IV Micah

IV Micah

IV Micah(TOC)

The prophecy of Micah shares with that of Zechariah the distinction of having been among the first to which the modern hypothesis of post-exilic expansion and redaction was applied. Stade's study on Deutero-Zechariah, wherein the author disclosed his program for the new critical treatment of the prophetic writings, appeared as the opening article in the periodical which has been edited by him since 1881, theZeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, and in the next installment of the same year this was followed by his "Observations on the Book of Micah." Owing to this early presentation of the case, Stade's proposals in reference to Micah have received more elaborate and exhaustive discussion, both from his own standpoint and from that opposed to his hypothesis, than any other question brought to the front by the recent development of prophetic criticism. Apart from current articles and views expressed in works on Introduction and in the latest commentaries, the controversy has called forth two extended monographs on our subject, that of Ryssel,Investigations on the State of the Text and the Authenticity of the Book of Micah(1887), and that of Elhorst,The Prophecy of Micah(1891), the former a German, the latter a Dutch treatise. In both not merely are the points at issue examined, but likewise a full survey is given of the history of modern critical opinion up to the date of publication. Since, however, neither of these two books has appeared in an English translation, it will not be superfluous to give a brief outline of the course taken by the discussion, before we endeavor to estimate its bearing upon the contest between the old and the new conception of prophetism and of its place in Old Testament history.

Stade was not the first who denied to Micah the authorship of a considerable part of the book bearing his name. Ewald, in the second edition of hisProphets of the Old Covenant(1867), assigned Chapters 6 and 7 to the time of Manasseh on account of the totally different historical and religious situation reflected in them. Though admitting that the chronology does not absolutely require this, yet for reasons found in the dramatic form, the style and the language of this section, Ewald thinks that not Micah, but some other prophet is the writer. In reference to chapter 2:12, 13, also, this critic anticipated the later conclusions by assuming that these verses are a marginal annotation either from the hand of Micah himself, or from an ancient reader, and that they are intended to illustrate the kind of false prophesying referred to in verse 11. [186] While the latter view, in this specific form, was soon shown to be untenable, Ewald's opinion about a part at least of chapter 7 received the support of Wellhausen. Wellhausen discriminates between 6:1-7:6, on the one hand, and 7:7-20, on the other. While not positively committing himself for or against the derivation of the former section from Micah, he finds that 7:7-20 is plainly written from a standpoint about a century later than the time of Manasseh and presupposes the exile, and that the obvious affinity between it and Isaiah 40 goes to support this judgment. [187]

Meanwhile among Dutch critics a discussion had arisen in reference to Chapters 4 and 5, which in a somewhat similar manner forestalled the views subsequently developed by Stade on this section of the book. In vol. 5 of theTheologisch Tijdschrift(1871), Oort published an article on "The Beth-Ephrathah of Micah 5:1. " Attaching himself to the conjectural emendation of this verse proposed by Roorda, so as to make it read, "And thouhouse of Ephrathah," instead of "And thouBethlehem Ephrathah," Oort infers from Genesis 35:16 seq., 48:7, [188] 1 Samuel 10:2 and Jeremiah 31:15, that there was an Ephrath in the territory of Benjamin, and that it is this Ephrath that is meant in the emended text of the prophet. He further identifies the "house of Ephrathah" with the house of Saul, and on the basis of this identification makes Micah predict the rejection of the Davidic dynasty, and the return of that of Saul to power in the person of the victorious ruler of the future. In the light of this interpretation, Oort then finds in the Migdal 'Eder of 4:8 another place in Benjamin[189] associated with the house of Saul, so that this verse contains the same promise concerning the restoration of this house as 5:1. But, these two fixed points being given, it follows that 4:8 brings the contrast to 3:12 Zion to be plowed as a field—the Benjaminite Migdal 'Eder to rise to royal glory. What stands between must therefore be an interpolation. Similarly 4:11-13 breaks the connection between verse 10 and verse 14, and thereby proves itself foreign to the original prophecy. These two excised pieces form a continuous oracle of one of those false prophets so severely denounced by Micah. Micah's genuine discourse consists of 3:12, 4:8-10, 14, 5:1 seq. [190]

This hypothesis of Oort was subjected to a searching criticism by Kuenen in the next volume of the same periodical (1872). The article is written in Kuenen's best vein, and may be cited not only as a masterpiece of that objective, incisive, luminous treatment of a difficult problem in which the author stands unrivaled, but also as one of the few instances where the arguments advanced are so final and convincing as to leave the opposing view beyond all possibility of resuscitation. The attempted exegesis and analysis are shown to be impossible as well as unfounded. Kuenen does not offer any new theory of his own. In regard to 4:11-13 he recognizes the difficulty of reconciling the situation there presupposed with that reflected in the verses preceding. But even here he does not turn the obscurity of the connection into a plea for denying the genuineness of the passage. It is further to be observed that incidentally in his argument Kuenen quotes from the concluding section of the book as from a prophecy of Micah, which leads us to infer that at the time he had not adopted the view of Ewald. [191]

