favourable to the unbroken maintenance at least of the sacred objects of the people and the priestly life of the old religion through every change in kingly government. The glory of ancient sanctity and high deserts from a hoary antiquity downwards, intensified by a great book of sacred law, cast a glow upon the whole Levitic priesthood, but especially upon the office of the high-priest, at the time of the destruction of the Davidic kingdom. From the position which it then occupied, the true religion could not yet quite free itself from the tutelage of the Levitical priesthood, although, with the support it had derived from it for a thousand years, it had learned long before to move with growing freedom. True prophecy, however, had then looked forward to its complete release,' and only lamented the profound indignities which the chief-priests experienced at the hands of the heathen,2 as though for a sign that they too knew how to suffer for the true religion. And, indeed, we have already 3 noticed what benefits resulted from the fact that so many priests felt themselves moved by their birth and their ancient privileges to contribute everything they could to the foundation of the new Jerusalem, so that it is at least doubtful whether it could have risen again from its ruins at all without their burning zeal. But in the high-priest and in the firm establishment of his supremacy over every visible expression of the holy, this new Jerusalem now found its firmest and most inalienable support against the heathen power. This fact could not fail to be soon demonstrated by experience, and remained henceforth unshaken, as we have already observed, through all the subsequent changes of heathen supremacy. But the necessity which compelled the hagiocracy to rest on the ancient priesthood, and the readiness with which the priesthood recognised in it a powerful means of exalting its own strength, which, at the beginning of this period, had been so miserably impaired, tended to unite the high-priestly power more closely with the hagiocracy, till it became one of its most powerful instruments, and then learned in its turn to make the hagiocracy a source of prestige and power to itself not easily to be exhausted. 5 When once, however, the hagiocracy is firmly established, as it was now among the people of Israel, it may succeed in maintaining in the lower classes for a considerable time a certain uniform culture of religion and morals; but its intrinsic hollowness will speedily be disclosed in the higher ranks, and its in fluence may be most prejudicial where its life has taken its deepest root. We have already seen' what vexation Nehemiah had to endure in his strife with the selfishness and stupidity of many of the nobles of his day in Jerusalem; and, by the time of Malachi, the avarice of many of the priests had developed to a most culpable extent. On the high-priest of his later years Nehemiah was compelled to inflict a rebuke for a grave transgression, and it can surprise no one that during the growing dissolution of the Persian empire the high-priestly house rapidly rose in power, but at the same time fell into the danger of the deepest moral degeneration. Josephus relates that the high-priest John, grandson of Eliashib," who lived under Nehemiah, murdered his own brother Jesus (Joshua) during a ceremony in the Temple, in consequence of a promise made to the latter, in mere friendship, by a Persian general, named Bagôsês, to promote him to the high-priesthood. In reliance upon this, so he alleged, his brother had provoked him to a quarrel. The result was that Bagôsês zealously took up the cause of his murdered friend, bitterly reproached the Judeans with the enormity of such a murder, committed in the very sanctuary, made his way in spite of every dissuasion into the sanctuary, affirming that he was at any rate cleaner than a murdered corpse, and laid on the country for seven years the burden of paying fifty drachmæ for every lamb offered as the law directed in the daily sacrifice. This case presents us with the first clear indication of the ruinous discord of the high-priestly house. Like a worm, it ate its way into the whole institution, and we shall find it spreading further and further during the Greek supremacy towards its destruction. The succession by primogeniture brought to the high-priesthood the same advantages of a continuous development which it secures to every princely dignity, but it also tended to make those who were called to the office, whether by near or distant ties, far too lax. We have already seen that Eliashib was by no means a pattern for his age;7 and the same cause provoked a state of dissension between the actual occupant and his expectant successor, which readily led under a foreign despotism to the most frightful crimes. 1 P. 160. 2 P. 174. 3 P. 159 sq. 4 Ant. xi. 7, 1. This name John is fixed by Neh. xii. 22 sq.; the name Jonathan in ver. 11 rests on an error, see p. 123, note 1. The Johanan, son of Eliashib, Ezr. x. 6. who must have lived much earlier, is only known to us by the fact that he had founded a hall in the new temple, which was called by his name. 7 See the Alterth. p. 132. Whether this event took place under Artaxerxes II. (Mnemon), or Artaxerxes III. (Ochus), cannot be determined with certainty from the words of Josephus as they stand.' We shall, however, find the son of John, Jaddûa, high-priest and advanced in years at the conquest of Alexander, and this might warrant us in fixing on Artaxerxes II., especially if John himself was (as is probable) still young at the time of the murder. So far as our present knowledge goes, at any rate, we may affirm that this event must not be confounded with the dangerous insurrection against Ochus, which terminated with the destruction of Jericho, and the deportation of a number of Judeans to Hyrcania. Of this Josephus says not one word; and the accounts of it preserved elsewhere are extremely scanty, a deficiency which is fully explained by its disastrous consequences. This probably led to the union of a strong party of Judeans with the Phoenicians and Cyprians, who, about the years 358-356 B.C., in alliance with Egypt and King Nectanebus, endeavoured permanently to shake off the Persian yoke.-Soon afterwards Ochus once more subdued Egypt; and quite possibly it was at this time that the numerous captive Judeans were compulsorily removed to Egypt, of whom, however, nothing but obscure traditions remain.3 2 II. THE BOOKS OF BARUCH AND TOBIT. The new government of the hagiocracy in Jerusalem was, then, seriously tottering already, after an existence of little more than a century and a half, during which it had had the opportunity of establishing itself more firmly. But, even in its wide dispersion, the nation still retained too much of the The reading Ochus Artaxerxes, which is adopted in a newer edition, rests on a mere conjecture of Scaliger. It might further be conjectured that the general Bagôsês was identical with the well known eunuch Bagoas, who was all-powerful under Ochus; but this receives no further confirmation elsewhere Josephus distinguishes between the two names. 