HISTORY OF ISRAEL LIBRARY

THE PERSIAN SUPREMACY.

THE HAGIOCRACY UNDER THE PERSIAN EMPIRE.

IN the course of this period, which extended over rather more than two hundred years, from 538 or rather 536 to 333 BC, the community which was forming itself once more round the ancient sanctuary and fortress of the hill of Jerusalem could but renovate its strength by degrees, beginning under the humblest and at the same time the most trying circumstances. It is true that there was much to favour its development. The good-will of the Persian government was at first secured to it. It was, in fact, one of its fundamental principles to allow every nation or tribe in its broad dominions to continue almost undisturbed in its peculiar customs, its internal organization, and its self-administration, provided it remained quiet and gave effect to the imperial decrees; and the far-firmed justice shown by a Cyrus, and still more by a Darius I, to their subjects, long kept the majority of the subjugated nations in no unwilling submission to this government. In all these respects the Persian supremacy was quite unlike and far superior to the Assyrian, or its simple continuation by the Chaldeans; and even under Artaxerxes I there were still some propitious days in store for the ancient people of Israel.

But in spite of the initial good-will of the Persian rulers, the ancient fatherland could not be regained without a thousand toils and trials. The foundations of the new settlement long remained very weak and subject to the most various oppression. The seat of the Persian government was too remote, and indeed the supreme power itself was hardly capable of finding a permanent solution of the complications and hostilities between the almost innumerable populations which were crowded together under its sway. Moreover, the new Israel once more occupied, so far as its members were gathered in Palestine, one of the most critical and exposed positions in the Persian empire, close by the Phoenician cities, which were never quite content, and the still more unruly Egyptians. Nor was it long before the relations between this peculiar people, as it arose once more, and its Persian governors gradually became more and more overcast. To this were added later on the grave evils from which the Persian supremacy languished in most countries, so that this period, after opening with the most eager anticipations of the benefits which would accrue from the rule of Cyrus, drew to a close amid increasing indifference and even keen hostility to the Persians. Thus for two hundred years the new commencement of a more independent community and a national development of Israel could only maintain and unfold itself under the heaviest pressure from without, and its dominant direction was towards the completest retirement from the bustle of the great world, and the closest internal consolidation. But the hardness of this shell and this tranquillity were precisely the conditions which enabled the indestructible growth of this community to rise with fresh power after every oppression. Accordingly, it becomes again more and more convinced of its special higher calling, and sees many new elements connected with it flourishing gaily; and towards the end of the whole of this period it even presents the spectacle of the resurrection of one of the most courageous and vigorous nations, hardly to be restrained from bursting through its narrow bounds.

Externally, then, Israel had hardy any connected or in any way elevating history during this period; and scarcely a single historical work of antiquity has ever been specially devoted to the description of the Persian age of Israel. When in after times it looked back upon these two hundred years they seemed on the whole to form a period of but little light or joy; and since the memory bequeathed to Israel by the majority of the great kings of Persia was only one of indifference and distance, or even of gloom, less and less accuracy came to be practised in distinguishing between the various monarchs who had borne the name of Darius, Xerxes, or Artaxerxes. The names of many of these remote kings were confounded, and only for some few was a fixed place retained in tradition and narration. But in the quiet inner sanctuary, in the secret world of Israel, a life was kindled of all the more intense activity. A few great men found a field for their noiseless but enduring labours all the more free and grateful, and they became pre-eminently the powerful and blessed instruments by which this age, in the enforced tranquility of oppression, was also enabled to satisfy its purer and nobler necessities. Since the whole period was supported only by these great but single and isolated personalities, it is fortunate that we still possess tolerably full and trustworthy monuments of them, partly composed by their own hands. These are therefore our readiest and richest materials for the restoration, on a sure and connected basis, of the history of a period of which we have little other accurate knowledge, and in which we are entirely without the guidance of any strictly continuous thread, of more or less brilliance in its outward relations.

This period of Israel's history might be regarded as a complete anticipation of that which followed the final destruction of the new Jerusalem itself and the second kingdom, when the nation could only rally round its spiritual instructors and leaders, and that hagiocracy which afterwards exercised so profound an influence over all the remnants of the ancient people by means of the Mishnah and Talmud was developed under the Head of the Exiles and his rabbis, especially under the Parthian and Neopersian empires. Indeed, at these times, when a nation has nothing left to rally round and lean upon except its ancient spiritual privileges, especially its venerable religion, the conditions are the most favorable to the development of a hagiocracy, whatever shape or form it may assume in details. Even Christian nations, when enslaved by Islam, have in many cases clung more closely to their clergy, and the ancient sanctity protected by them, as to their last refuge; and in like manner Islam has never been grasped with a firmer faith than when, through exceptional circumstances, it has fallen under foreign dominion. But the great difference between Israel as the second Temple rose and Israel as that temple fell in ruins for ever, is that the former could assemble once more on its ancient fatherland, not simply to enjoy the inheritance of its fathers, but above all things because it still retained the truest and most vivid consciousness of being destined to accomplish an infinitely lofty divine purpose, which could be achieved only in that land in which it had been incessantly pursued for a thousand years, and the attainment of which had been broken off violently for a little while, only that it might forthwith be followed up again with the greater purity and consistency. In the Israel, then, which gradually reassembled during these two hundred years from its dispersion and exile a true nation might once more develope itself, even thought the process must he slow, and it could never be so powerful outwardly as it had formerly been. Israel had still a task to accomplish which was capable by itself of molding the whole life of a people, and which, of all the nations of the time, whether great or small, Israel alone could achieve. Clearly or obscurely it was conscious of this, and this thought supported and molded it, drew it together and strengthened it, and, in spite of the hostility of the world, once more secured it a marvellous growth and prosperity, until it approached nearer and nearer to the goal at which it would be inevitably compelled to decide once for all whether it really desired the Perfect or not.

A.

THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE NEW JERUSALEM.

I.

ZERUBBABEL OF THE HOUSE OF DAVID, AND JOSHUA THE
HIGH-PRIEST.

The edicts in which Cyrus granted the exiles the right of returning together with certain other privileges, are no longer in our possession, but yet there are abundant traces from which we can recognise with tolerable certainty even their minuter details. Next to the return itself, the most important concession was the liberty to erect a new Temple on the site of the former one. Cyrus must have taken a specially warm personal interest in this undertaking, since he ordered his treasurer Mithridates to return the gold and silver utensils of the sanctuary of Jerusalem, which had been brought to Babylon by Nabuchadrezzar, and were there preserved as trophies in the great temple of Bel. About this circumstance we still possess the most accurate specifications. Cyrus further gave permission to those who were intending to return, to take with them not only their private possessions, of all kinds, but also any presents which might he offered them by their recent neighbours either for their personal use or for the projected erection of the sanctuary. These two facts cannot be satisfactorily explained except in connection with each other, and for that age the latter was of great importance.

We have seen that a partial improvement in the relations subsisting between the captives and their Chaldean conquerors had gradually taken place, and that many individual heathens began to experience a certain reverence for the fate of Israel, and still more for the truth of its religion. Now this feeling might in some cases rise into a desire to be received into their community, and in others might at least express itself in heartfelt sympathy with their future and with the honour of their sacred objects; and the favour shown to them by the mighty ruler of the then known world certainly quickened this active sympathy on the part of many heathens.

The prophets of the time, who have been described above, had therefore all the more ground for anticipating that even the heathen would devote their affectionate assistance of every kind to the returning exiles, nay, that princes and princesses would be as it were the guardians and nurses of the feeble infancy of the community as Jerusalem rose front its ruins. Indeed, generally speaking, the richer and more influential Judeans were very little disposed to return. Most of those, on the other hand, who did not shrink from the hardships of the journey and the new settlement were, according to every indication, so utterly helpless and destitute that these thoughts and anticipations may easily be understood, though they would have been impossible in the earlier and more prosperous days of the nation; and we can well conceive how important this second privilege granted by Cyrus must have been. We do not know exactly to what extent, or in what form the necessities of the exiles were relieved by these benefactions; but poverty and need of every kind were the lot of the settlers long after the new foundation of Jerusalem, and constituted one of the greatest contrasts between the later and the earlier people. Hence there was much depression and despondency in the hearts of New Israel. The fear, at any rate, that the sanctuary of the true God could not well attain to suitable splendor, and that the external honour of its worshippers would suffer in the eyes of numbers of heathens, was a source of deep sorrow to many Israelites, and excited thoughts and wishes within them which were far removed from the older nation.

We may, however, doubt whether Cyrus had given permission to this first band of returning exiles to take possession again of the whole territory of the former kingdom of Judah. Even the very brief account of the Chronicler makes everything which took place at this time revolve exclusively round the Temple and Jerusalem. The whole circuit of the ancient holy city, with a suitable piece of territory, must of course have been made over to the restored exiles, and evacuated by the foreign inhabitants who might have settled there in the meanwhile. It is, however, very remarkable that in the exact list of the first restoration (to be discussed presently) we find new settlers mentioned only in a small number of the cities of the ancient kingdom, and these are for the most part only the northern cities which, together with Jerusalem, were reckoned as belonging to the ancient Benjamin. In a southern direction we only find Bethlehem, which, since the time of David, had been almost inseparably united with Jerusalem. Such a phenomenon cannot be accidental. It was certainly made known in Babylon that no cities except these would be open to the returning exiles; and none but these, together with Jerusalem, were occupied in the first instance.

Now, in the first place, we should be ready to suspect the Idumeans, on general grounds, of being concerned in this matter, since they were Israel's most bitter foes when Jerusalem was destroyed; and in the second place, we actually find them in possession of important portions of the ancient territory of Judah and Israel even so late as in the times of the Maccabees; and we shall see more clearly hereafter how hotly the doubtful contest for these districts was maintained between the Idumeans and Israel, even in these later times.

