4. The Parable as Allegory.

PARABLES OF THE OLD TESTAMENT.

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CHAPTER IV. THE PARABLE AS ALLEGORY.

Characteristics of the allegory. — Reference to the Song of Songs. — The allegories of Ezekiel: — I. The allegory of the vine. II. The allegory of the adulterous wife. III. The allegory of Oholah and Oholibah. IV. The allegory of the eagles and the vine. V. The allegory of the younglions. VI. The second allegory of the vine. VII. The allegory of the cauldron. VIII. The allegories relating to Pharaoh.

WHILE the Fable Is thus scantily represented in Scripture — perhaps as unworthy of the grave dignity of tone which pervades even its simplest and homeliest parts — the cognate form of Allegory claims a not inconsiderable place of prominence. It is best represented in the Book of Ezekiel — in those parables, which were so distinguishing a feature of his prophecy, that they called out the angry taunts of his hearers (Ezekiel 20:49).

If, indeed, we were to follow the guidance of the old traditional interpretation of the Song of Songs, we should find in it the chief type of this form of Parable — a long and elaborate allegory, in which is shadowed out that mystical relation of God to His covenanted people, which has been perfected in the union of Christ with His Church. But it seems to be fairly established by a consensus of modern criticism that the poem (for such it is) is a half-lyric, half-dramatic expression of a real story of pure earthly love — consecrated, so to speak, by its inclusion in the canon of that Holy Scripture, which, by its comprehension of all the elements of human thought and life, exercises universal power over the humanity of all times and places. The style, indeed, of the whole poem is highly figurative — full of picturesque metaphors, which have become household words, and have reproduced themselves again and again in modern literature. Out of the merely sensuous beauty of description, characteristic of early Oriental poetry, suggestions of higher spiritual ideas through these metaphors gleam constantly on modern thought. Even beyond these, in virtue of the essential sacredness of marriage as a type of the mystical union of Christ with His spouse, the Church, there must emerge from time to time pregnant thoughts and expressions, suggestive of the higher spiritual meanings into which ancient interpreters resolved them altogether. Such suggestion, as we may see from St. Paul’s treatment of human relationships in the Epistle to the Ephesians (v. 22vi. 10), is natural in all Holy Scripture, as viewing all things from the high spiritual standpoint. In some sense, therefore, the story of actual fact may be held to be a parable of a higher spiritual reality. But this cannot be said to be its essential character — any more than the story of Sarah and Hagar can be esteemed a parable, because St. Paul draws from it (Galatians 4:24-31) a typical symbolism. Certainly, it is only by a forced interpretation — which would never have been dreamt of, except for a mistaken reluctance to admit into the Sacred Canon a simple utterance of passionate earthly love — that it has been by so many ancient authorities considered as a pure allegory, and wrought out accordingly into the most remote and mystic details of significance.

Setting this aside, we find, as has been said, the fullest development of the allegory in the “ parables “of Ezekiel.

These parables are in some respects like the fables already noticed, generally because they belong to the realm of fancy, and especially because they frequently ascribe to the lower orders of creation thoughts and actions which are properly human. But they differ from the simpler type of the fables, and assume the character of the allegory, not only as being far more highly, and even poetically, elaborated, but as presenting the type and antitype closely and obviously interwoven with each other; so that many details are in the type plainly artificial — destroying the touch of nature which gives quaintness and humour to the fable — because they properly belong to the antitype alone. The use of these parables by Ezekiel is one phase of the markedly figurative character of his whole prophecy — most strikingly exemplified in the symbolic visions and symbolic actions, by which a large even a principal, part of his revelation is conveyed; but exemplified also in these symbolic utterances which (with one exception) appear to belong to a single period of his ministry. It has been thought, not improbably, that the prominence of this symbolic teaching in the prophets of the Captivity may have been suggested by the gigantic symbolic imagery, amidst which they lived in the plains of Babylon and which could not but impress strongly the imagination both of the teachers, and of those whom they had to teach.

These parables — as might be expected, in view both of the late age of Ezekiel and the general character of his style — exchange the archaic simplicity of the true fable for a studied completeness of treatment, in which every detail is carefully wrought out, and a sustained beauty of style, not incisive or brilliant, but quietly harmonious in all its parts; so that the meaning is not forced upon the hearer by the quaintness of the whole conception, but grows upon him step by step, as the picture is gradually drawn out. Still inferior in impressiveness to the true parable, this form of allegory is so far like it, that it rather suggests, than forcibly demands, inquiry into the hidden lesson underlying the whole. The whole series of these allegories seems to be assigned to the sixth and seventh years of the Captivity of Jeremiah, in which the prophet himself had been carried away, about six years (see 33:2i) before the final overthrow of Jerusalem. At that time the voice of Jeremiah in the land of Israel, and of Ezekiel, answering it from beside the river Chebar, were bidden to tell the same mournful and disheartening message — to command the Israelites to accept subjugation under the victorious Chaldean power, as a chastisement ordained of God, and by submission to lighten it as much as possible. Thus the captives of the first Captivity were to build houses and settle in the land of Babylon; they were to “ seek the peace of the city, and pray to the Lord for it “: for “ in the peace thereof they should find peace “ (Jeremiah 29:7). The remnant of the people under Zedekiah in their native land were to keep the oath of allegiance, sworn in the name of the Lord to their conqueror, and so to avoid the utter destruction otherwise sure to fall upon them. It was naturally a sad, unwelcome message — deeply painful to those who uttered it in the consciousness that they were held to be traitors to the hope of Israel — utterly distasteful to the sanguine patriotism, which still clung to the memory of old glories, and refused to believe that they could have passed away. But it was faithfully repeated again and again in many forms, as in the pathetic sorrow of Jeremiah, so much the mystic solemnity of Ezekiel. In this section of his prophecy it appears in many forms of allegory.

Ezekiel 15. — “And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, what is the vine tree more than any tree, the vine branch which is among the trees of the forest? Shall wood be taken thereof to make any work? or will men take a pin of it to hang any vessel thereon? Behold it is cast into the fire for fuel: the fire hath devoured both the ends of it, and the midst of it is burned; is it profitable for any work? Behold, when it was whole, it was meet for no work: how much less, when the fire hath devoured it, and it is burned, shall it yet be meet for any work? Therefore thus saith the Lord God: As the vine tree among the trees of the forest, which I have given to the fire for fuel, so will I give the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And I will set my face against them; they shall go forth from the fire, but the fire shall devour them; and ye shall know that I am the Lord, when I set my face against them. And I will make the land desolate, because they have committed a trespass, saith the Lord God.” This first example is a simple one — little more, indeed, than an expansion of familiar metaphor, such as that used in Psalms 58:8-18: “Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt.” It comes also very near to the more explicit form of the parable, already considered, in Isaiah 5. But, simple as it is, it has to us a peculiar interest in this — that it may well have been in the mind of the Great Teacher Himself, when, on the eve of His Passion, He expressed to His Apostles their vital relation to Himself in the words, “ I am the true Vine, ye are the branches.” The idea was, indeed, visibly embodied in the golden Vine represented on the gate of the Temple, which, it is thought, may have been before the eyes of His hearers, when those words were spoken, on the way from the supper-chamber to Gethsemane. The representation of Judah by the vine was probably suggested by the physical features and the characteristic produce of the country itself, as in the words of the blessing of Jacob, which describes Judah as “binding his foal unto the vine, and his ass’s colt to the choice vine, he washed his garments in wine and his clothes in the blood of grapes “(Genesis 49:11). But it has always been noted that there is a special appropriateness in the representation of the chosen people of God (as of humanity itself gathered up in Christ) by the emblem of the vine, because the whole value of the plant and its branches depends on the indwelling life. In connexion with that life they bear the sweetest and most precious fruit; cut off from it, they have no value as timber, like the limbs of many other trees, but are simply withered branches, fit at best for firewood. “Shall wood be taken from it,” asks the prophet, “ to make any work? “ Will men even “take a pin from it to hang any vessel thereon “? “ If a man,” says our Lord, “ abide not in me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.” The allegory, as wrought out by Ezekiel, contains evident allusions to the recent history of the kingdom. In the figure it is said of the vine-branch, first that “the fire devoureth both ends of it”; then that “the midst of it” — the charred remnant— “is burned.” In the interpretation we read of “the inhabitants of Jerusalem,” “ they have gone forth “(marginal reading) “ from the fire, but the fire shall devour them.” The original burning is clearly the first taking of the city by Nebuchadnezzar, followed by the captivity of Jeconiah. The last and final destruction is the impending captivity of the poor remnant of former greatness, left for a time in vassalage under Zedekiah. The true inner life of the covenant had decayed and died out. So long as it was in its divine vigour, no fire of earthly kindling could touch it. Now that the tree was dry, it had no power to withstand the flame. By a destruction, slow or rapid, but always sure, it withered away.