Here the matter rested for almost ten years. The controversy was renewed along the whole line by the above-mentioned publication of Stade. Although this critic from the outset confined himself to chapter 2:12, 13, and Chapters 4, 5, being evidently of the opinion that the question of the two closing chapters of the book had been finally disposed of by Ewald, yet in the course of the discussion it soon appeared that even this later section had not yet ceased, in the opinion of at least some liberal critics, to be debatable ground. In regard to 2:12, 13, Stade undertakes to show that the symmetrical structure of the context in which these verses are placed requires their expulsion and proves the necessity of connecting 3:1 with 2:11. As to its contents, the passage has nothing in common with the Messianic utterances of Isaiah, but resembles rather Jeremiah 31:8 and Isaiah 52:12. It presupposes that Israel is in dispersion and must be gathered into a flock. All this leads him to declare these verses an exilic or post-exilic insertion from the hand of one who lived in the circle of ideas of Deutero-Isaiah. Stade also tries to assign a motive for this insertion. The interpolator may have referred 2:8-10 to crimes perpetrated on fugitives from Northern-Israel, or may have desired to place his own words about the gathering of Israel from among the Gentiles in contrast with verse 9, where the taking away of Jehovah's glory from the young children means to drive them into idolatry by ejection from Jehovah's land.

Much more complicated is Stade's hypothesis in reference to Chapters 4 and 5. It may be briefly stated as follows: 4:1-4, 11-5:4a, 6-14 reveal their close connection by the conception of the "many nations" which they have in common. But this is a conception belonging distinctly to the post-Ezekielian development of prophecy; consequently we must assume that at some date after the exile the three pieces just named were added as a continuous discourse to the genuine work of Micah. The motive for this insertion lay in the one-sidedness of the prophecy of judgment in Chapters 1-3. [192] At a still later time some one who attributed the whole thus obtained to Micah wondered at the absence of all reference to the Babylonian exile, as an episode intervening between the prophet's own historical standpoint and the eschatological era to which the attack of the many nations on Jerusalem belongs. To fill this gap in the assumed perspective of Micah, the two passages 4:5-10 and 5:4b, 5, were composed and inserted. The final arrangement of the inserted material was determined by the desire to make 4:1-4 contrast with 3:12.

From three quarters these proposals received at least, a partial support, although the particular elements of the hypothesis accepted or dissented from were in each case different. First. Giesebrecht expressed himself to the effect that even before the publication of Stade's views he had become convinced of the spuriousness of chapter 4, but could not agree with the rejection of chapter 5. [193] In replying to this, [194] Stade endeavors to strengthen his position as regards chapter 5 by an extended discussion of the reference to Bethlehem in verse 1, as well as by an attempt to show that the polemic against the Asherim and Mazzeboth in verses 12, 13, proves this passage to be later than the reformation of King Josiah. On the former point it is interesting to observe that Stade seems unaware of the thorough manner in which the Ephrath-question had been sifted and conclusively settled once for all by Kuenen in the criticism of Oort above referred to (1872). Kuenen's presentation of the case, though written eleven years before, will serve equally well as an answer to the German critic, who infers from the identification of Bethlehem and Ephrathah that the prophecy must be post-exilic, as to his Dutch predecessor, who thought that Micah, because speaking of Ephrath, must have expected a deliverer from the house of Saul—for both contentions rest on the common basisthat in the pre-exilic period only a Benjaminitic Ephrath was known, and it was precisely this basis which Kuenen had effectually destroyed.

Second among the critics to accept Stade' s conclusions was Cornill. But while agreeing with him as to Chapters 4 and 5, Cornill takes occasion from this avowal to revive the whole question concerning 6:1-7:6, the debate on which Stade had treated as definitely closed by Ewald's and Wellhausen's arguments. In his opinion, 6:1 reads as a justification of 3:12, and everything in 6:1-7:6, which had been applied to the reign of Manasseh, will apply equally well to the time of Ahaz, not excepting 6:7, so that from a chronological point of view no objection can be raised against Micah's authorship. Cornill declares that the origin of the book becomes a riddle to him, if after chapter 3 nothing is from the hand of the prophet, for to neutralize the pessimism of Chapters 1-3, the addition of Chapters 4 and 5 fully sufficed, and for appending a second piece no further motive existed. In his view the book consists of three genuine parts, to each of which a later prophecy has been joined, viz., Chapters 1-2:11, with the appendix 2:12, 13; chapter 3 with the appendix Chapters 4 and 5; Chapters 6-7:6, with the appendix 7:7-20. [195]

The third, who accepted Stade's results on some points, while taking issue with him on others, was Nowack. [196] The agreement, however, extends no further than 2:12, 13, whereas on almost every point of Chapters 4 and 5 the validity of Stade's arguments is denied. The latter's analysis is found faulty: 4:11-13 do not require 5:1-3, indeed leave nothing to be done by the Messiah; 5:2 even disagrees with the former passage in which no "giving up" is assumed; 4:11 seq. similarly contradicts 5:6 seq., because in the latter only a remnant appears as being saved; finally 4:11-13 also clash with 3:12. Consequently these verses, instead of forming a unit with 4:1-4 and 4:14-5:3, 6-14, as Stade had contended, must, according to Nowack, be considered a later insertion which introduces a disharmonious element into the context. [197] Of the remainder Nowack upholds the genuineness, except of the words lbb d( t)bw in 4:10, which are declared a gloss; 5:4, 5, which he considers interpolated; and 4:5-8, in regard to which he is non-committal. The motive for inserting the gloss in verse 10 and for adding verses 5-8, must be sought in the contradiction which was felt to exist between Micah's prophecy of Jerusalem's conquest by the Assyrian and the actual outcome of events. As this will not apply to 5:4, 5, Nowack confesses his inability to explain the insertion of these verses. The conclusion of the article is directed against Cornill's attempt to save the genuineness of 6:1-7:6.