They were then in possession of the whole of the southern part of the old kingdom of Judah, with the ancient capital of Hebron, up to the former territory of the Philistines to the west; but even further north-east of Jerusalem, between Jericho and the territory of the inhabitants of Samaria, now very much contracted, they occupied a tract of land extending to the Jordan, with Acrabat as its capital. This city seems, as far as we can make out, to have been founded here in the first instance by the Idumeans. The whole district was still called after it Acrabattine in the Greco-Roman times. How the Idumeans became possessed of these tracts of land as regular settlers we have, it is true, no direct evidence; but there are certain indications which point to a tolerably safe conclusion. Obviously they were put in possession of these southern and north-eastern tracts by Nabuchadrezzar, as a reward for the repeated and faithful assistance they had rendered him in his wars with Jerusalem, and in order that they might hold it in check upon two sides. It may have been that the kingdom of Judah, when the last king, Zedekiah, was placed upon the throne, was already reduced to these narrow confines as a punishment for the revolt which had preceded, or it may have been that on the destruction of the kingdom, Jerusalem alone, with its immediate surroundings, came under the special ban, and so remained deserted while the rest of the country fell to the Idumeans. These old hereditary foes of Israel were still occupying that portion of the territory of which they had taken possession when Cyrus sanctioned the return, and, as far as we can tell, this monarch was by no means prepared to expel the Idumeans front the lands they had occupied and cultivated for fifty or sixty years.

The violence of the fresh collisions between the Judeans and the Idumeans which soon arose out of these relations, and the persistency with which the new Israel maintained, at least in hope and aspiration, its claim to its ancient sacred possessions, may be gathered clearly from the prophetic utterances of the time. Yet twenty years after, when Zechariah preached, the southern and western districts of the ancient land of the tribe of Judah had not yet been recolonised by Israel. Later on, towards the time of Nehemiah, they must have succeeded already in gaining a firm footing in Hebron, for example, and in other places to the south. It is probable also that the Idumeans themselves soon lost a great deal of their prestige and power by internal divisions and commotions, for there are clear indications that their monarchy, which was only held in vassalage, still continued to be elective.

So small, then, even in its extension, was the commencement of the new community. But in numbers, too, the restoration itself was in the first instance scanty enough; for it might easily be foreseen that the returning exiles, in addition to the dangers of the journey, would have to contend against a thousand difficulties amid the ruins of their ancient country; and so it can only have been the more courageous, and those who were inspired by a more eager love for their former fatherland and its sanctuary, who would now decide to set forth at once and commence the new settlement. We still know with certainty that the whole number of those who then reassembled in the ruins of Jerusalem and the other cities which were open to them, did not amount to more than 42,360 men, with 7,337 servants of both sexes. An accurate record of the primitive condition of the new settlement was certainly made soon after some kind of order had been established, and although it has only been preserved in two or three versions, which already ex­hibit a tolerably wide divergence from each other, yet on the while it is very trustworthy, and is full of those instructive details which are peculiar to documents of this description. Many thousands of these settlers were, no doubt, descendants of the great band of captives who were carried away with King Jehoiachin. These men, since they were, to begin with, so numerous, and at the same time were drawn from the better classes of the people, must have been generally regarded as the actual support of the nation in Babylon. A definite connection was still for the most part maintained amongst them, and joint regulations, like those concerning the days of penance already mentioned, could most readily emanate from them. Any one, indeed, who should only consider the numbers of those who were carried away under public supervision, on occasion of the first and second conquests of Jerusalem, would be at a loss to understand how even so many as 42,000 could return; but we may certainly assume that on its final reduction the great mass of the Judeans were handed over as booty to the Chaldean conquerors, and that these also now received their freedom.

But the most fortunate circumstance of the time was that two men were found in Babylon to put themselves at the head of the movement, who, by their lofty zeal for Israel and its God, by the distinction of their tribe and family, and by the vigour of their age (neither appears to have been very old), were exactly qualified to become the leaders of the people as it rose again at a period of such great depression.

Zerubbabel sprang from the royal house of David. He was a grandson, through Shealtiel, of King Jeconiah, who had died' about 560 BC, and, at this time, therefore, he was by no means too far advanced in years; besides, we know that he and his colleague were both living twenty years afterwards. This colleague was Joshua (or Joshua, as the Chronicler calls him throughout, in accordance with the later usage, but in opposition to the older authorities), a son of Jozadak, who had been sent into exile after the destruction of Jerusalem, together with his father, the high-priest Seraiah. He was, therefore, about the same age as Zerubbabel, and both belonged to the younger generation of the exiles. The priests, in general, took a most active part in the enterprise; and this passage of Israel's history shows in the strongest light how the continued existence of a nation may be promoted by the presence of distinguished families of long-inherited position, occupation, and honour in its midst; for Israel would never have re-assembled so easily unless certain self-sacrificing descendants of the priestly and Davidic families had felt that the voice of history called upon them to make every effort for their people. And if it was a great gain to have such men, exalted by the nobility of their descent, and by personal high-mindedness, who, as the natural representatives of the people, showed themselves completely worthy of the call, it was an advantage of equal importance to find, if not in the ancient royal house, at least in the hereditary high-priest and his universally known and honored family, a firm nucleus round which the remaining members of the people might rally.

The simple Levites took a far less active part; and most of them, being accustomed to a simpler mode of life, appear to have fallen in more readily with foreign usages. This disproportion in the number of the Levites remained essentially the same in later times, and a complete change, therefore, in the general relations between the Levites and the priests was gradually established throughout the new state. In earlier times the priests had really been, as it were, the few princes of a great host of Levites; but the numbers of the latter were now so small that their efforts to put themselves on a footing of equality with the priests were likely to be more and more successful, especially as they had been constantly raising their position since the time of David. But the authority of the Pentateuch was so clearly opposed to this that centuries elapsed before they saw the claims they now put forward more and more fully recognised, until, towards the close of the whole Hagiocracy, their objects were almost entirely realised.—On the other hand, at the very commencement of the new kingdom, they disputed the right of the high-priest Joshua to some of the highest privileges of his office, as, for example, to the use of the holiest offerings for himself and his companions. The reason alleged was simply that he was without the necessary insignia of his office, especially the venerable adornment of the Urim and Thummim.

When Jerusalem was conquered, the last high-priest was doubtless stripped by the Chaldean king of the whole of his costly array, and this could not be restored at once, partly on account of its value, but partly, and indeed chiefly, because the royal permission to wear such a costume of more than princely splendor was not to be obtained immediately. This difficulty was, indeed, arranged afterwards, so that Joshua's house was even acknowledged on the part of the king. But there still remained one deficiency, of which we shall have to speak hereafter; and it is remarkable that even after this highest point had been reached, the new kingdom was still unlike the old one, and remained as it were incomplete, waiting for something better.

Of the royal house, however, no member but Zerubbabel seems to have braved the first dangers. Afterwards, no doubt, when the new settlement was consolidated, other descendants of David may have followed him; for instance, we know for certain of one who accompanied Ezra. But in the first instance the success of the whole undertaking depended pre-eminently on the good understanding between these two men, each of whom represented one of the different powers which had formed from ancient times the continuous circle of the outward sovereignty of Israel.

Before the commencement of the expedition, the individual exiles ranged themselves under prominent leaders, according to their ancestral houses, inasmuch as each both claimed and received, as far as possible, the national position and the property which he or his ancestors had enjoyed. We also know that Cyrus allowed them to set out with joyous demonstrations and under adequate protection. Great numbers attached themselves to the expedition who were unable to prove their descent from the priestly or from any other Israelite tribe, and who were, on this account, with difficulty able to obtain all the rights to which they laid claim.

Arrived in the ancient fatherland, they closed their ranks firmly, in part round their recognised leaders, in part round the cities in which they had settled; and it was in accordance with this arrangement that the above-mentioned register was drawn up. But as soon as the very first outline of a people of Israel was formed once more, and the first flights of a new and somewhat independent life began to stir within it, it immediately organised itself under the supervision of twelve men, amongst whom Zerubbabel and Joshua were but primi inter pares; so loyally did this fragment of the nation cling to its ancient institutions and traditions, even in its later history. Whether this supreme council of twelve elders, chosen from the heads of the people, remained in constant attendance on the governor in the new kingdom of Jahve6 we do not exactly know so far as concerns this period; but it is probable that it was so, since the elders are henceforth constantly mentioned in connection with him, while the simple heads of the people, with the members of their families, also bear a special name, viz. nobles or free mem. Different from these, again, were the simple superintendents of the separate districts or the smaller cities. For the rest, all these various grades of elders were chosen by the people themselves, under the governor, so that the internal organization and administration were established on a very independent footing, while the Persians were content with their supremacy. The nobles and elders (superintendents) were the ordinary representatives of the people; but whenever an important change was proposed, requiring the exertion and co-operation of all, the people itself assembled to deliberate and decide.

Zerubbabel, however, as the descendant of David, was considered the recognised head of the new nation of Jerusalem, and was certainly entrusted by Cyrus with the control of his coreligionists, and we know that in this capacity he bore the Persian title of Tirshatha, that is High Sheriff. We further know that besides the family name of Zerubbabel he also bore the court name of Sheshbazzar, or rather Sasabazzar, by which he was doubtless designated even under the Chaldean supremacy. But his privileges were circumscribed; close to him, and in important matters certainly superior to him, was one of the Persian governors of the whole of Syria, or the country west of the Euphrates. This was probably the officer resident in Samaria, who also went to Jerusalem for a few days every year to pass sentence in the most important cases, and there, at a north-eastern point of the wall, he established his dreaded tribunal.

II.

THE RETURN OF THE TEN TRIBES, AND THE STATE OF THE SEVERAL DISTRICTS OF THE ANCIENT LAND OF ISRAEL.

