
 Translations by Bede, Alfred, Wyclif and 
 Others 
 
 Not until many centuries after the latest book of the 
 Bible was written, was there any such language as Eng- 
 lish. When Christianity was brought into England 
 by Augustine about 600 A.D., the language spoken 
 by the inhabitants was a Germanic dialect called Anglo- 
 Saxon. After the establishment of Christianity in the 
 island, a number of translations of portions of the Bible 
 into Anglo-Saxon were made; and as modem English is 
 descended in part from this language, we may regard 
 these translations as forerunners of the English Bible 
 of later centuries. 
 
 The first attempt to provide a Bible for the people of 
 England was by a monk named Ceedmon, who prepared 
 a poetical paraphrase of the Bible story (about 700 A.D.). 
 While this was not strictly a translation, yet to a certain 
 extent it met the need of the people for a Bible in their 
 native tongue. There was perhaps no one in the country 
 at that time, who was well enough educated to make an 
 exact translation. 
 
 In the course of the next hundred years after Ceedmon, 
 there lived another monk, named Bede, generally called 
 the Venerable Bede. This man was really a great 
 scholar for those days. He wrote an Ecclesiastical 
 History of England of which copies are still in existence, 
 and to which we owe most of our knowledge of early 
 England. Before his last illness, this man undertook 
 to translate the Gospel of John. His disciple Cuthbert 
 in a letter to a fellow-student has left an account of 
 how the work was finished. " On the Tuesday before 
 Ascension Day, though suffering greatly, he con- 
 
 308 
 
BEGINNINGS OF OUR ENGLISH BIBLE 309 
 
 tinued to dictate cheerfully to his scribes, saying now 
 and again, ' Go on quickly, I know not how long I 
 shall hold out, and whether my Maker may not soon take 
 me away.' On the morrow he resumed his task. One 
 of the scholars said to him, ' Most dear master, there is 
 still one chapter wanting; do you think it troublesome 
 to be asked any more questions?' But he answered, 
 'It is no trouble; take up your pen and write quickly.' 
 Soon afterwards the student said, 'It is written now.' 
 The dying man answered, 'It is weU, you have said the 
 truth. It is finished.' " And so, shortly afterward, 
 " he breathed his last and departed to the heavenly 
 kingdom." 
 
 Another important translator was King Alfred, who 
 died about 900 A.D. As a part of the preface to his 
 code of laws, he translated the Ten Commandments, 
 and the greater part of Exodus 21-23. It is also said 
 that at the time of his death he was engaged on a trans- 
 lation of the book of Psalms. 
 
 There still exist manuscripts of the Psalms and 
 the Gospels in Anglo-Saxon, by different t'ranslators. 
 No doubt each one of them represents scores, or even 
 hundreds, of similar copies which were in circulation 
 when Anglo-Saxon was still a living tongue. We thus 
 see that more than a thousand years ago the Bible already 
 exercised a real and mighty influence in England. 
 
 The Birth of a New Bible Language 
 
 In the year 1066 England was conquered by William 
 of Normandy and his nobles, and the old Anglo-Saxon 
 population was reduced to serfdom. For the next 
 century or more, there were two languages spoken in 
 England. The rich and powerful nobles spoke Norman- 
 French, and the peasants spoke Anglo-Saxon. 
 
 Two or three centuries later, or about 1300, there began 
 an era of wonderful opportunity for the lower classes in 
 England. One cause for this was a war between England 
 and France. In this war the English foot soldiers, who 
 
310 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 were recruited from the serfs, were armed with cross- 
 bows, and proved themselves more than a match for 
 the French knights on horseback. This increased their 
 power and importance and compelled the English nobles 
 to make common cause with them. There was also 
 much general discontent in England, during this period, 
 on account of the extortionate demands of the church 
 dignitaries who at that time were luxury-loving and 
 corrupt. Nobles and common people were at one in 
 resisting this ecclesiastical ^oppression. 
 
 Finally, in the course of this century, there was a 
 series of dreadful epidemics which swept away nearly 
 half the population. The result was that labor was 
 scarce, and wages high. The working classes developed 
 a higher standard of livimg, and a larger degree of self- 
 respect. In this they were bitterly opposed by the 
 nobles, who tried in vain to keep down wages by law. 
 The working classes in turn went on strikes, just like 
 the strikes of today. In the year 1381 there was a 
 great uprising of the peasants, and an army of more 
 than a hundred thousand, under the leadership of a 
 certain Wat Tyler, marched into London to present 
 their demands to the king. It was at this time that 
 the expression was coined: 
 
 When Adam delved, and Eve span, 
 Who was then the gentleman? 
 
 Unfortunately, many acts of violence were committed 
 by the peasants, such as the burning of the archbishop's 
 palace in London. This turned public sentiment against 
 them. Wat Tyler's revolution was put down with great 
 cruelty. Nevertheless, the general level of the entire 
 working population had been raised by these various 
 causes, and there was less difference between Uving 
 conditions of the lower and upper classes. Gradually, 
 the nobles and the peasants, the rich and the poor, 
 were welded into a single nation. . The two languages, 
 Norman-French and Anglo-Saxon, were gradually blended 
 
BEGINNINGS OF OUR ENGLISH BIBLE 311 
 
 • 
 
 into a new language, English, which, in its grace and 
 homely strength, is a characteristic product of this 
 great movement toward equality, democracy and brother- 
 hood. Such a language was particularly well adapted 
 to become a vehicle of the message of the Bible, the 
 people's Book. 
 
 A New Interest in the Bible 
 
 During the years immediately after the Norman 
 conquest there was little Bible reading in England, and 
 no further progress in translating the Bible. The Anglo- 
 Saxon peasants were kept in ignorance, and few of them 
 could read even those translations which had already 
 been made for them. As for the nobles, they used the 
 Latin translation in so far as they read the Bible at all. 
 When a better day began to dawn for the common people, 
 however, we can trace a -new interest in the Bible, and 
 the Bible in turn, inspired a greater devotion to the 
 people's cause, for it is the great Magna Charta of democ- 
 racy. About 1325 the Psalms were translated into the 
 English of that day by a certain Richard Rolle. But 
 the great Bible translator of the age was John Wyclif. 
 
 John Wyclif as a Religious Leader 
 
 Wyclif was bom about 1320 in the north of England. 
 He became a minister, and a professor in the University 
 of Oxford. He first rose to prominence in a contest 
 over the question of ecclesiastical taxes between the 
 Enghsh parliament and the Pope, who had presented 
 a bill for back taxes for thirty-three years. Parliament 
 refused to pay, and Wyclif wrote a tract defending its 
 action. 
 
 In this contest Wyclif's eyes were opened to the im- 
 moral practices and superstitious teachings of the Roman 
 Cathohc Church of that day, and he began to expose 
 them. When summoned to a trial for heresy, however, 
 he had the protection of the great nobles whom he had 
 
312 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 encouraged to resist the demands for money made by 
 the Roman CathoUc Church. 
 
 But Wyclif was not only opposed to extortionate 
 church officials; he hated extortion and oppression of 
 every kind. He saw that, although many of the church 
 leaders were corrupt and selfish, yet the Bible reaUy taught 
 justice and love and brotherhood. So he boldly cham- 
 pioned the peasants in their struggle for higher wages. 
 More than that, he organized a band of disciples, who 
 were called " Poor Priests," who went about from village 
 to village, teaching these doctrines wherever the people 
 could be gathered together to listen. These men brought 
 a new moral impulse into the life of the English people, 
 which became the foundation for England's future 
 greatness. In order to help them in their work, Wyclif, 
 in his old age, decided to translate the entire Bible into 
 Enghsh. 
 
 Wyclif's Translation of the Bible 
 
 Although Wyclif was the leader in this work of trans- 
 lation he did not do all of it hiniself. Nearly all of the 
 Old Testament was translated by one of his friends, 
 Nicholas of Hereford. The original manuscript of this 
 scholar is still in existence, and it is interesting to note 
 that it breaks off abruptly in the middle of a verse in 
 one of the apocryphal books (Baruch). It is almost 
 certain that just when Nicholas was writing this verse, 
 officers came to arrest him on charges of heresy. After 
 Wyclif's death (1384) the entire' work was carefully 
 and skillfully revised by another friend and comrade, 
 John Purvey. 
 
 The translation as a whole was a remarkable achieve- 
 ment. It was based on the Latin version, not on the 
 original Greek and Hebrew, for in those days these two 
 languages were practically unknown in Europe. Wyclif 
 and his friends were good Latin scholars, however, and 
 they made a faithful translation from the Latin version. 
 The English wording is clear and forcible. Although 
 
J2(tHiC vontitc 
 r-patiffiwotgan 
 
 bfdjfliriBaBtLUiaiup Gonil;rtn. 
 t(frfaiict)^ui OHfaifinc wqiipr" 
 after l/iejiunomi. m luauv at 
 ffitoicae oijnav*ii([ui tip-friiwr 
 
 I of nc muHcofgttO-JluOlifcriT^ 
 
 I rejvocTf (DtiuiiJOia to i^QM \iat 
 \m OlKxUm not tcy tr fn> icni&Ir< 
 
 of^pt felnr- pfic'dcnJfliijc (ay iw 
 
 ISfittr-"tmrtcrillniliii(ct'aptm& 
 ffl pc Ijajii^' OP oflt- uut after pis jufl 
 OfrfoiTprflamaitogi < 
 
 m pifi ^(ttr/ rriiflif jtoii itoou fv 
 
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 baitf imoipf (jf twnfp (fi ui««? 4 
 mt'pc'*?"'^ pC f&Hxtisppitttf 
 mlmtma. cut itt Cdiuut taUt 
 fnrvmiiotft ijootpgxxf&dmiygK 
 fn AboiiC m CD ion -i ;a Cd/miiftf 
 iwracffletDUtCfB tcrttuTtaftifu 
 
 of pfcq/f.^ntj iB(,ataf i;cl/a&r 
 Cifr fit ft f Jiig;cE> (jfiu fctrufnr-'lw 
 waft Ofti^) flnii fldouftc ittcptutf 
 l/piu eropcmmof (?ca!ft roi|fliu' 
 ;«t bpbcctccu t;i»m gopiigt ui to 
 (jftimriaortcoajm Ct^?JJOalaK;- 
 iBtiiaf actUttncc b/fjfliiimirPni. 
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 iL ^Tftau po ninictoiRm, 
 tpicrtiu fro I'fbtn [tatiflrtjcjiitt 
 of ol|iitffr pc iPO'-rtjc IS Vidiris 
 icniftirutr i|ai'i,ugT |if loiinifrf 
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 p7^" iPCrttrutyjurpclma-pmire^Jjl.' 
 UiljcriJafupcrtni jjmr^ KwuWg'i^ 
 
 Ul»4fiUCiClD.plfiUp.tHfffHWS * 
 
 Mtfifouminijf 4 (uflrtKi ffiiiuBof 
 
 of jajur&aiir PCS tBarnOuv[(iiigr 
 0^ Uftpiigrto gutrf m jj^fjiociift 
 ptyriiioi eiUPumnr (;fnit'i)n*offf 
 cuaiio tyt-ijiga:cpotii<]')M mos 
 Oaf-cfl prtttr nftfufrmp iii iic uw 
 oa of Ojcftmc ftiflr. ffix-fef c pnr 
 mflflaalpajirk-of jiiflitcgiirr-ai 
 
 Uiapotii (rbpifourii j'f frnfrntrrtr 
 lif ftiiftUiO- It'll idK pc i]Ooip (pwff 
 (Tffiuf fcittifCttteupcf imiip-crf ,-«i , , 
 ?ii/B8 vat n'asu»Q-irf lino.- ptif'*iQ;y^ 
 totinncfiiiicretjiffiripafluoum 5^'--=* 
 DiiOmps-t^rsTprfoif of (li/empf'^^s 
 
 Fiipffitr-jii5foiai|'cptfltBcididrfl 4.^j" 
 ftrOof pf Hltrrof roulaflUfflX'flDd '^'^ 
 iff imiiffiS^ to lara pc mpotv axu) 
 
 LjjjertXiu^faimifaiBH-iipai-pc ^'^ "^ 
 '"luj ftm (pflfi ricptfl ar^dtoiflrui fCii^* 
 
 of Mmoc- fftnibpe if i3 lontf m 
 
 pcbooturof^mffl? cTtJciiatitCfi 
 
 tnju of l/yfu tJC tufliii fi"*^^ aw'' 
 ■JxpcriuxpgxotBcacmtti-auli 
 ^'nxL opcrtalir pc tntejflp2nl;f of ij j 
 
 liriu-l'frtirt'itf'Utouc;' oemamelS 
 
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 SfuJDU uirtopcmr' iti uu;(djf 
 
 (|C tyaStHtftt trpftp D0-"Ol7»flfj| 
 
 WYCLIF'S BIBLE. 
 
 From " Fac-similes of Biblical Manuscripts." 
 
 By permission of the Trustees of the 
 
 British Museum. 
 
BEGINNINGS OF OUR ENGLISH BIBLE 313 
 
 five centuries have passed away, much of it can still 
 be read and understood. Its quaint phrases often bring 
 home the meaning of a Bible sentence with fresh and 
 appealing force. As an example we may quote the 
 opening verses of the Beatitudes in this version. 
 
 " And Jhesus, seyinge the puple, wente up in to an 
 hil, and whanne he was set, hise disciples camen to hym. 
 And he openyde his mouth and tauzte hem and saide, 
 Blessed ben pore men in spirit, for the kyngdom of 
 heuenes is heme." Many of the fine expressions in 
 Wyclif's version were copied by later translators, and 
 some of them are embedded in the Authorized Version, 
 for example, " a well of water springing up into eternal 
 life; compass sea and land; the beam and the mote; 
 the deep things of God; enter thou into the joy of thy 
 Lord." 
 
 The spirit in which this group of men carried on their 
 work is well expressed in John Purvey's preface to his 
 revision. The translator, he says, " hath need to live 
 a clene life, and be full devout in prayers, and have 
 not his wit occupied about worldly things, that the Holy 
 Spirit, author of wisdom and knowledge and truth, 
 dress him in his work, and suffer him not for to , err. 
 By this manner, with good living and great travail men 
 may come to true and clear translating and true under- 
 standing of Holy Writ, seem it never so hard at the 
 beginning. God grant to us all, grace to ken well and 
 keep well, and suffer jo3rfully some pain for it at the last." 
 
 Wyclif's translation aroused a storm of criticism among 
 the church leaders of that day. The authorities passed 
 a law that no one should read it either in public or in 
 private "under pain of excommtmication. " Wyclif 
 himself wrote, before his death: " Many think it amiss 
 that men should know Christ's life, for then priests 
 should be shamed of their Hves, and specially these high 
 priests, for they contradict Christ both in word and 
 deed." Both Hereford and Purvey were imprisoned and 
 Hereford was tortured. Wyclif was too influential to 
 
314 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 be molested, but some forty years after his death, his 
 bones were dug up and burned, and the ashes thrown 
 into the brook called the Swift, which flows by his home 
 town Lutterworth. 
 