In a brief statement immediately subjoined to Nowack's article, Stade replied to the latter's arguments, and upheld the soundness of his hypothesis. Among those who expressed dissent from the new conclusions was Reuss. [198] Robertson Smith also held to Chapters 1-5 as a single well-connected book, with the qualification that in chapter 4:8 the words, "thou shalt come unto Babylon," and the whole of chapter 4:11-13, are interpolated, and that 2:12, 13, require at least to be transposed. [199] Cheyne contented himself with assuming the later origin of 4:5-10, 5:4, 5. [200] A more hearty defense of the genuineness not merely of the material attacked in Chapters 4 and 5, but of the contents of the book as a whole, was made by Ryssel in his treatise mentioned at the beginning of this article. Here all the objections made to Micah's authorship from the various quarters of the critical side are carefully collected and exhaustively investigated. Ryssel's treatment so fully takes into account all possibilities of the problem that it may be considered the final word on the question from the conservative standpoint.

A new departure was inaugurated by Elhorst, who proposed to remove all difficulties by assuming that the prophecy was at one time written in sections forming two parallel columns on the same page. A later copyist, instead of taking first a section from the right-hand column and next one from the left-hand column, as had been the order in which the writer wished his manuscript, to be read, put all the sections of the first column and all the sections of the second column together. The following table will make plain what is, according to Elhorst, the original arrangement of the prophecy, and how from it, in his opinion, the present disorder arose:

It will be perceived that Elhorst does not draw chapter 1 within the scope of his hypothesis. He further thinks that Chapters 6 and 7 originally preceded Chapters 4 and 5, and accounts for their present position by the additional hypothesis that some copyist found the prophecy on four pieces containing chapter 1, Chapters 2, 3, Chapters 6, 7, Chapters 4, 5, respectively. By mistaking the sequence of the third and fourth pieces he made them exchange places. A misunderstanding on the part of still another copyist is assumed to explain the displacement of 7:13. While in principle accepting Stade's view of a post-exilic redaction of the genuine prophecy, Elhorst is much more moderate than Stade in its application. Even Chapters 6 and 7 in their entirety are vindicated to Micah. The only piece given to the later writer is chapter 4:9-14 + 5:8. This must be post-exilic, Elhorst thinks, because it predicts an attack upon Jerusalem subsequent to the Babylonian captivity. [201]

Between the discussions of Ryssel and Elhorst falls the appearance of vol. 2 of the new edition of Kuenen'sHistorisch-Kritisch Onderzoek(1889). Here Stade's hypothesis is still characterized as "a most singular opinion," the validity of his arguments derived from the universalism in 4:1-3, from the identification of Bethlehem and Ephrathah in 5:1, from the polemic against the Mazzeboth and the Asherim in 5:9-14, is denied. At the same time the influence of Stade's criticism is perceptible in the admission that in chapter 4:6-8 the captivity and the cessation of Israel's national existence form the point of departure of the prophecy, whilst also 4:11-13 leave the Assyrian period far behind and remind us of Ezekiel 38, seq., and Zechariah 12, 14. With much hesitation Kuenen concludes that 4:9 seq., 14-5:5, 6-8, (also 9-14, in a less pronounced form than the present one) may have descended from Micah. Of a later exilic and post-exilic date are 4:6-8, 11-13, and the redaction of 5:9-14. Chapters 6:1-7:6 was written in all probability during the reign of Manasseh, but not by Micah. The close of the book, 7:7-20, translates us into the Babylonian captivity. [202]

Though this position of Kuenen marks a considerable advance beyond that taken seventeen years before in his debate with Oort, it was soon rendered conservative by the steady movement of criticism toward the denial of Micah's connection with Chapters 4 and 5 in toto. [203] Wellhausen in 1892 finds that 2:12, 13, presuppose the exile and the diaspora and simply prefixes to 4:1-5:14 the title of appendix. The only passage in reference to which he makes serious reserve is 5:9-13. This, he admits, might without difficulty be assigned to Micah. Curiously enough even here Wellhausen seems to be non-committal in regard to the authorship of 6:1-7:6; 6:1-6, he says, fit excellently into the time of Manasseh and that Micah wrote them is not impossible. On the other hand, in 7:1-6 marks of affinity with Malachi and the Psalms are pointed out. Cheyne, in the introduction to Robertson Smith'sThe Prophets of Israel(1895), thinks that "with regard to the Book of Micah, it is becoming more and more doubtful whether more than two or three fragments of the heterogeneous collection of fragments in Chapters 4-7 can have come from that prophet." Volz recognizes no more than 4:9-10a, 14; 5:9-14, as genuine remnants. The last-mentioned passage bears, however, at present, a different meaning from that intended by the prophet, who simply predicted the destruction of military power and of cultic objects because in these the national life was embodied, and not from any reform motive. In verse 14 he thinks that not the Gentiles but Judah was threatened by the prophet in the original form of the verse. Volz is also willing to admit that in 5:4 seq. there may be hidden some genuine words of Micah, but these are now beyond the possibility of restoration. Chapters 2:12 seq., 4:6 seq., 10b-13, 5:6-8, are of one author and exilic: they were inserted to break the force of the genuine predictions of doom in whose neighborhood they stand, while for the same purpose 5:9-14 was rewritten. Chapter 4:1-4 was probably added in the time of Deutero-Isaiah. A post-exilic poet interpolated 4:8, 5:1, 3, 4a. Still later accretions are 4:5 and 5:4 seq. Volz acknowledges that in regard to the details of the composition of chapter 4 seq., no certainty can be reached. But that the greater part does not come from Micah is absolutely certain in his view.

