31. § 5. The Condition of Religion

§ 5. The Condition of Religion In our previous representation of separate historical events, we have anticipated almost all that can be said on this subject, and may therefore be very brief. We have already shown, from a number of facts, how erroneous with respect to worship and religious feeling is the prevalent conception of the period of the judges, according to which it was a time of complete confusion or of rude barbarism. Respecting the worship, we have shown that throughout the whole period of the judges the tabernacle of the covenant formed the religious centre of the nation; that the great feasts, especially the feast of the passover, were then celebrated by the whole nation; that the partial and temporary participation in the heathen worship of Baal and Astarte did it no injury, because this worship was not regarded as antagonistic to the worship of Jehovah by those who practised it; that the Levitical priesthood was universally esteemed and recognised, and worship was performed only in the tabernacle of the covenant. With regard to the second point,—religious feeling,—we saw that, notwithstanding all the corruption which had crept in, there were still many tokens of the continuance of a better spirit, such as the song of Deborah, the prayer of Hanna, personalities like that of Gideon, institutions like that of the Nazirate and consecrated virgins, and many others. Here we shall only draw attention to the fact that we have the most complete representation of the religious and civil condition of the period of the judges in the book of Ruth, “whose historical truth regarding the description of ancient life,” Ewald says, “cannot be questioned.” We must bear in mind, however, that the events narrated in this book occur at a time in which Israel was purified in the furnace of affliction, and was mightily raised up by the wonderful help of the Lord, so that the picture is nothing but an exact counterpart of the better times of the period of the judges. If a good foundation had not remained even in times of degeneracy, the danger and the deliverance would have passed over without making any deeper impression. We cannot better describe the impression made by this picture than in the words of Roos: “The little book of Ruth stands between the books which treat of war and other things as a most graceful and unparalleled picture of honesty, propriety, wisdom, and uprightness exemplified by different persons in domestic life. This beautiful history contains a representation of every virtue required in the domestic and social life of man. It redounds to the everlasting glory of the God of Israel, that, in the freedom in which His people were living at that time, there was so much chastity, justice, love, and propriety. Who were Naomi, Boaz, Ruth? They were peasants. How charming is their eloquence! How pleasing their friendliness! How fine their manners! What wisdom and judgment they display! “In order to roll this stone out of the way, the credibility of the book of Ruth has been attacked. It has been asserted that the description, with its idyllic colouring, stands in irreconcilable opposition to the book of Judges, and that the preference must be unconditionally given to the latter. But we receive thankfully the candid confession that the book of Ruth is irreconcilable with the prevalent idea. To all unprejudiced persons it forms its own defence against the attack on its credibility. Only come and see! If ever a history bore testimony to its own truthfulness, it is this. In what light we are to regard the alleged inconsistency between this book and the book of Judges will appear from what has already been remarked. In the latter we have pointed out numerous points of contact with respect to the representation of the book of Ruth. We have shown that it was not the intention of the author of the book of Judges to give a complete history, but only to lay stress on a single part,—that it was his object to give special prominence to the scandala. Nothing can be more one-sided and narrow than to make the history of a war the measure of the whole religious and moral condition, and to cut away with the knife all that’ does not at once appear suitable. On the heights above it often snows and freezes, while below in the valleys there is genial sunshine. From this standpoint all the gospels must be regarded as a picture with idyllic colouring, but without any reality. For, in reading the books of Josephus on the Jewish war, we meet with a very different picture. In a time like this we find no footing for a Simeon and a Hannah, for a John the Baptist, for the whole Church of peace which meets us in the New Testament. In reading a description of the Thirty Years’ War, with all its horrors, we should not at first expect to find a Paul Gerhard living side by side with a Tilly; and yet his existence cannot be regarded as an isolated case, but is intelligible only on the supposition that he was a member of a whole community. What a contrast there is between the quarrelling of theologians of the seventeenth century and the songs of this period, the most beautiful that we possess! The same time which from one set of sources appears the saddest, when looked at from another point of view seems to be the most glorious of the evangelical Church.

It still remains for us to notice an influential institution which owes its origin to this period, viz. the schools of the prophets. In 1 Samuel 10:5, where they are first mentioned, we find Samuel in connection with them,—a circumstance which has led to the too hasty conclusion that they were founded by him. Yet this view is certainly not far from the truth. For even if the schools of the prophets had begun to form themselves before the time of Samuel, which we have the less reason to doubt since the book of Judges bears adequate testimony to the existence of prophets, and since it lay in the nature of the thing that individuals bound themselves together as closely as possible and joined in a common activity against the spirit of the time, yet we cannot suppose that there was any great extension and formal organization of the institution previous to Samuel, from what is said in 1 Samuel 3:1 : “And the word of the Lord was precious in those clays; there was no open vision.” Add to this the sporadic character of the activity of the prophets, which we learn from the book of Judges. Finally, in favour of Samuel’s having virtually established the schools of the prophets, we have the fact that after his death we no longer meet with them except in the kingdom of Israel. This circumstance cannot be attributed to lack of information. The fact of our not meeting with them in the kingdom of Judah leads us to infer that they did not exist; and if this were the case, it is impossible to suppose that the schools of the prophets had taken deep root before Samuel. They appear as an institution established by him for a temporary object, and only continued, where necessity demanded it, in the kingdom of Israel, whose relations were in many respects similar to those in Samuel’s time, where the prophethood occupied quite another position than in the kingdom of Judah,—not being a mere supplement to the activity of the Levitical priesthood, but possessing the entire responsibility of maintaining the kingdom of God in Israel. The principal passages referring to the schools of the prophets, besides 1 Samuel 10:10, are, 1 Kings 19:20-21; 2 Kings 2:5 Kings 2:5, 2 Kings 4:38, 2 Kings 6:1. The designation is an awkward one, liable to cause misunderstanding. No instruction was given in the schools of the prophets: they were regular and organized societies. Taking all these passages together, it becomes evident that the schools of the prophets were in many respects a kind of monkish institution. Those who were educated there had a common dwelling and a common table; the most distinguished of the prophets standing at its head as spiritual fathers. Music was employed as a principal means of edification, and of awakening prophetic inspiration. But what distinguishes the schools of the prophets from the cloisters, or at least from a great number of them, is their thorough practical tendency. They were hearths of spiritual life to Israel. Their aim was not to encourage a contemplative life, but to rouse the nation to activity: every prophetic disciple was a missionary.