1. We may regard it, then, as certain, that the original permission of the Persian government for the restoration of a community in the ancient fatherland referred only to Jerusalem and its immediate vicinity, and by no means embraced the whole extent of the former kingdom of Judah. And yet, at any rate about a hundred years later, in Nehemiah's time, we see nearly the whole of this larger district once more inhabited by Israelites, and firmly consolidating itself round Jerusalem. We must suppose, therefore, that the original permission of the Persian government was gradually extended, and that the first expedition under Zerubbabel was followed by an increasing number of stragglers, until the southern and western portions of Judea were peopled more and more by the descendants of its ancient inhabitants, and the Idumeans, though not indeed compelled to retire within their ancient boundaries, were, nevertheless, obliged to tolerate Judean settlers on their territory. We can no longer recognise the particulars of all these subsequent expeditions. They must at any rate have attached themselves closely to the new ground now granted; but the expeditions of Ezra and Nehemiah, of which more below, may serve as instructive examples of them.

This phenomenon, moreover, receives additional significance in connection with two other more important questions, which lie so close at our feet that we cannot pass them over. In the first place, we see at a subsequent period, in the great field of universal history lying open to our view, the non-heathen inhabitants of the extreme north of Palestine keeping up a connection with the temple at Jerusalem, and regarded as Israelites in the full sense. By descent, too, they were traced back to the ancient people, and even if individuals of heathen blood at length became just like Israelites among them, as we may admit without hesitation, yet the mass of them were always supposed to have sprung from the blood of Israel. Now, when did these men connect themselves with the new Jerusalem? and what was their character? had they always occupied that part of the country, or did descendants from the former kingdom of Judah gradually emigrate thither? or where else did they come from?

We could form a safer judgment on these enquiries if we had documentary evidence of the character of the Chaldean division and administration of the whole country, after the destruction of Jerusalem; but no record of this has been preserved. So far as we can now judge, from a number of indications, the position of affairs was as follows. The Idumeans certainly demanded possession of all Israelite lands, partly on account of their recent services, and partly in virtue of ancient hereditary claims; but Nabuchadrezzar only handed over to their jurisdiction the portions of the country already specified. The districts which did not pass into the possession of the Idumean vassal-king, viz. Jerusalem itself, the small territory round it which was still, in the first instance, placed under a Judean governor, and now, together with Jerusalem, formed the basis of the new community, and, in addition, Galilee in particular, were subject directly to the Chaldeans. Samaria, and a small district belonging to it, were, as we have seen, occupied by aliens; and elsewhere, too, numbers of foreigners had certainly by this time penetrated here and there into the land; for instance, the great city of Scythopolis, south­west of the Lake of Galilee, had acquired a territory even earlier, and remained an almost entirely free city far into the Greek period, at the time in question inclining rather to the Samaritans than the Judeans. But certainly the central part of the country, as well as the district beyond the Jordan, and Galilee in particular more than the rest, were still inhabited by many descendants of Israel who remained true to their religion as far as the pressure of the times allowed. And this continued to be the condition of the country, this closely pruned, until the time of the new Persian dynasty; and even this made no change designedly, except in putting Israel again in possession or Jerusalem, with the small district belonging to it. What further consequences, however, lay all concealed in this seemingly small alteration!

2. But here we are at once met by the second question, what became of the descendants of the Ten Tribes formerly carried away by the Assyrians? If they, too, were ever to come back again, the present circumstances and opportunity were the most suitable for doing so; and if the mass of them were eager for a return to their ancient home, it was now high time to accomplish it, for even where settlers have in the first instance been transported by force, their ancient fatherland tends more and more to become a foreign country to them. We do not, however, possess any such simple and explicit evidence as would enable us to settle this question easily, and we cannot be surprised that all kinds of conjectures were formed on the subject at a tolerably early period, or that in modern times they have multiplied still further, and in some cases assumed perfectly monstrous proportions.

From an early period the great prophets had foretold the certainty of a final return of the captive exiles of the Ten Tribes as well as of the others; and later ages always found a specially prominent example of this in the bold image which Isaiah had adopted of Israel returning across the Euphrates as safely and as mightily as it had once come home from Egypt across the sea. This prediction was fulfilled during these decades as completely as was in a general way possible in its immediate sense. But since it was more and more strongly felt in the following centuries how far the whole of the new kingdom lagged behind the expectations formed about it, this prediction, as then read in the holy scriptures, like the similar one of the seventy years, and, indeed, nearly all the ancient prophecies, came to be interpreted, by the narrow views which then prevailed, in too rigid a sense. It was considered as good as unfulfilled in the letter; and its accomplishment was, therefore, relegated altogether to the future which still remained.

Fl. Josephus, accordingly, mentions on one occasion, though quite incidentally and without giving any further details, that the Ten Tribes still remained in his time beyond the Euphrates in countless hosts, and almost at the same date a later imitator of the prophets introduces a picture of their return across the Euphrates into the great design which he is sketching of the Messianic future.

The calmer language of the earlier Talmudists never rises above general anticipations and hopes on behalf of the Ten Tribes; but during the centuries which followed the final destruction of Jerusalem the belief took firmer and firmer root in the nation that somewhere in the far north-east a better people of Israel was to be found, living in happy union and hoping for the Messiah; and inasmuch as certain writers bound up this belief very closely with the stories of the Middle Ages concerning Alexander's expedition to the extreme north or Asia as to the end of the known world, there arose the strangest representations of these Judeans on the other side, belonging as it were to another world. Thus, in the ninth century after Christ, the learned Jew Eldad, himself descended from the tribe of Dan, undertook a fruitless journey, we are told, in search of the Ten Tribes, and other Jewish travellers, also, of the later Middle Ages were fond of discoursing of them.

A zeal of a very different kind, however, has been roused among the Christians of the last centuries of our era for the discovery of these lost tribes; and since they despaired of finding them again on the Euphrates, at least in the countless numbers of which Josephus speaks, many learned men have sought for them through the whole world. Wherever anyone fancied he had detected a certain resemblance to Jewish customs or cast of features in any distant people, there he would make out descendants of the Ten Tribes; and it often happened that scattered legends, whether obscure or boastful, among such a nation came to aid the quest, for many a Christian or Islamite tribe was ready to pride itself on such a descent on account of its sacred writings. Thus, attempts have been made to rediscover them in the Afghans, in the Sinese Jews, in the Parthians and Buddhists, nay, even in the wandering tribes of North America. But even the best attempt of this kind, namely, that made in 1840 by Dr. Asahel Grant, to rediscover them in the Nestorian Jews and Jezids of the mountains north of the ancient Nineveh, is by no means successful.—This might seem to warrant the exactly opposite conjecture, that every one belonging to the Ten Tribes had in the early times of their deportation and settlement in a foreign land been so completely lost among the heathen, and so thoroughly adopted their character, that even at the time of the liberation under Cyrus not a single trace of them any longer remained.

But with regard to this idea, a number of considerations suggest themselves. It is true that the captives of the Ten Tribes were on an average hardly so faithful to the true religion as were those of Judah. This is, in fact, only what we should expect from the general position and civilization of the former kingdom. Besides this, they were torn away into foreign countries at a much earlier period, without having gained the further experience and blessings which prepared Judah still more effectually for a faithful constancy to Jahveism; and the longer their exile lasted, the severer must their trial have become. But many indications combine to show that in some places, at any rate, they were very zealous in patiently preserving the loftier faith, and very eager in their hope for deliverance. We will not now call attention to Tobit, his house, and his connections. The book which perpetuates this north-eastern legend will have to be discussed below; but very valuable evidence to this effect is furnished by Nahum, the Prophet of Elkosh, as we have already seen; for the fact that he, as well as Tobit, according to the legend just mentioned, thinks of Zion, not of Samaria, as the holy city, finds its explanation in the circumstance that no other place could then be considered the centre of union for all true worshippers of Yahveh. And if in the times of Jeremiah and Ezekiel no favourable tidings whatever of the earlier exiles had reached the Judeans, and if the hope that the mass of them, purified by suffering, should return to Canaan some time, as worthy servants of Yahveh, had already become quite empty, these prophets could not have spoken as they do of Israel or Joseph in parallelism with Judah, while Jeremiah has almost better hopes of the former than of the latter. Moreover, writers at the end of the exile, and soon after it, place Israel by the side of Judah not only in the alternate members of a verse, or to secure a proper fulness of expression, but in a way that shows how carefully they still distinguished the two great sections of the exiles, and hoped for fresh salvation for them both. But the longer the exile continued, the more completely did the true confessors of Yahveh who still remained from the Ten Tribes and the scattered communities of the Judeans, openly amalgamate with one another, but under such conditions that the more recent and superior civilization of the latter maintained the sole ascendant.

Now when once Cyrus had given the Judeans permission to return to Jerusalem and its immediate vicinity at any rate, there seems no reason why numbers of the descendants of the ancient kingdom of the Ten Tribes should not also have accomplished a similar return to the northern provinces. As a result of the great storms of the last two centuries, many cities and other places in this part of the country no doubt lay in ruins, and since the Chaldean supremacy had stepped into the place of the Assyrian throughout all these regions, all the exiles of Israel lived under essentially similar laws. Thus, when Cyrus had given them liberty to do so, many descendants of the Ten Tribes might gradually, and with no great display, come back; but if many of the tribe of Judah, even after the liberation, preferred to remain in the east, no doubt still more of the descendants of the Ten Tribes made the same choice. We have no longer any certain clue by which to trace this movement, but neither have we any reason to deny that after the great change in the political situation, individual descendants of the northern kingdom, formerly so extensive, may have assembled once more in the ancient fatherland. The Chronicler, the only historian of this period whose work has been preserved entire, passes over all this; but for him Jerusalem had already become the central point of all history so exclusively that his silence concerning these contemporary but remote events and changes need not surprise us. The expeditions of these returning exiles, however, cannot have been of any great importance, as not even the smallest reminiscence of them on which we can rely has been preserved.