In conclusion of this historical review the present views of Nowack, as formulated in the volume from his hand on the Minor Prophets in theHandkommentar zum Alten Testament, should be noticed. As stated above, in 1884 this critic entered the lists against Stade, not merely in opposition to the latter's analysis, but equally to defend the genuineness of the greater part of Chapters 4 and 5. It is significant of the drift of present-day criticism toward the acceptance of Stade's principles that in this newest exposition of Micah all the fundamental points, which the author had contested with such skill and vigor thirteen years before, are now abandoned. To be sure, Nowack still endeavors to vindicate 4:9, 10a, 14 + 5:9-13 for Micah, but even this is qualified and greatly weakened by a "perhaps." Besides, from a doctrinal point of view the retention of these fragments is quite unimportant, whereas the surrender of the other pieces is of far-reaching consequence. Still more significant, however, is the fact that this change of opinion is not justified by any refutation of the author's own former arguments. Apparently the difference between now and then is due to the greater force with which thea prioriprinciples of Stade's method appeal to the critical consciousness of the times. The facts have remained what they were, but the relative weight of all objective data has decreased in the same proportion as the idea of development has become the predominating factor in shaping the modern views on prophetism and the prophetic literature.

We now proceed to consider the bearing of the disintegration of Micah's book on the main principles of the critical hypothesis and also thea posteriorigrounds, which, it is claimed, justify the analysis. The discussion divides itself into three parts. Within the limits of Chapters 1-3 only one passage is involved, viz., 2:12, 13. Here it is the Messianic element (whether in the wider impersonal or in the specific personal sense depends on the exegesis) whose right to a place among the ideas of Micah is disputed. Of the two following chapters scarcely anything is left intact, and the doctrinal interest at stake concerns four points: (1) The antiquity of the idea of universalism; (2) that of the fully developed Messianic hope; (3) the pre-Ezekielian origin of the eschatological idea of a world-attack upon Zion; (4) the pre-Deuteronomic date of the polemic against certain features of the popular cult. The debate about the authorship of Chapters 6 and 7, finally, derives its Biblico-theological interest from the testimony which the closing section (7:7-20), if genuine, bears to the promissory outlook of early prophecy.

Chapter 2:12, 13, contain the prediction of the reassembling of all Israel and their triumphant breaking forth under the leadership of their king. The grounds on which this passage is pronounced late are partly derived from the contents and partly from the connection. As to the former, it is claimed that the historical situation reflected in these verses is not that of the age of Micah, but of the exile. As to the latter, it is deemed psychologically inconceivable that the prophet himself should have passed without transition from the fierce tone of rebuke and the stern announcement of evil characterizing his previous discourse to the note of comfort and promise which is struck in these verses. It has been suggested that these objections may be removed at one stroke by finding here, instead of an expression of Micah's own hopes, an illustration of the deceitful hopes preached by those false prophets whom, according to verse 11, the people delighted to hear. This view was held long ago by Aben Ezra, and has been revived in modern times by such writers as Roorda, [204] Ewald,[205] Kleinert, [206] and others. But according to 3:11, the false prophets would not even consider the possibility of evil coming upon Israel: by admitting that the people were to be reduced to a remnant they would have in principle passed over to Micah's standpoint, and their further assurance that Israel would be reassembled again cannot have been quoted as a fundamental point of difference between them and the true prophets, unless we assume that the latter positively contradicted every prospect of restoration, which no one will maintain. Nor can verses 12, 13, be said to form an illustration of the kind of prophesying referred to in verse 11. The prophesying "of wine and strong drink" must relate to a promise of more realistic and sensual pleasures than that of the reassembling of scattered Israel.