II.’ From this simple parable we pass, in the next chapter (c. 16.), and in c. 23, which is clearly connected with it, to two allegories, bearing strong likeness to each other, both working out, with startling and almost painful vividness of detail, that familiar metaphor of Holy Scripture, in which the peculiar relation of the Lord to His chosen people Is compared to the relation of marriage, and the spiritual sins of idolatry and apostasy are accordingly represented by the sensual sins of adultery and fornication. This metaphor Is something more than metaphor. From the deeper teaching of the New Testament we learn that it is no arbitrary assimilation of things naturally unconnected with one another; for that the sacredness of the marriage tie itself depends on its being a shadow of that relation of God to the humanity made in His Image, which is brought out in perfection by the Incarnation of the Godhead in our nature. It will follow that the sensuous temper, giving way to the natural craving for something visible and material, on which to rest our spiritual affections, and so leading to various forms of idolatry, has an essential affinity to the unrestrained indulgence of sensual appetite, out of which springs unfaithfulness to the marriage vow. The connexion of the grosser idol-worships with licensed and chartered impurity is a terrible comment on this relationship of idolatry to sensual uncleanness.[1] The consecration of purity, as “holiness,” by the sense of the spiritual communion of the soul with God, Is a similar enforcement of the essential likeness between conjugal fidelity and spiritual faith.

[1] See the catalogue of the sins of the flesh in Galatians 5:20-21, where “adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,” are followed immediately by “ idolatry “ and “ witchcraft.”

Ezekiel 16. — “ Again the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, cause Jerusalem to know her abominations, and say, Thus saith the Lord God unto Jerusalem: Thy birth and thy nativity is of the land of the Canaanite; the Amorite was thy father, and thy mother was an Hittite. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * swaddled at all. None eye pitied thee, * * * * * * * to have compassion upon thee; but thou wast cast out in the open field, for that thy person was abhorred, in the day that thou wast born. And when I passed by thee, and saw thee weltering in thy blood, I said unto thee. Though thou art in thy blood, live; yea, I said unto thee, Though thou art in thy blood, live. I caused thee to multiply as the bud of the field, and thou didst increase and wax great, and thou attainedst to excellent ornament; thy breasts were fashioned, and thine hair was grown; yet thou wast naked and bare. Now when I passed by thee, and looked upon thee, behold, thy time was the time of love; and I spread my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness: yea, I sware unto thee, and entered into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord God, and thou becamest mine. Then washed I thee with water; yea, I thoroughly washed away thy blood from thee, and I anointed thee with oil. I clothed thee also with broidered work, and shod thee with sealskin, and I girded thee about with fine linen, and covered thee with silk. I decked thee also with ornaments, and I put bracelets upon thy hands, and a chain on thy neck. And I put a ring upon thy nose, and earrings in thine ears, and a beautiful crown upon thine head. Thus wast thou decked with gold and silver; and thy raiment was of fine linen, and silk, and broidered work; thou didst eat fine flour, and honey, and oil: and thou wast exceeding beautiful, and thou didst prosper unto royal estate. And thy renown went forth among the nations for thy beauty; for it was perfect, through my majesty which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord God. But thou didst trust [in thy beauty, and playedst the harlot because of thy renown, and pouredst out thy whoredoms on every one that passed by; his it was. And thou didst take of thy garments, and madest for thee high places decked with divers colours, and playedst the harlot upon them: the like things shall not come, neither shall it h^ so. Thou didst also take thy fair jewels of my gold and of my silver, which I had given thee, and madest for thee images of men, and didst play the harlot with them; and thou tookest thy broidered garments, and coveredst them, and didst set mine oil and mine incense before them. My bread also which I gave thee, fine flour, and oil, and honey, wherewith I fed thee, thou didst even set it before them for a sweet savour, and thus it was; saith the Lord God.

Moreover, thou hast taken thy sons and thy daughters, whom thou hast borne unto me, and these hast thou sacrificed unto them to be devoured. Were thy whoredoms a small matter, that thou hast slain my children, and delivered them up, in causing them to pass through the fire unto them? And in all thine abominations and thy whoredoms thou hast not remembered the days of thy youth, when thou wast naked and bare, and wast weltering in thy blood. And it is come to pass after all thy wickedness (woe, woe unto thee! saith the Lord God) that thou hast built unto thee an eminent place, and hast made thee a lofty place in every street. Thou hast built thy lofty place at every head of the way, and hast made thy beauty an abomination, and hast opened thy feet to every one that passed by, and multiplied thy whoredom. Thou hast also committed fornication with the Egyptians, thy neighbours, great of flesh; and hast multiplied thy whoredom, to provoke me to anger. Behold, therefore, I have stretched out my hand over thee, and have diminished thine ordinary food^ and delivered thee unto the will of them that hate thee, the daughters of the Philistines, which are ashamed of thy lewd way. Thou hast played the harlot also with the Assyria^s, because thou wast unsatiable; yea, thou hast played the harlot with them, and yet thou wast not satisfied. Thou hast moreover multiplied thy whoredom in the land of Canaan, unto Chaldea; and yet thou wast not satisfied herewith. How weak is thine heart, saith the Lord God, seeing thou doest all these things, * * * * * in that thou buildest thine eminent place in the head of every way, and makest thy lofty place in every street; and hast not been as an harlot, in that thou scornest hire. A wife that committeth adultery! that taketh strangers instead of her husband! * * * * * * *

“Wherefore, O harlot, hear the word of the Lord: Thus saith the Lord God, Because thy filthiness was poured out, * * * * * and because of all the idols of thy abominations, and for the blood of thy children, which thou didst give unto them; therefore behold, I will gather all thy lovers, with whom thou hast taken pleasure, and all them that thou hast loved, with all them that thou hast hated; I will even gather them against thee on every side.

* * * * * And I will judge thee, as women that break wedlock and shed blood are judged; and I will bring upon thee the blood of fury and jealousy. I will also give thee into their hand, and they shall throw down thine eminent place, and break down thy lofty places; and they shall strip thee of thy clothes, and take thy fair jewels: and they shall leave thee naked and bare. They shall also bring up an assembly against thee, and they shall stone thee with stones, and thrust thee through with their swords. And they shall burn thine houses with fire, and execute judgments upon thee in the sight of many women; and I will cause thee to cease from playing the harlot, and thou shalt also give no hire any more. So will I satisfy my fury upon thee, and my jealousy shall depart from thee, and I will be quiet, and will be no more angry.

Because thou hast not remembered the days of thy youth, but hast fretted me in all these things; therefore behold, I also will bring thy way upon thine head, saith the Lord God: and thou shalt not commit this lewdness above all thine abominations.

