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THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET ISAIAH.

Note.-THE Rev. George ADAM SMITH, M.A., has published a magnificent work on Isaiah. It is overflowing with information, whilst its literary style is absolutely enchanting. I wish all students and preachers could have a copy of this invaluable treatise. It occupies totally different ground from that traversed by the PEOPLE'S BIBLE. In a sense the one supplements the other; though in my opinion Mr. SMITH'S work stands far above all others in erudition, in historical insight, and in spiritual perception of proportion and colour. I have instructed my Editor to enrich the following pages with illustrative extracts.-J. P.

A CATECHETICAL NOTE.

Q. In what reigns did Isaiah prophesy ?

A. In the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, Kings

of Judah.

Q. Who were some of his official contemporaries?

A. Hosea, Amos, and Jonah, in the kingdom of Israel, and Micah in the kingdom of Judah. Micah and Obadiah are also supposed to have been contemporary with Isaiah.

Q. Is much known about the prophet's life?

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A. No. In Hebrew and Greek the two names are spelled alike, and for this reason some of the Fathers, who were unacquainted with Hebrew, thought the names referred

to one man.

Q. What is known about Isaiah domestically?

A. He was married, and he designated his wife a prophetess. Two of his sons are mentioned under their names of

Shear-jashub, and Maher-shalal-hash-baz. Isaiah wore a garment of hair-cloth, as did Elijah and John the Baptist,

Q. Is anything more than his Prophecy assigned to the authorship of Isaiah?

A. Yes. A biography of King Uzziah, and a biography of King Hezekiah.

Q. Is there any evidence that Isaiah was ramiliar with other

portions of sacred Scripture?

A. Yes. He alludes to Eden and Noah (li. 3; liv. 9), to Abraham and Moses (xli. 8; lxiii. 11, 12), to Sodom and Gomorrah (i. 9; xiii. 19); and many allusions would have been impossible but for a wide knowledge of the Book of Proverbs. It is not disputed that Isaiah was well read in the Book of Job.

Q. Does Isaiah show any signs of a wider culture? A. Yes. Probably some knowledge of medicine (i. 6; xxxviii. 21), and some acquaintance with the religion and history. of the great kingdoms contending for the sovereignty of the East (xviii. 2; xix. 11-13; xxiii. 12, 13; xlvi. 1). He must have read much or heard much of Egypt, Zoan, Noph, and Pathros; also of the rivers of Ethiopia and the seven streams of the Delta; he was familiar, too, with many Moabite cities.

Q. How old was Isaiah at the beginning of the reign of Hezekiah?

A. He is supposed to have been over sixty.

Q. How are the prophecies of Isaiah generally divided?
A. They have been divided by competent criticism thus:-
(a) Chapters i.-xxxv.: Prophetic writings from the death of
Uzziah to the closing years of Hezekiah.

(b) Chapters xxxvi.-xxxix.: A historical appendix to this
collection.

(c) Chapters xl.-lxvi.: A systematic collection of prophecies. referring centrally to the deliverance of the Jews from Babylonian captivity.

Chapter i. 1-17.

ACCUSATIONS.

T is a living man who speaks to us.

IT

This is not an anony

mous book. Much value attaches to personal testimony. The true witness is not ashamed of day and date and all the surrounding chronology; we know where to find him, what he sprang from, who he is, and what he wants.

"The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah (ver. 1).

"*

This man is a speaker. Has the speaker any function in society? Does the man of sentences, of eloquence, play any part in the education of the age? Isaiah defines the part he is about to attempt; he says he will first of all accuse the times of degeneracy. This is not a grateful task. More loudly would he be welcomed who came to pronounce a eulogy upon the age. But Isaiah was characterised by intense and invincible reality. He will be an iconoclast; nothing will be spared by the iron rod of his vengeance: yea, though they be gods, they shall go down; though they be idols well cared for they shall be smitten as if they were common clay. This is a chapter of denunciation,