Even if the proposed solution were not beset with all these difficulties, it would still, just as much as the ordinary exegesis, remain open to the criticism that the situation presupposed is that of the age of the exile. We must, therefore, enquire what force there is in this argument. Of the naive form in which certain writers are wont to press it as if every literary representation of the exile as present must invariably involve its actual historical presence, we may dispose without further ceremony. It is an undeniable fact that in certain instances the prophetic consciousness projects itself into a more or less distant time so as to view future events as present or even past. The only question can be whether the starting-point for such a mental process is given in the general historical perspective of Micah. Now the prophet clearly predicts in the undoubtedly genuine portions of his book a captivity not merely of Ephraim, but also of Judah, on a no less extensive scale than that actually brought about by the Chaldeans. This is indeed denied by Robertson Smith, with whom Cheyne expresses agreement. [207] But what the latter calls a "capital argument" is very far from convincing. The text of chapter 2:5, from which Robertson Smith infers that after the judgment the congregation of Jehovah remains, is highly obscure and uncertain; perhaps the words on which the argument hinges belong to the sixth verse. [208] In verse 4 the whole peopleare made to utter the lamentation that their portion is removed and their fields are divided. Does not this presuppose a national captivity? In 1:16 also the subject, though not explicitly named, can be none other than the personified nation. That the nobility of Israel, "the glory," will flee to the cave of Adullam (1:15) by no means excludes a captivity of the mass. Nothing of course can be inferred from chapter 5:1. Even if we explain the dislike to military equipment and city civilization voiced in 1:13, 5:10, 11, from the prophet's rural sympathies, it by no means gives us the right to infer that his preference for the country districts and their inhabitants must have led him to believe that these would escape from the impending captivity. In general it may be doubted whether, after Amos and Hosea and Isaiah had plainly foretold a deportation of the peopleen masse, and a sort of prophetic tradition had been formed on this point, Micah could have easily introduced a modification in regard to such a standing feature of the prophecy of judgment. If the evidence of exegesis plainly proved this, we should have to accept it; but this is far from being the case. There is no need, therefore, in order to escape the exilic dating of our passage to follow Ryssel's explanation, who maintains that the exiles are not here represented as constituting the whole of Israel, but that the "totality of Jacob," of which the prophet speaks, is the result of the reunion of theGrundstockwhich has remained in Palestine with the exiles returned from among the Gentiles. Decisive against this view is that the assembling evidently takes place in the foreign land, whence also the assembled forces march forth. Ryssel himself so conceives of it, but without reconciling this representation with the exegesis of verse 12 a proposed by him. So far as I see, a reconciliation could be effected only by supplying the thought that theGrundstockfirst march to the foreign land to deliver their exiled brethren, and then, reunited with these, march back to Palestine as described in verse 13. But if such had been the writer's meaning, he could hardly have failed to state it in explicit terms, since the idea, being quite novel, does not readily suggest itself. [209]

It must be granted then, without reserve, that the exile forms the background of the passage under review. But the critics go too far in asserting that this background must be the real historical situation of a later writer, and cannot be the imaginative situation into which Micah projected himself, and out of which he spoke his prophecy of restoration. That the exile as it actually came about fits the description ought certainly not to be used as an argument against its authenticity. Nothing appears which in any way betrays a later standpoint or acquaintance with later facts than those well within the range of vision of the eighth century. Stade indeed thinks that the words reveal affinity to Isaiah 52:15, Jeremiah 31:8, while points of contact with genuine Messianic oracles of Isaiah are lacking. Waiving the question of the exilic origin of Isaiah 52, of course taken for granted by Stade, this critic himself will not claim that the passages cited are the models upon which the writer of Micah 2:12, 13, framed his prophecy. The similarity of thought and expression is of so general a kind that from a mere comparison nothing can be determined about the sequence of the three passages. As to Isaiah, since Stade expressed the above opinion, it has become more and more recognized that the Messianic prophecies in 8:22-9:6 and 11:1-9 have for their background the captivity of the entire remnant of Israel and the cessation of the Davidic dynasty ruling in the prophet's time. There are other utterances of Isaiah, such as 10:20, 11:11, still more closely resembling Micah 2:12, 13, but unfortunately these are excluded by the critics from the genuine work of the prophet.

After having ascertained that in the contents of the passage there is nothing prejudicial to its genuineness, we are qualified to determine more precisely how much weight can be attributed to considerations drawn from its connection with what precedes or follows. Of course, to show that a prophecy might have been spoken or written by Micah is not equivalent to a demonstration that he must be the author. Just as little, however, does a lack of close connection of itself prove the presence of an interpolated piece. It would seem a sound principle of criticism that, in a text where the contents are unobjectionable, three things are required to make out a clear case of interpolation:

