Books: Stories of the Prophets
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Isaac Landman >> Stories of the Prophets
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STORIES OF THE PROPHETS
COMMISSION ON JEWISH EDUCATION
of the
UNION OF AMERICAN HEBREW CONGREGATIONS
and the
CENTRAL CONFERENCE OF AMERICAN RABBIS
DAVID PHILIPSON, Chairman
JOSEPH L. BARON DAVID MARX
EDWARD N. CALISCH S. FELIX MENDELSOHN
H. G. ENELOW JULIAN MORGENSTERN
HARRY W. ETTELSON JOSEPH RAUCH
MAX HELLER WILLIAM ROSENAU
SAMUEL KOCH SAMUEL SCHULMAN
GERSON B. LEVI ABBA H. SILVER
HARRY LEVI ABRAM SIMON
LOUIS L. MANN LOUIS WITT
LOUIS WOLSEY
GEORGE ZEPIN, Secretary
STORIES OF THE PROPHETS
(Before the Exile)
BY ISAAC LANDMAN
To
My Parents
Who first introduced me to the Prophets,
this book is dedicated with
love and devotion.
CONTENTS.
I. THE SHEPHERD OF TEKOAH.
1. An End to War
2. In the Days of Prosperity
3. The Man Who Dared
4. Treason and a Fight
5. Priest Against Prophet
6. The Prophet in Tekoah
II. THE MAN WHO LEARNED HIS LESSON.
1. An Eventful Night
2. The Tragedy with a Purpose
3. The Repentant Returns
III. THE STATESMAN PROPHET.
1. The Vision in the Temple
2. The Parable of the Vineyard
3. A Coward on the Throne
4. On Deaf Ears
5. The Survival of the Fittest
6. Working with the Remnant
7. Like Father, Like Son
8. The Prophet Triumphs
9. The Fruit of His Labor
IV. THE COMMONER.
1. His Awakening
2. The Cause of the Common People
3. When Samaria Fell
4. Judah Learns Its Lesson
V. THE PROPHET OF WOE AND HOPE.
1. The Escape
2. The Boy King
3. Jeremiah's Call
4. The Seething Caldron
5. The Great Discovery
6. A New Covenant
7. To the Fore Again
8. The Shadow of a King
9. The Temple of the Lord
10. A Narrow Escape
11. A Taste of Martyrdom
12. The Woe of the Prophet
13. Teacher and Pupil
14. Baruch's First Venture
15. The King Hears and Acts
16. Beginning of the End
17. The First Deportation
18. In Exile and in the Homeland
19. A Friend in Need
20. In the Midst of Despair
21. Lamentations and a Vain Hope
22. Cowardice and Treachery
23. Jeremiah, the Martyred
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
"_The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz._"--Isaiah I, 1
"_Prepare to meet thy God, O Israel._"--Amos IV, 12
"_Yea, I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in
judgment, and in loving kindness, and in mercy._"--Hosea II, 21
"_Here am I, send me._"--Isaiah VI, 8
"_And they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears
into pruning-hooks._"--Isaiah II, 4
"_For the transgression of Jacob is all this, and for the sins of
the house of Israel._"--Micah I, 5
"_I sat alone because of Thy hand._"--Jeremiah XV, 17
"_And thou, Pashur, and all that dwell in thy house shall go into
captivity._"--Jeremiah XX, 6
FOREWORD
The company of inspired men, commonly known as the prophets of Israel,
were the unique product of the Jewish religious genius. They were
pre-eminently preachers of righteousness. Fearless and undaunted, they
told the house of Israel their sins and the house of Jacob their
transgressions. They contemplated the facts of life from the highest
point of view. For them religion and morality were blended, ethics and
politics were one. Theirs was peculiarly a social message; the demand
for justice underlies all their thinking and speaking. They had a
veritable passion for righteousness; through all the ages their words
have been torches lighting the way of men struggling upward towards
the truth.