"The first chapter of the Book of Isaiah owes its position not to its date, but to its character. It was published late in the prophet's life. The seventh verse describes the land as overrun by foreign soldiery, and such a calamity befell Judah only in the last two of the four reigns over which the first verse extends Isaiah's prophesying. In the reign of Ahaz, Judah was invaded by Syria and Northern Israel, and some have dated chapter i. from the year of that invasion, 734 B.C. In the reign, again, of Hezekiah some have imagined, in order to account for the chapter, a swarming of neighbouring tribes upon Judah; and Mr. Cheyne, to whom regarding the history of Isaiah's time we ought to listen with the greatest deference, has supposed an Assyrian invasion in 711, under Sargon. But hardly of this, and certainly not of that, have we adequate evidence, and the only other invasion of Judah in Isaiah's lifetime took place under Sennacherib, in 701. For many reasons this Assyrian invasion is to be preferred to that by Syria and Ephraim in 734 as the occasion of this prophecy."-REV .G. A. Smita, M.A.

with which is strangely inwrought figures of mercy and tones evangelical. My song shall be of judgment and mercy!

Isaiah personates the divine Being as accusing Judah and Jerusalem :

"Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth: for the Lord hath spoken, I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me" (ver. 2).

Instead of "children" say sons ""I have nourished and brought up sons"-not a mixed family, but all sons; so to say, all eldest sons, all equal sons, without favour or specialty of advantage" and they have rebelled against me." Sometimes we imagine that the fatherhood of God is a New Testament revelation; we speak of the prophets as referring to God under titles of resplendent glory and overpowering majesty, and we set forth in contrast the gentler terms by which the divine Being is designated in the new covenant. How does God describe himself in this chapter? Here he claims to be father: I have nourished and brought up sons-not, I have nourished and brought up slaves or subjects—or creatures-or insects-or beasts of burden -I have nourished and brought up sons: I am the father of creation, the fountain and origin of the paternal and filial religion. "And they have rebelled against me." In what way have they rebelled? We must come to particulars. We find those particulars in the fourth verse-"Ah! sinful nation." The word "ah" is not an interjection, indicating a mere sighing of pity or regret ; the word should not be spelt as it is here, the letters should be reversed, it should be "ha," and pronounced as expressive of indignation. God does not merely sigh over human iniquity, looking upon it as a lapse, an unhappy thing, a circumstance that ought to have been otherwise; his tone is poignant, judicial, indignant, for not only is his heart wounded, but his righteousness is outraged, and the security of his universe is threatened, for the universe stands in plomb-line, in strict geometry, and whoever trifles with the plomb, with the uprightness, tampers with the security of the universe. "A people laden with iniquity;" so that you cannot add another element to the heavy burden: genius cannot invent an addition. "A seed of evildoers; " not a mere progeny, as if the force of heredity could not be resisted and therefore fate must be accepted, but a house of evildoers—

that is to say, all the evildoers having grouped themselves to keep house together-a whole houseful of bad men. "Sons that are corrupters"; sons that are as cankerworms; sons that throw poison into pellucid water streams; sons that suggest evil thoughts to opening minds. What have they done? They have done three things. It is no general accusation that is lodged against Judah and Jerusalem, and through them against all the nations of the earth; it is a specific indictment, glittering with detail. "They have forsaken the Lord." By so much their action is negative they have ceased to attend the altar; they have neglected to read the holy writing; they have turned their backs upon that towards which they once looked with open face and radiant eye. Next, "they have provoked the Holy One of Israel unto anger." Observe how the intensity increases, how the aggravation deepens and blackens: "they have forsaken ;' "they have provoked;" they have grown bold in sin; they have thrown challenges in the face of God; they have defied him to hurl his thunderbolts and his lightnings upon them. "They have provoked the Holy One of Israel." That is the key of Isaiah's whole revelation-" the Holy One of Israel."

The book of Isaiah is divided into two parts: in the first part "the Holy One of Israel" is a phrase which is used some fourteen times; in the second part it is used sixteen times. "The Holy One of Israel" is the key of Isaiah's whole religious position. His was a majestic mind; specially was that majesty invested with highest veneration. God is not to him a mere conception; he is "the Holy One of Israel "-the one holy, the only holy. Every man has his own God, in the sense of having his own conception or view of God. There are as many conceptions of God as there are men to conceive of God. Here is a mystery, and yet a joy. When men compare their several conceptions of God one with another they make each other's hearts ache. To what mind does it ever occur that the multitude of conceptions of God is due to the wondrousness and infinite glory of the God who is thought about? Were he himself less it would be easier to comprehend him, and represent him in one formula; but seeing the heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain him, where is the wordhouse you will build for him, where is the creed-tabernacle in

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