(1) it should be shown that no transition of thought is discoverable; (2) that a later writer could have some adequate motive for inserting the passage where it stands; (3) that after its expulsion from the context the preceding and following words make plausible connection. Especially the second and third of these requirements should be rigidly insisted upon. Not to do so would mean to ignore the possibility that some genuine part of a prophetic book may have become displaced and strayed into an environment where it appears foreign to the writer's momentary trend of thought without being foreign in principle to his general circle of ideas. Now turning to the case in hand, we find that the difficulty of explaining the transition from verse 11 to verse 12 furnishes the whole basis of the critical contention. Granting for a moment that this difficulty is in reality as great as it is made out to be, still it is insufficient to prove the later origin of our passage unless the other two conditions are complied with. And this has not been done. First of all, no reasonable motive for the insertion can be discovered. The general explanation, that the later writers used to append their work in such places where they felt the need of taking off the sharp edge of an exceptionally severe prediction of judgment by a qualifying promise, does not apply in this instance. Verse 11 is not the climax of a threatening passage, nor is verse 10 sufficiently severe in its tone to have called for such a remedy. Immediately after 1:16 or 2:5 would have been the proper place for interpolating a promise. Stade has suggested a twofold motive from which the insertion might be explained. He thinks that perhaps some reader referred verses 8-10 to crimes perpetrated on fugitives from northern Israel, and thereby was induced to add a prediction about the gathering of the scattered Ephraimites. Or a contrast to verse 9 may have been intended where the taking away of Jehovah's glory from the young children means to drive them into idolatry by expulsion from Jehovah's land: hence the remnant of Israel receives the promise that it will be gathered from among theGentileswho serve idols. Micah, however, does not use Jacob and Israel elsewhere with specific reference to the northern kingdom. The later writer, therefore, in order to make his meaning plain would have been apt to speak of Ephraim as the subject of the promise. And as to the second suggestion, if such a subtle antithesis had been actually present to his mind, he would surely have stated in so many words that the gathering of verse 12 was to be from among the Gentiles, and would involve the restitution of Jehovah's glory to the exiles. And after all, one cannot help asking if the later writer considered the connection of thought between Micah's words and his own sufficiently lucid, why should not Micah himself have been of the same opinion? If a contrast of this sort is actually implied, there is no reason for asserting that Micah can have had nothing to do with it, except thea priorione that the contrast between threatening and promise is foreign to early prophecy.

But, although no plausible motive can be assigned for an interpolation at this precise juncture, yet we might perhaps be persuaded to assume one in case after the removal of verses 12, 13, the continuity of the discourse left nothing to be desired. This, however, is by no means the case. Chapter 2:11 does not read as if intended to close the section which begins at 2:1 or at 2:6. This is acknowledged by those of the critics who believe that the appended passage has been allowed to extrude the genuine conclusion. If 2:11 and 3:1 were to be closely connected we would expect the prophet to have more formally indicated by the use of a personal pronoun that he considered his own announcement of judgment as the direct opposite to the prophesying of wine and strong drink of the other seers. [210] On the other hand, if verses 12, 13, are genuine words of Micah, the transition from them to 3:1 by means of the simple rm)w is perfectly natural. As C.B. Michaelis[211] has well said, its force may be paraphrased as follows: "But while we are yet but too far away from the longed-for times, which have just been promised, Isayin the meanwhile, viz., in order to complete the list of the iniquities of evil princes and teachers begun in chapter 2. "

Stade has taken special pains to prove that the expulsion of the passage under review is imperatively demanded by the symmetrical structure of the remainder of Chapters 1-3, considered by him a single discourse. He maintains that 3:1 is parallel to 2:7 and 3:8, inasmuch as in each of these three statements Micah defines his attitude over against the sinful rulers and the false prophets. Consequently 3:1 ought to follow immediately upon 2:11, just as 2:7 follows immediately upon 2:6 and 3:8 upon 3:7. There is no reason to deny that in a general sense the sequence of thought is thus correctly indicated. But the symmetry is not so perfect as Stade believes. That the obscure words in 2:7 are spoken by the prophet and define his attitude toward the persons rebuked and threatened in the foregoing is denied by many commentators. It is perhaps even more probable that verse 7 contains the words of the sinners instead of giving the answer of Micah. In that case the parallelism with 3:1 would entirely disappear. And, as Ryssel has already pointed out, 3:1 does not bring so much Micah's "Stellungnahme" in reference to his opponents, as rather a new description of their wickedness. Stade's synopsis of the contents of chapter 2 can thus be improved upon by leaving out altogether the item of Micah's prophetic self-assertion over against the sinful rulers and seers. If verse 7 be taken as words of the sinners, a perfect parallelism results; 2:1-2 and 2:8-9 describe the sin, 2:3-5 and 2:10 announce the judgment, 2:6, 7, and 2:11 finally speak of the resentment which the prophecy of evil awakens in those against whom it is directed. But, as will be perceived, on this scheme Stade's conclusion that 3:1 must have followed immediately upon 2:11 no longer holds. It might be said, to be sure, that if 2:6, 7, is the end of section 1, then 2:11 ought to be the end of section 2. But as section 3, consisting of 3:1-12 is enlarged over against the two preceding ones by the introduction of new elements, and has subjoined to itself a promissory discourse in 4:1 seq., so the prophet might well advance in section 2 beyond the limits of section 1 by appending the promise of 2:12, 13, which in point of proportion and progress of thought places it midway between what precedes and follows.