 Despite all this opposition, however, the new English 
 Bible exerted a great influence. Copies could only be 
 made by hand, as the printing-press had not yet been 
 invented. There are still in existence one hundred 
 and seventy partial or complete' copies of this translation. 
 People used to gather at night to hear it read. One 
 historian tells us that as much as a load of hay was at 
 times given for a few chapters of an epistle of Paul. 
 Through the reading of the Bible thus made possible 
 the people were prepared for the great Protestant Reforma- 
 tion, a century and a half later. 
 
BEGINNINGS OF OUR ENGLISH BIBLE 315 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. What characteristics of the English language made it a 
 good Bible language? 
 
 2. What characteristics in the following men, as they are 
 described in this chapter, made them good Bible translators? 
 (a.) Bede. 
 
 (&.) Alfred, 
 
 (c.) Wyclif. 
 
 (d.) Hereford, 
 
 (e.) Purvey. 
 
 3. What qualities are necessary in any one who would 
 transmit the truth of the Gospel to others either through deed 
 or word? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What language was spoken in England, when Christianity 
 was brought there by Augustine and his feUow missionaries? 
 
 2. What was " Caedmon's paraphrase"? 
 
 3. What book of the New Testament was translated by 
 Bede? 
 
316 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 4. Tell the story of the completion of Bede's translation 
 of John. 
 
 5. What parts of the Bible were translated by King Alfred? 
 
 6. What two languages were blended to form the EngHsh 
 language? 
 
 7. What historical events led up to this blending? 
 
 8. To what extent was English the language of the common 
 people, from the very beginning? 
 
 9. How did John Wyclif become a religious and social re- 
 former? 
 
 10. What was his purpose in translating the Bible? 
 
 11. Mention some characteristics of Wyclif 's translation. 
 
 12. Who helped him prepare it? 
 
 13. How was it received by the nobles? By the conynon 
 people? 
 
CHAPTER XL 
 
 A NEW ERA OF TRIUMPH FOR THE BIBLE 
 The Printing-Press and the Reformation 
 
 About fifty years after Wyclif's death there Hved in 
 Strassburg, in Germany, a silversmith, named Johann 
 Gutenberg, who takes high rank among the benefactors 
 of mankind. He it was who invented the art of printing. 
 
 Even before Gutenberg's time men had been feehng 
 their way toward this invention. Small picture books 
 had been made, called block-books, each page having been 
 printed from a single block of wood. Among these 
 " block-books " were some called " Bibles of the poor," 
 with a Scripture text on each page, and a picture to 
 illustrate it. Gutenberg improved on this device by 
 introducing small movable engravings of single letters, 
 called types. In making them, he experimented first 
 with wood ; but these were soon brol^.en or split, and metal 
 ones were substituted. The first printing-press in the 
 world was set up by Gutenberg, in his native city May- 
 ence, about the year 1450. 
 
 It is an eloquent testimony to the general interest 
 in the Bible in those days that the first book of any 
 length which the inventor undertook to publish was a 
 Latin Bible. The work was begun in 1453 and was 
 finished four years later. About one hundred copies 
 were printed of which thirty-one are still known to be 
 in existence. It was a very beautiful and costly piece 
 of work. 
 
 The new invention aroused great interest. Presses 
 were quickly set up in many cities, not only in Germany, 
 but in other countries. Venice became famous for its 
 printers. Before 1500, or within fifty years after Guten- 
 burg's first Bible was published, ninety-two other edi- 
 tions of the Bible were printed, including both the Latin 
 and other versions. 
 
 317 
 
318 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Linen Paper 
 
 The earliest printed books were very expensive. Only 
 princes 'or rich merchants could afford to buy them. 
 The chief expense was the material out of which the 
 books were made. But there was a remedy for this 
 difficulty, for some centuries earlier the Arabs had 
 learned from the Chinese the art of making paper by 
 soaking linen rags in water and acid. When Gutenberg 
 set up his press, the only paper available was a kind 
 of imitation parchment, very costly. Part of his first 
 edition of the Bible was printed, on paper, and the rest 
 on parchment, and the pa,per copies were quite as beauti- 
 ful as the others. But with printing-presses now spring- 
 ing up in every important city, there was a demand for 
 less expensive paper, which was quickly met, and within 
 a few decades printed books could be sold almost as 
 cheaply as today. 
 
 The Influence op the Printing-Press ' 
 
 With a supply of inexpensive paper at hand, there 
 was thus perfected a mighty engine for the dissemination 
 of knowledge and ideas. The importance of this new 
 factor in civilization was almost inconceivably great. 
 It was as though there had been placed at the disposal 
 of any man with a message for his f ellowmen a megaphone 
 which would carry his voice to the very ends of the 
 earth; and it was not long before the thinkers and leaders 
 of those days awoke to their opportunity. There was 
 a sudden outpouring of pamphlets on various subjects 
 of public interest. For example, in the year 1518 there 
 were published 150 books and pamphlets in the German 
 language. Six years later, in 1524, there were published 
 990 German works of various kinds. The special cause 
 for all these new books at just this time was the out- 
 break of, the Protestant Reformation. No doubt in other 
 countries also, there was a similar rapid increase at this 
 time in the number of printed publications. 
 
4 GUTENBERG PRESS. 
 
A NEW ERA OF TRIUMPH ' 319 
 
 Since those days there has been a steady and at times 
 almost magical improvement in the process of printing. 
 Great presses driven by steam or electricity have taken 
 the place of the old hand-power machines. The total 
 volume of printed matter which is now turned out an- 
 nually is beyond computation. It is the Bible, however, 
 whose circulation has been most increased by the in- 
 vention of printing. Not only was the Bible the first 
 printed book but it has always been the most frequently 
 printed book, and remains today the one " best seller." 
 The British and Foreign Bible Society alone issues a 
 million Bibles yearly. 
 
 The Resurrection of the Greek Testament 
 
 In pictures of the famous statue of Moses by Michel- 
 angelo, one notices that the great lawgiver is represented 
 as having horns springing from above his forehead. 
 This strange fact is due to a mistaken translation of Ex. 
 34 : 35, in the Latin version by Jerome. Instead of 
 " Moses' face shone," Jerome understood the Hebrew 
 to mean, " Moses' face was homed." There were 
 many such errors in the Latin version, both in the Old 
 Testament and in the New, and these errors were of course 
 perpetuated in translations made from the Latin, such 
 as Wyclif's. Now WycliE and his colleagues knew well 
 enough that the Latin version from which they translated 
 was itself a translation from the original languages in 
 which the Bible was written. No doubt they would 
 have given much for a manuscript of the Greek New 
 Testament. But there probably was not a single copy 
 in England. Moreover, no one tmderstood the Greek 
 language, nor was there such a thing as a Greek grammar 
 or lexicon, in all western Europe. 
 
 But in this department 'of human learning too, a new era 
 was at hand. In 1453, or the very year that Gutenberg 
 began to set the type for the first printed edition of the 
 Latin Bible, the Turks captured the city of Constantinople. 
 In this city the knowledge of Greek had been cherished 
 
320 THE STORY OP OUR BIBLE 
 
 through the centuries, although neglected in other parts of 
 Europe. With the coming of the Turks, the learned 
 monks hastily gathered up their manuscripts, including 
 copies of the New Testament in Greek, and fled to Italy. 
 Here they awakened a new interest in Greek literatiire, 
 which rapidly spread to other coimtries. This movement 
 is called " the new learning," or the Renaissance. 
 
 Among the centers of the new learning was Oxford 
 University, in England. A little group of scholars 
 gathered there who were especially interested in the 
 Greek New Testament. As they read the story of Jesus 
 and the letters of Paul in the freshness and force of the 
 original language, the meaning came home to them like 
 a new revelation, which they longed to impart to others. 
 One of these men, a young German named Erasmus, 
 published in his own country in the year 1516, a printed 
 edition of the Greek New Testament, with a new and 
 more accurate Latin translation in parallel columns. 
 Thousands of copies of this book were quickly sold, 
 and a new interest in the Bible was awakened among 
 educated men. There were indeed many who resented 
 any suggestion that the Latin version was not perfect. 
 Some in their ignorance even went so far as to say that 
 the Greek and Hebrew languages were inventions of 
 heretics! When an edition of the Old .Testament was 
 published with the Hebrew in one column, the Greek in 
 another and the Latin in the middle, it was said that the 
 true version of the Bible had been crucified, like our 
 Lord, between two thieves. 
 
 In spite of all opposition there was an increasing 
 number of men who studied Greek and Hebrew, and 
 the way was thus prepared for new and more accurate 
 translations of the Bible into the modem languages of 
 Europe, including English. 
 
 The Protestant Reformation 
 
 Throughout the Middle Ages, the people of Europe 
 had been under a rigid ecclesiastical tyranny. Freedom 
 
A NEW ERA OF TRIUMPH^ 321 
 
 of religious opinion was unknown. To be a " Wycliffite " 
 or any other kind of a so-called heretic meant severe 
 persecution, if not death. Not only were men forbidden 
 to think for themselves, they were not even allowed 
 to read the Bible for themselves. Pope Innocent was 
 asked by a bishop what to do with associations of Bible 
 -readers in his diocese. He replied (1199) that of course 
 the study of the Bible was to be encouraged among the 
 clergy but that all laymen were to be kept from it, the 
 Bible being so profound in its mysteries that even scholars 
 sometimes get beyond their depth and' are drowned. 
 He compares the Bible to the sacred mountain, Sinai, 
 and quotes the words of Moses (Exodus 19: 12-13), 
 " Take heed to yourselves that ye go not up into the 
 motmt, or touch the border of it. Whosoever toucheth 
 the mount shaU be stoned or shot through." Likewise, 
 the Pope said, " If a layman touches the Bible he is 
 guilty of sacrilege and should be stoned or shot through." 
 
 As time went on, however, thinking men grew restive 
 under these restrictions. Such men also became dis- 
 gusted with some of the superstitious doctrines which 
 were taught. But what set the great mass of the common 
 people against the Roman Church was the comtption 
 and immorality of the ecclesiastical officials. The priests 
 and prelates, great and small, seemed to care for nothing 
 but money. One of the worst scandals was the selling 
 of indulgences for money, that is, pardons for sins not 
 yet committed, or in other words, permission to commit 
 these sins. Discontent with such practices grew more 
 and more widespread and intense. All that was needed 
 was a leader around which a reform movement could 
 crystallize. 
 
 The leader appeared on the scene in 1517, when a 
 monk named Martin Luther, a professor in the little Uni- 
 versity of Wittenberg, denounced the sale of indulgences. 
 Much to Luther's own astonishment, the news of his 
 action spread like wildfire all over Europe. Within a 
 few years nearly all the independent kingdoms of northern 
 
322 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Germany had revolted from Rome, and had set up an 
 independent church organization. Other countries, in- 
 cluding England, soon followed Germany's example and 
 were known as Protestant countries. 
 
 One important result of this great religious revolution 
 was a gradual increase in personal religious liberty. 
 Entire religious liberty did not come all at once. Here- 
 tics were still burned by Protestants as well as by the 
 Catholics; yet northern Germany, Switzerland, and 
 the Netherlands, did become a haven of refuge to many 
 a fearless and'outspoken reformer from other countries of 
 Europe. In all Protestant countries and eventually in 
 Roman Catholic lands also, permission was granted to 
 the common people to read translations of the Bible. 
 Thus the Bible was set free by the Protestant Reforma- 
 tion, and itself became one of the most powerful forces 
 working for a higher degree of human liberty and equality, 
 
A NEW ERA OF TRIUMPH 323 
 
 I • 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 Consider the following as subjects for debates, and jot down 
 notes for arguments on each side. 
 
 1. Resolved that the invention of the printing-press did 
 more harm than good. 
 
 Affirmative 
 
 Negative 
 
 2. Resoved that the publication of the Greek New Testa- 
 ment hy Erasmus did more harm than good. 
 Affirmative 
 
 Negative 
 
 3. Resolved that laymen should not be allowed to read the 
 Bible. 
 
 A£&rmative 
 
 Negative 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. Who invented the art of printing from movable tjrpes? 
 
 2. When and where was the first printing-press set up? 
 
 3. What book was the first one printed? 
 
 4. What other invention increased the usefulness of the 
 printing-press? 
 
324 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 5. What was the influence of the printing-press on civiUza • 
 tion? 
 
 6. How has the printing-press increased the influence of 
 the Bible? 
 
 7. How were the errors of the Latin Bible brought to light 
 during the fifteenth century? 
 
 8. How did the great German scholar Erasmus awaken 
 fresh interest in the New Testament? 
 
 9. Why did some persons denounce him? 
 
 10. Why did the Church formerly forbid the reading of 
 the Bible by laymen? 
 
 11. How was the Bible set free by the Protestant Reforma- 
 tion? 
 
CHAPTER XLI 
 
 THE BIBLE FOR THE GERMAN PEOPLE 
 
 Luther's Translation of the Bible 
 
 The period of the Reformation not only set the common 
 people free to read the Bible, but it also aroused every- 
 where a new and intense interest in the Bible. The air 
 was ftill of questions about religion, and all thinking 
 persons were eager to find out for themselves what the 
 Bible taught in regard to the disputed points. When 
 we consider this general interest, and also the revival of 
 Greek and Hebrew scholarship which had already begun, 
 we are not surprised that this period of history was 
 remarkable, among other things, for its translations of 
 the Bible into the various languages of Europe, as for 
 example, English, French, Italian, German and Swedish. 
 
 Early Continental Translations 
 
 Long before the period of the Reformation, the Bible was 
 translated somewhat imperfectly into certain languages 
 of continental Europe, as well as into English. Among 
 the leaders in this work were those groups of Christians 
 known as the Waldenses. In the year 1176 there was 
 living in the city of Lyons, France, a rich -merchant 
 known as Peter Waldo. One Sunday he heard a minstrel 
 in the street singing a poem about a certain Saint Alexis, 
 who had given up his property and had thus found peace. 
 The song struck a responsive chord within him, for he 
 himself was longing for peace of heart; and he sought 
 out two priests who agreed to translate the Gospels for 
 him into the language of the south of France. Reading 
 these Gospels, he came to the story of the rich young 
 ruler to whom Jesus said, " Go. sell all that thou hast 
 and come follow me." As he read, he thought about the 
 
 325 
 
326 THE STORY OP OUR BIBLE 
 
 rich and powerftil church ofi&cials of his day, who lived 
 in luxury, and who were supposed to be Christ's repre- 
 sentatives. Were they Christians in any true sense _ of 
 the word? It seemed to him that the so-called Christian 
 church had almost wholly forgotten the true meaning 
 of Christianity, and he determined that he himseH 
 would take Christ's words literally. So he distributed 
 all his property among the poor, and henceforth sup- 
 ported himself by his labor from day to day, at the same 
 time preaching his ideas to aU who would listen. In a 
 very short tirrie, he was joined by others in this new way 
 of life. They were known as the Poor Men of Lyons. 
 " They are orderly and modest in their manners," says 
 a writer of that time "and their dress is neither expensive 
 nor mean. They use no oaths, falsehoods, or frauds. 
 They live on what they can earn by the labor of their 
 hands from day to day. Even shoemakers are teachers 
 among them. They are contented with the bare neces- 
 sities of life. They are also chaste. They are never 
 found hanging about wineshops." 
 