Though living over twenty-six hundred years ago, these men are very
modern. As a great thinker has well said, "The spirit of the prophets
of Israel is in the modern soul." The foremost workers for the welfare
of their fellowmen to-day posit social justice as the first article of
their program. The world to-day, as never before, is filled with cries
for social righteousness as the indispensable foundation for the
structure of society. What is this but harking back to the eternal
message of the ancient prophets? "Let justice flow as water"
passionately and unreservedly demanded Amos of old; for him and his
brother prophets this was the sine qua non for society's welfare; the
same may be said of the thousands and tens of thousands to-day of
every creed and every nation who are toiling for the social salvation
of their fellowmen the world over. Ages meet; the words of the ancient
preachers of righteousness are still the inspiration for the seekers
after justice everywhere.
The story of the life work of these giants of the spirit has often
been told, but it can be told none too often, particularly if the
telling is well done, as is the case in the present volume. Each one
of these men delivered the same message in his own individual and
inimitable way. Yet their work was continuous and forms a consecutive
tale. In the speeches and experiences of each one of them the eternal
truths they present appears in differing light. The author of the
present volume approaches his subject, one might say, from the
dramatic standpoint, for, with fine insight, he has culled from the
lives of the prophets those striking and intense experiences which
illustrate most powerfully the indomitable spirit of these men who
followed right in scorn of consequence, for were they not the
messengers of the God of right whose demand upon men is, as told by
one of them in imperishable words, to do justice, to love mercy and to
walk humbly with God?
The author has succeeded well in his characterization of the various
prophets. His pages glow with the vital spark of each prophet's
flaming figure. He has named his book fittingly "Stories of the
Prophets," and interesting stories has he told. He has brought to his
task not only a sympathetic appreciation of his subject, but an
imaginative faculty that has enabled him to supply links in the
narrative suggested if not actually given in the incidents preserved
in the recorded annals.
From the words of the prophets themselves he has, therefore,
occasionally built up situations which if not strictly indicated in
the original text may, at any rate, be imagined. Not as predictors of
events in the far future, for this the prophets were not, despite
frequent interpretations of their words along this line, but as bold
speakers of the truth, as fiery preachers of the right, as intrepid
champions of the poor and oppressed, as fearless denouncers of
corruption and wrong in high places does our author present the
leading figures in his book. As such, their words are as significant
for us to-day as they were for the men of their generation, and their
impassioned accents sound as forcefully now as they did then. This is
brought out clearly and strikingly in the sketches of this volume,
which without doubt will succeed in giving a vivid picture to the
reader of these towering spirtual heroes who belong to the ages,
speakers of the everlasting nays and yeas of the Everlasting God.
DAVID PHILIPSON.
CINCINNATI, SEPTEMBER, 1912.
THE SHEPHERD OF TEKOA
CHAPTER I.
_An End to War._
"Damascus has fallen!
Damascus has fallen!!"
The whole city of Samaria rang with the glad tidings. Fleet-footed
runners, who had started with this precious news on the day of
victory, covered more than one hundred and fifty miles to bring it to
the capital of the Kingdom of Israel.
They crossed mountains and swam rivers, fairly flew over fertile
plains and through busy cities, shouting, while there was breath in
their bodies:
"Damascus has fallen!"
Many of the messengers fell exhausted on the way, but others took up
the wonderful news from the front and carried it on, until the whole
northern part of the kingdom knew of the king's victory.
Little by little the whole story was told to the eager Samarians--how
the king, Jeroboam II, himself led the hosts of Israel; how attack
followed attack upon the fortified Syrian capital; how the first
breach was made in the outer wall; how the valiant Israelites rushed
upon the enemy, and how the final victory was won for Israel's
standard.
What a celebration was there in Samaria that long-to-be-remembered
day!
Not since the days when the first Jeroboam led the rebellion of the
ten tribes against King Solomon's weak son, Rehoboam, and established
the independent kingdom of the Ten Tribes, with Samaria as the
capital, was there such rejoicing in that city.
We can picture the celebration in our mind's eye; we cannot describe
it in words.
Parents who had sent their sons to the war now laughed happily through
their tears, because there would be an end to war.
Sisters whose brothers doubtless lay dead in and about the walls of
the doomed city, now sang songs of joy in the midst of their weeping,
because there would be an end to war.
The strongest and finest men of Israel had given their lives for their
country, but now, thank God! there would be an end to war.
The fall of Damascus meant the end of a hundred and fifty years' war,
commenced by Ben-hadad I, of Syria, against Israel, long before
Jeroboam's great-grandfather established the dynasty of Jehu on the
throne of Israel.