2 These are the very brief narratives in Eus. Chron. ii. p. 221, and G. Syncellus, Chron. i. p. 486, the equally sketchy and condensed account in Solinus, Memorab. or Polyhist. cap. 44, and that in Orosius, Hist. iii. 7. Of these the last sounds the most circumstantial; and the war here referred to as being carried on at the same time against the Phoenicians, who had been treated by Ochus with the greatest cruelty, as well as that against the Cyprians, is described with great minuteness by Diodorus, Hist. xvi. 40-45. Moreover, Eusebius places this deportation to Hyrcania many years earlier than the conquest of Egypt, which is probably correct; and the Romans there named, together with the Judeans, may originally have been Idu means. 3 In the book of Aristeas, at the end of Haverkamp's edition of Josephus, vol. ii. p. 103 sq. Hecatæus also speaks in general terms of ill-treatment endured by the Judeans at the hands of the Persian satraps and kings. See Jos. Contr. Ap. i. 22, p. 456. healthy spirit which had come down from the grand old times of the great prophets to allow the secret corruption which the hagiocracy carried in its core to develope itself so soon in full. Nay, the dispersion of the people of the true religion now proved even salutary to it. The hagiocracy in Jerusalem might tend to dangerous disturbances, but it was by no means so rigidly organised, or so supreme over all other forces, as to prevent healthier endeavours and simple reverence from maintaining themselves in more distant circles, and even reacting with moderating influences on the central locality. This is most clearly shown by a work belonging to this period. The little book of Baruch, which is now found in the Greek Bibles associated with the great book of Jeremiah, was probably written at the time of dangerous risings against the Persians. The Judeans in Babylon certainly held aloof from the disturbances of their fellow-countrymen in the holy land; and the book of Baruch is just the kind of work which would have proceeded from men who, while filled with the most lively Messianic hopes, and zealously desiring a divine deliverance of Jerusalem (i.e. the community of Israel) from the yoke of foreign nations, nevertheless severely condemned self-willed and inconsiderate revolts. It was known that Jeremiah1 had formerly required similar prudence from the Babylonian Judeans; and it accordingly seemed expedient to the author to introduce his assistant Baruch, who was supposed to have been in Babylon on a commission from his master,2 as despatching to the community in the holy land a letter, which, though drawnup by him, had been approved by the whole Babylonian community. This communication carries out further the view which Jeremiah himself might have entertained on the matter in question. For the sake of outward keeping it refers exclusively to similar circumstances under the Chaldeans, but in its true application and its main portion3 it is perfectly suitable to the existing relations with Persia. Loyal to the king and his house, the community in the holy land should freely confess its deep repentance in prayer to God. Not till then can it again understand with edification the sermon of life, and grasp the fact that as the people of God it already possesses all true wisdom, and with this, if it will only use it aright, all true salvation; now, what lamentation rises from Jerusalem (i.e. the rue community of God) for the present misery of its separate members, Jerusalem, whose Messianic salvation will nevertheless be assuredly complete at last!2 This little book, thus compact in itself, is no unworthy echo of the old prophetic voices. It contains many thoughts powerfully conceived in the spirit of the past; but the special feature in which it shows itself worthy of the age immediately succeeding Ezra's lofty labours, is the view which it expresses of the sacred law. This wears the appearance of full creative originality. The law is the final manifestation on earth of the wisdom of God himself, which has taken a sort of bodily form, bestowing life and salvation on all who keep it. This constitutes a totally new combination of the older representation of wisdom as the revelation of God in the world with the deep veneration for the law which had recently arisen, and provides us with one of the principal reasons for not placing the composition of the book at an earlier date. But, on the other hand, there are many clear marks that it cannot be later. That the purport of the whole composition was directed far more to the country communities in Palestine comes out quite prominently towards its close.— Considerably later, an unknown writer, apparently desirous to 5 1 Bar. iii. 9-iv. 9. 2 iv. 9, from àкоÚTаTe to the end. In this discourse, which rises towards the conclusion into quite prophetic style, four strophes of equal length may be clearly distinguished, iv. 9-18, 19-29, 30-37, v. 1-9. In the three divisions of its own contents, the whole book thus supplies a type of the contemporary worship in the house of prayer: first prayer, next preaching, and, lastly, a more elevated prophetic close. This is the purport of iii. 35-iv. 1. 98 8q9. In many passages the Greek translation corresponds so imperfectly with the original as to show that the latter must have been by that time tolerably old; and, further, the books of Jeremiah and Baruch have evidently been translated by the same person (it is sufficient to comparo the use of the words βαδίζω, μαννά for μαναά, ἀποστολή, χαρμοσύνη, γαυρίαμα, deoprns); he therefore found the book already closely united with that of Jeremiah. Besides this, the author of the book of Daniel had read the book, and doubtless in Hebrew, probably also in the same connection with the book of Jeremiah. The words of the prayer in Dan. ix. 4-19 are in substance only a reproduction of Bar. i. 15-ii. 17, for the mest part in an abbreviated form; and while in Daniel this prayer is only subsidiary, so as to lead up to something more important, it is the chief feature in Baruch. The quotations from the Pentateuch also, ii. 2 sq., 28-35, are very free, and not drawn from the LXX. The last, however, is so peculiar that it might almost recal the commencement of the book of Jubilees; cf., however, the similar case in vol. i. p. 191. Further, compare the Jahrbb. der Bibl. Wiss. vol. iv. p. 77 sq., vi. p. 113. 7 Cf. iv. 8, and the address to the ai pokoi Ziwv, i.e. the country communities, iv. 9-24. |