 Many of these people traveled from town to town, 
 and although forbidden by the church authorities, 
 gathered groups of hearers together and explained the 
 Scriptures. The movement spread very rapidly, although 
 it was condemned as heretical, and was persecuted. 
 Organizations of similar " poor men " sprang into exist- 
 ence in various parts of France, and also in Italy and 
 Germany. Everywhere, they urged people to read the 
 Bible for themselves. To encourage such reading, they 
 translated the Gospels and other biblical books into a 
 number of languages, including Bohemian and German. 
 In time, translations were made of the entire Bible. 
 Soon after the invention of printing, a number of editions 
 of the Bible in German were published. These early 
 translations were very faulty. The translators were 
 like those early Christians who first translated the New 
 Testament into Latin, not learned scholars, but humble, 
 consecrated men with little education. ^ They did not 
 
THE BIBLE FOR THE GERMAN PEOPLE 327 
 
 know Latin very well. For example, they did not 
 recognize Tertius as a proper name, and translated it 
 " the third." Nor were they skillful in expressing the 
 ideas of the Bible in their own language. Their sen- 
 tences were often awkward, and sometimes did not make 
 sense. Such translations were not easy to read. Never- 
 theless they exerted an important influence, preparing 
 the way for the Reformation. 
 
 An Enforced Vacation Put to Good Use 
 
 The first and in some respects the greatest of the Bible 
 translations of the Reformation era, was that by Luther 
 himself into the German language. It is of special 
 interest to us, as it was one of the forerunners of our 
 English Bible. That Luther was led to give his attention 
 to this matter was due in part to a turn in his fortunes 
 which compelled him to retire for a tirne from his busy 
 life as a teacher and a public leader. He had been 
 summoned from his home in Wittenberg (in the year 
 1521) to appear before the Imperial Diet in the city of 
 Wurms, to answer the charge of heresy. All the world 
 knows how this peasant-bom monk stood up before the 
 Emperor and all his princes, and refused to take back 
 a' single syllable: "Here I stand. God helping me I. 
 cannot do otherwise." 
 
 He had been granted a safe-conduct by the Emperor, 
 and so was allowed to set out for home. He was now a 
 condemned heretic, however, and his life was in dire 
 peril. By the edict o'f the Diet, no one was to receive 
 him or feed him. Wherever he might be found, he was 
 to be seized and handed over to the Emperor. Hitherto, 
 he had been protected by his friend the Elector Frederick, 
 in whose province Wittenberg was situated. Now, 
 however, even the good Elector dared not defy openly 
 the Imperial decree. So by a plan which had been ex- 
 plained to Luther beforehand, the carriage in which he 
 was traveling homeward was stopped by armed horse- 
 men in a lonely forest, and Luther himself was taken 
 
328 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 to one of Frederick's castles, the Wartburg. Here he' 
 remained safely hidden for nearly a year, only a few of 
 his intimate friends knowing of his whereabouts. It 
 was widely believed that he had been made away with 
 by his enemies. 
 
 Although he was in the hands of friends and surrounded 
 by every comfort, this was not an agreeable experience 
 for Luther. He was an exceedingly active man, and 
 sitting around all day with nothing to do was not at all 
 to his taste. Indeed his health suffered from the la,ck 
 of exercise, along with much rich food. Only one oc- 
 cupation was left to him, namely the study of the Scrip- 
 tures; and in the autumn of 1521 it occurred to him that 
 a new translation of the Bible into German was greatly 
 needed. Immediately he set about the task, and with 
 such impetuous energy did he work, that within three 
 months he finished the New Testament. This was pub- 
 lished in September, 1522, after his return to Wittenberg. 
 
 At Work on the Old Testament 
 
 Immediately after finishing the New Testament, 
 Luther continued with the Old, but this of course even 
 with the help of associates, required more time, especially 
 as he was now back in active life again. In certain of 
 his letters Luther tells of the difficvilties which he and 
 his friends encountered in translating from the Hebrew. 
 " It has often happened," he says in one letter, " that 
 we have sought a fortnight, or three or four weeks, for 
 a single word." 
 
 And again he writes, " I am now at work translating 
 the prophets. Good Heavens! How hard it is to make 
 the Hebrew writers speak German! They withstand our 
 efforts, not wishing to give up their native tongue for a 
 barbarous idiom, just as a nightingale woiild not change 
 her sweet song to imitate the cuckoo." 
 
 In still another letter, he speaks of his work on the 
 book of Job. "We have so much trouble translating 
 Job, on account of the grandeur of his style, that he seems 
 
THE BIBLE FOR THE GERMAN PEOPLE 329 
 
 to be much more impatient of our efforts to turn him 
 into German, than he was of the consolations of his 
 friends." Finally the work was finished, and the whole 
 German Bible in the new translation was published in 
 1534. 
 
 The Influence op Luther's Translation 
 
 Within fifty years after the first edition of Luther's 
 version of the entire Bible, more than 100,000 copies 
 were sold, Luther himself never taking a penny for this 
 work. The following remark by one of Luther's op- 
 ponents, Cochlseus, soon after the publication of the 
 New Testament, shows what an enormous influence 
 it immediately wielded: " Luther's New Testament was 
 multiplied by the printers in a most wonderful way, so 
 that even shoemakers and women, and every and any 
 lay person acquainted with the German type read it 
 greedily as the foimtain of all truth, and by repeatedly 
 reading it impressed it on their memory. By this means 
 they acquired in a few months so much knowledge that 
 they ventured to dispute not only with Catholic laymen, 
 but even with masters and doctors of theology about 
 faith and the Gospel." 
 
 Luther was well qualified for this task of translation. 
 He had received a thorough education at the University 
 of Erfurt, and after his graduation he had gone on with 
 his study, taking up both Hebrew and Greek. Naturally 
 he translated the Bible from the original languages 
 instead of from the Latin with its many errors. 
 
 Besides being accurate, Luther's translation was a 
 fine example of forcible and beautiful German. He 
 did not merely transpose the original words into German 
 words, but he sought rather to express the thought of 
 each sentence, as it would naturally be expressed by 
 Germans themselves. One secret of his success in the 
 use of the German language, is revealed by his own state- 
 ment, as follows: "You must get yoiu: German," he 
 declares, " not from the Latin, but from the mother in 
 
330 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 the home, the child in the street, and the common man 
 in, the market-place." 
 
 Luther's greatest qualification as a translator was his 
 inner sympathy with the biblical writers, and his deep 
 spiritual understanding of the great ideas of Christianity. 
 As he himself says, " Translating is not everybody's 
 gift. It demands a genuinely pious, true industrious, 
 reverent heart." 
 
 Luther's Bible became at once the Bible of the German 
 people, and has continued so to the present day. Indeed 
 the present German language is in part the product of 
 Luther's translation. Before his time there were a great 
 number of dialects, so that sometimes even persons from 
 districts only a few miles apart, could scarcely understand 
 one another. But when the new translation was .scat- 
 tered into every German household, its language became 
 the standard, and the dialects gradually disappeared. 
 To what extent Luther's Bible has inspired the spiritual 
 greatness of the German people, as revealed in the past 
 four centuries by such men as Schiller and Goethe, of 
 course no one can measure. 
 
THE BIBLE FOR THE GERMAN PEOPLE 331 
 
 * 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1. Which is the more essential, book learning or character? 
 Illustrate from the early history of the Waldenses. 
 
 2. Why did Luther's translation of the Bible have a great 
 sale, while earlier German translations, even in printed editions, 
 were known only to a few? 
 
 3. HowhadLuther prepared himself for the work of transla- 
 tion? 
 
 4. What can you infer as to Luther's character from the 
 fact that he mastered Hebrew and Greek, in an age when 
 few persons, even clergymen, had any acquaintance with them? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. Why was there a demand for translations of the Bible 
 in the period of the Reformation? 
 
 2. Who were among the early leaders in the work of trans- 
 lating the Bible into the languages of Europe? 
 
 3. TeH about Peter Waldo, and how he came to start a 
 new religious organization. 
 
 4. Briefly describe the early translations of the Bible into 
 German and other European languages. What were their 
 defects? 
 
 5. How did it happen that Luther was able to give his 
 attention to Bible translation? 
 
 6. What does he say about the difficulty of translating the 
 Old Testament into German? 
 
 7. What were some of the good qualities of Luther's trans- 
 lation? 
 
 8. What influence did it exert? 
 
CHAPTER XLII 
 
 THE FATHER OF THE ENGLISH BIBLE 
 
 The Work of William Tyndale 
 
 It has been well said that the father of the English 
 Bible, as we now have it, was William Tyndale. Otir 
 Authorized and Revised Versions bear the mark of his 
 genius, more than of any other single man. Few other 
 names in history are so closely identified with the Bible. 
 His whole life-work was the translation of the Bible. 
 
 About Tyndale's early life we know little. He was 
 bom about 1490. As a young man he studied in the 
 universities of Oxford and Cambridge, and gained a good 
 reputation as a scholar. While he was still in Cambridge 
 there fell into his hands a copy of the new Greek Testa- 
 ment by Erasmus. This was the turning-point of his 
 life. As he read this volume the conviction was burned 
 deeply into his heart that the religion of the church of 
 those days had fallen very far from the religion of Jesus 
 and His apostles. Soon afterwards came the news of 
 Luther's revolt against Rome. Tyndale's heart was 
 with Luther, and he longed to help the cause of a purer 
 Christianity in his own country. In the preface to the 
 New Testament of Erasmus he foiind a suggestion as to 
 what he might do. " I wish," said Erasmus, " that 
 even the weakest woman should read the Gospels — 
 should read the Epistles of Paul: and I wish that they 
 were translated into all languages, so that they might 
 be read and understood not only by Scots and Irishmen, 
 but also by Turks and Saracens. I long that the husband- 
 man should sing portions of them to himself as he follows 
 the plow, that the weaver should hum them to the tune 
 of his shuttle, that the traveler should beguile with their 
 stories the tedium of his journey." It is probable also 
 that Luther's translation into German stirred Tyndale 
 with a desire to render the sa;me service to his own people. 
 
 332 
 
THE FATHER OF THE ENGLISH BIBLE 333 
 
 « 
 
 At any rate, he determined to translate the Bible into 
 English, and to circulate printed copies in every palace 
 and cottage in England. There was already in existence 
 the English translation by Wyclif, but the language had 
 greatly changed since Wyclif's time; and besides that, 
 the time had come for a new and more accurate transla- 
 tion not from the Latin but from the original languages. 
 Tyndale felt himself the man to do the work. It was 
 probably about this time that there occurred his famous 
 dispute with a so-called " learned man " in his native 
 county, about the authority of the Pope; in which he 
 said: " If God spare my life, ere many years I will cause 
 a boy that driveth the plow to know more of the Scripture 
 than thou dost." We shall see how well he made good 
 his promise. 
 
 The First Printed English New Testament 
 
 While still a young man of about thirty, Tyndale went 
 to London, in the hope of interesting Bishop Tunstall 
 of that city in his undertaking. He needed some means 
 of support while he worked. The Bishop was a friend 
 of Erasmus ; but he had been greatly disturbed by Luther's 
 agitation, and he was instinctively hostile to any project 
 which might stir up a similar revolt in England. So 
 he told Tyndale that " his house was full "; that is, he 
 could not pay him a salary. The young scholar never- 
 theless found friends in London, including a certain Hum- 
 phrey Munmouth, and other well-to-do merchants who 
 backed him with funds. After about six months in 
 London, however, Tyndale realized that if he should ever 
 succeed' in giving the Bible to the English people, it 
 would only be in the teeth of the fiercest opposition on 
 the part of the authorities. He perceived that "not 
 only was there no rowme in my_ Lord of London's palace 
 to translate the New Testament, but also that there 
 was no place to do it in all Englonde." So in 1524 he 
 went frorn England to Germany, where he found pro- 
 
334 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 tection among the Lutherans. He perhaps visited 
 Luther himself at Wittenberg. From this time, on he 
 lived an exile's life, nor did he ever again set foot upon 
 his native soil. 
 
 For a time he found a home in Hamburg, where he 
 finished the New Testament. The next year he went 
 to Cologne and made arrangements with a printer in 
 that city, named Peter Quentel, for the publication of his 
 manuscript. When the work was about half finished, 
 Luther's opponent Cochteus discovered what was going 
 on. He had overheard some of the workmen from the 
 printing establishment boasting of the revolution which 
 would soon be accomplished in England through a book 
 which they were printing. Inviting the men to his 
 house he plied them with wine, and finally drew from 
 them the information he wanted. Fortunately, before 
 the authorities could do anything Tyndale was warned, 
 and taking the vinbound sheets which had already been 
 printed he fled to Wurms which at that time was one of 
 the leading ceriters of the Reformation. Here, where 
 six years before Luther had defied both Pope and Em- 
 peror, Tyndale brought out two editions of his English 
 New Testament (1525). One was a large quarto book, 
 the other smaller. About 3000 copies of each were 
 printed. These were quickly smuggled into England 
 hidden, it is said, in bales of cloth, and many of them 
 were at once bought up and distributed. 
 
 The English authorities had been on the lookout for 
 these books. Cochlaeus and others had written to 
 King Henry the Eighth warning him of the awftil danger 
 to which his realm was 'exposed, and urged him "to 
 prevent the importation of the pernicious merchandise." 
 When it was discovered that a large ntimber of copies 
 had been smuggled in, a great outcry was made. Bishop 
 Tunstall preached against the new translation, saying 
 that it contained no less than 3000 errors ; and copies of it 
 were publicly burned. Of the two editions, or 6000 books 
 in all, only one copy of each remains, and these are imper- 
 
THE FATHER OF THE ENGLISH BIBLE 335 
 
 feet, so determined and fierce was the campaign of 
 destruction directed against them. 
 