It meant even more than that; it meant the end of Syrian oppression,
and, perhaps, a period of peace to the long-troubled and war-ridden
kingdom of Israel.
No wonder, then, that there were feasts of rejoicing and full-throated
cries:
"Damascus has fallen! Long live King Jeroboam!"
"Damascus has fallen! Long life to the house of Jehu!"
All day and all night Samaria swarmed with people. The streets were
thronged with shouting men and women who had come from Geba and
Dothan, and even from Jezreel on the north, and from Schechem and
Shiloh and Bethel on the south, to help celebrate the great victory.
Sacrifices were brought at all the sanctuaries of Israel--in Bethel,
in Dan, in Gilgal, in Beersheba.
Priests and people brought thank-offerings, and, together, sang
praises to God:
"God is my light and my salvation,
Whom shall I fear?
God is the strength of my life,
Of whom shall I be afraid?"
Truly, God was on the side of Israel, or else the Syrians could not
have been defeated. He was showing favor to the Northern Kingdom, and
was pleased with Israel, for was not Judah, the Southern Kingdom, too,
paying tribute to Jeroboam?
And so they recalled how Joash, the father of the great Jeroboam II,
defeated Amaziah, king of Judah, took him captive, partially
demolished the walls of Jerusalem, and looted the Temple in Jerusalem.
The older men of Samaria remembered the fine sarcasm with which Joash
treated Amaziah's challenge to war, in his reply:
"The thistle that was in Lebanon sent to the cedar that was in
Lebanon, saying, 'Give thy daughter to my son to wife,' and there
passed by a wild beast that was in Lebanon, and trod down the
thistle."
How young and old laughed at the repetition of this clever little
story that compared Israel to a cedar in its strength and to a wild
beast in its fighting power, and Judah to a poor, little thistle to be
tramped upon!
Jeroboam II was indeed a son of his father. Joash humbled Judah,
Israel's enemy on the south; Jeroboam humbled Syria, Israel's enemy on
the north.
Not satisfied with the fall of Damascus, however, Jeroboam pushed
right ahead and captured Lodebar and Karnaim, which he turned over to
Assur-dan, king of Assyria.
The fact is that Jeroboam had to do this. It was his end of a bargain
made with Assur-dan. It was agreed between the two that the Assyrians
would keep their hands off during the war between Israel and Syria.
As a reward for Assur-dan's non-interference, Jeroboam undertook to
capture these two cities and turn them over to the Syrians to become
part of his empire.
Having fulfilled his agreement, Jeroboam continued his victorious
march further north, and never stopped until he had laid low the pride
of Hamath, the prosperous city on the river Orontes.
Jeroboam II, thus had the great distinction of restoring the
boundaries of the Kingdom of Israel to the proportions of the empire
of David and Solomon, "from the entrance of Hamath unto the sea of
Arabah," which is the Dead Sea.
Wonderful was the reception prepared for the king and his victorious
army on their return to Samaria. More people had come to the city to
join in the welcoming demonstration than had pilgrimed to Jerusalem on
the Passover, in the days before the division of the kingdom.
The northern walls were massed with people, and the gates were
decorated with flowers. Priests and elders, dressed in spotless white
and led by the high priest, Amaziah, himself, awaited Jeroboam and his
generals just outside of the city and preceded them to the gates. Such
an acclamation of joy as greeted the king upon his entrance through
the gates had never been heard in Samaria.
Passing through a triumphal arch of stone and marble, the procession
was met by hundreds of maidens and children, clothed in linen and
gold, who led the way, singing and strewing flowers in the path of
the heroes.
A turn in the street led to the market-place. Here had been built a
great triumphal arch of ivory and gold, beyond which was an altar,
specially erected for the occasion.
Passing through the arch, Amaziah and Jeroboam mounted the steps that
led to the altar. All the rest remained below. When the priest and the
king faced the people the singing and the shouting ceased. With due
ceremony, and according to the rites, the king brought a thanks-offering
to God for his victories and his safe return. When Amaziah placed the
sacrifice upon the altar a deep hush fell over the great assembly.
Slowly the smoke of the sacrifice rose to heaven, and the multitude of
people, like one man, fell on their knees and worshiped.
Jeroboam was deeply moved. Solemnly he raised his right hand, and,
from the depths of his grateful heart, he said:
"Peace to the house of Israel!"