It may, indeed, seem sad, at the point which we have now reached, to see quite clearly and indubitably how the last remains of the kingdom of the Ten Tribes, that chief section of ancient Israel which even attempted once to constitute itself the whole, vanish entirely from history. It is true that even in later times many of the inhabitants of the holy land continued to boast of their descent from one of the ancient tribes of this kingdom; but no such restoration as was now in store for the kingdom of Judah ever really fell to the lot of the sister kingdom, which had once been so much greater. On the other hand, from this time forward whatever vitality remained amid its ruins endeavoured to pass entirely into Judah, and in spite of the narrow and prejudicial opposition which proceeded from Judah itself, as we shall presently see, it succeeded in its efforts more and more completely.

The name of the Judeans, which had already risen into importance during the last centuries before the destruction of Jerusalem, is the only one after its restoration which maintains a place in the great history of the world; and it supplants the venerable designation of Israel so completely that the latter retains no significance except in connection with the religion of the various fragments of the ancient people and their sacred traditions. From the correct feeling that it was in its religion alone that the ancient Israel, in its deepest life, could survive in anything like completeness, the community of the new Jerusalem clung fast to the ancient sanctity of the kingdom of twelve tribes, at any rate in its loftier thoughts and ultimate efforts, both in its sacred language and also, though only on rare occasions, in certain significant symbols. Even the legends of the lives and exploits of distinguished descendants of the kingdom of the Ten Tribes, during the first period of the Assyrian captivity, at the court of Nineveh and elsewhere, subsequently tended more and more to pass into stories of the Babylonian exile and become Judaic. The legend of Daniel's wise behaviour at the court of a mighty king was older, according to every indication, than is assumed in the late book of Daniel; and the struggle between Haman and Achiachar at the court of Nineveh was finally transformed into one between Haman and Mordecai at that of the Persians; and the Book of Tobit is the only work left to us which attempts to perpetuate the renown earned during the exile by the holy men of old among the Ten Tribes also.

But yet this extinction of all genuine remains of the kingdom of the Ten Tribes did but accomplish the fate to which this kingdom had been destined from the first, though we have been unable to mark its fulfilment under the clear light of events till now. Afterwards, indeed, as we shall see, when a new community was gradually formed in Samaria, partly through the fault of the new Jerusalem, which was driven by the spirit of rivalry between the two to greater and greater extremes and ended by claiming to be the true continuation of the ancient Israel and the kingdom of the Ten Tribes, its very late historians invented an actual return of three hundred thousand men from the Assyrian captivity, and a fresh foundation of the ancient Israel under this great host of thoroughly genuine Israelites, in the centre of the country so sacred in their early history, and especially on Mount Gerizim. It is easy to see, however, that this is not only pure invention, but very late invention too.

But here we must recollect that t the northern districts of Canaan had already learned to look to Jerusalem as their capital more and more during the centuries immediately preceding its destruction. The fall of the kingdom of Samaria had at any rate produced one immediate good result, viz. the removal of an obstacle which had stood in the way of uniting the severed members of the Davidic kingdom to the greatest extent possible. The rulers in Jerusalem were again at liberty to attempt to extend their authority over the northern districts; and all the inhabitants of those parts who desired to worship the true God, were still more ready once more to cling exclusively to the sanctuary at Jerusalem. This had even then been the case to a great extent; the clearest proof of it is furnished by the strong attraction thither of residents in Shechem, Shiloh, and Samaria. These were the very cities which had always before been rivals of Jerusalem; but immediately after the destruction of the Temple numbers of persons in deep mourning made a pilgrimage from them to the ruins of Jerusalem, in order at least to offer their sacrifices of sorrow on the site of the fallen sanctuary' If, then, this sanctuary of Jerusalem rose again, and the beams of this new victorious glory streamed round its august and ancient splendor, it would spontaneously step once more into the position of a holy metropolis for the northern districts of Canaan also; and if henceforth all the worshippers of Yahveh who lived in even the most distant countries of heathendom looked to this concentrated centre with joy and pride, made pilgrimages thither, and found there the place where they were most firmly united, how much more, in the northern half of Canaan, must they all have clung to this sacred rock, how much more must all the descendants of the kingdom of the Ten Tribes also, who had perhaps assembled there in somewhat greater numbers now, have regarded Jerusalem alone as their holy city!

There are, in fact, many signs which enable us to recognise this state of things clearly enough; but the jealousy of the Persian government would not permit any closer connection between the southern and northern portions of the country. Thus, all the worshippers of the true God dwelling north of Jerusalem were obliged to content themselves for the present with recognising Jerusalem simply as the spiritual capital of their country. They could not be prevented from voluntarily offering sacrifices there; but no more intimate union of any other description was thought of under the Persians. The sequel of the history will show, however, the infinite importance which the closer connection of Galilee and Judea assumed when the pressure of the times allowed it to put out its strength more boldly.

In this direction, then, everything might henceforth take a form very favourable to Jerusalem as the renovated centre of true religion, although the advantages of the new situation could only disclose themselves fully in the course of the following centuries. If a religion be true, it is good for its own activity that it should have a local centre as widely and generally recognised as possible. At that time no old unexpiated guilt clung to the ancient sanctity of Jerusalem, and it even rose from its ruins in fresh and marvellous life; so that it soon looked for a grand new future favoured by its own fitness for its task and the charm peculiar to it, as well as by the condition of the age, and it might even hope once more to regain its ancient greatness and power, even though in a very different way. But this great advantage was counterbalanced by a disadvantage almost as great. The ancient holy land had been so cruelly and so frequently conquered and desolated by powerful heathens, owing even its restoration, as far as it went, to them, that the strongest and most permanent traces of their action necessarily still remained; and although the Idumeans of the south were gradually pushed back again somewhat further, and the ancient kingdom of Judah was enabled to collect itself round Jerusalem more and more completely, yet many heathen inhabitants had long ago found their way into the northern and central districts, and maintained their footing there far more stubbornly. In the remoter northern district, as its very name of Galilee, i.e. march (shortened for heathen-march), shows, as well as in the eastern district beyond the Jordan, a powerful heathen element had always lived in the midst of Israel. This separation of the districts inhabited by Israel in this quarter had increased since the Assyrian period, and became more and more marked in each succeeding age, as we shall see more clearly hereafter.

Ever since the inroad of the Scythians, indeed, a city, occupied in the first instance by those who remained behind as settlers, had held its ground in this neighbourhood, and it always jealously strove to preserve its independence. But in the centre of the country, in Samaria, the colonists of heathen extraction, who had been settled there by the Assyrians, continued to dwell in much the same condition as that which we have already observed towards the end of the kingdom of Judah. No change of any importance is as yet to be noticed in them, and these foreign settlers, drawn together from very different countries, having now dwelt long on the fruitful soil, had evidently amalgamated more and more, simply from the length of time that had elapsed, into one uniform whole. In this way elements of various heathen nationalities had long been scattered right through the ancient holy land when Jerusalem, and with it a people at once old and new, and a sanctuary of ancient renown and of a character peculiar to itself, endeavoured to rise from its ruins. When this movement had once begun, the violent collision of elements so radically at variance with one another, and yet in such close local contiguity, was inevitable; and its necessary consequence was to reveal more clearly and to shape more firmly the very peculiar genius of the new Jerusalem, as it began with difficulty to rise again.

III.

THE BUILDING OF THE TEMPLE IN JERUSALEM AND THE
SAMARITANS.

The general circumstances of the exiles who returned under Zerubbabel supplied them with no object to push forward more earnestly than the building of the Temple: the restoration of the sanctuary was the first task of their holy zeal. It was in vain that the great Unknown, in reference Perhaps to a somewhat too glowing ardor, pointed out incidentally at this time that no temple, however splendid, could really correspond to the full sublimity of the true God. His words did but prove that at the right moment that truth of all higher religion would break forth again which had already displayed itself on the same field, when first the idea was conceived of building the former magnificent temple.

It was in vain that anything like the previous temple, with its offerings, had already been shown to be far more superfluous now than in David's time; the impulse to restore what had been was too strong. Besides this, however, the strong buildings of the holy place of refuge might serve to increase in no small degree the security of the capital, which was still very weak at first. Considerable treasure was at once collected through the voluntary contributions of all who could afford anything from their private means. Zerubbabel led the way, and his example was followed by the other chiefs of the nation and the common people. The sums thus obtained were employed partly for the building itself, and partly for the most necessary vestments of the priests, who entered again upon the duties of their office for the most part in great poverty. As no great number of new sacrificial utensils was required, no one but Zerubbabel made any considerable gift for this purpose. From the extant statements derived from the original sources,' we may well suppose that Zerubbabel, as the grandson of King Jeconiah who had been restored to the position of a prince, was the foremost man of the community in worldly possessions as well as rank.

But the difficulty of even removing the ruins from the site of the ancient sanctuary, and clearing the space for the foundations of the Temple, was so great that on the approach of the seventh month or the month of harvest, which they desired to celebrate on account of its pristine sanctity with full Mosaic ceremonial on the sacred spot, they erected a simple altar provisionally, in order to offer the sacrifices upon it according to primitive usage. From the first day of this month onward the daily sacrifices were again continued, and many individuals who had long had vows to perform were now enabled to redeem them in all solemnity. Many a fresh and glorious hymn might now ring forth, as for example Ps. 118.—that song of joy and sacrifice which expresses the feeling of the age with such wonderful depth. Even on the part of many heathens, whether near or at a distance, the liveliest sympathy for the new community was at this time displayed. It glowed as yet with the first charm of growth, and the favor of the great king still shone upon it fresh and unclouded. In the many songs, such as Psalms 116, 116, animated with an inspiration so marvelously fresh and a devotion so deep, which rang forth from the commimity and from individuals about this time, or at any rate not much later, those that fear Yahveh are readily brought forward by the side of Israel and Aaron, so that all who fear Yahveh even outside Israel are included.

Meanwhile, the preparations for the building of the Temple were being constantly pushed on with energy. Cedar-wood was ordered from Lebanon, as had been done before for the Temple of Solomon. Workers in wood and other materials were hired for money wages; and Tyrian and Sidonian sailors were employed for the transport of the costly timber to the harbour of Joppa, and received payment in corn, wine, and oil, the produce of the land. Accordingly, in the second mouth of the following year they were in a position to lay the foundations of the Temple-house, and to appoint the priests and Levites who were to take the work under their special superintendence, and, as far as necessary, give their own personal assistance. These appointments were probably made with special ceremonies.