 AH this furious opposition however was like an at- 
 tempt to hold back the tide or to keep the sun. from 
 rising. The futility of it is shown by an amusing incident. 
 A certain London merchant named Packyngton went 
 to Bishop TunstaU and offered to buy for him all the 
 unsold copies of the new translation. The Bishop eagerly 
 accepted the offer, and Packyngton did indeed secure a 
 large number of the books and charged the Bishop a 
 good round sum for them. This money he immediately 
 turned over to Tyndale to be used for printing a new 
 edition. " And so," declares the old chronicler who tells 
 the story, " the Bishop had the bokes, Packyngton had 
 the thankes and Tyndale had the money." Of course 
 new editions were immediately published. Within three 
 or four years, as many as fifteen thousand copies were 
 sent to England. 
 
 At Work on the Old Testament 
 
 Immediately after finishing the New Testament Tyn- 
 dale set to work to translate the Old Testament. In 
 1530 he published an English version of the Pentateuch, 
 and the following year the book of Jonah. By this time, 
 however, the clouds of persecution were gathering deeply 
 about him. He had made many enemies especially 
 among the church leaders, not only by translating the 
 Bible, but also by his own keen and forcible comments 
 on Bible passages. Many of these comments were 
 directed against the Roman Catholic Church of that 
 day. As examples of his skill as a reform writer we 
 may quote the following marginal notes from his transla- 
 tion of the Pentateuch. 
 
 • Opposite Ex. 34:20, which reads, "None shall come 
 before me empty," Tyndale wrote, " that is a good text 
 for the Pope." He meant that the Pope and the other 
 church leaders were always asking the people for money, 
 and cared for nothing else. He makes the same point, 
 
336 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 in his comment opposite Ex. 36 : 6, where it reads that 
 the people brought too many gifts for the new tabernacle, 
 and were told not to bring anything more. "When," 
 asks Tyndale, " will the Pope say, Hoo [that is, hold, 
 or stop]. When will our spiritualitie [that is, church 
 leaders] say, Hoo? Never, verily, until they have all." 
 
 Such thrusts as these made many a selfish Bishop 
 wince. The authorities in England left no stone tmtumed 
 to get him back into their power. In Germany, also, 
 the enemies of the Reformation joined in the hunt. 
 Attempts were made 'to seize him at Wurms. For a time 
 he found protection under another Lutheran prince, 
 Philip of Hesse, at Marburg. Later we find him at 
 Antwerp in Belgium. Thus he was driven like a wild 
 beast from one hiding place to another. To use his own 
 words, he suffered " poverty, exile, bitter absence from 
 friends, hunger and thirst and cold, great dangers, and 
 other hard and sharp fightings." Finally in May, 1535, 
 he was betrayed by one in whom he had trusted and was 
 thrown into prison at Vilvorde near Brussels. A touching 
 letter has been preserved which he wrote in the prison 
 to the governor of the city sometime during the winter 
 after his arrest. He begs the governor to procure from 
 his goods " a warmer cap, for I suffer extremely from 
 cold in the head, being afflicted with a perpetual catarrh 
 which is considerably increased in this ceU; a warmer 
 coat also, for that which I have is very thin; also a piece 
 of cloth to patch my leggins. My overcoat is worn out. 
 My shirts are also worn out. ... I wish also permission 
 to have a lamp in the evening, for it is wearisome to sit 
 alone in the dark. But above all I entreat and beseech 
 your clemency „ . . to permit me to have my Hebrew 
 Bible, Hebrew grammar, and Hebrew dictionary, that 
 I may spend my time with that study." 
 
 It is probable that this request for his books was 
 granted, and let us hope that warmer clothes were pro- 
 vided for him also. At any rate, he seems to have finished 
 while in prison his translation of the historical books 
 
THE FATHER OF THE ENGLISH BIBLE 337 
 
 from Joshua through II Chronicles. Before he could 
 carry the Old Testament to completion, however, he 
 was tried and condemned as a heretic, and on October 
 6, 1536, he was put to death by strangling. His last 
 words were, " Lord, open the King of England's eyes." 
 
 The Influence of Tyndale's Version 
 
 Although Tyndale himself thus died a martyr and in 
 exile, few men have ever been more gloriously victorious 
 in life's battle. Tyndale's translation has been the 
 dominating influence in all the leading English versions 
 from that day to this. "It is substantially the Bible," 
 says the historian Froude, " with which we are all familiar. 
 The peculiar genius — if such a word be permitted — the 
 mingled tenderness and majesty — the preternatural 
 grandeur — unequalled, tmapproached in the attempted 
 improvements of modem scholars — all are here and 
 bear the impress of the mind of one man — William 
 Tyndale." 
 
 The following selection from Tyndale's translation 
 (of Matthew 6 : 24-25) shows how little it has been 
 changed in later versions : 
 
 " No man can serve two masters. For either he shall 
 hate the one and love the other, or else he shall lean to 
 the one and despise that other. Ye cannot serve God 
 and- mammon. Therefore I say unto you, be not careful 
 for your life, what ye shall eat, nor what ye shall drink, 
 nor yet for your body what raiment ye shall wear. Is 
 not the life more worth than meat, and the body more 
 of value than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air. 
 For they sow not, neither reap, nor yet carry into the 
 barnes; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are 
 not ye better than they? " 
 
 A striking evidence of the value of Tyndale's transla- 
 tion is the fact that the English and American revisions 
 have in many cases gone back to it in preference to the 
 King James Version. One example is in the thirteenth 
 chapter of First Corinthians, where both Tyndale and 
 
338 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 the Revised Versions read " love," rather than " charity " 
 as in the King James Version. 
 
 The honesty and unselfish humility which Tyndale 
 showed in all his work is well expressed in the following 
 quotation from his letters: "I call God to record," 
 he writes to his dear friend John Frith, " against the 
 day we shall appear before our Lord Jesus, to give a 
 reckoning of our doings, that I never altered one syllable 
 of God's word against my conscience, nor would this 
 day, if all that is in the earth, whether it be pleasure, honor 
 or riches might be given me." 
 
THE FATHER OF THE ENGLISH BIBLE 339 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 1. Comparing England with Germany, in which country 
 was the Reformation movement strongest, at the time of the 
 appearance of the New Testaments of Tyndale and Luther 
 respectively? 
 
 2. To what extent was^ Tjmdale's translation one of the 
 prime factors in starting the Reformation movement in Eng- 
 land? (Compare it in this respect with Luther's translation 
 as a factor in the German Reformation.) 
 
 3. For how many years was Tjmdale an exile from his 
 native land? 
 
 4. On what occasions did Tjmdale's tmdertaking require 
 quick wit, cleverness, promptness and energy? 
 
 5. With what thoughts do you suppose he comforted himself 
 during the lonely hours of his last imprisonment? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What is known about the early life of William Tjmdale? 
 
 2. What two events suggested to the yoimg man Tyndale 
 the idea of translating the Bible into English? 
 
 3. Why did Wyclif's version no longer meet the needs of 
 the English people? 
 
 4. What did Tyndale hope to accomplish through a new 
 translation? 
 
340 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 5. To whom did he first go for assistance in this work? 
 
 6. Who finally furnished the necessary funds? 
 
 7. Why did he have to leave England, in order to finish 
 the work? 
 
 8. WTiere did he find protection? 
 
 9. What difficulty did he encounter in getting his New 
 Testament printed? 
 
 10. Where and when was it finally published? 
 
 11. How were the books brought to England? 
 
 12. How many copies were distributed in England, in the 
 course of three or four years? 
 
 13. How much of the Old Testament did Tyndale succeed 
 in publishing in an English translation before his death? 
 
 14. Where and how did he die? 
 
 15. To what extent did Tyndale's version influence later 
 English translations? 
 
CHAPTER XLIII 
 A MASTERPIECE OF ENGLISH LITERATURE 
 
 The Origin of the King James Version 
 Anout a hundred years after Tyndale, there was pub- 
 iished an Enghsh version of the Bible which for nearly 
 three centuries was destined to be in a peculiar way 
 " the Bible," and the only Bible, of the vast majority 
 of English-speaking Christians. This was the King 
 James Version or the so-called Authorized Version. The 
 period between the first appearance of Tyndale's New 
 Testament, and the publication of the King James 
 Version (that is, 1525 to 1611), was marked by great 
 activity in Bible translation. Many different versions 
 appeared. As most of these exerted an influence on the 
 translators of the King James Version it is of interest 
 to take note of the most important of them. 
 
 Coverdale's Bible and its Successors 
 
 Even before Tyndale's death conditions had begun 
 to be more favorable for the publication of an English 
 Bible. The Reformation movement was making headway 
 all the time. King Henry, from selfish motives, had 
 broken with the Pope and this led him to favor the 
 reformers. His prime minister, Thomas Cromwell, see- 
 ing in what direction the wind was blowing, had quietly 
 engaged a prominent scholar named Miles Coverdale 
 to prepare a translation of the Bible. This scholar was 
 a man of about the same age as Tyndale. He had been 
 a monk, but like Tyndale had gone over to f he Reforma- 
 tion movement, and had been compelled to flee from Eng- 
 land for safety. He had a rare gift for musical English, 
 although he was not a thorough student of Greek and 
 Hebrew, like Tyndale. He was well aware of his limita- 
 
 341 
 
342 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 tions, but there seemed no chance that Tyndale's version 
 would ever receive legal sanction, for King Henry sttU 
 regarded Tyndale as a dangerous heretic. Moreover 
 Tyndale had not yet been able to publish a complete 
 Old Testament in English. So Coverdale modestly 
 accepted the task. " It was neither my labor nor my 
 desire," he says, "to have this work put in my hand" 
 Yet " though I could not do so well as I would, I thought 
 it yet my duty to do my best, and that with a good will." 
 Thus there appeared in England in 1535, while Tyndale 
 was in prison, the first coniplete printed English Bible, . 
 namely Coverdale's translation. In the course of the 
 next thirty years, three versions appeared which may 
 be classed together as the Coverdale-Tyndale group. They 
 were combinations of Tyndale's work and Coverdale's, with 
 minor changes. The first of these (1537) is known as Mat- 
 thew's Biblei. This was nothing else than Tyndale's ver- 
 sion of the New Testament, and of the Old Testament 
 as far as he had completed it, namely to II Chronicles, 
 together with Coverdale's translation of the remainder 
 of the Old Testament. It was edited by John Rogers, 
 a close friend of Tytidale, with whom the latter had 
 left his unfinished manuscript of the Old Testament. 
 It bore the name of Thomas Matthew on the title-page, 
 but this was probably an assumed name adopted by 
 Rogers himself. There was a preface dedicating the 
 book to King Henry, and a license was secured from 
 him permitting copies of it " to be bought and read 
 within this realm." How great a vindication this was 
 for Tyndale is shown by the fact that the book not only 
 contained all of his translation, so far as he had com- 
 pleted it, but also many of his marginal notes, expressing 
 ideas to which Henry had been hostile. 
 
 It is probable that the King did not exarnine these 
 notes very closely when he gave the permit to sell it, 
 and possibly his Protestant advisers were a bit nervous 
 on this account; for the next year the chancellor called 
 MUes Coverdale again into service and asked him to 
 
A MASTERPIECE OF LITERATURE 343 
 
 • 
 
 prepare a new edition without notes. Coverdale took 
 as the basis of the work,' not his translation of 1535, 
 but Matthew's Bible, of which only the latter part of 
 the Old Testament was his own work, while the rest 
 was Tyndale's. 
 
 This second Tyndale-Coverdale version was known 
 as the Great Bible, because of the large size of the 
 volumes. By royal edict, a copy of this edition was 
 set up in every church throughout the kingdom. We 
 read that six copies were set up in convenient places 
 in St. Paul's Church in London, and so great was the 
 enthusiasm for reading them that it was necessary to 
 admonish the people not to come in crowds nor to be 
 disorderly. In spite of this, the bishop of the cathedral 
 complained that " divers willful and unlearned persons 
 read the same at the time of divine service, yea in the 
 time of the sermon." Evidently many persons found 
 the Bible more interesting than the sermon. Thus at 
 last had Tyndale with Coverdale's help brought the entirp 
 Bible even to the boy who followed the plow. 
 
 The Psalms in the Episcopal Prayerbook as used today 
 are taken from the Great Bible, and are from Coverdale's 
 translation as Tyndale's work had stopped with II 
 Chronicles. They were retained by the church authori- 
 ties, in spite of many errors, because the people had 
 come to love so much the tenderness and poetic beauty 
 of Coverdale's wording. It was Coverdale who intro- 
 duced into our Bible the expressions "loving-kindness," 
 and " tender mercy." 
 
 A revision of the Great Bible, the third in this Tyndale- 
 Coverdale group, was published about thirty years later, 
 and was known as the Bishop's Bible, because a number 
 of prominent bishops had contributed to it. This 
 revision did not vary from the " Great Bible " in many 
 places, and unfortunately some of the changes were not 
 improvements. It is of interest to us chiefly because 
 the scholars who prepared the King James Version 
 used it as the basis of their work. It may, therefore. 
 
344 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 be called the lineal ancestor ot that version. Through 
 it the work of Tyndale and Coverdale was handed C/C 
 to future generations. 
 
 The Puritan and Roman Catholic Bibles 
 
 There were two other English versions which the Kiug 
 James translators frequently consulted. One of these 
 was the Geneva Bible, the work of Puritan exiles who 
 fled to Geneva, during the reign of the Roman Catholic 
 queen Mary (1553-1558). The other was the so-called 
 Rheims-Douay Bible, prepared in turn by Roman Catholic 
 exiles in France, after Mary had been succeeded by the 
 Protestant Elizabeth. 
 
 The leading spirit in the preparation of the Geneva 
 Bible was William Whittingham. He and his associates 
 were thorough students and corrected many errors in 
 the earlier versions. Many of their expressions, especially 
 in the prophetical books, are retained in the Authorized 
 Version. Puritan ideas were expressed in marginal 
 notes. This was the first English version in which 
 the Bible text was divided into chapters and verses, as 
 at present. The Hebrew text had been so divided for 
 many centuries. As for the Greek text of the New 
 Testament, it is said that the verses were made by 
 Stephen, a French scholar, associated with these English 
 Puritans at Geneva, and inserted in his Greek Testament 
 while he was on a journey on horseback about the year 
 1551. The Geneva Bible was published in 1560, in a 
 small convenient size, and in clear Roman type rather 
 than the old Gothic or black-letter. It became very 
 popular with the mass of the English people. It was 
 the Bible used by Shakespeare. Copies of it were 
 probably brought to America by the Pilgrim Fathers, 
 on the Mayflower. 
 
 The great influence of these various translations by 
 Protestants finally made it necessary for the Roman 
 Catholic leaders to prepare an English version for use 
 among their people. The task was undertaken by 
 
A MASTERPIECE OF LITERATURE 345 
 
 '• 
 
 professors in the Roman Catholic Seminary for English 
 students located at Rheims and later moved to Douay. 
 The New Testament was issued at Rheims in 1582, and 
 the Old Testament at Douay in 1609. Notes were added 
 giving the Roman Catholic interpretation of disputed 
 texts. 
 