Like the rumble of a mighty wave rolling toward the shore came the
response from the sea of worshiping people:
"To the house of Israel, peace!"
For one whole week after Jeroboam's triumphant entry into the capital,
Samaria was a place of feasting and rejoicing. When, by command of the
king, the celebration came to an end and the people began to return to
their homes, each one, on leaving the city's gates, repeated to
himself the now answered prayer of over a century:
"Peace to the house of Israel!
To the house of Israel, peace!"
CHAPTER II.
_In the Days of Prosperity._
It was market day in Samaria.
Great throngs of people crowded all the streets. They jostled each
other good naturedly, traded, bargained, renewed acquaintanceship,
spoke of their home towns and expressed the hope of meeting again.
The market place itself, where the many bazaars displayed wonderful
merchandise from many cities and many lands, was an especially lively
place. It was gay with life and color. Gilded chariots and ivory-bedecked
litters passed to and fro. Heralds announced particularly important
personages and escorts and cleared a way for them with whip or spear.
Military men and merchant princes, with many followers, often
scattered the smaller merchants and petty traders in their path
through the market. Many were caught under the wheels of the vehicles
of the rich when they did not get out of the way quickly enough.
Others were purposely thrust aside by the wealthy aristocrats simply
to show their disdain.
It was a typical Samarian market day--crowds and noise; buying and
selling; idle rich and drudging poor; haughty military grandees, in
their resplendent attires, and cowed, miserable beggars in their rags;
color and laughter at the bazaars, and tears and sorrow at the auction
block just across the way--always crowds and always noise.
The auctioneer was shouting above the general din the good points of a
man who had just been placed on the block.
"To be sold till the Jubilee Year," he cried. "How much am I bid?"
A clerk read the court's decree that this man was to be sold for debt.
It was signed by the judges, who sat in the East Gate of Samaria. The
document was a cold, formal statement. It did not take into account
the reason why this man, in the full vigor of manhood, had fallen into
debt. His creditors had pushed the poor fellow hard for their money.
He could not pay. He pleaded with the judges that the sickness of his
wife and children had reduced him to direst need, but it was without
avail. He could not pay his debts and must work them off as a slave
for seven years; that was the decree of the court. After seven years
he would be a free man again. Cases like this were very common.
The keen eye of the auctioneer noted a man at the far edge of the
platform who had made several attempts as if to bid during the sale.
He was a middle-aged man, tall and thin, but wiry. His face was
bronzed from exposure to sun and wind. He wore a long woolen mantel
that completely covered him, even to the sandals on his feet.
"How much am I bid?" The auctioneer spoke the question directly to
this country yokel, while he winked at the crowd in front of him. He
thought that the fellow who came to the market clad in such clothes,
instead of his Sabbath best, had little money with him to buy a slave,
and less use for one. So he spoke the question again to the "farmer,"
expecting an answer that would make the crowd laugh and put them in
good humor.
The country yokel again made as if to speak but changed his mind and
backed away, facing the auctioneer.
He had hardly backed three paces when he bumped into some one. He was
pushed violently forward, and, before he could recover, winced under a
stinging crack from a whip.
He turned quickly and faced two brutish looking men, swearing at his
awkwardness and cursing his impudence for being in the way.
The "farmer" could have given a good account of himself in a square
fight with these men, but he knew better than to start a fight with
them. They were the foreguards to a splendid pleasure outfit--the
outfit of a very rich Samarian merchant. A fight meant arrest and
punishment at the hands of Samarian judges, whether he was in the
right or not. The rich of Samaria had the judges under their thumbs. A
stranger or a poor man, in fact, anyone who had no influence in
Samaria, stood little chance of getting justice.
So the farmer cleared the way. Standing aside, he watched the chariot
drawn by four Egyptian steeds, surrounded by guards, slaves and
hangers-on, make its way through the crowded market place, paying no
attention to the rights and privileges of any one. The wealthy
merchant in the chariot held his head up proudly. He greeted only the
prosperous looking; upon the curious crowds and small merchants, he
looked down with contempt.
The merchant whose attendants had so grossly insulted the "farmer"
drew up before a great palace. Rich carpets were spread from the
chariot to the steps of the mansion. The rich man's followers bowed
low as he passed up the steps and through the door held open by
attendants. Some followed him into the house; others mingled with the
people in the market place; the slaves went to their quarters by a
rear entrance.