“Behold, every one that useth proverbs shall use this proverb against thee, saying. As is the mother, so is her daughter. Thou art thy mother’s daughter, that loatheth her husband and her children; and thou art the sister of thy sisters, which loathed their husbands and their children: your mother was an Hittite, and your father an Amorite. And thine elder sister is Samaria, that dwelleth at thy left hand, she and her daughters: and thy younger sister, that dwelleth at thy right hand, is Sodom and her daughters. Yet hast thou not walked in their ways, nor done after their abominations; but, as if that were a very little thingy thou wast more corrupt than they in all thy ways. As I live, saith the Lord God, Sodom thy sister hath not done, she nor her daughters, as thou hast done, thou and thy daughters. Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom; pride, fulness of bread, and prosperous ease was in her and in her daughters; neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. And they were haughty, and committed abomination before me: therefore I took them away as I saw good. Neither hath Samaria committed half of thy sins; but thou hast multiplied thine abominations more than they, and hast justified thy sisters by all thine abominations which thou hast done. Thou also, bear thine own shame, in that thou hast given judgment for thy sisters; through thy sins that thou hast committed more abominable than they, they are more righteous than thou: yea, be thou also confounded, and bear thy shame, in that thou hast justified thy sisters. And I will turn again their captivity, the captivity of Sodom and her daughters, and the captivity of Samaria and her daughters, and the captivity of thy captives in the midst of them: that thou mayest bear thine own shame, and mayest be shamed because of all that thou hast done, in that thou art a comfort unto them. And thy sisters, Sodom and her daughters, shall return to their former estate, and Samaria and her daughters shall return to their former estate, and thou and thy daughters shall return to your former estate. For thy sister Sodom was not mentioned by thy mouth in the day of thy pride; before thy wickedness was discovered, as at the time of the reproach of the daughters of Syria, and of all that arc round about her, the daughters of the Philistines, which do despite unto thee round about. Thou hast borne thy lewdness and thine abominations, saith the Lord. For thus saith the Lord God: I will even deal with thee as thou hast done, which hast despised the oath in breaking the covenant. Nevertheless I will remember my covenant with thee in the days of thy youth, and I will establish unto thee an everlasting covenant. Then shalt thou remember thy ways, and be ashamed, when thou shalt receive thy sisters, thine elder sisters and thy younger: and I will give them unto thee for daughters, but not by thy covenant. And I will establish my covenant with thee; and thou shalt know that I am the Lord: that thou mayest remember, and be confounded, and never open thy mouth any more, because of thy shame; when I have forgiven thee all that thou hast done, saith the Lord God.” The sixteenth chapter is one long pleading of the Lord with His people. The remnant of Israel, still retaining its national existence after the fall of the Northern Kingdom under the power of Assyria, is impersonated in Jerusalem itself, the old heathen city of the Jebusites, which had become the holy city of the Lord. Its exaltation to that spiritual dignity from heathen degradation is represented first (in vv. 4-6) by the figure of the adoption and cherishing of an exposed and neglected infant; and next (in vv. 7-14) by the taking to marriage of the infant, now grown into beauty, but still desolate and bare. She is covered (comp. Ruth 3:9) with the skirt of the king’s mantle; she is purified with the marriage purification; she is clothed with broidered work and fine linen and silk; she is decked, as a bride, with jewels of gold and silver; she is fed with “ fine flour, and honey, and oil.” So she flourishes in royal dignity and beauty, and her renown “goes out among the heathen,” as perfect in the gift of superhuman “ majesty,” “ which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord God.” The whole picture clearly represents the palmy times of Israel in the days of David and Sofomon, when Jerusalem sat as a queen among the nations, flourishing not only in plenty and wealth, in power and splendour, but in the higher spiritual beauty of faith and wisdom and holiness. Suddenly out of the misery and subjection of the time of the later Judges, Israel had become a victorious empire; she had been exalted by the blessing of God to a royalty of a higher kind than that of the great heathen empires because resting on the moral strength of wisdom and goodness, and acknowledging itself as great only in the “ majesty of the Lord.” Of all the magnificence of Jerusalem, the crown and centre was the splendour of the Temple; on fidelity to that in-dwelling Presence, which the Temple visibly enshrined, depended all the prosperity, which was the wonder of the world. The glory of the earthly Jerusalem was thus a fit type of the transcendent glory of “ the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband,” — “ having the glory of God, and her light was like unto a stone most precious,” — “ arrayed in fine linen, clean and white; for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints “ (Revelation 21:2, Revelation 21:11; Revelation 20:8).

Then (in vv. 15-22) there passes a deep shadow over the brightness of the picture. The apostasy, as in the later days of Solomon, to the manifold idolatries of Canaan (1 Kings 11:1-8) is described as a harlotry — the horrible perversion to evil of the gifts of beauty and wealth which God had bestowed upon His bride. The garments of her splendour deck the high places of idolatry; the silver and gold are formed into idols in “ the likeness of corruptible man “; the oil and frankincense, the fine flour and honey, are lavished upon the heathen altars, even the children whom God gave her are “ passed through the fire,” and sacrificed to the devouring idol (comp. Ps. 104:36-39). The descent was, indeed, a sudden descent from high spirituality of religion to the lowest depths of a foul Nature-worship in many discordant forms, polluted with nameless abominations; it is rightly compared to the infatuated lasciviousness, which leaves the marriage-bed of a king for the grossest fornication. In the type, as in the antitype, it is the deadly yet natural fruit of a carnal, worldly idolatry of wealth and splendour and power — God’s good gifts abused and perverted to evil, because regarded, not as manifestations of Him to the soul, but as in themselves sufficient satisfactions for all the needs of humanity. From this forgetfulness of God to gross superstition is, as history teaches, but a step.

Yet the picture of this unfaithfulness is not yet complete. With a terrible emphasis of condemnation (“Woe, woe unto thee, saith the Lord God”) Israel is described as plunging recklessly and wantonly into foreign idolatries — “building a high Place”[1] of shame “ at every head of the street “ — going (so to speak) out of her way to introduce all kinds of strange worships, side by side with the native idolatries, which had already polluted the land. These native idolatries — lingering, perhaps, even through the days of Samuel and Saul and David, by fatal inheritance from the apostasies of the days of the Judges — had been (1 Kings 11:1-8) formally taken up, and recognised by the erection of temples, in the old age of Solomon, through the influence of his many wives — probably, in the first instance, as self-chosen phases of worship of Deity under many forms. From these the great apostasy to the Phoenician Baal-worship in the days of Ahab seems to have emerged as chief, united with the worship of “ the grove,” i.e.^ the Asherah, of which we read so often in earlier times. To this were now added the false worships of the great empires around.

First, the idolatry of the Egyptians (characteristically described as “ great of flesh “ in their sensual luxury), of which the introduction by Jeroboam of the golden calves was the fatal beginning, and from which no subsequent king of Israel, not even Jehu, the extirpator of Baal-worship, ever departed (2 Kings 10:29).

Next, the Assyrian worship, of which we first read in the days of Ahaz, when he, having become the vassal of Tiglath Pileser, brought from his interview with the Assyrian king at Damascus the pattern of an idolatrous altar, to be erected for worship in the very house of the Lord (2 Kings 16:10-18). Extirpated by Hezekiah, it formed, no doubt, an element of the various and heterogeneous idolatries into which Manasseh rushed so recklessly. (In c. 23:6-12, this idolatry is described as introduced first in the kingdom of Israel, and borrowed from them by the kingdom of Judah.) Lastly, the kindred but distinct worship of the Babylonian (or Chaldean) idols (comp. 22:14-18), which, no doubt, came in when the Babylonian empire rose on the ruins of the Assyrian, and became the conquering power in the later days of Jerusalem. With a singular bitterness of reproach, this apostasy of the chosen people is represented as like the adultery of a false wife rather than the fornication of a harlot, in being gratuitous and more than gratuitous, not receiving, but giving the hire of shame (vv. 30-34). It was a part of the tribute poured out before the feet of the conquering oppressor, perhaps in vain hope of conciliation, but in itself given unasked, and in fact meeting with no reward. Nothing is more terribly striking than the rebound, after the restorations of Hezekiah or Josiah, into a wild recklessness of strange and inconsistent worships. Well may it be compared to the outrages of a Messalina against a royal spouse. The lofty spirituality of the^ worship of the Invisible Jehovah was a yoke to this idolatrous craving for the visible and tangible, as the tie of marriage to the fleshly spirit of lasciviousness.

Then comes (vv. 35-43) the message of judgment, still drawn in metaphor from the penalty of Mosaic Law and Eastern usage on adultery and shedding of blood. That judgment is represented, as wrought on Israel, not only before the eyes but by the hands of the heathen nations, with whose idolatries she had polluted herself So it was to be in fact. From Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, the chief blows of destruction actually came, and the tribes of the land itself, whose idolatries Israel had adopted, such as Moab, Ammon, Edom, and Philistia, took the opportunity of rising against her in her hour of trouble. The picture is vividly drawn. The adulteress is exposed in shame before the eyes alike of her lovers and of those whom she has hated; the high place of her harlotry is broken down; she is stripped of her jewels and her gorgeous clothing; then, exposed in her naked helplessness she is stoned, and pierced with the sword; and her very house is burned, that no memorial of her may be left. Not till this utter destruction is accomplished “ shall the Lord’s anger rest, and His jealousy depart.” How terribly the reality corresponded in every point to the figure the Book of Lamentations testifies. The discrowned “daughter of Zion” was indeed thrown down from her high estate before the eyes of the heathen; her polluted Temple and high places laid in ruins, her treasures spoiled, her people slaughtered or dragged into captivity, her Holy City burnt and razed to the ground. “ Behold [she cries], and see whether there is any sorrow like unto my sorrow, wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of His fierce anger.” But “ there is none to comfort.” “ All that pass by clap their hands: they hiss and wag the head “; “ they say. We have swallowed her up.”

