History of the Jews (Vol. 1-6). Graetz Heinrich

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СКАЧАТЬ the inhabitants. Even in those days the Judæans possessed peculiar facility for acquiring foreign languages. The position of the Judæans in Babylonia after the death of Nebuchadnezzar (561) was still more favourable.

      Nebuchadnezzar's son and successor, Evil-Merodach (Illorodamos) was utterly unlike his father. He was not courageous, nor did he love warfare, and he paid little attention to the business of the state. Judæan youths, from the royal house of David, were to be found at his court as eunuchs. How often have these guardians of the harem, these servants of their master's whims, become in turn masters of their master. The king Evil-Merodach appears to have been under the influence of a Judæan favourite, who induced him to release the captive king Jehoiachin, who had been imprisoned for thirty-seven years. The Babylonian monarch clothed him in royal garments, invited him to the royal table, and supplied his wants most generously. When Evil-Merodach held his court with unusual pomp, and assembled all the great men of the kingdom about him, he raised a throne for Jehoiachin higher than the thrones of the other conquered kings. He wished all the world to know that the former king of Judæa was his particular favourite.

      This generosity of Evil-Merodach must have extended in some degree to Jehoiachin's fellow-prisoners, for to many of them greater freedom was given, whilst others, who had been kept in the strictest captivity on account of their enmity to Nebuchadnezzar, were released. In fact, it is possible that Evil-Merodach might have been persuaded to allow the exiles to return home, with Jehoiachin as king of Judæa, had not his own death intervened. After a short reign of two years, he was murdered by his brother-in-law, Neriglissar (560). The dream of returning to their own country, in which some Babylonian Judæans had indulged, was thus dispelled. They were soon to learn the hardships of captivity.

      One of the many prophecies of the Hebrew seers—namely, that only a small part of the people should be saved—had been fulfilled. Insignificant indeed was the remnant. Of the four millions of souls which the children of Israel numbered in the reign of King David, only about a hundred thousand remained. Millions had fallen victims to the sword, famine, and pestilence, or had disappeared and been lost in foreign lands. But there was another side to the prophecies, which had not yet been realised. The greater number of the Judæan exiles, particularly those belonging to the most distinguished families, unchastened by the crushing blow which had befallen their nation and their country, persisted in their obstinacy and hardness of heart. The idolatrous practices to which they had been addicted in their own country, they continued in Babylon. It was difficult indeed to root out the passion for idolatry from the hearts of the people. The heads of the families, or elders, who laid claim to a kind of authority over all the other exiles, were as cruel and as extortionate in Babylonia as they had been in Palestine. Regardless of those beneath them, they did not try to better their condition. They chose the best and most fruitful portions of the lands assigned to them, leaving the worst to their subordinates.

      Ezekiel, the son of Buzi, the first prophet of the captivity (born about 620, died about 570) directed his prophetic ardour against the folly and obstinacy of the exiles. Gifted with simple, yet fiery and impressive eloquence, with a sweet and impassioned voice, and fully conscious of the highest ideal of religion and morality that the Judæans were capable of attaining, he spoke with courage and energy to his fellow-exiles. At first they treated him roughly (actually fettering him upon one occasion), but at last he gained their attention, and they would gather round him when he prophesied.

      The elders had often entreated him to foretell the end of that terrible war whilst it was raging in and about Jerusalem, but he had been silent. Why should he repeat for the hundredth time that the city, the nation, and the Temple were to be inevitably destroyed? But when a fugitive announced to him that the threatened misfortune had become a reality, he broke silence. Ezekiel first addressed himself to the conscienceless and heartless elders, who were leading a comfortable existence in captivity, whilst they were ill-treating their unfortunate brethren. (Ezekiel, ch. xxxiv.) But also in another direction, he had to combat a false idea prevailing amongst the exiles. Like the rest of the prophets, Ezekiel had foretold with absolute certainty the ultimate return of the Judæans to Palestine, but also their return to a purer state of morality. Many of the captives, however, in consequence of their repeated misfortunes, began to despair of the new birth of the nation, and looked upon it as a mere dream. They said, "Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost: we are quite cut off." The greatest of all evils is for a nation to despair of its future and to give up every hope. Ezekiel considered it a most important duty to banish this gloom from the hearts of his people. In a beautiful simile—that of the dry bones restored to life—he placed before them a picture of their new birth.

      But there was another group of exiles who despaired of the restoration of the Judæan people. They felt themselves utterly crushed by their sins. For centuries the nation had tempted the anger of its God by idolatry and other misdeeds. These sins could not be undone, but must meet with their inevitable result—the death of the sinner. These unfortunate people exclaimed, "If our transgressions and our sins be upon us, and we pine away in them, how then should we live?" But the prophet Ezekiel also combated this gloomy belief, that sin and its punishment were inseparably connected, and that crime must necessarily lead to the death of the sinner. In eloquent words, he laid before the people his consolatory doctrine of the efficacy of repentance.

      Often and in varied terms Ezekiel spoke of the future deliverance of the exiles, and painted it in ideal colours. So deeply was this prophet of the exile impressed with the certainty of a return to the old order of things in his own country, that he actually devised a plan for the building of a new Temple, and for the ordering of divine service and of the priesthood. Ezekiel was far from thinking that such a brilliant and glorious future was near at hand. The ideas, the feelings, and the actions which he daily observed in the exiles were not of a kind to justify such a hope. But he and other holy men helped to make a small beginning. Not long after the death of Ezekiel and Jeremiah, an unexpected change for the better commenced. The captivity which, notwithstanding the kind treatment at the hands of Nebuchadnezzar and his son, was attended with much suffering, but more especially the influence of their peculiar literature led to a change in the disposition of the people. In the very midst of the idolatrous abominations of the kingdoms of Ephraim and Judah, the flowers of a higher morality had blossomed. "The Spirit of God had dwelt amidst the uncleanliness of the people." The sublime thoughts of the prophets and the psalmists, awakened during the course of centuries, had not vanished into thin air with speech and song, but had taken root in some hearts, and had been preserved in writing. The priests of the sons of Zadok, who had never been idolatrous, had brought with them into captivity the Torah (the Pentateuch); the disciples of the prophets had brought the eloquent words of their teachers; the Levites had brought the sublime Psalms; the wise men, a treasure of excellent sayings; the learned had preserved the historical books. Treasures, indeed, had been lost, but one treasure remained which could not be stolen, and this the exiles had taken with them into a strange land. A rich, brilliant, and manifold literature had been carried into exile with them, and it became a power that taught, ennobled, and rejuvenated. These writings were replete with wonders. Had not the prophecy been realised to the letter, that the land of Israel would spew forth its people on account of their folly and their crimes, just as it had thrust out the Canaanites? Had not the menacing words of the prophets come to pass in a most fearful manner? Jeremiah had prophesied daily, in unambiguous words, the destruction of the nation, the city, and the Temple. Ezekiel had foretold the terrible war and subsequent misery, and his words had been fulfilled; and earlier still, Isaiah, Hosea, Amos, and even Moses had warned the people that exile and destruction would follow upon the transgression of the Law. Yet in spite of all their terrible misery, the people were not entirely annihilated. A remnant existed, small indeed, and homeless, but this remnant had found favour in the eyes of the conquerors. It was clear that even in the land of their foes, God had not entirely rejected them; He did not "utterly abhor them, to destroy them and break His covenant with them."

      Another miracle took place before their own eyes. A part of the descendants of the Ten Tribes, scattered for more than a century in the Assyrian provinces, and looked upon as lost, had asserted their nationality. Though long separated by jealousy and artfully whetted hate, they approached their suffering СКАЧАТЬ