The stranger in the woolen robe was not as green as he looked. He had
witnessed the growth and prosperity of Samaria during the last twenty
years of Jeroboam II's reign until it became the busiest trade center
in the Empire.
Leaning against the stone column, on which was graven the record of
Jeroboam's victory over Damascus, and still smarting from the lash of
the servant's whip, he recalled the story of Samaria's great strides
to its present prosperous condition.
The subjugation of Judah on the south, which this farmer had good
cause to remember; the conquest of Syria on the north and Jeroboam's
peace compact with Assyria further east, assured a long period of
peaceful development within the empire.
New highways were built, so that the farther ends of the country were
brought close together for business purposes. Farmers could bring
their crops to the cities easily. Many remained in the cities and
engaged in business pursuits. Caravans traveled great distances,
bringing precious luxuries from one part of the empire to another, and
even from foreign countries.
Many thus became very wealthy. They built themselves palaces for
winter residences in the cities and palaces for summer residences in
the country. To get rich seemed to be the aim of everybody; and, with
riches, came ostentation and luxuriant living.
The city of Samaria, especially, was the center for Israel's most
wealthy men. Their homes were wonders of stone and ivory. The
furnishings rivaled in beauty the splendor of the outside. The rooms
were high and spacious. The beds and tables and chairs were of the
finest wood of Lebanon, carved by the craftsmen of Tyre, and inlaid
with ivory. The coverings were of the richest purple and gold from
Egypt and the Indies. Wine cellars were a part of every house and
feasts were spread whenever the occasion offered itself. Fatted lambs
and calves were slaughtered daily to supply the tables, and new
instruments were invented to furnish music at the feasts.
This, however, was only one side of the picture of Samaria in its days
of greatest prosperity. The "farmer" knew that there was another, much
less beautiful. While the rich were growing richer, the poor were
growing poorer.
The rich, thinking only of themselves, their wealth, their power,
their good times, cheated and oppressed the poor unmercifully. They
gave false weights and short measure and sold at high prices, poor
stuff at that. They would drive a poor man into debt and have him sold
into slavery; so that human beings became a drug on the market, as it
were. In fact, at the very auction which the "farmer" watched that
day, one poor man was sold for the price of a pair of shoes. The poor
had even no chance to get justice in the courts. The greed for money
placed corrupt officials in office and the offenders bribed them to
the undoing of the poor and needy.
Strange to say, the Israelites, in whose midst there were those who
lived such scandalous lives and treated the poor people so
outrageously--the Israelites--nevertheless, believed in their hearts
that they had not forgotten God. They believed that God was with them;
that He loved them above all other peoples; that He guarded and
protected them; that He sent them all their blessings of prosperity
and peace.
This is the way they reasoned it out: Had not God helped them to
defeat Judah? Had not God been with them when they crushed their
ancient foe, Syria? Did not God send them rain in season, so that
crops were good and plentiful?
"Therefore," said they, "God is on our side. Let us go up to the
sanctuaries and offer sacrifices upon His altars."
And so, at festival times, Bethel and Gilgal, and Dan and Beersheba
were crowded with the rich, offering their sacrifices, feasting,
drinking and rejoicing. It never entered their minds that God is the
God of the poor, as well as of the rich. Though they continued to rob
and oppress and enslave the poor and the needy and the helpless, they
were perfectly satisfied with the idea that all God asked of them was
to offer the prescribed sacrifices. If there were any who knew
differently, or thought differently, they seemingly did not dare say
so in anybody's hearing. For the poor, these were, indeed, evil times.
At this point in his musings, the "farmer" actually shuddered. He was
not aware that his peculiar dress and his peculiar position at the
moment had attracted attention. While he was contrasting in his mind
the great difference between the rich and the poor in Samaria, several
men, having nothing better to do, had stopped to stare at the yokel.
As is always the case when people stand in the street and gawk, a
large crowd soon assembled. A military chariot stopped near the group
of curious gazers to see what was going on. Soon several others were
halted there, including gilded and gaudy litters, in which fashionably
dressed women were being conveyed. All stared, called each other's
attention to the queerly garbed stranger, and finally laughed
outright.
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