“ The Lord hath cast down from heaven to earth the beauty of Israel, and remembered not His footstool in the day of His anger” (Lamentations 1:12, Lamentations 1:17; Lamentations 2:1).

Yet even now the bitterness of reproach is not exhausted (vv. 44-59). Jerusalem, fallen from her holiness as the city of the Lord, is taunted by her enemies (in the words of the proverb, “ As is the mother, so is the daughter”) as being spiritually worthy of her heathen origin. She is bidden to look from the height of Moriah on Samaria, the city of the apostate kingdom, on the one hand, and on Sodom, the accursed city of nameless abominations, on the other, and to recognise both these, which she had despised, as her true sisters in sin and ruin. Nay, as she had sinned against special light and grace, she is warned that even the sensuality of Sodom and the unfaithfulness of Samaria were not equal in flagrancy of abomination to that wilful sin. She had judged them; she had thought Sodom not worthy “ to be mentioned by her mouth.” Now by her greater wickedness she had “ justified her sisters “; even the daughters of Syria and the daughters of the Philistines had learnt to despise her. Not till the hated Samaria and the loathed Sodom were restored to their high estate should Jerusalem be brought back from her captivity. Yet (vv. 60-63) there should be restoration from the inexhaustible mercy of God. “ I will remember (saith the Lord) my covenant with thee in the days of thy youth; and I will establish unto thee an everlasting covenant.” In that covenant — “ not thy covenant “ of old, but a greater and more enduring covenant — there should be room even for heathen Sodom and apostate Samaria, as her daughters. The pride of Judah shall be changed into humility; that “ thou mayest remember and be confounded, and never open thy mouth any more, when I am pacified towards thee for all that thou hast done.” It is the same promise of the new covenant of forgiveness of iniquity, which Jeremiah was even then uttering in the old land, but from a different point of view (Jeremiah 31:31). There it is the spirituality of the covenant, written on the heart (as contrasted with the letter of the Law written on stone) > which is dwelt upon; here its universality, breaking down the exclusive pride of Israel, and calling in the heathenism — gross in sin and misguided in idolatry — which it had despised. In both, after the long, dreary sadness of continual sin and punishment, there is the dawn of the great day of the Messiah.

III. Ezekiel 23. — “The word of the Lord came again unto me, saying, Son of Man, there were two women, the daughters of one mother: and they committed whoredoms in Egypt; they committed whoredoms in their youth: * * * * * * And the names of them were Oholah the elder, and Oholibah her sister: and they became mine, and they bare sons and daughters. And as for their names, Samaria is Oholah, and Jerusalem Oholibah. And Oholah played the harlot when she was mine; and she doted on her lovers, on the Assyrians her neighbours, which were clothed with blue, governors and rulers, all of them desirable young men, horsemen riding upon horses. And she bestowed her whoredoms upon them, the choicest men of Assyria all of them: and on whomsoever she doted, with all their idols she defiled herself. Neither hath she left her whoredoms since the days of Egypt; * * * * * * Wherefore I delivered her into the hand of her lovers, into the hand of the Assyrians, upon whom she doted. These discovered her nakedness: they took her sons and her daughters, and her they slew with the sword; and she became a byword among women: for they executed judgments upon her. And her sister Oholibah saw this, yet was she more corrupt in her doting than she, and in her whoredoms, which were more than the whoredoms of her sister.

She doted upon the Assyrians, governors and rulers, her neighbours, clothed most gorgeously, horsemen riding upon horses, all of them desirable young men. And I saw that she was defiled; they both took one way. And she increased her whoredoms; for she saw men pourtrayed upon the wall, the images of the Chaldeans pourtrayed with vermilion, girded with girdles upon their loins, exceeding in dyed attire upon their heads, all of them princes to look upon, after the likeness of the Babylonians in Chaldea, the land of their nativity. And as soon as she saw them she doted upon them, and sent messengers unto them into Chaldea. * * * * * * * So she discovered her whoredoms, and discovered her nakedness: then my soul was alienated from her, like as my soul was alienated from my sister. Yet she multiplied her whoredoms remembering the days of her youth, wherein she had played the harlot in the land of Egypt. And she doted upon their paramours, whose flesh is as the flesh of asses, and whose issue is like the issue of horses. * * * * *

“Therefore, O Oholibah, thus saith the Lord God: Behold, I will raise up thy lovers against thee, from whom thy soul is alienated, and I will bring them against thee on every side: the Babylonians and all the Chaldeans, Pekod and Shoa and Koa, and all the Assyrians with them: desirable young men, governors and rulers all of them, princes and men of renown, all of them riding upon horses. And they shall come against thee with weapons, chariots, and wagons, and with an assembly of peoples; they shall set themselves against thee with buckler and shield and helmet round about: and I will commit the judgment unto them, and they shall judge thee according to their judgments. And I will set my jealousy against thee, and they shall deal with thee in fury; they shall take away thy nose and thine ears; and thy residue shall fall by the sword: they shall take thy sons and thy daughters; and thy residue shall be devoured by the fire. They shall also strip thee of thy clothes, and take away thy fair jewels. Thus will I make thy lewdness to cease from thee, and thy whoredom brought from the land of Egypt: so that thou shalt not lift up thine eyes unto them, nor remember Egypt any more. For thus saith the Lord God: Behold, I will deliver thee into the hand of them whom thou hatest, into the hand of them from whom thy soul is alienated: and they shall deal with thee in hatred, and shall take away all thy labour, and shall leave thee naked and bare: These things shall be done unto thee, for that thou hast gone a whoring; after the heathen, and because thou art polluted with their idols. Thou hast walked in the way of thy sister; therefore will I give her cup into thy hand. Thus saith the Lord God: Thou shalt drink of thy sister’s cup, which is deep and large: thou shalt be laughed to scorn and had in derision; it containeth much. Thou shalt be filled with drunkenness and sorrow, with the cup of astonishment and desolation, with the cup of thy sister Samaria. Thou shalt even drink it and drain it out, and thou shalt gnaw the shreds thereof, and shalt tear thy breasts; for I have spoken it, saith the Lord God. Therefore thus saith the Lord God, Because thou hast forgotten me, and cast me behind thy back, therefore bear thou also thy lewdness and thy whoredoms.

“ The Lord said moreover unto me: Son of man, wilt thou judge Oholah and Oholibah? then declare unto them their abominations. For they have committed adultery, and blood is in their hands, and with their idols have they committed adultery; and they have also caused their sons, whom they bare unto me, to pass through the fire unto them to be devoured. Moreover this they have done unto me 1 they have defiled my sanctuary in the same day, and have profaned my sabbaths. For when they had slain their children to their idols, then they came the same day into my sanctuary to profane it; and, lo, thus have they done in the midst of mine house. And furthermore ye have sent for men that come from far: unto whom a messenger was sent, and, lo, they came; for whom thou didst wash thyself, paintedst thine eyes, and deckedst thyself with ornaments; and satest upon a stately bed, with a table prepared before it, whereupon thou didst set mine incense and mine oil. And the voice of a multitude being at ease was with her: and with men of the common sort were brought drunkards from the wilderness; and they put bracelets upon the hands of them twain, and beautiful crowns upon their heads. Then said I of her that was old in adulteries. Now will they commit whoredoms with her, and she with them. And they went in unto her, as they go in unto an harlot: so went they in unto Oholah and unto Obolibah, the lewd women. And righteous men, they shall judge them with the judgment of adulteresses, and with the judgment of women that shed blood; because they arc adulteresses, and blood is in their hands. For thus saith the Lord God: I will bring up an assembly against them, and will give them to be tossed to and fro and spoiled. And the assembly shall stone them with stones, and despatch them with their swords; they shall slay their sons and their daughters, and burn up their houses with fire Thus will I cause lewdness to cease out of the land, that all women may be taught not to do after your lewdness. And they shall recompense your lewdness upon you, and ye shall bear the sins of your idols: and ye shall know that I am the Lord God. The allegory of Ch. 23. — less vivid and powerful — traverses the same ground, except that it has nothing to correspond to the final promise. The one difference is that, as in Jeremiah 3:6-10 (of which, indeed, this chapter might seem to be a vivid expansion) there is a double impersonation of the chosen people in the two sisters Oholah (Samaria) and Oholibah (Jerusalem). Each runs the same career of unfaithfulness and degradation; but far worse — more varied in the blending of Assyrian, Egyptian, and Chaldean worship — more reckless in the eager and wanton invitation of idolatry and corruption — is the career of Oholibah; and on it accordingly the prophet pours out most fully the vials of reproach and judgment; scornfully describing the lust after the gorgeousness of the Assyrian horsemen, the splendour of the Chaldeans “ pourtrayed in vermilion,” as “ princes to look upon,” and the sensual lewdness of abominable sin in Egypt; painting in detail the gathering of “ all the Babylonians, nobles, and chiefs and princes,” and all the Assyrians with them, in vast and warlike company, in judgment against the guilty adulteress; and then the mutilation, the despoiling, the exposure in shameful nakedness, which are her sentence.