 This translation was made not from the original Greek 
 and Hebrew, but from the Vulgate and therefore per- 
 petuates the errors of the Latin. However, it brought 
 over into English much of the stateliness and dignity 
 of the Latin, and many noble renderings in the King 
 James Version were taken from it. 
 
 The Making op the King James Version 
 
 In January, 1604, soon after the death of Queen Eliza- 
 beth, and the accession of James I, a conference of church 
 leaders was called by the king, to discuss certain ques- 
 tions of ecclesiastical policy. Among other things it was 
 suggested that a new translation of the Bible should 
 be made. King James at once favored the idea, partly 
 because he was himself something of a scholar, and liked 
 to ■ display his attainments. He was also greatly dis- 
 satisfied with the marginal notes of the Genevan Bible 
 which had already gained a wide circulation. The 
 Puritan translators of this version were strongly demo- 
 cratic in their sentiments, and did not believe in the divine 
 right of kings. King James pointed out two marginal 
 notes in partictilar which offended him. In a note on the 
 first chapter of Exodus, the Hebrew women were praised 
 for resisting the tyranny of Pharaoh. In I Chron. 
 15: 16, the narrative tells how Asa deposed his mother 
 from being queen. The translators added in the margin 
 that Asa ought not only to have deposed her, but should 
 also have killed her. These notes, said King James, 
 " savored too much of traitorous and dangerous 
 conceits." 
 
 With the king's approval and support, the plans for a 
 new translation were carried out. About fifty of the 
 
346 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 leading scholars in the kingdom were selected and divided 
 into six groups, two in Cambridge, two in Oxford, and 
 two in London. A certain section of the Bible was 
 given to each group, and a small committee representing 
 all the groups went over the entire work and prepared 
 it for the press. It was published in 1611, with a preface 
 giving some account of the purpose of the work, and the 
 manner in which it was done: " Truly, good Christian 
 reader, we never thought from the beginning that we 
 should need to make a new translation, nor yet to make 
 of a bad one a good one- — -but to make a good one 
 better, or out of many good ones one principal good 
 one, not justly to be excepted against; that hath been 
 our endeavor, that our mark. Neither did we disdain 
 to revise that which we had done and to bring back to 
 the anvil that which we had hammered. But having 
 and using as great helps as were needful and fearing no 
 reproach for slowness, nor coveting praise for expedition 
 we have at length through the good hand of the Lord 
 upon us, brought the work to that pass that you see." 
 
 This version has taken its place as one of the master- 
 pieces of English literature. Its greatness is largely 
 due to the eagerness and good judgment with which 
 its authors adopted for their own all that was best in 
 earlier versions. Like the original books of the Bible 
 this translation is therefore the product of no single 
 individual, but rather of an epoch, and that epoch one 
 of the greatest and noblest in English history. 
 
 To appreciate the beauty of the King James Version, 
 we may well ttim for a contrast to a selection from an 
 attempted improvement which was published in 1768. 
 " A gentleman of a splendid family and opulent fortune 
 had two sons. One day the younger approached his 
 father and begged him in the most importunate and 
 soothing terms to make a partition of his effects betwixt 
 himself and his elder brother. The indulgent father 
 overcome by his blandishments immediately divided 
 all his fortunes betwixt them." Compare this with: 
 
A MASTERPIECE OF LITERA-^URE 347 
 
 " A certain man had two sons: and the younger of them 
 said to his father, Father, give me the portion of goods 
 that falleth' to me. And he divided unto them his 
 Hving." 
 
 Perhaps the best description of this great version is 
 that of Faber. " It lives on the ear like music that 
 can never be forgotten, hke the sound of church bells 
 which the convert hardly knows how he can forego. 
 It is part of the national mind and the anchor of the 
 national seriousness. The memory of the dead passes 
 into it. The potent traditions of childhood are stereo- 
 typeid in its verses. The power of all the griefs and trials 
 of a man is hidden beneath its words. It is the repre- 
 sentative of his best moments, and all that has been 
 about him of soft and gentle and pure and penitent and 
 good speaks to him forever out of his English Bible. It 
 is his sacred thing which doubt has never dimmed and 
 controversy never soiled." 
 
348 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. Make a list of the translators who contributed directly 
 or indirectly, to the Authorized Version of 1611. * 
 
 2. What reasons are there for sayiag that Coverdale, next 
 to Tyndale, did more than any one else to give us our English 
 Bible? 
 
 3. Of. the various translations mentioned in this chapter, 
 which ones were most in danger of being biased and one-sided, 
 in their interpretations of the Bible? 
 
 4. How did the translators of the Authorized Version show 
 
 the spirit of good '" team-work "? 
 
 5. How were they rewarded for their work? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. When was the first complete English Bible printed? 
 
 2. Who was the translator? 
 
 3. How did it happen that Coverdale was asked by the 
 English prime minister to prepare this translation? 
 
 4. What editor and translator were responsible for Mat- 
 thew's Bible? 
 
 5. Who prepared the Great Bible, and of what earlier 
 version was it a revision? 
 
 6. Why was the Great Bible so named? 
 
A MASTERPIECE OF LITERATURE 349 
 
 7. How was this version made accessible to every one? 
 _ 8. What revision of the Great Bible was used in the prepara- 
 tion of the Authorized Version? 
 
 9. By whom and when was the Geneva version prepared? 
 
 10. In what respects was the Geneva Bible printed dif- 
 ferently from its predecessors? 
 
 11. Where and by whom was the Roman Catholic Bible 
 prepared? 
 
 12. Mention one or two characteristics of this version. 
 
 13. Why did King James favor still another translation? 
 
 14. How was this translation prepared? 
 
 15. Mention some ways in which the King James or Au- 
 thorized Version was indebted to both the Kheims New Testa- 
 ment and the Geneva Bible. 
 
 16. For how many centuries did the Authorized Version 
 remain in almost universal use as the Bible of aU English- 
 speaking peoples? 
 
CHAPTER XLIV 
 
 A QUEST FOR PERFECT ACCURACY 
 
 The English and American Revisions 
 
 Great as were the merits of the King James Version 
 of the Bible it was inevitable that after three centtuies 
 a revision would be necessary. One reason for this was 
 of course the gradual modification of the English lan- 
 guage. Many words in common use in 1611 are entirely 
 obsolete today; for example, leasing,, for lying (Psalm 
 4:2!), and daysman for umpire (Job 9: 33). Other words 
 have changed in meaning; let is no longer used in the 
 sense of hinder (II Thess. 2 : 7.) Grammatical con- 
 structions have also changed; as the use of " its," where, 
 the King James Version always uses " his." 
 
 An even more important reason for a new revision 
 was the fact that the version of 1611 was made from 
 comparatively late and imperfect manuscripts. In chap- 
 ter thirty-eight we saw that errors quickly 'crept into 
 the written manuscripts of the biblical books, and that 
 these errors gradually multiplied as time went on. The 
 Greek manuscripts used by the King James translators 
 all dated from as late as 800 A.D., and contained many 
 errors. 
 
 The Oldest Greek New Testaments 
 
 There were in existence, however, although inaccessible 
 to those scholars of 1611, many copies of the Greek New 
 Testament which were centuries older. It is fortunate 
 for us that the parchment of which these old books were 
 made has proved so durable. Our modem paper is 
 perishable. Experts are in doubt whether any books of 
 the twentieth century, even those printed on linen paper, 
 will survive two hundred years of time. On the other 
 
 350 
 
A QUEST FOR PERFECT ACCURACY 351 
 
 hand, the papyras of ancient times, although its fibers 
 were easily broken, was far more durable than the paper 
 of today; while some of the parchment books have 
 survived very rough treatment. 
 
 Very soon after the publication of the King James 
 Version, some of these older and nlore reliable manu- 
 scripts were made available for English scholars. Since 
 that time others have come to light. All these manu- 
 scripts, both recent and early, are iiow listed under 
 certain letters or numbers, as Codex A, or Codex B, 
 and the location of each is known to all scholars. Photo- 
 graphic fac-similes of the most important ones have 
 been distributed among all the leading libraries of the 
 world. We may mention four of them, namely codices 
 A, B, C and Aleph. As Professor Gregory says, these 
 stand forth among the rest, like David's four mighty 
 men. 
 
 Codex A was given to Charles I of England by the 
 Patriarch of Constantinople in 1628. It is now in the 
 British Museum. It was probably written about 425 
 A.D. 
 
 Codex B has been in the Vatican library -at Rome at 
 least since 1475, but it is only within the last century 
 that scholars have been permitted to see it. It was 
 written at least as early as 350 A.D. 
 
 Codex C has been for many centuries in Paris. It 
 belongs to a class of manuscripts known as Palimpsests. 
 This means that sometime during the middle ages, 
 when writing material was scarce, the monks in charge 
 of the 'library, where it was kept, seeing that the ink 
 had faded and was almost illegible, tore the leaves apart, 
 and used them for copying other things, of little or no 
 interest to us. Modem scholars', however, by applying 
 chemicals, have caused the original letters to stand out 
 more distinctly, so that with patient study most of the 
 words may be deciphered. Only about three-fifths of 
 the New Testament, however, is preserved. The leaves 
 containing the remainder were doubtless thrown away. 
 
352 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 But though it comes to us maimed and disfigured, like a 
 traveler from a long and dangerous voyage, this manu- 
 script bears a priceless testimony regarding the correct 
 wording of the New Testament books. The original 
 writing dates from about 450 A.D. 
 
 Codex Aleph, the fourth of the " mighty men," has 
 also had a somewhat exciting history. In the year 1844 a 
 young scholar named Tischendorf, from the University 
 of Leipsig, visited the monastery of St. Catherine at 
 Mount Sinai. While there he found in a wastebasket 
 forty-three leaves of an old manuscript, and the monks 
 let him have them. He also saw other leaves which they 
 refused- to give him. These forty-three leaves proved to 
 be from an old copy of the Greek translation of the Old 
 Testament, and Tischendorf determined to get the rest of 
 the manuscript some day if possible. Nine years later he- 
 returned to the monastery, and again fifteen years later, 
 in 1859, he made a third visit and spent some days there 
 without success. But the night before he was to leave, 
 the steward of the monastery invited him to his room, and 
 showed him a great pile of leaves of parchment, wrapped 
 in cloth on a shelf. The steward allowed him to take the 
 pile to his room, and he sat up all night looking at it, in 
 an ecstasy of joy, for it proved to contain not merely the 
 Greek Old Testament but also the New Testament 
 complete', and to his practiced eye, it was clear that the 
 writing was very old. The next morning he tried to gel, 
 the monks to let him have it, but they refused. Ten 
 years later (in 1869), however, it was secured from them 
 by the Russian government, and it may now be seen in 
 the Imperial Library at Petrograd. 
 
 This manuscript and Codex B, at the Vatican, are 
 probably the two best Greek manuscripts so far dis- 
 covered. It is believed that they both belonged to a 
 collection of fifty Bibles prepared for the Emperor 
 Constantine at Caesarea, in 331, under the direction of . 
 Eusebius, the church historian. Indeed to judge from 
 
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A yUKb'i -b'UK fKbLFECT ACC'UKAiJY 353 
 
 pecularities of the handwriting, the same scribe wrote 
 parts of both. 
 
 In addition to these Greek manuscripts, there have 
 recently been discovered a number of copies of very- 
 ancient translations t)f the New Testament. A very 
 valuable Syriac New Testament was discovered in 1892, 
 by two English ladies, Mrs. Lewis and Mrs. Gibson, 
 in the same monastery of St. Catherine on Mount Sinai 
 where Tischendorf found Codex Aleph. These ancient 
 translations are invaluable witnesses to the correct 
 Greek wording. 
 
 The Science of Textual Criticism 
 
 Not only have we found these older and more accurate 
 copies of the New Testament, but modem scholars 
 hiave also learned to use to better advantage whatever 
 manuscripts they may have. A new science has grown 
 up called textual criticism, which is the science of dis- 
 covering, in accordance with certain laws, the most 
 accurate wording of ancient writings. One of the most 
 important laws of this science is that of genealogy. 
 When a copy is made from any manuscript, the new copy 
 is a child, as it were, of the older one, and inherits its 
 mistakes. Now there are about three thousand known 
 manuscripts of the Greek New Testament, including 
 incomplete copies. Scholars have discovered that these 
 aU belong to two or three great families, according to 
 their differences in wording, and the value of a manu- 
 script depends" in no small degree on its family. Even 
 though it may not be very ancient, yet if it belongs to 
 a good family, it is more likely to be accurate than one 
 which is older, but which comes from a less accurate 
 ancestry. 
 
 As the fruit of an enormous amount of labor, in which 
 these principles have been followed, revised Greek texts 
 have been published in recent years, which probably are 
 nearly identical with the original autograph copies of 
 the New Testament books. 
 
354 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 The English and American Revisions 
 
 All these new manuscripts, and the scientific prog- 
 ress of modem scholars finally have made possible 
 translations of the Bible, which represent far more ac- 
 curately the original meaning of the writers, than the 
 King James Version. In 1870, all the leading scholars 
 in England were invited to join in the preparation of 
 a Revised Version. There was a committee of thirty- 
 seven for the Old Testament, and twenty-seven for the 
 New Testament. Meetings were held in Westminster 
 Abbey for more than ten years. There was a similar 
 committee in the United States, and the suggestions of 
 these American scholars were carefully considered by 
 the English committee. Finally in 1881, the New 
 Testament was published. So great was the general 
 interest that the entire New Testament in its new 
 form ■w/as actually sent by telegraph from New York 
 to Chicago and published in one of the newspapers. 
 The revised Old Testament was published in 1885. 
 These editions constitute what is known as the English 
 Revision. 
 
 There was, however, room for further improvement, 
 and the American committee decided to continue its 
 organization. In 1901 they published an American 
 Revised Version, which embodied a large number of 
 alterations which the English committee had rejected, 
 and also other changes. 
 
 These revised versions retain the beautiful language 
 and wording of the King James Version so far as possible, 
 and introduce changes only in the interests of accuracy 
 or when they are made necessary by changes in English 
 usage. 
 
 The Revised Version of the New Testament is much 
 more satisfactory than that of the Old Testament. It 
 is generally believed that much work remains to be 
 done on the latter. This is because it is so difficult to 
 correct the Hebrew text. We saw that all the copies of 
 
A QUEST FOR PERFECT ACCURACY 355 
 
 the Old Testament books in Hebrew, except the one which 
 the Rabbis chose for a standard, were lost or destroyed. 
 This standard text is on the whole a very good one, but 
 it is not perfect. There are not a few passages which 
 really do not make sense at all, as they stand. In some 
 places the Greek translation gives a better sense, and 
 in many such cases it is evident that the Greek translators 
 had a more accurate Hebrew text before them, than 
 the one which has come down to us. Yet scholars have 
 hesitated to use the Greek translation in correcting the 
 Old Testament, because it also is full of errors. In 
 recent years, however, scholars have learned how to use 
 the Greek in spite of its errors. Several excellent transla- 
 tions of the Old, as well as of the New Testament, have 
 been made by individual Biblical scholars and are already 
 being widely and profitably used, for they are based on 
 the established results of recent scholarship and express 
 the thoughts of the biblical writers in clear, vigorous 
 English idioms. We shall perhaps see in the not distant 
 future a complete English translation of the Old Testa- 
 ment which will be the greatest forward step in the 
 whole history of English Old Testament revisions. 
 