After all, it still remains an open question whether a transition in the prophet's mind between verses 11 and 12 cannot be made psychologically conceivable. It must be admitted that we cannot fall back upon the writer's desire to produce a rhetorical contrast, for verse 11 coming between breaks the force of the contrast. No solution can be considered satisfactory which does not take its point of departure in verse 11. Here we have the thought that those who make sensual delights the theme of their message find it easy to gain the popular ear. Now this thought was calculated to awaken in Micah a sense of the disadvantage under which he labored owing to the character of his own message. He had no bright prospect to hold out either for the present or the immediate future. Nevertheless he was conscious of being the herald of an infinitely higher and farther-reaching hope, the hope of salvation after judgment. What is more natural than that under the circumstances he should give utterance to this consciousness for his own relief, though fully aware that a salvation thus conditioned on previous calamity would have no charm for his hearers. There is nothing irrational or unworthy of a true prophet in such a train of thought. The expression of it becomes still more intelligible if we assume that verses 12, 13, did not constitute part of the spoken discourse, but were added afterwards, when, in committing the same to writing, the prophet could give freer vent to his feeling. [212]

Passing on to the discussion of Chapters 4 and 5, we may again divide the objections raised against the prophecies here grouped together into two classes. On the one hand, it is alleged that the historical background of some of the sections cannot possibly be that of Micah, and that the several pieces presuppose entirely different situations out of which or for which they were written. On the other hand, it is believed that the connection of the fragments is so defective and clumsy as to exclude every idea of its representing a continuity of thought in the mind of a single author. The disorder is such that it can be understood only as the result of a more or less complicated process in which the earlier material passed through several hands and was increased by a number of additions or rewritten for the purpose of altering its original meaning.

The central idea of 4:1-5, and the possibility of correlating it to the thought of the eighth-century prophets, has been dealt with in a previous article. As regards Micah in particular, the undisputed part of his prophecy offered no occasion for any direct deliverance on Jehovah's relation to the Gentile world. The only passage throwing light on the prophet's views touching this point is chapter 1:2, where all peoples, the earth and its fullness are called upon to hear God's witness against them. An attempt has been made to limit the part of the peoples, in the transaction described, to that of witnesses, so that the idea of Jehovah's exercising rule over them would not be implied. [213] But if the words meant, "Let the Lord God be a witnessamongyou," thoseagainstwhom the witness is to be borne would also have been named. The passage does prove, therefore, that Micah believed Jehovah concerned in the conduct and destiny of the other nations and that the presuppositions for the universalism expressed in 4:1-5 were not wanting in his thought. But it proves more than this. If the prophet found it necessary to state at the very opening of his prophecy that the divine judgment was directed against the Gentiles as much as against Israel, is it likely that he would have allowed this conviction no further influence on the character of his message? If, as the critics believe, 3:12 is the end of his genuine discourse, there is a remarkable incongruity as well as disproportion between the announcement of the text and the further working out of the sermon. [214]

Verse 4, wanting in Isaiah, Stade considers too sentimental in its tone to be of an early date. He compares 2 Kings 18:31, Leviticus 26:3-5, Deuteronomy 28:1 seq. Waiving the question of the late date fixed by the critics for Leviticus and Deuteronomy, it is hard to believe that Micah cannot have appreciated the blessings of peace and expressed his appreciation of them in a proverbial form.

Chapter 4:6, 7, stand in a line with 2:12, 13, so that only a few words of comment are required. Undoubtedly here, also, the exile is presupposed, but not in any form which would imply that the author knew it from actual experience. The figure of the sheep "halting" and "driven away" recurs with the use of the same words in Zephaniah 3:19, and with the use of one of them in Ezekiel 34:16. Inasmuch as these must have been familiar terms of pastoral life, their appearance wherever the figure of the shepherd and his flock appears is perfectly natural. Even if the application of this figure by these prophets to the gathering of Israel proves literary dependence, which we do not believe, there is no reason why the original should not be recognized in Micah. The prophet's discourse abounds in figures derived from his rural surroundings (cf. 2:12, 13; 4:3, 4, 12, 13; 5:6, 7; 6:15; 7:1, 2, 4, 14, and the original way in which the idea of the shepherd is brought in connection with the pastoral antecedents of David as the type of the Messiah in 5:1, 3). [215] Attention has also been called to the technical use of tyr)#, "a remnant," in verse 7. [216] Standing parallel with "a strong nation," this expression, it is said, must be a title of honor and promise. There would be something strange in this only if we did not know that with Isaiah already the term r)# had obtained a fixed meaning in which it was associated not merely with the judgment of the present, but likewise with the restoration of the future. Still further, exception is taken to the idea of Jehovah's kingship as dependent on Zechariah 14:9. To this the answer has been given that this idea is protected by its prominence in Isaiah. Since this kingship was identified with Israel's national existence, the restoration would naturally assume to the prophet the form of a renewal of Jehovah's rule over his people, which had been suspended by the captivity.

In verses 8-10 little is found by the critics to which suspicion can attach. In fact, verses 9, 10a are the one fragment of chapter 4 in reference to whose possible or plausible genuineness a certain consensus has begun to form itself. As may be seen from the historical survey given above, Oort., Kuenen, Nowack, Volz, concede it to Micah; even Wellhausen is not positive in expressing the contrary opinion. Against verse 8 Stade advances the trite argument that "theformerdominion" presupposes the cessation of the Davidic kingdom. Nevertheless Stade himself considers verses 8-10 from one hand; in verse 9 on his own interpretation the later writer artificially transports himself backwards into the time of Micah as his apparent present and out of it projects himself into the Chaldean crisis as his ideal present. Why then, supposing always that Micah could imagine a restoration at all, should we deem him incapable of going through the same mental process in the opposite direction? In verse 10 those critics who uphold the genuineness reject the words, "and shalt come even unto Babylon," as a gloss addedex eventu. In so far as this opinion results from anti-supernaturalistic bias it would be useless to argue against it. That there is nothing external to mark the clause as a gloss is shown by the fact that other critics, like Stade, who treat the whole context as avaticinium ex eventu, find nothing objectionable in it and treat it as of one piece with the rest. A difficulty is further found in Jeremiah 26:19, where the destruction of Jerusalem predicted in Micah 3:12 is represented as referring to the Assyrian crisis under King Hezekiah, and as having been averted by the repentance of people and king. But, as Ryssel and others have shown, whatever may have been the prophet's own meaning or the ultimate divine intent of the prophecy, it was quite possible for Micah's and Jeremiah's contemporaries to connect the idea of deportation to Babel with an Assyrian invasion. It would be rash, therefore, to conclude that in Jeremiah's days either the whole prophecy of chapter 4:9, 10, or at least the words referring to Babylon were not known. [217]