“ Thou shalt drink (saith the Lord) of thy sister’s cup, deep and large; thou shalt be filled with drunkenness and sorrow, with the cup of astonishment and desolation.” The prophet himself is called upon to pronounce judgment on Oholah and Oholibah for their sensual idolatry, their bloodshedding, their human sacrifices, their pollution of the worship of the Lord by admixture with it of heathenish rite and sacrifice. Still continuing the figure of the allegory, he reproaches them with the wanton passion for these heathen abominations, with their coarse indulgence and drunkenness; he denounces righteous judgment against them, under which (saith the Lord) “ lewdness shall cease out of the land,” “ and ye shall bear the sins of your idols, and ye shall know that I am the Lord God.”

IV. The next chapter brings out an allegory, perhaps less elaborate, but more imaginative and more beautiful. It is the allegory of the eagles of Babylon and Egypt, and the vine of Judah.

Ezekiel 16:1. — “ And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying Son of man, put forth a riddle, and speak a parable unto the house of Israel; and say.

Thus saith the Lord God: A great eagle with great wings and long pinions, full o{ feathers, which had divers colours, came unto Lebanon, and took the top of the cedar: he cropped off the topmost of the young twigs thereof, and carried it into a land of traffic; he set it in a city of merchants. He took also of the seed of the land, and planted it in a fruitful soil; he placed at beside many waters; he set it as a willow-tree. And it grew, and became a spreading vine of low stature, whose branches turned toward him, and the roots thereof were under him: so it became a vine, and brought forth branches, and shot forth twigs. There was also another great eagle with great wings and many feathers: and behold, this vine did bend its roots towards him, and shot forth its branches towards him, from the beds of its plantation, that he might water it. It was planted in a good soil by many waters, that it might bring forth branches, and that it might bear fruit, that it might be a goodly vine. Say thou, Thus saith the Lord God, Shall it prosper.^ shall he not pull up the roots thereof, and cut off the fruit thereof, that it may wither; that all its fresh springing leaves may wither; even without great power or much people to pluck it up by the roots thereof? Yea, behold, being planted, shall it prosper? shall it not utterly wither, when the east wind toucheth it? it shall wither in the beds where it grew.

“Moreover, the word of the Lord came unto me, saying. Say now to the rebellious house. Know ye not what these things mean? Tell them, Behold, the king of Babylon came to Jerusalem, and took the king thereof, and the princes thereof, and brought them to him to Babylon; and he took of the seed royal, and made a covenant with him; he also brought him under an oath, and took away the mighty of the land that the kingdom might be base, that it might not lift itself up, but that by keeping of his covenant it might stand. But he rebelled against him in sending his ambassadors into Egypt, that they might give him horses and much people. Shall he prosper? shall he escape that doeth such things? shall he break the covenant, and yet escape? As I live, saith the Lord God, surely in the place where the king dwelleth that made him king, whose oath he despised, and whose covenant he brake, even with him in the midst of Babylon he shall die. Neither shall Pharaoh with his mighty army and great company make for him in the war, when they cast up mounts and built forts, to cut off many persons. For he hath despised the oath by breaking the covenant; and behold, he had given his hand, and yet hath done all these things; he shall not escape. Therefore, thus saith the Lord God, As I live, surely mine oath that he hath despised, and my covenant that he hath broken, I will even bring it upon his own head. And I will spread my net upon him, and he shall be taken in my snare, and I will bring him to Babylon, and will plead with him there for his trespass that he hath trespassed against me. And all his fugitives in all his bands shall fall by the sword, and they that remain shall be scattered toward every wind: and ye shall know that I the Lord have spoken it.

“ Thus saith the Lord God: I will also take of the lofty top of the cedar and will set it; I will crop off from the topmost of his young twigs a tender one, and I will plant it upon a high mountain and eminent: in the mountain of the height of Israel will I plant it; and it shall bring forth boughs, and bear fruit, and be a goodly cedar: and under it shall dwell all fowl of every wing: in the shadow of the branches thereof shall they dwell. And all the trees of the field shall know that I the Lord have brought down the high tree, have exalted the low tree, have dried up the green tree, and have made the dry tree to flourish: I the Lord have spoken and have done it.” The allegory is wrought out with much brilliancy and subtlety of detail. The first great eagle is described, with a sweep of pinion and a splendour of plumage not attributed to the second, in order to denote the wider conquest and the richer magnificence of Babylon, as compared with Egypt. The contrast of the highest branch of the lofty cedar of Lebanon with the *’ seed of the land,^^ planted like a willow-tree in the low, watery ground, to become “ a spreading vine of low stature,^^ marks the contrast, elsewhere drawn, between the flower of the royal house and the people, carried away into the first captivity with Jeconiah — “ all the princes and the mighty men of valour, and all the craftsmen and smiths’’ (2 Kings 24:14) — and “the poorest of the land,’’ who remained with Zedekiah, in what was now a mere satrapy of Babylon. The recovery of the land from utter desolation, on which Jeremiah so often dwells, and which he urges the people to retain by submission to the King of Babylon, is marked in the allegory by “ the planting it in a good soil by great waters, that it might be a goodly vine.” Even its being permitted to spread only along the ground — not on props, or from tree to tree — represents the provision that “ the kingdom might be base, that it might not lift itself up,” and the determination that “its branches should turn towards him, and its roots “be under him” similarly represents the provision that “by keeping of his covenant it should stand.”

Then (although the metaphor is here somewhat forced), the sudden “ lifting itself up,” the “ shooting out its branches,” that it might be watered by the eagle of Egypt — that, so watered, it might rise from its depressed condition to be, as of old, a “ goodly vine,” — gives a vivid picture of the vain, though natural and not ignoble, aspiration for independence to which now, as in Sennacherib’s time, the trust in Egypt was but as a “ bruised reed “ (2 Kings 18:21). The destruction which this unhappy action draws down on the land is represented partly as the vengeance of the offended king, partly as the “ withering by the east wind,” under the blighting touch, that is, of the judgment of God.