 In the meantime, the American Standard Version is 
 widely recognized as the most accurate complete trans- 
 lation now current among English-speaking peoples. 
 
356 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. Secure a copy of the Authorized Version of the Bible, 
 and also of the Ainerican Revision: what changes do you 
 notice in the form of the verse division, and in the printing 
 of the poetical books? 
 
 2. Read the preface to either the Old or the New Testament, 
 in the American Revision: find out what are some of the dis- 
 tinctive features of this Revision, as compared with that of 
 the English scholars. 
 
 3. Look up the following passages in a copy of the Au- 
 thorized Version: Acts 17:22, Lk. 2:14. Acts 26:28, Matt. 
 6:31, I John 5:7-8. Compare the changed wording in the 
 American Revision. Do, any of these changes affect the sub- 
 stance of the Christian belief? 
 
 4. Do you consider such changes as the above important 
 enough to justify the great amount of labor which made them 
 possible? 
 
 5. There are a few passages in the Old Testament where 
 the Hebrew wording is so badly preserved as to be quite unin- 
 telligible. What should a Bible translator do with such 
 passages? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. Why did it become necessary, in modem times, to issue 
 a Revised Version of the English Bible? 
 
 2. What names are given to the four most important 
 Greek manuscripts of the New Testament now known? 
 
A QUEST FOR PERFECT ACCJJRACY 357 
 
 3. State the probable date when each of these was written, 
 and where each is now located. 
 
 4. What is a Palimpsest manuscript? 
 
 5. By whom, when, where, and how, was Codex Aleph 
 discovered? 
 
 6. How may the ancient Syriac translation be used in 
 determining the true wording of the New Testament? 
 
 7. By whom, when, and where was a valuable Syriac 
 manuscript discovered? 
 
 8. Why must the genealogy as well as the age of a manu- 
 script be considered in determining its value? 
 
 9. How many English scholars were engaged in the prepara- 
 tion of the English Revision? 
 
 10. How long did they hold meetings? 
 
 11. Give the dates of publication of the New and Old 
 Testaments in the English Revision. 
 
 12. What part did American scholars have in the prepara- 
 tion- of this revision? 
 
 13. Why did the American committee continue in the work? 
 
 14. When was the American Revision published? 
 
 15. To what extent do these reviaons vary from the Au- 
 thorized Version? 
 
 16. In what part of the Bible is there still need for further 
 revision? Explain why. 
 
CHAPTER XLV 
 
 THE BIBLE IN NON-CHRISTIAN LANDS 
 
 The Story of the Missionary Translations 
 The story of' the missionary translations of the Bible 
 goes back almost to the time of the apostles. Within 
 a century after the New Testament was completed, it 
 had been rendered into Latin, Syriac and Coptic. Before 
 the close of the first six Christian centuries, the Bible 
 was known in eight languages. During the period of 
 the Reformation this number grew to twenty-four. 
 Then with the beginning of the nineteenth century 
 came a wonderful development of foreign missions in 
 almost all parts of the globe which has now continued 
 for more than a hundred years with steadily increasing 
 momentum. As a result, the Bible has now been trans- 
 lated in whole or in part into more than four hundred 
 and fifty languages. Some of these are now obsolete; 
 and the total number of living tongues in which the Bible 
 is used and circulated is 432. Of these, 56 are in Europe, 
 50 in North and South America, 58 in Australia and 
 the South Sea Islands, 117 in Africa, and 175 in Asia. 
 It is estimated that seven out of every ten of the world's 
 inhabitants have had the Gospel story provided for them 
 in their own tongue. There are still a large number 
 of minor languages or dialects, spoken by a limited 
 number of people, into which the Bible has not been 
 translated. Most of these, however, are rapidly dis- 
 appearing and the people who spoke them are adopting 
 .one of the great civilized tongues. Thus the ideal set 
 forth in the story of Pentecost has been realized. The 
 nations of the world have heard the Gospel proclaimed, 
 all " in their own language wherein they were bom."' 
 
 Even from the scientific point of view this is a remark- 
 able achievement. The science of language, or com- 
 
 358 
 
THE BIBLE IN NON-CHRISTIAN LANDS 359 
 
 • 
 
 parative philology has been made possible by the labors 
 of these devoted missionary translators. Some of them 
 were really geniuses in this field. William Carey, the 
 great missionary to India, was one of , the greatest lin- 
 guists known to history. It . is said that he supervised 
 the publication of the Bible in no less than forty different 
 languages. Many of these translations were his own 
 work. Elias Riggs, the American missionary to Turkey, 
 was another genius. He had a working knowledge of 
 twenty languages, was master of twelve, and gave the 
 Bible to four nations. These men are only two of scores 
 of others who might be mentioned with honor. 
 
 Nearly all of the great missionary translators were 
 aided in their labors by a most noteworthy agency, 
 the British and Foreign Bible Society, with its branches 
 or allied organizations in America and elsewhere. This 
 movement began in 1802. The attention of the Christian 
 leaders of England had been called to the heed for a 
 wider distribution of a Welsh translation of the Bible 
 in Wales. " Surely a society might be formed for this 
 purpose. But if for Wales, why not for the kingdom? 
 Why not for the world? " So spoke Rev. Joseph Hughes, 
 a Baptist minister. And his suggestion led to the organ- 
 ization of the British and Foreign Bible Society, with 
 the purpose of encouraging the wider circulation of 
 the Bible without note or comment. This society and 
 its sister societies have helped to support missionary 
 translators, and have undertaken the printing of large 
 numbers of these missionary versions. They have also 
 kept large numbers of colporteurs or Bible salesmen in 
 the field who in the course of the century have distributed 
 literally hundreds of millions of Bibles, in every continent, 
 from the frozen north, to the burning tropics. 
 
 The Romance of Missionary Translation 
 
 The difficulties involved in the work of translating the 
 Bible into these many languages, and the skill, per- 
 sistence and heroism with which they have been over- 
 
360 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 come, form a most fascinating story. In many cases, 
 the missionaries were the first visitors from western civili- 
 zation to the regions in which they worked, and they 
 had to solve the mysteries of the language single handed, 
 and unaided by interpreters. Sometimes many years 
 passed before they succeeded in discovering all the 
 words which were necessary for expressing the Christian 
 message. Rev. WiUis R. Hotchkiss, a missionary to 
 Africa, says that he spent two and a half years looking 
 for a single word. How he finally discovered it, he 
 tells as follows: " One night my people were seated 
 arotmd the campfire. I listened to their stories, and 
 finally my head-man, Kikuni, told a story from which 
 I hoped much, a story of a man who was killed by a 
 lion. But he never said a word which I could construe 
 to be the one I wanted. I was about to turn away when 
 he said ' Bwana nukuthaniwa ne Kikuni.' (The master 
 was saved by Kikuni.) I immediately said to him 
 ' Uku thani Bwana? ' (You saved the master?) 'Yes,' 
 said he. ' Why ' said I, ' this is the word I've been wanting 
 you to tell me all these days, because I wanted to tell 
 
 you that Jesus died to ' ' Master, I understand now !' 
 
 he shouted, his black face lighting up in the lurid blaze 
 of the campfire. ' This is what you have been trying 
 to tell us all these moons. Jesus died to save us from 
 sin.' " 
 
 Reducing Languages to Writing 
 
 Hundreds of languages have been reduced to writing 
 for the first time, by missionary translators. In most 
 cases our English (i.e. Roman) letters have been found 
 sufficient to express all the sounds. In one case, however, 
 a most ingenious system of characters, somewhat, like 
 our shorthand, was devised. The inventor was Rev. 
 James Evans, missionary to the Cree Indians in north- 
 west Canada. These Indians were obliged to live by 
 hunting and fishing, and hence could not stay long in 
 one place. If they were to learn to read, therefore, 
 
THE BIBLE IN NON-CHRISTIAN LANDS 361 
 
 » 
 
 they needed a very simple system of letters, which, if 
 possible, would do away with the necessity of learning 
 to spell. The plan worked out by Mr. Evans was a 
 great success. He made his own type out of the sheets 
 of lead which lined the tea-chests brought in by the fur 
 traders. For ink, he used a mixture of soot and stur- 
 geon's oil. For paper, he used white birch-bark. In 
 a very short time, nearly every Indian in the tribe was 
 eagerly reading these pieces of " talking bark." Later 
 on, a fine set of type was made, and real paper books 
 were printed, using the new characters. These were 
 adopted by other Indian tribes, and are said to be still 
 in use. 
 
 The Lack of Words for Bible Ideas 
 
 To express the rich and varied ideas of the Bible in 
 a crude dialect containing perhaps only a few hundred 
 words, is found to be a most perplexing task. Suppose 
 we are trying to give the Bible to a tropical island in 
 the South Seas, where the temperatiure never falls below 
 the freezing point; how shall we translate into their 
 language, Job 38:29? 
 
 Out of whose womb came the ice? 
 
 And the hoary frost of heaven, who hath gendered it? 
 
 Still more perplexing is the problem of finding words to 
 express the lofty moral and spiritual truths of the Bible. 
 For example there was no word for God in the Chinese 
 language. The nearest approaches to it were words 
 meaning ghosts, or the sun. The languages of heathen 
 tribes are generally very deficient in words for righteous- 
 ness or moral goodness. In the languages of Tahiti 
 there was no word for faith. How could there be, when 
 the whole atmosphere of their life was suspicion! In 
 Maori there was no word for hope; they had no use for 
 such a word ; their lives were top' full of hopelessness. 
 
 To meet these difficulties the translators sometimes 
 coined new words, or imported words from more civilized 
 
362 THE STORY. OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 languages. More often, however, they took the best 
 words they could find in the native tongue, and sought 
 to read into them new meaning. For example, in Malag- 
 asy, the native language of Madagascar, there was no 
 word for purity ; so the translators used the word ' ' white- 
 ness"; and this word thus became freighted with a 
 wealth of new meaning. In many languages there was 
 originally no word for conscience; so the missionaries 
 had to take some word like " meditation " and explain 
 as best they could the new sense in which they used 
 it. This method has proved very successful. When 
 the Bible has been rendered into a heatheri language, 
 it has had the same result as when the truth of the Bible 
 has entered into the heart of a human being. It has 
 been a purifying, transforming, ennobling influence. 
 
 The Power of the Bible as a Missionary Agency 
 
 John G. Paton, in his autobiography, tells of the welcome 
 which was given to his first translation of Bible books 
 in the language of Aniwa, in the New Hebrides Islands. 
 
 " ' Missi, is it done? ' said the old chief Nomakei. 
 ' Can it speak? ' 
 
 " ' Yes.' 
 
 " ' Does it speak my words? ' 
 
 " ' It does.' ' 
 
 " ' Make it speak to me, Missi. Let me hear it speak.' 
 I read to him a part of the book, and the old man shouted 
 in an ecstasy of joy." 
 
 Then the missionary taught the old man his alphabet, 
 first fitting his eyes with glasses, for he was nearsighted. 
 And from that time on, whenever people carne around 
 him he would get out his little book. " Come," he 
 would say; *' I will let you hear how the book speaks 
 our own Ahiwan words. You say it is hard to learn to 
 read, and make it speak. But be strong and try. If an 
 old man like me has done it, it ought to be much easier 
 for you." 
 
 In the Hindu province of Dacca missionary explorers 
 
THE BIBLE IN NON-CHRISTIAJ^ LANDS 363 
 
 once discovered several villages of Hindu peasants, who 
 had given up idol-worship, were renowned for their 
 truthfulness, and were searching for a true teacher come 
 from God. They called themselves Satya-Gooroos. When 
 the missionaries inquired how they had come by this 
 religion, they brought out a much worn book kept in 
 a wooden box in one of their villages. No one could 
 say whence it came. They only knew that they had 
 possessed it many years. It was a copy of the Bengali 
 New Testament, translated by WiJHam Carey. 
 
 The annals of the Bible societies contain many such 
 incidents, showing the power of the Bible message over 
 the human heart, even when carried by lifeless ink and 
 paper. The Bible is a book of life. It is forever demand- 
 ing to be translated and the translation into spoken 
 or written words is but the first step. The next step, 
 and the next, and the next, is the endless process of 
 translation into living deeds. 
 
364 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. Do you consider it a good thing for humanity that 
 more than four hiuidred separate languages should be per- 
 petuated through Bible translations? 
 
 2. If in any language there were no words which possessed 
 even a suggestion of moral and spiritual significance, would it 
 be possible to translate the Bible into that language? 
 
 3. In view of the fact that the Bible has been translated 
 into nearly all languages, what can you infer regarding human 
 nature? 
 
 4. Show how the following EngHsh words have risen, or 
 are rising from a lower to a higher meaning : honor, patriotism, 
 love. 
 
 5. Judging from the way words and languages are changed 
 for the better, how do you think a person's character may be 
 made God-like? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What is the total number of living languages in which 
 the Bible is now circulated? 
 
 2. About what proportion of the inhabitants of the earth 
 have had the Gospel story provided for them in their own 
 language? 
 
THE BIBLE IN NON-CHRISTIAN LANDS 365 
 
 3. Since about what date has the largest part of this work 
 been done? 
 
 4. Mention two men of genius as Knguists, who did notable 
 work as missionary translators. 
 
 5. Give an account of the history of the British and Foreign 
 Bible Society. 
 
 6. TeU something about the work of this society, and other 
 Bible Societies in America and elsewhere. 
 
 7. How do missionaries proceed to learn a language pre- 
 viously tmknown to the civilized world? 
 
 8. What must be done in case the language has never been 
 reduced to writing? 
 
 9. What difficulties are encountered in the attempt to ex- 
 press the ideas of the Bible in the languages of heathen tribes? 
 
 10. How are these difficulties met? 
 
 11. What is the effect of a translation of the Bible upon 
 a language? 
 
 12. - How effective is a Bible translation as a missionary 
 agency, even apart from living missionaries? 
 