The foundation itself was laid with the utmost solemnity, amid the trumpet blasts of the priests, the music of the stringed instruments and cymbals of the Levitical singers, and the loud songs of thanksgiving of the whole people. It is true that many of the older priests, Levites, and elders, who had themselves beheld the first Temple, when they saw the meagre foundations of this second Temple calculated, in accordance with the necessities of the time, on a scale of far inferior richness, splendor, and solidity, broke out involuntarily into violent lamentations. But the historian remarks emphatically that the common people shouted so loud for joy that it was impossible to distinguish between the discordant sound of woe and the tones of joy; as though this might avert the evil omen which world readily be found in the circumstance that among the honoured elders of the community many were weeping loudly on a day like that.

Many prophets now reassembled round the sanctuary as it rose from its ruins; and many a word of decision (when asked for),' as well as of lofty anticipation of more glorious times in future, issued once more from their lips, as though in this direction also the ancient state and grandeur of Israel were to reappear. While the ancient seat of the true religion and the Davidic empire became again the object of pilgrimage from every quarter, there were heard. in the sanctuary itself, as well as among the joyous bands upon their way, new hymns in rich variety, of a concentrated power and captivating earnestness, such as had hardly arisen in such a full stream of creative and living power since the time of David. At this time, no doubt, the kernel was formed of the collection of "Pilgrim songs", which may first have been generally sung upon the journey. Those which are preserved in the present Psalter are almost entirely of the same form and style, and stand apart as a small collection by themselves.

The joy of those days, and the dawning trust in the protection and sanctity of the newly-rising Temple, were indeed so great and widespread that the mixed settlers in Samaria and its territory sent a solemn embassy to express their desire to take part in it; they worshipped the same God, and had sacrificed to him ever since Asarhaddon had settled them there. Thus the very centre of the country of the Ten Tribes, which had formerly been so hostile in its disposition towards Judah, now lay at the feet of Jerusalem, almost before it began to rise again from its ruins; and we have no reason to suppose that the proposal of the Samaritans was not meant quite seriously, or that they would have refused to make a proportionate contribution to the expenses of the Temple and the priests.

The superintendents of the new work, however, declared that they would have no fellowship with them in the concerns of the Temple, but intended to make use of the permission given by Cyrus for themselves alone. The real ground of this refusal, therefore, must be looked for solely in the peculiar nature of the religion of these Samaritans. In that ancient fatherland of the free intermingling of religions, the worship of Yahveh had been reintroduced among its prevailingly heathen descendants a century and a half before, but only after the half-heathen fashion of the former kingdom of the Ten Tribes, and moreover, by the side of a number of deities of a purely heathen description, multiplied at discretion, and pertaining to individual houses according to their national origin. The better minds had probably long since become wearied of this great confusion of different religions, which prevented the worship of Yahveh, though it stood above the others as the public religion of the land, from ever rising to a more effectual power and to a greater sanctity. From these comparatively better minds we may suppose that the present overtures for a union with the Temple in Jerusalem proceeded. Only in Judah and among the Judeans had the ancient religion been preserved and developed in knowledge, science, and the practice of the arts; and this fact was recognised even in Samaria. But the danger was that in spite of this many Samaritans would be unwilling radically to reform their half-heathen character, and their completely heathen family religions, so that it was to be feared that a baneful influence might be exerted by them on the pure religion, especially through intermarriages.

Had there been enough wisdom and power in Jerusalem gradually to check the dangers and evils which undoubtedly lay in such a union, it might have been accomplished at once. But the spirit of scrupulousness which lay in the very germ of all this period, concerned with the restoration of antiquity, was roused for the first time at this attempt in all its freshness, and stepped at once into full view. The authorities at Jerusalem shrank from the very thought of such a union with neighbours whose religion had not hitherto been pure enough; and by this scrupulousness the memory of the ancient reproaches against Samaria would easily be revived in Jerusalem, and their proud contempt for neighbours of mixed or solely heathen blood excited again in greater strength. This rejection of the Samaritans exercised a very favourable influence at the time on the holy zeal of the new settlers in Jerusalem, which was essentially national; and so far the authorities no doubt acted in accordance with the feelings of the great majority of the Judeans of the time.

But the further consequences of this rigid conduct could not be escaped. Even now, in its very first movements, the new community simply showed that it still felt too weak actually to give that universal validity to its religion to which in theory it was hound. Henceforth, it never got rid of this internal contradiction, which continued to assume larger dimensions. Moreover, this rejection of the Samaritans necessarily caused the consuming fire of those national jealousies and hostilities, which had burned so stubbornly and destructively in earlier times, to begin to glimmer once more. As soon as Israel appeared again upon the soil of its ancient fatherland, as a people even partially independent, it had to expect that the ground beneath its feet would be kindled again into a fiercer glow by the flame of the old enmities, and that all its various neighbours would soon bestir themselves to prevent its gathering strength again. In fact, it cannot be said that the apprehensions of the adjacent peoples were altogether groundless. Even in this remnant of the ancient Tsrael, feeble as it was, much of its old spirit, with all its traditions of its former glory and all its hopes for the future, was still alive; and in the person of Zerubbubel there stood at the head of Jerusalem a son of David round whom the Messianic hopes involuntarily moved with increased vitality, as we see from the prophetic utterances of the time.

Thus these petty national jealousies began even now to develope themselves, to the very sensible detriment of the new settlement. The Samaritans, hid indignant at their rejection, put everything in motion at the Persian court to throw suspicion upon the Judeans as a restless and quarrelsome set of men; and they succeeded in obtaining orders from the king forbidding the continuation of the building of the Temple. The history passes rapidly over these events. The result is only too plain, inasmuch as no further progress could be made in the work during all the remainder of the reign of Cyrus in Babylon, which lasted about nine, or rather seven, years. The Persian empire, however, was constituted on such a basis that any change depended for the most part on the favor or disfavor of the sovereign individually, so that the accession of each new king might witness the introduction of a new method of regarding and conducting the most important concerns of the administration. The neighbors of Jerusalem, accordingly, as soon as ever Cambyses ascended the throne, further contrived to excite his jealousy of the building of the Temple and of every other sign of vigor displayed by the new settlement, which was still so weak.

Throughout the eight and a half years of the reign of this king we have hardly any further information about Jerusalem; and this is not surprising in the long duration of these gloomy times. According to the solitary historical work which has been preserved on this period, he was called Ahashverosh (in Greek, Xerxes), and the Pseudo-Magian Smerdis, Artashashta (Artaxerxes). On account of its proximity to Egypt, the country must certainly have suffered much during the Egyptian campaigns of Cambyses; and the hopes which at first had been raised so high of the speedy glory of Jerusalem sank lower and lower on every side. But even in an age so overcast as the last years of Cyrus and those of Cambyses, the eternal hope always revived afresh upon its native soil: and the feeble community, which seemed about to perish as soon as it was born, as though it was in vain that it had surmounted the pangs of its birth, nevertheless did not despair of its everlasting destiny. All this we may gather with certainty from several prophetic fragments, which by all indications must have been written at this very time, and which place its spiritual condition before us in the liveliest colours.

In spite of these heavy trials, the spirit of many of the new settlers was not quite broken, and whenever time brought about a change which might prove favourable, they endeavoured to improve their position at the Persian court, as we see in the ease of the short reign of the Pseudo-Smerdis, where the Chronicler has presented his materials somewhat more fully. At that time several distinguished members of the young community sent a petition to the new king, signed, however, with their own names, and without the subscription of Zerubbabel, who had fallen into disgrace.

The document was in the Aramaic character and language, as it may be assumed that even under the Persians this was still the official language of the old Assyrian, as well as of all the other countries west of the Tigris. But two Persian officials in Samaria, the royal councillor Rehum, and the royal secretary Shimshai, immediately sent a counter-petition to the Persian court in the name of all the settlers of mixed nationality in Samaria, not forgetting to mention, as they well might, the Persians amongst them. The document set forth that simply because they were the king's friends, and did not wish to see his interests publicly injured, they were compelled to warn him seriously against encouraging at the commencement the audacity of the new inhabitants of Jerusalem, the descendants of the ancient kings, once so bold, so mighty, and of such lofty pretensions; and against permitting them to rebuild their extensive city, and surround it with strong walls. If they were not checked at first, it might be foreseen with certainty that they would afterwards renew the constant disturbances and rebellions of their former powerful kings, and soon they would refuse every kind of tribute or toll to the Persian king. This letter, which though not preserved exactly in the words of the original, is evidently chronicled by a contemporary who was well acquainted with it, actually produced the desired effect. The Persian officials in Samaria received orders to act according to their own suggestions, and hastened to proceed against Jerusalem with an armed force, and especially to put a stop to the building of the Temple.

In this way more than twelve years passed by without the blessing of Cod seeming really to rest on the new settlement; and how far were the hopes—so highly strung at first—of the great and speedy glory of the new kingdom from being fulfilled! In these same years, too, failure of crops and great unfruif fulness of the land, which had hardly begun to be cultivated again with anything like diligence, were repeatedly added to their other difficulties. Thus, from every quarter, the gravity of the trials of the new community increased by the side of its first joy in existence. The seeds of gloomy discontent and mean fear for life kept ever shooting up in ranker luxuriance, and the anxious timidity and self-seeking which so easily lay hold of individuals under such circumstances threatened to become more and more predominant.

Whilst this community had still to establish on a firm basis the most necessary means of enjoying and protecting life collectively, there were numbers who considered that they had only to take care of themselves before all things, and they excused their growing disinclination for more generous cares and toils by the pretext that it was now no time for leaving their own houses and with united strength pushing on the work of the Temple. Darius had already taken the place of the Pseudo-Smerdis, and no doubt he found the Persian empire, in the first period of his reign, in a state of great excitement and commotion, so that he was compelled to pass with heavy fighting from one country to another; but in Jerusalem, frightened perhaps by the results of the three former Persian reigns, the Judeans hesitated even to attempt to secure a restoration of the original permission of Cyrus from the court.