There is a similar appropriateness of detail in the symbolical promise at the close. The Lord, like the great eagle of Babylon, carries off “ the highest branch of the high cedar,” “a tender twig”; yet He sets it not “ in the land of traffic,” “ the city of merchants “— in the great plain (that is) of Babylon, where the captives of Judah were bought and sold — but “on a high mountain and eminent: in the mountain of the height of Israel.” It does not remain, as in the first case, barren and dead in the unfriendly soil, but it brings forth boughs and fruit, and becomes “ a goodly cedar “ (comp. Ps. 53:10), under which “ shall dwell all fowl of every wing.” It is exalted above the trees •of the wood by that special blessing of the Lord, which “ brings down the high tree and exalts the low, dries up the green tree, and makes the dry tree to flourish.” Every detail of the picture throughout is painted with singular perfection, far more elaborate and highly coloured than the simplicity of the ordinary fable. The meaning of the whole parable is fully and •emphatically explained, with a grave regretful severity, laying especial stress on the breach by rebellion of the covenant with Babylon, which is (saith the Lord) “ my oath “ and “ my covenant “; and an exulting charge to hope and thankfulness in the promise of restoration by the hand of the Lord. The fulfilment of the prophecy of the sixteenth verse is recorded in 2 Kings 25:6-7: “They took the king and brought him up to the king of Babylon at Riblah; and they gave judgment upon him,” as a servant of the great king, who had (in the words of Ezekiel) “despised the oath and broken the covenant,” sworn in the name of God (2 Chronicles 36:13) and therefore sacred before Him. “ And they put out the eyes of Zedekiah, and bound him with fetters of brass, and carried him to Babylon.” There was no great struggle, except a long defence of Jerusalem; it needed “ no great power or many people to pluck up by the roots “ the weakened kingdom. From this passage of Ezekiel and from Jeremiah 37:5-7 we learn — what is not told in the brief record of the historical books — that an Egyptian army did for a time raise the siege, but then retired to their own land without eventual succour. The destruction, which fell on the doomed city was “the net and snare “ of God’s judgment; in the captivity of Zedekiah in Babylon the Lord “ would plead with him for his trespass.” The ruin was all but complete; the “ spreading vine “ did “ wither in all the leaves of its spring,” although even then some remnant of its strength was left under Gedaliah, to rebel once more (in trust apparently still on Egypt), and to bring upon the land a final destruction. The closing promise clearly had its first fulfilment in the future restoration of Israel from Babylon, with, however, that further reference to the Messianic kingdom, which we find closely connected with the restoration in the prophets after the Captivity. The “ tender twig “ was to become a great tree, on which all the trees of the field should gaze with wonder, and under which the fowl of every wing should lodge. The very description reminds us of “ the mustard seed “ of our Lord’s parable, to which “ the kingdom of Heaven was like.” It was at best inadequately fulfilled in the restoration of the exiles, when the newly-planted power of Israel was weak and struggling, of no bright spiritual glory, and of no account among the nations of the earth. Yet, just as those who wept over the diminished glory of the second temple were comforted with the promise that it should be greater than the glory of the first, so in all the prophecies of this imperfect restoration the mind is led on to the world-wide kingdom, of which the restoration from captivity was but an earnest. The “ tender shoot “ of verse 22 (comp. Is. hii. 2) is the “ rod out of the stem of Jesse “ (Isaiah 11:1), the “ righteous Branch “ (Jeremiah 23:5; Zechariah 3:8) “ planted in the mountain of the height of Israel “; that “all nations might flow unto it” (Isaiah 2:2; Micah 4:1), humbled that He might be exalted (Php 2:9-10), dying that He might flourish and give life.

V. The next instance of allegorical treatment is in the nineteenth chapter of the same prophecy: —

Ezekiel 19. — “ Moreover, take thou up a lamentation for the princes of Israel, and say, What was thy mother? A lioness: she couched among lions, in the midst of the young lions she nourished her whelps. And she brought up one of her whelps; he became a young lion: and he learned to catch the prey, he devoured men. The nations also heard of him: he was taken in their pit: and they brought him with hooks unto the land of Egypt. Now when she saw that she had waited, and her hope was lost, then she took another of her whelps, and made him a young lion. And he went up and down among the lions^ he became a young lion: and he learned to catch the prey, he devoured men. And he knew their palaces, and laid waste their cities; and the land was desolate, and the fulness thereof, because of the noise of his roaring. Then the nations set against him on every side from the provinces: and they spread their net over him; he was taken in their pit. And they put him in a cage with hooks, and brought him to the king of Babylon; they brought him into strong holds, that his voice should no more be heard upon the mountains of Israel.

“ Thy mother was like a vine, in thy blood, planted by the waters: she was fruitful and full of branches by reason of many waters. And she had strong rods for the sceptres of them that bare rule, and their stature was exalted among the thick boughs, and they were seen in their height with the multitude of their branches. But she was plucked up in fury, she was cast down to the ground, and the east wind dried up her fruit: her strong rods were broken off and withered; the fire consumed them. And now she is planted in the wilderness, in a dry and thirsty land. And fire is gone out of the rods of her branches, it hath devoured her fruit, so that there is in her no strong rod to be a sceptre to rule. This is a lamentation, and shall be for a lamentation.” The two allegories of this chapter are simpler, and freer from incongruous detail, but, perhaps, less striking than the allegory of the eagle and the vine. In the first (vv. 1-9) each of the “ princes,” that is, the successive kings, of Israel, is represented under the familiar emblem of the “ Lion of Judah.” The mother lioness is described in words which recall the old prophecy of Jacob, “Judah is a lion’s whelp... he couched as a lion, and as an old lion, who shall rouse him up?” (Numbers 23:24; Numbers 24:9). In her mountain home she rears her whelps, and sends them forth when full grown in strength. The first whelp (cf 5:3) is clearly Jehoahaz, the son of Josiah. When all Jerusalem was startled by the fatal news of the fall of Josiah at Megiddo, the prelude to the utter ruin soon to come, we read (2 Kings 23:30) that “ the people of the land took Jehoahaz,” although younger than Jehoiakim (see vv. 3 1-36), “and anointed him and made him king.” Probably he gave promise of a courage and energy, which might make him equal to the critical emergency, able to “ catch the prey and devour men.” But, after a short reign of three months, he was taken, like a lion “ in the pit “ and “ sent in chains to the land of Egypt.” Over him Jeremiah (Jeremiah 22:11-12) uttered the Song of Lamentation, “ Weep not for the dead,” (i.e. Josiah, see 2 Chronicles 35:25) neither bemoan him: “but weep sore for him that goeth away: for he shall return no more, nor see his native country.” The second whelp (cf 5:5) is apparently Jehoiachin, or Jeconiah. It is remarkable that Jehoiakim, set on the throne by the King of Egypt (perhaps already an Egyptian partisan), is passed over. His reign (see Jeremiah 22:13-17) was one of unrighteous tyranny over the people, of selfish magnificence at a time of national distress, and of covetous oppression and shedding of innocent blood. His character (see Jer. 35.) was that of a bold, bad man, defiant of God’s warning even when the people and the princes trembled before it. Possiblyhis whole reign was looked upon as a usurpation, while Jehoahaz survived in his captivity. But the young Jehoiachin succeeded, when after long waiting, Israel “saw that her hope was lost.” Once more she placed her hope in him, as a young lion, “ who had just learnt to “ catch the prey and devour men.” For three months he also reigned: and his reign was but an interlude between the death of his father, when bound in chains, ready to be carried to Babylon (2 Chronicles 36:4) and the final subjugation by Nebuchadnezzer. But, even so, the short time was long enough to give scope for manifestation of a character of rapacity and cruelty, like that of his father. “ He knew his palaces; he laid waste their cities, and the land was desolate and the fulness thereof.” Then, “ by the noise of his roaring, the nations set against him”; some act of rash defiance drew down the irresistible force of Babylon, crushing all opposition in a moment, and carrying him “in chains to the king of Babylon.” With him went the first band of captives, the flower of the people. After a long imprisonment of six-and-thirty years, he was released by Evil-merodach, and set on a tributary throne at Babylon of some special distinction (2 Kings 25:27-30). But “ his voice was heard no more on the mountains of Israel.” He was (see Jeremiah 22:28-30) as a “despised broken idol “; he was to be written as “childless, a man that should not prosper in his days; for no man of his seed should prosper, sitting upon the throne of David, and ruling any more in Israel.”! With him the glory of the Lion of Judah departed, and the land of Israel became a mere province of the great Babylonian Empire.

VI. The second allegory of the Vine (vv. 10-14) evidently refers to the succeeding period, when the remnant of the people were left under Zedekiah, as a sworn servant of the king of Babylon, humbled and enslaved, but still safe, until his rebellion through “The comparison of the genealogies in Matthew 1:1-16, Luke 3:23-38, shows, that Shealtiel, the father of Zerubbabel, who appears as officially the son of Jeconiah, was really descended from Nathan, the son of David, and evidently adopted into the royal line.