CHAPTER XLVI 
 
 THE BIBLE AND THE SPADE 
 
 The Discoveries of Modern Archeology 
 
 In many ways the century in which we are living is 
 
 the greatest century of Bible study that the world, has 
 
 yet seen. Not only do we have an accurate and beautiftil 
 
 translation of the Bible in English ; not only have similar 
 
 translations been made into nearly all modem languages ; 
 
 but a flood of new light has been shed on the meaning 
 
 of the Bible, especially by the wonderful discoveries of 
 
 those patient investigators who with pick and spade 
 
 have gradually been uncovering the buried ruins of the 
 
 civilizations of Bible times. The story of their labors 
 
 is a romance in itself. 
 
 Deciphering the Hieroglyphics op Ancient Egypt 
 
 All through the Middle Ages, travelers from Europe 
 stood in amazement before the pyramids, temples and 
 monuments of Egypt, and looked in puzzled wonder at 
 the many strange inscriptions upon them. These were 
 evidently a kind of picture-writing, but the meaning was 
 an absolute mystery. 
 
 A clue to the solution of the problem was not found 
 until 1799. In that year some engineers connected with 
 Napoleon's army discovered a large slab of black granite 
 on which an inscription was carved in three languages, 
 in parallel lines, one of which was Greek; the other 
 two appeared to be different forms of Egyptian. This 
 famous fragment of rock is called the Rosetta stone. 
 (Now in the British Museum.) Of course the Greek 
 was quickly spelled out and translated ; it proved to be a 
 decree by Egyptian priests in honor of Ptolemy V and 
 his queen Cleopatra. But even with the Greek as a 
 key, it was no easy matter to decipher the Egyptian 
 
 366 
 
KW?"'*^**""^ 
 
 THE MOABITE STONE. 
 
THE BIBLE AND THE SPA^E 367 
 
 words in the parallel lines. Where did the words begin 
 and end? Were they spelled out alphabetically, or 
 was there a special sign for each word as in Chinese? 
 The answers to all these questions were finally found by 
 a French scholar, ChampoUion. He heard about the 
 Rosetta stone in 1802, when he was a boy of 11, and 
 even from this early age, his chief ambition in life was 
 the decipherment of that wonderful unknown language. 
 He first succeeded in identifying certain proper names, 
 such as Alexander, Ptolemy and Cleopatra and then 
 used these to work out the other words. When he died 
 in 1832, he had translated many Egyptian texts, and 
 had gathered the necessary facts for an Egyptian gram- 
 mar and lexicon. 
 
 Since then, the scholars of the world have gradually 
 laid before us the whole story of the ancient Egyptian 
 life, which influenced Hebrew history at so many points. 
 We have found inscriptions of old Ramses II, the king 
 who " knew not Joseph," and have read his own account 
 of the great buildings on which his serfs were compelled 
 to labor. We have unearthed his store-city Pithom, 
 built by the Hebrews, and we find that the upper layers 
 of bricks are in part " without straw." We even have 
 his body preserved as a mummy 
 
 We are also given a much fuller knowledge of the 
 concrete life out of which all the events grew, of which 
 we read in the books of Genesis and Exodus. Thus 
 the Bible narratives are not only confirmed and verified, 
 but are made more real to our imagination, and mote 
 full of human interest. 
 
 The Story of the Cuneiform Inscriptions 
 
 There was another unknown script, by which European 
 travelers in the Orient were long puzzled. The Arabs 
 call it mismari, or nail-writing. The usual term for it 
 is cuneiform or wedge-shaped writing. The illustration 
 facing page 118, will show the appropriateness of these 
 names. Inscriptions in these wedge-shaped characters 
 
368 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 were observed in Persia as early as 1472 by Josaphat Bar- 
 baro, a Venetian traveler, and by others, but until modem 
 times this writing was as unintelligible as the Egyptian. 
 The scholars who undertook to decipher it were not 
 fortunate enough to find a key like the Rosetta stone, 
 with sentences in Greek running parallel with the un- 
 known writing. It was rightly surmised, however, that 
 the majority of these Persian inscriptions must represent 
 the Persian language, which was already known in 
 another form. Early in the nineteenth century, the great 
 German scholar Grotefend, by patient effort distin- 
 guished certain recurring groups of characters, which 
 he thought were records of Persian kings. This group 
 of characters he surmised might correspond to the Persian 
 words meaning ' ' great king, king of kings/ ' It turned out 
 that he had found the clue to the labyrinth, and soon 
 many of these Persian inscriptions were deciphered and 
 translated. 
 
 There were other cuneiform inscriptions, however, 
 in which the same characters were used, but out of which 
 no Persian words could be made, and which were evi- 
 dently in another language. This, as we now know, 
 was Babylonian or Assyrian, a language which the 
 human race had wholly forgotten for more than a thou- 
 sand years. Already, however, inscriptions had been 
 found which were written both in Persian and in Baby- 
 lonian, and now that the sounds of many of the cuneiform 
 characters had been discovered, these parallel inscriptions 
 soon gave up their secrets to a number of brilliant scholars 
 working independently. One of the most famous of 
 them was an English army officer. Sir Henry Rawlinson. 
 In the Zagros mountains in Persia, near where Rawlinson 
 was at one time stationed, there is an enormous Persian- 
 Babylonian inscription carved on the face of the Behistun 
 precipice, 500 feet above the level of the plain, with 
 characters from eleven to twelve feet high. Rawlinson 
 copied part of this inscription with the aid of a field- 
 glass, in 1835, and later risked his life cHmbing the face 
 
THE BIBLE AND THE SPADE 369 
 
 of the cliff and finishing his copy. In 1846 he published 
 a translation of the Persian text, and in 1851 a translation 
 of 112 lines of the Babylonian text. He also made a 
 transliteration of the Babylonian words into English 
 letters showing how they should be pronounced. Thus 
 the ancient speech of the Tigris-Euphrates valley had 
 now come to life again, on the lips of these tireless scholars. 
 
 At about the same period, excavations were undertaken 
 on the great mounds near the Tigris river, in the territory 
 of ancient Assyria, by the French consul, Botta, an 
 Englishman named A. H. Layard, and others. The 
 earth had scarcely been scratched, before wonderful- 
 sculptured images and monuments began to come to light, 
 covered with cuneiform inscriptions. Ere long, the ex- 
 plorers fotmd themselves standing amidst the uncovered 
 ruins of palaces which had been the pride of the con- 
 querors of the world. It was hard to believe that the 
 original inhabitants had been dead three thousand years : 
 so striking were the traces of their every-day life; e.g., 
 bake-shops, wine-cellars, and agricultural implements. 
 Some of the iron tools were so well preserved that they 
 could still be used, and were used, in the excavations. 
 The excitement of these discoveries stirred the world. 
 Even the ignorant Arab workmen caught the spirit. 
 One day when the English explorer Layard was visiting 
 a neighboring sheikh, some distance from the excavations, 
 he observed two Arabs approaching on horseback at 
 top speed. " Hasten, O Bey," they exclaimed, " hasten 
 to the diggers, for they have found Nimrod himself. 
 Wallah it is wonderful, but it is true! We have seen 
 him with our eyes. There is no God, but God." Re- 
 turning with them, Layard found that they had indeed 
 imearthed an enormous winged lion with a human head, 
 which they thought must be an image of Nimrod himself. 
 It is now in the British Museum. 
 
 Among the greatest of these discoveries, in its relation 
 to our knowledge of the Bible, was an entire library 
 of inscribed clay tablets, the library of the Assyrian 
 
370 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 ruler, Asshur-banipal. (Discovered about 1850.) Since 
 that time, in the face of danger from disease, and from 
 hostile Arab tribes, similar excavations have been made 
 in many places- in the Tigris-Euphrates valley. An 
 enormous quantity, literally ship-loads, of carvings and 
 clay tablets and other material, has been foimd. 
 
 Something of what this has meant to Bible students, 
 we have already seen in the preceding chapters of 
 this book. As a result of these discoveries, we have 
 the Babylonian Deluge story, which throws much light 
 on the. origin of the story of Noah in the Bible. We 
 have the law-code of Hammurabi, similar in many ways 
 to the early Hebrew law-codes. We have the personal 
 memoirs of Shalmanezar, Tiglath-Pilezer, Sargon, Sen- 
 nacherib, Nebuchadrezzar, and other Assyrian and 
 Babylonian kings mentioned in the Bible, giving their 
 own versions of their relations with the people of Israel, 
 and mentioning by name, many of the Hebrew kings, 
 such as Omri, Jehu and Hezekiah. In short, it was not 
 merely dead languages which came to life when the 
 cuneiform and the Egyptian scripts were deciphered; 
 rather has a dead world come to life, the larger world 
 of that ancient civilization of which the Httle nation of' 
 Israel was in some ways a very small but exceedingly 
 important part. 
 
 Explorations in Palestine 
 
 One might suppose that it would be the sacred soil of 
 Palestine itself to which the explorer would turn most 
 eagerly with his spade, and from which the most precious 
 reUcs of the past would be recovered. Unfortunately 
 the climate of Palestine, with its annual rainy season, 
 is not favorable to the preservation of written records, 
 or even of buildings. Yet many interesting finds have 
 been made, among them being the conduit or water 
 tunnel, built by King Hezekiah to bring water to the 
 Pool of Siloam, inside the city walls. (II Kings 20 : 20.) 
 In the year 1880 some boys were swimming in this ancient 
 
THE BIBLE AND THE SPADE 371 
 
 • 
 
 pool, and venturing up into the conduit a little distance, 
 they discovered a Hebrew inscription. This gives an 
 account of the building of the tunnel. It tells how the 
 two parties of workmen' worked toward each other from 
 either end, and how when they were about three cubits 
 apart, they could hear each other's voices through the 
 rock. 
 
 Another famous discovery in Palestine is the so-called 
 Moabite stone. (See illustration facing page 366.) This 
 large piece of basalt was found in 1868, in Moab, by a 
 German missionary named Klein. When he tried to 
 secure it for the British Museum, the native Arabs broke 
 it in pieces, thinking there must be treasure inside. 
 Most of the pieces were recovered and patched together, 
 and it is now in the Louvre, in Paris. The inscription 
 is from Mesha, king of Moab, who is mentioned in II 
 Kings 4:4-27. It gives Mesha's own story of his wars 
 against Omri and Ahab, kings of Israel. He corroborates 
 the narrative in the book of Kings. 
 
 Much has also been done in Palestine to identify the 
 exact sites where the events of Bible history took place. 
 Explorers in Galilee have rediscovered many of the 
 villages in which Jesus worked, as Chorazin, Bethsaida, 
 and Capernaum. The ruins of an ancient synagogue have 
 been excavated on the site of Capernaum; and some 
 of the f oimdation stones may have been a part of the very 
 building in which Jesus preached. 
 
 Egyptian Papyri 
 
 Of all the countries in the world, the special paradise 
 of the archaeologist with his spade, is Egypt, for not 
 only was this country the home of one of the most ancient 
 of human civilizations, but it is a country where rain is 
 almost unknown, and where the atmosphere, from one 
 year's end to another, is as dry as the desert-sands by 
 which the land is surrounded. This has made possible 
 the discovery of an almost inexhaustible mine of buried 
 papyri, which we have just begun to appreciate. These 
 
372 THK HTUKY Uif' UUR BLHLE' 
 
 come from old heaps of waste paper. It seems to have 
 been the custom in Egypt not to bum waste papers, 
 but to dump them outside the town Hmits, and let the 
 sand sweep over them anci bury them. As time went on, 
 more rubbish of this kind would accumulate and in turn 
 be buried. Near the site of every ancient Egyptian 
 village, therefore, we can dig down today, through layer 
 after layer of these rubbish heaps, sometimes hundreds 
 of feet deep. 
 
 The most important discoveries thus far come from 
 early Christian times. There is one precious sheet, very 
 badly torn, which must have given its discoverers a thrill 
 of delight, when they read thereon the two words: " Jesus 
 saith." (See illustration facing page 372.) Among the 
 sayings of Jesus recorded on this papyrus are some 
 already included in the New Testament. There are 
 also new ones, and a few which are so full of deep 
 meaning that many believe them to be genuine utter- 
 ances of the Great Teacher. Thus, " Jesus saith: Where- 
 ever there are two, they are not without God, and where 
 there is one only, I say I am with him. Raise the stone 
 and thou shalt find me; cleave the wood and there am I." 
 
 The large majority of the documents in this enormous 
 mass are of the sort that one would expect to find in 
 a sack of waste paper nowadays, and at first sight are 
 utterly uninteresting. Among them are bills, receipts 
 and other business forms, official notes from lawyers' 
 ofiices, almanacs, and private letters from people of all 
 degrees of culture. Yet the explorers at work at this task 
 have carefully pieced together every torn and tattered 
 scrap, and have published many volumes containing photo- 
 graphic copies of them. Surely a monumental waste of 
 labor, one might say. Why should you and I care to know, 
 for example, that some obscure person 'named Marcellus, 
 in sortie obscure Egyptian village, paid his landlord six 
 shillings rent, on such and such a date? And yet, out 
 of this great mass of seemingly useless bits of writing 
 we have learned one fact of the greatest importance 
 
RECENTLY DISCOVERED PAPYRUS: 
 SAYINGS OF JESUS. 
 
THE BIBLE AND THE SPADE 373 
 
 * 
 
 regarding the language of the New Testament, a fact 
 which is worth all the labor that has been expended. 
 
 Scholars have long been puzzled by the great difference 
 between the Greek of the New Testament, and all other 
 Greek books. Not only does it differ from the earlier 
 classical authors, such as Plato and Xenophon, but it 
 differs almost as greatly from Greek authors such as 
 Plutarch and Josephus, who wrote at about the same 
 general period as the New Testament. The older 
 explanation of these differences was that the apostles 
 wrote in the language of the Holy Ghost: that is, -a 
 language which was never in common use, but was set 
 apart as it were, for the sacred Book. 
 
 We now know, however, from our study of these papyri 
 from Egyptian- waste-baskets, that the language of the 
 apostles was nothing else than the tongue of the common 
 people ; the language which they used in their homes and 
 in the market-places. The other writers of that day, 
 Josephus for example, tried to imitate the sorcaUed 
 classical authors, and their style is stilted and unnatural. 
 But the New Testament writers had the good sense to 
 avoid any such archaic, out-of-date language, and use 
 the every-day speech of the people. Thus once again 
 we see that the Bible has been from the very beginning 
 the book of the common people, adapted to their un^ler- 
 standing and needs. 
 
374 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. Judging from this chapter, to what extent does success 
 in the field of archaeology depend upon luck, and to what 
 extent on persistent effort? 
 
 2. Can you think of any further information about Bible 
 history which may possibly be given to the world through 
 archasplogy? 
 
 3. Will it be gained through good fortime, or by hard 
 work, or both? 
 
 4. To what extent does success in other fields that you are 
 familiar with depend upon luck, and to what extent on per- 
 sistent effort? 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. What is meant by the Rosetta stone? 
 