But the very spread of sloth and selfishness did but serve as a more powerful incitement to certain prophets, who glowed with to pure and higher zeal for the divine duties of the day, to toil for their correction with all the strength of their oracles, and to reanimate the flagging zeal for an undertaking which should not be left unfinished through any human hesitation or timidity. The erection of the Temple must not be abandoned half way, nor the most necessary arrangements for the new community allowed to remain incomplete. These requirements were among the most immediate divine duties and most pressing necessities of the time, unless the new settlement was to fail completely, a result which the Persian government itself could not and did not desire.

Indeed, the petty jealousies of the surrounding peoples had only succeeded in preventing the permission to build the Temple granted by Cyrus from being carried into effect: it was not wholly withdrawn. When even a new dynasty, therefore, came into power, there was no real necessity to consult the court afresh as to whether the works should proceed or not. Fortunately, there were two prophets in Jerusalem at this very time who took this view of the matter: by their words of reproof and encouragement they roused the flagging spirit of all classes of the new people, and, thought it might seem doubtful whether they were authorised to go on with the building, dissipated every scruple by the supreme decision of their utterance.

First of all, on the first day of the sixth month in the second year of the reign of Darius, arose Haggai. He was to all appearance a prophet already far advanced in years, and one of the very few who had seen the Temple of Solomon and still survived. He regarded the very disasters which the people had experienced for many years in the cultivation of the soil as a proof of the divine displeasure already incurred by the growth and spread of selfishness. He therefore exhorted them all, but especially the two leaders, Zerubbabel and Joshua, to take up the building of the Temple once more with greater zeal; and when the simple words of his admonition took effect he promised the immediate advent of better times.

In the beginning of the eighth month of the same year appeared Zechariah, with similar exhortations. He was certainly a much younger man than Haggai, not born before the Babylonian period, and of priestly family. He is the first in whom we can distinctly trace any powerful influence of the civilization of eastern Asia, in the representations and figures in which he has no hesitation in allowing his imagination to clothe itself on suitable occasions. Started again by the mighty voice of prophets such as these, the grand work of the period was taken up afresh with the most vigorous and indefatigable zeal; and, amid great exertions, it soon went prosperously forward.

But, for the actual success which attended their efforts, so far as the limited means at their command admitted of success at all, the community was ultimately indebted to the justice and moderation of the new king, Darius, which soon won the praise of all his various subjects. Darius appears to have appointed a new governor about this time over the district known at the court of the great king as the land beyond the river (i.e. the Euphrates), that is to say, Western Syria. At any rate, we hear no more of the Persian officers in Samaria who had thrown everything into confusion two years before. This governor, Tatnai, and his colleagues in office (of whom Shethar-Boznai alone is mentioned by name) were no doubt appealed to by the Samaritans for help to oppose the new undertaking in Jerusalem; and they could not do otherwise than officially demand an explanation from the inhabitants of the city. But this time the elders of the city, though God's eye protected them, remained true to their resolution of allowing nothing to interfere with the zealous and speedy prosecution of the work, and confidently appealed to the original permission of Cyrus.

The governor, therefore, contented himself with asking the names of those who superintended the building, and reporting them, as those on whom the chief responsibility rested, in his detailed memorial to the great king. Meanwhile, the works were to be proceeded with until the decision of the Persian court should arrive and be publicly communicated to the accused. We are not further informed by the Chronicler who were the individuals whose names were indicated to the court as those of possible insurgents. We may, however, readily infer that Zerubbabel and Joshua were the most important, and this conclusion is confirmed by prophetic utterances of the day. On the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month Haggai again addressed the whole people, reproving the sullen discontent of many, but applying certain words of lofty promise even more expressly than before to Zerubbabel in particular, as though in the world's great course everything would soon change propitiously for him.

On the twenty-fourth day of the eleventh month, Zechariah, in the long and highly artistic piece which we still possess, gathered up all the apprehensions, the noble desires, and the hopes, arising out of the loftier and stronger movements which had commenced anew. With peculiar sympathy, however, he depicts the high-priest Joshua as suffering under heavy accusations, and, promising him a glorious acquittal, he represents him and Zerubbabel as the two branches of fairest verdure and blown under God's special care, and destined to grow greener and more blooming yet. These pure and ardent hopes were, in fact, soon justified by the event. On receipt of the governor's report, presenting an impartial statement, the Persian court instituted an inquiry into the history of the case; and a royal mandate confirmed once more the original charter of Cyrus. The two leaders of the community, who would have had much to fear personally had the supreme court come to the opposite decision, must have been raised high in the general estimation by this issue, and the building of the Temple could be vigorously carried on.

It was probably before this favourable solution of the great question of the day that an embassy of Babylonian Judeans arrived at Jerusalem with rich presents for the sanctuary. Amidst the many depressing circumstances of the new settlement—the poverty of most of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and the extraordinary expenditure required by the erection of the Temple—the longing for more active help from without, especially on the part of the numerous wealthy Judeans who still lived in the north-east, was just now very keen. Even the prophets had given expression to the justifiable hopes entertained on this subject. The joy created by the actual arrival of this embassy was, therefore, all the more intense; and to the soul of the prophet Zechariah it even seemed like a blessed confirmation of the prophetic anticipations thus far announced, as well as a pledge of the further development of all the lofty hopes of Israel which were as yet unfulfilled.

Thus was the erection of the Temple completed in the last month of the sixth year of the reign of Darius, 516 BC, and the consecration of the sanctuary performed with all solemnity. The ceremony bore clear traces of the firmness with which the idea was maintained that this Temple, in its essential nature, was the great general sanctuary of the whole of Israel, including all the twelve tribes. This was the noble spirit in which the festival was celebrated; and thereby at least the true hope for the future, and the elevating point of view from which it should be regarded, were vindicated. Some of the songs which were sung on this occasion, in some cases composed expressly, in others adopted, and to some extent modified, from earlier tunes, have certainly been preserved in the Psalter. The Temple music, also, must have received a fresh impulse along with the complete restoration of the ancient service; and now, for the first time, was the true place found for the many songs composed at this period, full of pure courage, born of cheerful trust and of swelling hopes, iu which the declaration, "Yahveh reigns", resounds again and again with loudest joy.

Besides the main edifice of the sanctuary, moreover, it will be readily understood that other buildings necessary to the new capital were erected at the same time in these early days. Of the city walls we shall have more to say hereafter, when speaking of Nehemiah; but we may mention specially that it must have been at this time that a castle was either built or repaired, which appears in history henceforth under the name (which is not ancient Hebrew) of Bira, or in its Greek form Baris. It stood on the same site as the building which was subsequently enlarged by the Asmonean princes, and still more by Herod, under the name Antonia, viz. on the bill north-west of the Temple. A residence for the governor was also erected, though not in the same position south of the Temple which Solomon's palace had occupied. The Baris was held by the Persian garrison, which appears, however, to have been but small in Jerusalem itself.

But the exultation of those days could not long endure in the face of the poverty and oppression of the present, nor could their bright joy hold its ground before the deep Consciousness that the fulfilment of the grand old hopes had not yet arrived. It is true that the Temple was now restored, if not so richly, yet, in accordance with the taste of the age, with ampler and loftier dimensions than before. The sacrifices, with all the rest of the service, could be performed in it again exactly as they had been performed of old; and in order that the daily offerings of the priests might go on without interruption, the great king had granted the necessary funds from the public treasury, probably only as a small compensation for the former immunity from taxes enjoyed by all the laud and other property of the priests. Thus, down even to certain details, which will be more minutely described hereafter, the whole constitution of the ancient true religion was fully organized. The priests and Levites, too, were now re-established, as far as possible, according to their ancient regulations. We have distinct information, for example, of the reinstitution henceforth of the twenty-four divisions of the priests who undertook the special duties of the Temple service in rotation week by week. Once more, just as of old, the God of Israel, like a mighty king, had a great stronghold in the consecrated centre of his people, and a sacred service furnished at every moment by many hundreds of superior and inferior priests, with fire, sacrifice, and vigil; and its uniform and unbroken continuance, with the utmost readiness and devotion, night and day, appeared to ensure the continuance of the grace of God himself and of the life of the whole people.

But in spite of all this the Temple of Zerubbabel stood far below that of Solomon in point of splendor, and the rich contributions for which they had hoped from foreign countries were far from corresponding eventually to their expectations. The priests, however, in the prayers which accompanied the daily sacrifices in the Temple, were bound expressly to include the great king, although in every respect he simply tolerated this religion, without in any way promoting it or even himself professing it. It is quite true, moreover, that now, if times were at all tolerable, individuals might once more live in Jerusalem and other parts of the holy land quite comfortably and happily, and in the quiet life of the people during those days personal devoutness ripened into that wonderful depth which is the fairest fruit of the age, and of which we still possess monuments of a significance that can never die. Yet it was not easy to infuse a genuine cheerfulness and unclouded hopefulness into the general national life and all its public manifestations. To this the following circumstance bears evidence. Some two years before the completion of the Temple, an embassy came from Bethel to the priests and prophets at the Temple, to ask whether the annual days of mourning already mentioned ought still to be observed or not? On this occasion the prophet Zechariah pronounced the striking decision that no one ought to imagine that by compulsory fasts and mourning they could compel God; and that since the great misery of the people was now over, it would be better to change the days of annual mourning into days of thanksgiving. This advice may even have been followed during the first years in which the Temple was rising again to completeness from its ruins; but we know with certainty that the oppressed and sullen spirit of the age soon ceased to pay much attention to those great truths proclaimed by Zechariah, that excessive fasting and mourning came more and more into favor with the people, and that at least one annual day of mourning continued to be observed in commemoration of the destruction of Jerusalem, as though to keep the fact constantly in mind that the new Jerusalem was still conscious how far it stood below its proud recollections of the past and its hopes of a better future.