I trust in Egypt drew down the final stroke of destruction. In the days of her prosperity Israel[1] is as a vine planted by the waters, and therefore fruitful and full of branches. The prophet describes first her royal might and empire; for she had “ strong rods ’’ (or shoots) “for the scepters” of her kings; next, her glory, “towering over the nations”; “ her stature was exalted among the clouds” (wrongly rendered in our Version “ thick boughs “); lastly, the multiplication of her people and her subjects; for “ she appeared in her height with the multitude of her branches.” The picture is like that of the Psalmist (Psalms 58:8-11), “ Thou has brought a vine out of Egypt... thou preparedst room before it, and didst cause it to take root, and it filled the land. The hills were covered with the shades of it, and the boughs thereof were like the goodly cedars.” Then comes the storm of ruin. In it the vine is “ plucked up in fury and cast to the ground “; the parching East wind dries up the fruit of her prosperity; “the strong rods “ of her royalty “ are broken and withered and cast into the fire” (comp. Ps. 58:16). Yet the destruction is not yet utter. In her humiliation she is planted again, but now in “ the dry and thirsty ground of the wilderness.” The phrase is, of course, comparative. In 17:6, the vassal-kingdom is a vine “ of low stature “ indeed, but yet so far watered that it can put forth new shoots. It lives still, though in diminished strength and fruitfulness. But “ out of the rod of her branches,” the last scion of the royal house, there comes forth fire (as from the bramble in Jotham’s fable — Judges 9:15), and in that fire her fruit is devoured, and her royalty utterly destroyed. The reference is clearly to the infatuation of Zedekiah, rebelling against Babylon, in spite of prophetic entreaty and warning (Jeremiah 38:14-23), and thus destroying the last hope of national life. In both allegories the meaning is obvious throughout; phrases (as in vv. 4, 9) are used which bear the distinct impress of the antitype. Through both these runs a mournful strain of sorrow; each “ is a lamentation, and shall be for a lamentation.” But, as usual in the Book of Ezekiel, there is a dominant tone of solemnity, almost stern in its stress on the infatuation and disobedience of the people, which stands out distinct from the tearful pathos of Jeremiah. As in his own domestic bereavement (see Ezekiel 24:16), so in the destruction of his country, he seems to be taught “ neither to mourn nor weep, nor to let his tears run down.” Rapt again and again into the vision of the Divine glory, he learns to look calmly, even in sorrow, on all that works out the counsel of God, and the laws of His righteousness.

VII. Ezekiel 24:1-14. — “Again, in the ninth year, in the tenth month, in the tenth day of the month, the word of the Lord came unto me, saying. Son of man, write thee the name of the day, even of this selfsame day: the king of Babylon drew close unto Jerusalem this selfsame day. And utter a parable unto the rebellious house, and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God, Set on the caldron, set it on, and also pour water into it: gather the pieces thereof into it, even every good piece, the thigh, and the shoulder; fill it with the choice bones. Take the choice of the flock, and pile also the bones under it: make it boil well; yea, let the bones thereof be seethed in the midst of it.

“Wherefore thus saith the Lord God: Woe to the bloody city, to the caldron whose rust is therein, and whose rust is not gone out of it! bring it out piece by piece; no lot is fallen upon it. For her blood is in the midst of her; she set it upon the bare rock; she poured it not upon the ground, to cover it with dust; that it might cause fury to come up to take vengeance, I have set her blood upon the bare rock that it should not be covered. Therefore thus saith the Lord God: Woe to the bloody city!

I also will make the pile great. Heap on the wood, make the fire hot, boil well the flesh, and make thick the broth, and let the bones be burned. Then set it empty upon the coals thereof, that it may be hot, and the brass thereof may burn, and that the filthiness of it may be molten in it, that the rust of it may be consumed. She hath wearied herself with toil: yet her great rust goeth not forth out of her; her rust goeth not forth by fire. In thy filthiness is lewdness, because I have purged thee and thou wast not purged, thou shalt not be purged from thy filthiness any more, till I have satisfied my fury upon thee. I the Lord have spoken it: it shall come to pass, and I will do it; I will not go back, neither will I spare, neither will I repent; according to thy ways, and according to thy doings, shall they judge thee, saith the Lord God.” The last “parable uttered unto the rebellious house “ belongs to” the tenth month, the tenth day of the month,” of the ninth year — the very time afterwards observed as a fast (Zechariah 8:19) — when the final siege of the city began (2 Kings 25:1). The key-note of it is found in the proverb, quoted in c. 11:3, as used by “ the men that devise mischief” in worldly self-confidence, “ the city is this caldron, we are the flesh “; in the meaning, cither that they are the choice pieces, for the sake of which the city exists, or that they will be unconsumed, even if the fire rage round the city. The prophet evidently takes up the proverb, and turns it against those who used it. In comparison with the elaborate allegories which precede it, this parable is very simple. The figure itself has two parts, separated from each other, but connected in idea.

First, the caldron, filled with “ every good piece” and with “ the choice bones,” is set on the fire; and that fire is fed (according to Eastern custom) with the larger bones themselves. Possibly in this last detail there is an allusion to the fact that it was the sin of Israel itself, which fed the flame of vengeance to consume it. Next, when the flesh has been boiled and devoured, the empty vessel is once more to be “ set upon the coals,” that “ the brass of it may burn, and the filthiness of it may be molten in it, and the rust of it may be consumed.” This last part of the parable is perhaps suggested by the method of purification by “ passing through the fire “ of anything before unclean, which was to be dedicated to the Lord (see Numbers 31:23). The application is similarly twofold, in each part opened with the stern words — the same which introduce Nahum’s denunciation of Nineveh (Nahum 3:1) — “ Woe to the bloody city! “; in each case also implying, as united with this blood-guiltiness, a temper of lewdness or “ filthiness.” Possibly in the desperate season of coming ruin, as at some time of earthquake or pestilence, the bonds of order began to fail, and the wild-beast fury of blood and lust to be let loose.

First, there comes vengeance on the people — this time indiscriminate and unsparing. “ Bring it out piece by piece; no lot” (for destroying or sparing) “has fallen upon it.” For their blood guiltiness had been utterly shameless. “ Her blood is in the midst of her; she set it on the bare rock; she poured it not on the ground, to cover it with dust.” Therefore it should cry to God, that it “ might cause fury to come up to take vengeance.” How signally this was fulfilled may be seen in the record of the systematic destruction and captivity wrought out by Nebuzaradan at Jerusalem, after the capture of the fugitive Zedekiah; the chief of the captives brought to Nebuchadnezzar at Riblah, to be put to death in cold blood: the rest of the people, except the few left to till the land as serfs, carried away into captivity.

Next, the empty caldron — the desolated city itself — is to pass through, the fire as that which was too unclean to be preserved. It had been purged again and again; now the pollution was (so to speak) engrained in the very stones of the city and the temple, and could only be destroyed with them.

“ She hath wearied herself with labour,” or suffering, “ yet her rust goeth not out of her.” “ I have purged thee and thou wast not purged.” “ Thou shalt not be purged from thy filthiness any more till I have satisfied my fury upon thee.” “ I will not go back, neither will I spare.” “According to thy doings shall they judge thee, saith the Lord.” This sentence also was carried out in literal exactness by the un-conscious instruments of retribution. Nebuzaradan “ burned the house of the Lord, and the king’s house; and all the houses of Jerusalem, even every great house, burned he with fire.” For seventy years the burned ruins of Jerusalem lay desolate; not till then could the new city and temple rise again to be holy to the Lord.

Such are the chief “ parables of Ezekiel,” full of a grave poetic dignity and beauty, and wrought out with singular perfection of detail. Like the whole of his prophecy, they breathe the thoughtful spirit of the solitary thinker and writer, rather than the impassioned and pathetic pleading of the preacher; and they represent not so much the tearfulness of lamentation, as the calm, sad gravity which accepts for the time the inevitable chastisement, confessing it just, and only looks on to a distant future of restoration and blessing.

VIII. To the fuller description of these allegories, in which Ezekiel has symbolized the history of the Israel of his day, it may be well to add some brief notice of three other allegories of the same book, referring to the great heathen empires, of which Israel was then the battle-field. All belong to the portion of the book which contains “ the burdens of the nations.” All are addressed to the king of Egypt — the one great power still antagonistic to the conquering empire of Nebuchadnezzar, so fatally trusted by Israel, as a protection against the ruin threatening them from Assyria and Babylon. Here, as in other portions of their prophecy, Jeremiah in Israel, and Ezekiel in Babylonia, tell the same mournful tale. From both comes the prophecy of the coming fall of Egypt; from both the warning, often uttered in vain, against trusting to the broken reed of Egyptian alliance. In two of these allegories (c. xxix. and c. xxxii.), Pharaoh is compared to the great “dragon^ of the waters,” — clearly the huge crocodile of the Nile, the ^’ leviathan “ of the Book of Job, — strong in his scaly armour and his fierce brute force, delighting in the great river — at once the pride and the support of Egypt — and claiming it as created by himself and for himself.