 2. How did it furnish a clue to the meaning of the Egjrptian 
 characters? 
 
 3. By whom was the Egyptian language deciphered? 
 
 4. What new information regarding Old Testament his- 
 tory has been gained through the excavations in Egypt, and 
 the study of the Egyptian inscriptions? 
 
 5. What ancient languages were written in cuneiform 
 characters ? 
 
 6. Explain the appropriateness of this name cuneiform. 
 
 7. By whom, and how, were the Persian cuneiform in- 
 scriptions deciphered? 
 
 8. Describe the great inscription on the Behistim cUff. 
 
THE BIBLE AND THE SPAD^ 375 
 
 _ 9. By whom was it copied, and explain how it made pos- 
 sible the decipherment of the ancient Babylonian language. 
 
 10. Mention two men who were pioneers in excavating the 
 ruins of Nineveh, and other cities in the Tigris-Euphrates 
 valley. 
 
 11. What were some of their important discoveries? 
 
 12. What new information about the Bible has been ob- 
 tained through the cuneiform inscriptions? 
 
 13. Give an account of the Siloam tunnel and inscription. 
 
 14. What is the Moabite stone? By whom and when was 
 it discovered? 
 
 15. In what way have great quantities of Egyptian papyri 
 been preserved from ancient times? 
 
 16. What important discoveries have been made through 
 the excavation of these papjoi? 
 
CHAPTER XLVII 
 
 THE BIBLE, SCIEInCE AND RELIGION 
 
 Rediscovering Human Elements in the Bible Books 
 
 Within the last generation the ideas of most persons 
 about the Bible have greatly changed. Formerly it was 
 regarded as an infallible authority on all subjects. The 
 final and conclusive argument in all questions, was " the 
 Bible says so." Questions of science and politics, as 
 well as of morals and religion, were decided by " proofs 
 of Holy Writ." Pro-slavery preachers in the United 
 States quoted the story of Noah and Canaan, and the 
 words, " Cursed be Canaan." Many books have been 
 written by temperance advocates to prove that Jesus 
 did not use wine, but unfermented grape juice. It 
 was supposed, of course, that whatever the Bible taught 
 on any subject, was absolutely binding on us today. 
 
 This attitude toward the Bible, however, has always 
 been beset with difficulties. The early Greek and Roman 
 opponents of Christianity were quick to point out in- 
 consistencies in the various Bible narratives, and called 
 attention to certain passages in the Old Testament which 
 reflect crude and undeveloped moral ideas, and which 
 impute to the Almighty human passions and weaknesses 
 such as the command to destroy all the Canaanites with- 
 out mercy, both men, women and children. The early 
 Christian leaders met these objections by interpreting 
 the Bible allegoricaUy. For example, the list of Canaanite 
 kings in Joshua was explained as a list of sins. This 
 method of explanation served its purpose very well in 
 those days, and helped many a Christian to keep his 
 faith in the truth of the Bible. Unfortunately " if you 
 once begin such a system," as old St. Agobard of Lyons 
 remarked, " who can measure the absurdity which will 
 follow? " There are no limits except the powers of the 
 
 376 
 
THE BIBLE, SCIENCE AND RELIGION 377 
 
 • 
 
 httman imagination. The ass on which the Saviour 
 rode into Jerusalem on his triumphal entry, was explained 
 as the Old Testament, and the ass's colt as the New 
 Testament. The Shunamite maiden who was selected 
 to cherish David in his old age, was made to represent 
 divine wisdom. The condemnation of the serpent to 
 eat dust was explained as typifying the sin of curiosity, 
 since in eating dust he " penetrates the obscure and 
 shadowy." The dnmkenness of Noah was even made 
 to typify the sufferings and death of Christ. 
 
 In the time of the Reformation, the greatest leaders, 
 such as Luther and Calvin, turned away from all such 
 vagaries, and insisted that the Bible must be interpreted 
 in its plain, literal sense. This, however, brought back 
 the old difficulties arising from the inconsistencies and 
 the primitive ideas in some of the Bible narratives. 
 
 The old tendency to regard the Bible as an absolutely 
 infallible book has been gradually modified in modem 
 times through the development of science and a more 
 careful study of the Bible itself. As long ago as the 
 Reformation", Galileo and Copernicus laid the foundations 
 of modem astronomy, showing that the earth is round, 
 and that it revolves around the sun, not the sun around 
 the earth. This new theory aroused a storm of criticism. 
 Luther called Copernicus a fool. Galileo was tried for 
 heresy by the Roman Church, and was forced to renounce 
 his belief that the earth moves, although under his 
 breath he kept saying, " Yet it does move." Even 
 down to recent times many persons have refused to accept 
 these teachings of astronomy, because the Bible speaks 
 of " the comers of the earth." 
 
 After astronomy came geology. The first chapter of 
 Genesis teUs us that the earth was created in six days; 
 but the pioneers in geology, such as LyeU, fotind in the 
 rocks themselves unmistakable traces of a history 
 extending over millions of years. And then came Darwin 
 and his theory of evolution, according to which man 
 himself was not created outright from a lump of clay, 
 
378 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 through the vitaHzing breath of God, as described in 
 Genesis, but was evolved from a form similar to the 
 lower animals of today, the process extending over 
 hundreds of thousands of years. Again there was a 
 great outcry against these ■ new ideas, which were said 
 to be contrary to the Bible. It was indeed a painful 
 position in which Christians found themselves. Some 
 closed their eyes to the facts of science, and clung to the 
 Bible. Others accepted science, and felt compelled to 
 give up altogether their faith in the Bible and in Chris- 
 tianity. 
 
 Then there began a quiet movement on the part of a 
 few scholars, here and there, who neither denounced 
 the Bible as false, nor defended it as infalhble, but simply 
 asked, What are these books which are grouped together 
 as the Bible ? Judging from the evidence of the language 
 in the books themselves, and the testimony of other 
 writers, when were they written, by whom, and in what 
 circumstances? As long ago as the days of Louis XIV, in 
 France (about 1700) , a physician named Astruc, a Roman 
 Catholic, wrote a book showing from the varying use 
 of the words Jehovah and God, that two doctiments were 
 used in the Pentateuch. In the nineteenth century, 
 this kind of investigation grew to be an independent 
 science. Among the pioneers was a German professor 
 named DeWette, who was driven out of Germany for 
 his writings, and compelled to take refuge in Switzerland. 
 This new science seems to show that the Bible is a very 
 human book. The laws of Moses are now seen to be 
 the product of centuries of experience on the part of 
 the Hebrew people, and were impressed on the minds 
 and hearts of the Hebrew people rather than written on 
 tables of stone. The prophets were great reformers, 
 preachers of righteousness, pointing out to the people 
 of their own generation their injustice to the weak, 
 and their disloyalty to Jehovah. They were not primarily 
 concerned with the prediction of future events although 
 they often warned their hearers of the future conse- 
 
THE BIBLE, SCIENCE AND RELIGION 379 
 
 « 
 
 quences of their sins, and promised future rewards for 
 right conduct. 
 
 We cannot wonder that some were disturbed by this 
 new interpretation of the Bible. " If the Bible is not 
 true from cover to cover," they said, " then who knows 
 whether or not any of it is true ? Let us have nothing to 
 do with it." 
 
 On the other hand, many more accepted these nqw 
 ideas, and suddenly discovered that to them the value 
 of the Bible had been extraordinarily, increased. Though 
 they no longer expected to find it a textbook in natural 
 science, nor in all its parts equally authoritative even in 
 matters of morals and religion, yet they have found it their 
 chief source of inspiration for right living. They have seen 
 that it is no less a divine book for being so thoroughly 
 human. Just as God's spirit has found expression 
 through certain great souls, in all ages, and supremely 
 in Jesus Christ, so in the Bible writings, we see God's 
 truth becoihing more and more perfectly expressed in 
 human words, and supremely in the great passages of 
 the prophets, psalmists, evangelists and apostles. We 
 see that the authors of the Bible were men and women 
 of "like passions with ourselves," subject to the same 
 temptations, sharing the same weaknesses, in need of 
 the same divine help, and we see more clearly than 
 before how near God is to each of us. Though he is 
 infinite Goodness, he is yet willing to dwell in the hearts 
 of imperfect and faulty human beings, in order to make 
 them like himself. He is eager to seek even a broken 
 and stammering expression of his truth in the utterances 
 of weak and erring human lips, in order that this utter- 
 ance may grow ever clearer, and more splendid, as the 
 dim light of early dawn gradually grows into the glory 
 of perfect day. 
 
380 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 Questions and Topics 
 
 1. What is the difference between reading the Bible, and 
 studying the Bible? 
 
 2. Make a list of two or three rules, as to how to study the 
 Bible. 
 
 3. Apply your rules to the following passages: 
 (a) Psahn 19:4-6. 
 
 (b) Rev. 13:11-18. 
 
 (c) Matt. 5:39. 
 
 To Sum Up 
 
 1. How did the early Christians explain those passages in 
 the Old Testament, which seemed on a lower moral level 
 than the teachings of Jesus? 
 
 2. What is the difficulty with this method of interpretation? 
 
 3. Why was GaUleo denounced by the church authorities 
 for his discoveries in astronomy? 
 
 4. How did the science of geology seem in conflict with 
 the Bible? 
 
 5. Why was it difficult for many Christians to accept 
 Darwin's theory of evolution? 
 
THE BIBLE, SCIENCE AND RELipiON 381 
 
 6. According to many modem Bible students how did 
 the biblical books originate: in a natural way like other books, 
 or otherwise? 
 
 7. What theory about the Bible is made impossible by all 
 these scientific discoveries? 
 
 8. Why does the Bible seem to many persons more helpful 
 and more truly inspired, when they thmk of it as written by 
 
 , men like ourselves? 
 
CHAPTER XLVIII 
 
 A SURVEY OF THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 1. On what writing material were Paxil's letters originally 
 written? 
 
 2. What was probably the '=!arliest New Testanient book? 
 
 3. What was the general purpose which called out Paul's 
 letters to his churches? 
 
 4. Which of Paul's letters were written while he was in 
 active missionary work, and which were written during his 
 imprisonment? 
 
 5. Before the Gospel narratives were written, how was the 
 knowledge of Jesus' words and deeds preserved? 
 
 6. Which of the four Gospels is the oldest? 
 
 7. To what extent is the Gospel of Matthew really the work 
 of Matthew the publican, Jesus' disciple? 
 
 8. How does Luke's Gospel reveal the point of view of a 
 physician? 
 
 9. What New Testanient books were written to encourage 
 the Christians when they were persecuted by the Roman 
 government? 
 
 10. What misunderstandings of Paul's teaching are cor- 
 rected in the Epistles of James, II Peter and Jude? 
 
 IL Why did the author of I John insist that " whosoever 
 loveth is begotten of God, and loioweth God; he that loveth 
 not, knoweth not God "? 
 
 12. Why is the term " spiritual Gospel," especially appro- 
 priate to the Gospel of John? 
 
 13. Against what opponents did the author of this Gospel 
 seek to show that Jesus is " the Christ, the son of God "? 
 
 14. Between what approximate dates were all the New 
 Testament books written? 
 
 382 
 
A SURVEY 383 
 
 « 
 
 15. What literary fragments in the Old Testament are 
 from the earliest period in Hebrew history? 
 
 16. What passages of connected history, in the Old Testa- 
 ment, are probably the oldest? 
 
 17. How do you accotmt for the sunilarity between some 
 of the stories in Genesis and certain stories from Babylonia? 
 
 18. What period of Hebrew history was covered by the 
 Judean-Ephraimite history, and what were some of its main 
 teachings? 
 
 19. In what period of Hebrew history did the various Old 
 Testament decalogues originate, and what moral spirit do they 
 express? 
 
 20. Why is it that the Pentateuch contains such a great 
 number of laws as well as historical narratives? 
 
 21. Which of the prophetical books in the Old Testament 
 was the earliest? 
 
 22. Who were the four prophets who wrote between 750, 
 and 700 B.C., and what was their great revolutionary idea? 
 
 23. Name the great prophet who witnessed the downfall 
 of Jerusalem, and teU who wrote his biography. 
 
 24. What group of historians gave us the historical books 
 Joshua to II Kings, in their present form, and what was their 
 chief purpose? 
 
 25. What are the most important prophetical writings in 
 the Old Testament which were written after the destruction 
 of Jerusalem, and how do they differ from earlier prophetic 
 utterances? 
 
 26. What were the main teachings of the "Second Isaiah " ? 
 
 27. What two Hebrew hymn and prayer-books are found 
 in the Old Testament? 
 
 28. By what class among the Jews, and at about what period 
 in Old Testament history were most of those psalms probably 
 written which are prayers for prdtection against enemies? 
 
 29. What Old Testament historical books were written to 
 glorify the temple at Jerusalem, and what part of them is most 
 valuable as history? 
 
 30. What differing attitudes toward foreigners is expressed 
 in the stories of Esther and Jonah? 
 
384 THE STORY OF OUR BIBLE 
 
 31. Explain what it is that you love and admire in the story 
 of Ruth. 
 
 32. What Old Testament books and what two apocryphal 
 books were written by the " Wise Men "? 
 
 33. Which of these books is a representative collection of 
 the sayings of this class of Hebrew teachers? 
 
 34. What great longing of the human heart is portrayed, 
 and what great problem of the htiman mind is discussed, 
 in the book of Job ? 
 
 35. Why was the author of Ecclesiastes a pessimist? 
 
 36. How was he answered by Ben Sira, and how by the 
 author of the Wisdom of Solomon? 
 
 37. Point out the similarities between the books of Daniel 
 and Revelation, as regards the circumstances of their origin, 
 and their general character. 
 
 38. Give a brief account of the successive steps by which 
 the present books of the Old and New Testaments came to 
 be accepted as canonical. 
 
 39. How did the early Christians get copies of the Bible to 
 read? 
 
 40. Into what languages was the Bible translated during 
 the first three or four centuries of our era? 
 
 41. When and by whom was the entire Bible first translated 
 into EngUsh? 
 
 42. What causes led to an enormous increase in Bible read- 
 ing in nearly all the countries of Europe, between the years 
 1500 and 1600 A.D.? 
 
 43. In what respects was Luther's Bible superior to the 
 earHer German versions? 
 
 44. When was the first printed English New Testament 
 brought to England, and by whom had it been translated? 
 
 45. Give a brief account of Tyndale's life. 
 
 46. What English translations were consulted and to some 
 extent copied, by the translators of the Authorized or King 
 James Version? 
 
 47. Mention two reasons why it became necessary to 
 prepare a Revised Version. 
 
A SURVEY 385 
 
 ♦ 
 
 48. What is Codex Aleph? By whom, and how, was it 
 discovered? 
 
 49. Into how many languages has the Bible now been 
 translated? 
 
 50. What new light has been thrown on the Bible in modem 
 times by archaeology, and by a careful study of the origin 
 of the biblical books?