One thing, however, of the utmost consequence for all future ages was absolutely settled by the time that the foundations of the new kingdom of Yahveh were completed. This kingdom, which aspired to become anew the local centre of all the worshippers of Yahveh, and which never relinquished, at least in the most secret recesses of its heart, any of the lofty claims of its antiquity, was nevertheless to remain closely limited, both in territory and population. It is true that at the end of these twenty years it had surmounted satisfactorily enough the first period of growth and self-formation, which is always the most full of danger. For this at least it still retained enough of the pure divine strength which descended as a legacy from the heroic period of its antiquity and also resulted from the profound change and improvement produced by the Captivity, and still fanned so effectually by genuine prophets. Even the first hardships of the commencement—that bitter sowing of tears—had enriched the soil with heavenly seed, and even the unexpected hindrances from without had been most wonderfully converted into helps. We cannot fail to note that one of the reasons why the new Jerusalem remained so quiet at the beginning of the reign of Darius was that it had suffered so much from both its previous rulers; or to perceive how easy it was for it to secure the good-will of its new master, while at the very moment it lived to see, not without a thrill of joy, the heavy twofold penalty inflicted in the first years of the reign of Darius on its mortal adversary Babylon, which seemed always to have been treated by Cyrus with an excess of leniency, for twice repeated violent and stubborn insurrection against the Persian supremacy. But although the new community might rejoice in the only way still open to it, viz. in a purely spiritual sense, over the fall of Babylun, which at length became an accomplished fact, as the last of the great victories of the age, yet its position was not in any respect altered by it.

The decree of Cyrus had indeed permitted Jerusalem to have a great sanctuary once more, and its inhabitants, in accordance with the custom of antiquity, claimed inviolability for their whole territory. Yet in spite of this, the wild campaigns of Cambyses against Egypt probably did not respect it, and may thus have called forth the bitter lamentations already mentioned; and even Darius, from all that we know, did not concede this privilege to the district now adorned by the splendor of the Temple, which therefore continued, even in the holy land itself, to be simply one of many sanctuaries. But if once the past glory were restored, the feelings and, under favourable circumstances, the courage and activity also of the members of the new kingdom of Yahveh would be once more roused irresistibly by the strong desire to obtain the public acknowledgment of the inviolability of all the district appertaining to Jerusalem.

From this sanctuary and its sacred territory they would at any rate seek to extend their sway over the whole of the ancient holy land. They would attempt to restrain the partially or wholly heathen religions which had long been allowed to spread and take root in it unchecked, and would endeavour to draw more and more closely together into the bond of the unity of the true religion and its kingdom the highly diversified populations which now covered the land in more motley variety than ever before. The history of the succeeding centuries will teach us how these efforts could never be repressed until the very end of the whole history of the nation, and what great results they attained. But we are already in a position to understand that they were nevertheless unable to reach their full measure of achievement. We have seen what far more powerful impulses were counteracting them from the first.

IV

THE DESCENDANTS AND SUCCESSORS OF ZERUBBABEL AND JOSHUA. THE HIGH-PRIESTS.

Of Zerubbabel's death, or of how long he lived after the consecration of the Temple, we have no trustworthy record. But much as this omission is to be regretted, we have far more reason to lament that the single historical work of antiquity on these centuries of the Persian supremacy which has been preserved, passes in absolute silence over the whole of the period between this sixth year of Darius, 516 BC, and the seventh of Artaxerxes Macrocheir, 459 BC, in which Ezra's history begins. It is impossible that a period of fifty-seven years can originally have been so entirely empty of important events, especially in the ease of a kingdom which, though without any high degree of independence, and still very weak and small, was nevertheless placed in a position so entirely novel and peculiar, and was besides animated by a spirit so unique as that of the new Jerusalem at the time of which we speak.

The most necessary foundations of further growth and progress on the part of the new settlement were indeed secured already, and the first wants of the new kingdom of Yahveh were satisfied. In other respects, however, hardly a single point in the grand and mighty scheme for which the inmost soul of the new kingdom was struggling, could be said as yet to be firmly established.

All the earlier efforts and pretensions of the ancient kingdom of Yahveh were revivified by the appearance of a new state; and, though the difficulties which surrounded the beginning of the undertaking and the unexpected troubles of the past quarter of a century had hitherto prevented them from rising up with sufficient freedom, yet now that on the completion of the building of the Temple quieter and more settled times had come, they would be tempted to put themselves forth with greater force.

We have already seen the Messianic hopes gathering strength round Zerubbabel. We have therefore every reason to suppose that these fifty-seven years of the new kingdom of Yahveh did not go by in such perfect calm, and so entirely free from movement within or without; but we are unable now to fill in the gap left by the Chronicler, even from other historical works. The history of Esther does indeed fall into the time of Xerxes; but it hinges on a perfectly isolated question concerning the general fate of the Judeans who were subject to heathen masters, and has no special reference to the new Jerusalem; and for that reason we shall not discuss it until further on, at the point at which the general fortunes of the scattered Judeans rise into importance once more.

Fl. Josephus, again, found nothing in the authorities at his command to enable him in any way to make good this deficiency. He does indeed quote a passage in his latest work, as if to stake up for the omission, in which the old Greek poet Choerilus, describing the nationalities marching against the Greeks in the great unity of Xerxes, sketches a wondrous race, the Phonician-speaking Solymi, dwelling upon the mountains and by the broad sea, with sun-burned heads, hair clipped all round, and wearing visors on them of smoke-cured horse-hide. These Solymi Josephus tacitly assumes to be the inhabitants of Jerusalem in the neighbourhood of the Dead Sea.

Now it is conceivable enough that Xerxes, who made such claims upon the assistance of the sea-going Phoenicians in this campaign, had also included Judeans among his levies, for we know from other sources that they were not exempt from liability to serve under the Persians, and indeed we might take this for granted. But, beyond this we know nothing of this levy under Xerxes, and Josephus evidently allowed himself to be misled simply by the name. Up to the age immediately preceding Christ, the Greeks knew of no Solymi, except those of Lycia, famous even in Homer's time. These may very well have spoken a Phoenician, i.e. a Semitic language. But it is equally certain that the abbreviation of Jerusalem into Solyma does not occur before the period of the Ptolemies, as will be shown below.

It is no less surprising, however, that we know of no single descendant of Zerubbabel who in after times filled his office of Persian Tirshatha. The Chronicler does indeed give an exact list of his posterity up to the close of the Persian period, so that they must still have been known and respected in Jerusalem up to that date; and this is only what we should naturally expect in the case of this scion of the house of David and the descendants of such a man as Zerubbabel; but he nowhere hints that anyone of them was ever invested with Zerubbabel's office. Yet it seems so obvious an arrangement that the honor should devolve upon his sons. Nor would this have been a solitary example in the extensive dominions of the great king of a former royal family receiving the hereditary dignity of vassal king and sovereign of a special territory, and even maintaining itself in its exercise through the whole duration of the Persian empire. If, moreover, any family of that time had a right to expect this hereditary prerogative, it was surely the family of David, which numbered a long line of most illustrious ancestors, and had under Cyrus and Darius been restored, sofar as circumstances admitted, in the person of Zerubbabel from transient obscurity to honor and glory.

Now, although there are no historical works which enable us to solve this riddle, further research does bring to light certain other remains of this period, which prove on close inspection quite sufficient to supply the key to it, as far as can be expected in the absence of any more explicit narrative. I allude to Pss. 132 and 99, in which we possess two great songs of a highly remarkable character. Full of the most touching sighs for fresh salvation and deliverance for Jerusalem, they resemble each other closely in other respects, and are further distinguished by this peculiarity, that each must have been composed by a descendant of David himself. The indications are very clear that they neither of them belong to all earlier period than that of the new Jerusalem; and it is equally plain that Ps.132. is somewhat the older of the two. It is, moreover, an exceedingly tender and refilled poem, and prays only in such general terms for the higher welfare of Jerusalem, her priests, and the poet himself, who gives himself to be understood as the rightful heir of David, that we may suppose it to have been composed by Zerubbabel towards the close of his life.

What great misfortune it was which had then fallen upon the city we cannot clearly gather; but we see that though the Temple was rebuilt, yet all the priestly order and the rest of the population which gathered around it were in a state of unusual depression. On the other hand, the descendant of David who composed Ps. 99, a poem of greater length, seems already plunged deep in the heaviest sufferings; he himself and his people have become the scorn of their neighbours, they have been defeated by them in war, and Jerusalem itself has been conquered. By the side of this poem appears a series of others front other hands. They depict Jerusalem as suffering the bitterest insults and injuries at the hands of the neighbouring peoples, the Temple itself violated, the whole land laid waste, and, in particular, all its houses of prayer destroyed; and in an agony of supplication in every variety of form they either seek to draw forth the Divine sympathy or already anticipate and promise it. There can be no doubt that the country sustained at that time some great and continuous calamities of this kind; and from the relations subsisting during the twenty years preceding, which have been explained above, we can easily understand that they could only proceed from the neighbouring peoples, and would touch most sensitively the contemporary representative of the house of David. Now, whether Zerubbabel himself lived long enough to witness this misery in his last years, or whether it was only his son who composed Ps. 99, we may at any rate assign this crisis to some part of the long reign of Darius, or, at the latest, of his son Xerxes; nor have we the smallest ground for denying in the abstract that a bitter crisis of this kind did ensue within that period.

The effort which shot up afresh in the new kingdom of Yahveh to reassert ancient pretensions and ancient supremacy was in itself a force constantly tending more and more powerfully to bring it on; and we cannot be surprised that the Persian court allowed the neighbouring peoples to quench these pretensions in blood, and henceforth suffered the house of David to fall into neglect. We cannot now trace the course of events in detail, but we know for certain that the walls and gates of Jerusalem layin ruins until the arrival of Nehemiah, so that no one can have had courage to rebuild them until his time. All the surrounding nations, moreover, were now watching most eagerly for opportunities of plunging Jerusalem still deeper in weakness and dishonor, as we clearly see from Nehemiah's history, which will soon be elucidated. Of the continuous tension of the relations with the Samaritans, Idumeans, and other neighbours, there is abundant evidence.