Ezekiel 29:3-5. — “ Speak, and say, Thus saith the Lord God: Behold, I am against thee, Pharaoh king of Egypt, the great dragon that lieth in the midst of his rivers, which hath said, My river is mine own, and I have made it for myself. And I will put hooks in thy jaws, and I will cause the fish of thy rivers to stick unto thy scales; and I will bring thee up out of the midst of thy rivers, with all the fish of thy rivers which stick unto thy scales. And I will leave thee thrown into the wilderness, thee and all the fish of thy rivers: thou shalt fall upon the open field; thou shalt not be brought together, nor gathered: I have given thee for meat to the beasts of the earth and to the fowls of the heaven.” The crocodile is caught (as was the custom in Egypt) by the “hook in his jaws”; all the lesser powers, like “ the fishes sticking in his scales,” are drawn out of the water to perish with him; he is slaughtered, and his flesh given for food to beasts and birds.

Then metaphor is dropped. The empire of Egypt is reproached, as in the taunt of Sennacherib (2 Kings 18:21), because it had been “ a staff of reed to the house of Israel.” “ When they took hold of thee with the hand “ (margin) “ thou didst break and rend their shoulders, and, when they leaned on thee, thou brakest, and madest all their loins to shake.” How well founded the reproach was, from the days of Hezekiah to the later times of Jehoiakim and Zedekiah, the history but too plainly shows. The strong country of Judah was simply made an outpost of Egypt against the empires of the North — to be sacrificed at all times to its interests, and finally to be involved in its ruin. Finally is uttered the prophecy of its fall. “ I will make the land of Egypt utterly waste and desolate. I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations.” Even when the storm passes, their realm shall be but “ a base kingdom “; it shall “ no more rule over the nations,” or be “ the confidence of the house of Israel.”

Similarly, but in fuller and stronger terms, is Pharaoh addressed in the second allegory.

Ezekiel 32:1-8. — “And it came to pass in the twelfth year, in the twelfth month, in the first day of the month, that the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, take up a lamentation for Pharaoh king of Egypt, and say unto him. Thou wast likened unto a young lion of the nations: yet art thou as a dragon in the seas; and thou brakest forth with thy rivers, and troubledst the waters with thy feet, and fouledst their rivers. Thus saith the Lord God: I will spread out my net over thee with a company of many peoples; and they shall bring thee up in my net. And I will leave thee upon the land, I will cast thee forth upon the open field, and will cause all the fowls of the heaven to settle upon thee, and I will satisfy the beasts of the whole earth with thee. And I will lay thy flesh upon the mountains, and fill the valleys with thy height. I will also water with thy blood the land wherein thou swimmest, even to the mountains; and the watercourses shall be full of thee. And when I shall extinguish thee, I will cover the heaven, and make the stars thereof dark; I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not give her light. All the bright lights of heaven will I make dark over thee, and set darkness upon thy land, saith the Lord God.” The past strength and conquering energy of Egypt are here more vividly described. The vastnes5 of its ruin, the rivers of blood which it will shed forth, the world-wide crash of its destruction, are terribly painted; and (as in so many prophetic utterances) over its fall the heavens are seen to be darkened, and the sun and moon give no light. The direct prophecy which follows is accordingly of fuller and more awful import. “ The sword of the king of Babylon,” “ the swords of the mighty,” and “ the terrible of the nations “ are all drawn against the doomed empire. Her allies perish with her, and “all the daughters of the nations,” — Asshur, Elam, Meshech,Tubal,Edom, Zidon, — wail over the common ruin, past and future, under the devouring conquest of Babylon.

Ezekiel 32:18-21. — “Son of man, wail for the multitude of Egypt, and cast them down, even her, and the daughters of the famous nations, unto the nether parts of the earth, with them that go down into the pit. Whom dost thou pass in beauty? go down, and be thou laid with the uncircumcised. They shall fall in the midst of them that are slain by the sword: she is delivered to the sword: draw her away and all her multitudes. The strong among the mighty shall speak to him out of the midst of hell with them that help him: they are gone down, they He still, even the uncircumcised slain by the sword.” In the same context, addressed to the king of Egypt, stands the third allegory. It is a figurative description of the past greatness and fall of Assyria, held up as a prophetic warning to Pharaoh and his people. The metaphor, as in the dream of Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 4:10-12), is the familiar metaphor of the great tree, cut down in its pride and given to utter destruction; but it is worked out with singular force and beauty of detail.

Ezekiel 31:3-17. — “Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with fair branches, and with a shadowing shroud, and of an high stature; and. his top was among the thick boughs. The waters nourished him, the deep made him to grow: her rivers ran round about her plantation; and she sent out her channels unto all the trees of the. field. Therefore his stature was exalted above all the trees of the field; and his boughs were multiplied, and his branches became long by reason of many waters, when he shot them forth. All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations. Thus was he fair in his greatness, in the length of his branches: for his root was by many waters. The cedars in the garden of God could not hide him: the fir-trees were not like his boughs, and the plane-trees were not as his branches;, nor was any tree in the garden of God like unto him in his beauty. I made him fair by the multitude of his branches: so that all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of God, envied him.

** Therefore thus said the Lord God: Because thou art exalted in stature, and he hath set his top among the thick boughs, and his heart is lifted up in his height; I will even deliver him into the hand of the mighty one of the nations; he shall surely deal with him: I have driven him out for his wickedness. And strangers, the terrible of the nations, have cut him off, and have left him: upon the mountains and in all the valleys his branches are fallen, and his boughs are broken by all the watercourses of the land; and all the peoples of the earth are gone down from his shadow, and have left him. Upon his ruin all the fowls of the heaven shall dwell, and all the beasts of the field shall be upon his branches: to the end that none of all the trees by the waters exalt themselves in their stature, neither set their top among the thick boughs, nor that their mighty ones stand up in their height, even all that drink water, for they are all delivered unto death, to the nether parts of the earth, in the midst of the children of men, with them that go down to the pit.

“ Thus saith the Lord God: In the day when he went down to hell I caused a mourning: I covered the deep for him, and I restrained the rivers thereof, and the great waters were stayed: and I caused Lebanon to mourn for him, and all the trees of the field fainted for him. I made the nations to shake at the sound of his fall, when I cast him down to hell with them that descend into the pit: and all the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that drink water, were comforted in the nether parts of the earth. They also went down into hell with him unto them that be slain by the sword; yea, they that were his arm, that dwelt under his shadow in the midst of the nations.” The cedar of Lebanon, the one kind of great tree with which Palestine was familiar, and which the Psalmist calls so emphatically “ the tree of the Lord, which He had planted” (Psalms 104:16), is taken as the type. Its height and far-.spreading branches, fed by the perennial waters of the mountains, its deep root and solid strength, its protecting shadow over the birds of the air and the beasts of the field, — all are clearly drawn from the life. But it is of an ideal greatness: it towers over all “ the cedars of the garden of God “; the fir-trees and plane-trees are not even equal to its branches, and all the trees of Eden envy its surpassing glory. Then is brought in the moral element, which belongs only to the antitype.

It is because of this towering pride that the deep waters which feed it are dried up, and the crash of ruin comes, at once a retribution and a warning to all the other giants of the forest. Lastly, in one brief verse is made the application to Pharaoh and all his multitude, to the like strength and the like pride of Egypt. Of the fulfilment of this prophecy, and the parallel prophecy of Jeremiah, we have but scanty historical record. The Pharaoh of the time is undoubtedly Pharaoh Hopra the Apries of Herodotus, whose Egyptian informants here, as in other cases suppressed all tradition of disaster from foreign invasion, and represented the fall of the king as due to domestic rebellion under Amasis. But there appears little doubt that such invasion (expressly described by Josephus), did take place, and that after it the kingdom of Egypt, though for a time prosperous under Amasis, never recovered its glory, and was perhaps in theory under vassalage to Babylon, till the utter destruction of its greatness under Cambyses. In these utterances of Ezekiel we have fully sufficient exemplification of the Parable as allegory — full of beauty and solemnity, and truly suggestive of the fundamental idea of Analogy, underlying all parabolic teaching. But, compared with the true Parable, drawn from the common incidents and actors of real life, it seems to want solidity and natural vividness, and to appeal more to the imagination than to the heart.