Under these circumstances, it was natural that the whole position of the new Jerusalem and its Temple should assume a more definite shape. Jerusalem and its territory no doubt still retained a governor of their own, whether of Judean or foreign extraction. He was, as we might expect, subject to the governor-general of Syria in questions of importance; but there was, besides, an official reporter (so to speak) of Judean birth, who resided at the court, and was the great king's immediate adviser in matters relating, to this province and its people. The governor was assisted in his administration by the advice of the nobles and elders. But he was liable to be removed at any moment; and, except in purely religious concerns, the community possessed no further independence. This was the end of even that shadow of autonomy under foreign supremacy which had risen again under Zerubbabel; and it was now irrevocably decreed that this community, united on its ancient fatherland, must for the present either content itself with securing permanent independence and development on the basis of its peculiar religion alone, or else disappear entirely. Once reduced to this inexorable alternative, its choice could no longer be doubtful. Too healthy as yet were its efforts, and too grand and imperative the future towards which it had an innate tendency, and the pure hope of which upheld it still through all its difficulties. But instead of a Zerubbabel, far other men were needed to call forth and protect the blessings which were now most indispensable for its well-being.

The office of high-priest remained henceforth hereditary in the house of Joshua, the colleague of Zerubbabel, described above, though certainly without the knowledge of the Persians at first, simply because the ancient religion allowed it to be so, and now even sanctioned it by the Pentateuch. Thus a kind of hereditary dignity, at the same time new and of primeval antiquity, rose unperceived in the community, once more. In the entire absence of any other continuous authority of national extraction, it could put forth the more strength in support of its unity and permanence, and at the same time it afforded the first fixed centre round which the hagiocracy, which had hardly disclosed itself distinctly until now, could group itself. But every hereditary dignity, and especially the high-priesthood, gradually loses, from the very fact of its being inherited so quietly, much of the pure strength and activity which characterise it at first; nor was every high-priest equal to the new and difficult problems which the times produced. The consequence was that as soon as the office had by degrees acquired considerable importance and attracted the attention of the supreme authorities, it always remained subject to their dictation. This state of things continued all through the Persian age, and even lasted into the Greek supremacy.

Nor was it until the dignities of high-priest and prince were united in the person of the Asmonean Jonathan that the conditions of the office were essentially altered. Thus the thread of history could not be attached even to the hereditary succession of high-priests in the same way that it had been connected with that of the kings of Judah or Israel. Even in civic life, their government supplied no dates: the Persian and then the Greek eras continued the only chronologies in use. This also explains the fact that when, from the standpoint of the later high-priests who had become princes and kings of the nation, it was thought desirable to review and settle the chronology of their predecessors, the attempt could only he carried out with great difficulty, and was not very successful after all.

The Chronicler gives the list of high-priests in due succession up to his own time, but without any dates. Fl. Josephus, in a survey of all the high-priests of Israel from the time of Moses to that of Nero, states that between Cyrus and Antiochus Eupatorr (that is, from 538 to 161 BC at the outside), there were fifteen high-priests of the same family, beginning from Joshua, who ruled for 414 years; but although in the course of his history he mentions several of these fifteen, and attempts to assign them to their proper dates, yet he never defines accurately the time during which each of them held office individually, and, in recording the earlier names, he expresses himself in reference to this only in very general terms. In some cases, especially among the later members of the series, whose power increased with the progress of the hagiocracy, it was certainly known with sufficient accuracy how long they had individually been in office; but when at last the attempt was made to continue the thread of general government in Israel through them, and to fix them all firmly in the great network of universal chronology, the extremely arbitrary and contradictory manner in which the records had to be dealt with, shows how little dependence could be placed on the sources of information available for the purpose.

But the rapidity with which, as we have seen, the descendants of David sank into almost complete obscurity, and the want of success which attended the efforts of the high-priests to restore a real and permanent government, allowed the self-sacrificing activity of individuals who rose up from among the people to exercise a more powerful and beneficent influence than would otherwise have been possible. Soon enough the right men were found to render to the young community, in its continued weakness and disorganisation, the twofold services with which it could no longer permanently dispense. Another subject, however, claims our first consideration.

V.

LATER VIEWS OF ZERUBBAREL AND HIS TIME.

In all times and places, the character of a man who is prominent in his own day strikes deepest into the national consciousness of posterity under that aspect in which it last appeared as he passed from earth. If, then, Zerubbabel, round whose head Messianic hopes had played in the early days of Jerusalem's rise, met with the gloomy end we have conjectured above, we need not wonder that his memory soon paled and in later times grew more and more obscure. However certain it may be that he ought to be regarded as the most prominent man of the first five-and-twenty years of the new Jerusalem, yet beyond the few broad features of his life and work described above we know nothing of him from trustworthy historical sources.

When the Temple was consecrated on its completion, an event which took place almost at the end of the first quarter of a century of this new epoch, he was certainly still living. If, as is probable on many grounds, he was the author of the wonderfully profound Ps. 138, in which we hear the language of a man of princely family, thoroughly penetrated by the most exalted feelings excited at the fairest moment of this time, marked as it was by new aspiration and fresh and noble hope, we may then affirm that this descendant of David, as poet, also, must have been worthy of his great ancestor; and we shall understand still more fully how it was that he became the firmest support of the feeble steps of the new Judah, even though fate forbade him to mount the throne of David itself, and finally cast him deeper and deeper down.

But when in the Greek times the recollection of the Persian period in general, and of its opening years in particular, retreated further into the distance, and at the same time the freedom of historical representation degenerated into greater and greater license, the memory of this hero, as well as others, was distorted and defaced in all kinds of ways. We still possess a tolerably large fragment of a strange historical work of this description, and we must now devote to it at least a passing notice. In this book the whole history of the first Persian kings was brought, in the most extravagant style, into the closest connection with the liberation and restoration of Israel, just as if these kings had been in the habit of thinking of the God of Israel and the fate of his people at every critical moment of their lives, and the history of the whole world had strictly hinged, in consequence, upon the changes of its lot. And since nothing remained so firmly planted in the general mind as the recollection of the fact that Cyrus had granted permission for the building of the Temple, but that it had not been actually accomplished before the reign of Darius, this loose style of narrative concocted on this basis the following story. Cyrus, before his attack on Babylon, vowed to God that if he were victorious he would release Israel and restore the sacred vessels of the Temple; but for some reason or other the latter promise was not redeemed. When Darius, therefore, had (as we know) to attack and conquer Babylon a second time, he, too, vowed to God his willingness to rebuild Jerusalem and its Temple and to send back the sacred vessels; but he also subsequently failed to perform his vow.

So once on a time there happened to be three young nobles at the court of Darius, who had agreed, in the exuberance of youthful spirits, to contend for a wager before the king and his assembled council, in discussion on the philosophical question what is the strongest power among men? and the victor was to receive the highest honors. They sealed up their proposals, together with the outline of the argument which each intended to support, and laid them under the pillow of the sleeping king. Darius, on waking, received the papers, and allowed the contest to be held with all solemnity. The first had undertaken to prove that wine was the strongest power among men; the second that it was the king (a trait in full accordance with the very corrupt conceptions of royal prerogative current in the last two centuries before Christ); but the third, who was no other than Zerubbabel, had advanced the twofold proposition that woman was incomparably the strongest power among men, but that stronger still, the strongest absolutely was the truth, i.e. according to its proper meaning in Israel, divine truth.

The king and the three Persian nobles declared the last to be the victor, decreed him the highest honours, and promised to grant him any boon he might ask. Zerubbabel, however, requested nothing more than that Darius would perform his own vows and those of Cyrus with regard to Jerusalem and the Temple. Then, at last, full concessions were obtained front Darius, the new constitution and the immunities of Jerusalem and the Temple, with its priestly and other servants, were established, and Zerubbabel, at the head of a great band of exiles, arrived in the holy land.—The author of this work was tolerably well acquainted with the traditions of Persian history; but he certainly wrote no earlier than in the last century before Christ, and his object probably was to secure to Judea the favour of a Ptolemaic or other heathen power.

Now, however great the interval between the pictures and stories of this production (which was, no doubt, of considerable dimensions) and the traditions and records of the earlier works, yet the Greek author of the book commonly known as the Apocryphal or third book of Ezra undertook to put together a new work from both these sources. This Hellenist was either himself a translator of the books of Chronicles, or else (being only a Greek editor) he found them translated already, but assumed the liberty of working up together two such very different productions as the narrative of the Chronicler and the story-book just mentioned. From the latter he took the long piece descriptive of Zerubbabel as a page at the court of Darius, and then rearranged the passages of the Chronicler, caring little whether the result was an adequate and consistent account or not. Since a book which related the rise of the new Jerusalem might suitably commence with the last glorious days of the former city, our author begins his quotations from the work of the Chronicler with the description of the last great feast in Josiah's time; but the work breaks off abruptly in the middle of Ezra's life, perhaps because the author himself never finished it. Josephus then followed this incongruous tale; but since he also took as a foundation another later work, according to which Zerubbabel came to Jerusalem under Cyrus, he has contrived to tell a great deal twice over, and has only introduced still greater confusion into the whole history of these five-and­twenty years.

Apart, however, from this fictitious narrative, the memory of Zerubbabel, as well as of his priestly colleague Joshua, remained in later times without fruit. Yet, as it was seen that he was glorified in the prophetic book of Zechariah as a distinguished descendant of David, a rabbinical writer of the early Middle Ages thought his name available as a mask for the publication of a short apocalypse on the certainty of the ultimate appearance of the Messiah son of David, on his precursor the Messiah son of Joseph, and on their friends and foes.

B.

EZRA THE SCRIBE AND THE GOVERNOR NEHEMIAH.