With verses 11-13 we reach that part of the chapter in the denial of whose genuineness the recent critics, however varying their views in other respects, are unanimous. As verses 9, 10a are recognized as the one fragment which may perhaps be from Micah, so this piece is before all others recognized as the one that must be late. A difference is, however, to be observed, as to the ground on which this judgment is based by the several critics. While Stade proceeds on the principle that the whole idea of an attack of many nations upon Zion is post-Ezekielian, most of the others take the position that, while the contents of verses 11-13 in themselvesadmit of Micah's authorship, yet the contradiction between them and what immediately precedes renders it psychologically impossible that both should be from the same writer. Undoubtedly Stade's view has the advantage of greater consistency. In the consciousness of the early prophets as at present defined, there is hardly a place for a prediction of this type. For not merely are the defeat and the destruction of the Gentile nations that attack Zion foretold, but in verse 11 their hostility is represented as inspired by the desire "to profane" her, i.e., to prove by the conquest of Zion that her claims to special sacredness and inviolability are unfounded. [218] We have here, in fact, the same thought which underlies Ezekiel's prediction of a world-attack upon the holy city, and those unwilling to believe that the early prophets ascribed such a sanctity to Zion should follow Stade in rejecting the verses on their own merit, altogether apart from the question whether they can be reconciled with what precedes or not.

But this observation in reference to verse 11 also points out the way, we believe, in which the deeper harmony between the two apparently conflicting utterances here placed together must be sought. Evidently the point of view from which the prophet approaches the conflict of the world-power with Judah is a twofold one. In so far as this conflict is viewed as a matter between Jehovah and the people and as intended for the punishment of Israel's sin, it must result in captivity. In so far as it is viewed as a matter between the nations and Zion in its religious significance, the issue must be destruction for the Gentiles, because in Zion they attack Jehovah. [219] We know how in Isaiah these two modes of viewing the conflict and of forecasting its issue go side by side from almost the beginning until the end of his ministry, and that the recent critical attempts to eliminate this dualism from Isaiah cannot be considered successful. Why, then, should the appearance of the same phenomenon in Isaiah's contemporary Micah make us despair? The harmonizing of Micah 3:12 and 4:11-13 is precisely as difficult and no more difficult than the harmonizing of Isaiah 3:26, 5:13, 6:12, on the one hand, and 8:9, 10, 10:5-19, on the other hand. That in Micah the two representations stand in closer proximity than in Isaiah should not prejudice us against their genuineness, because we need not assume that they occupied the same relative position in the prophet's oral discourse. [220] The historical facts to which this mode of viewing the conflict and of anticipating its outcome might attach itself were given to both Isaiah and Micah in the expedition of Sennacherib, of the year 701. The developments of this crisis offered a striking illustration of the principle here proclaimed as having validity for all time. Thus we can maintain that the prophecy preserves its contact with the history of the people of God in the prophet's own age, while yet through the clearly realized typical import of these contemporary events it is made to extend beyond these and to cover the remote future.

In chapter 4:13-5:4, several things are believed to indicate a later date than the age of Micah. As stated above, Stade has renewed the objections at one time raised by Oort against the association of Bethlehem and Ephrathah and against the description of Bethlehem as "little to be among the thousands of Judah." The data of this controversy are as follows: Jeremiah 31:15 and 1 Samuel 10:2 prove that Rachel's grave was situated not far from Ramah on or near the border of Benjamin. Now it is inferred from Genesis 35:19 (cf. 48:7) that Ephrath lay in the neighborhood of the sepulcher of Rachel. Consequently it cannot be identical with Bethlehem, and the words in Genesis making this identification must be a gloss. The explanation of Nöldeke and Dillmann, to the effect that there may have existed two grave-pillars of Rachel, one near Ramah and another near Bethlehem-Ephrath, and that, E in Genesis refers to the latter, whilst Jeremiah and the author of 1 Samuel 10:2 have in mind the former, is rejected by Stade, because E in his narrative is supposed to deal exclusively with localities on the border of the two Rachel tribes—Joseph and Benjamin. [221] Further, there could not have existed a grave-pillar of Rachel in Bethlehem because the inhabitants of that place did not trace their descent from Rachel. But, if the testimony of E for the identity of Bethlehem and Ephrathah falls away, there is reason to examine critically the other passages in which the two are associated. These are: (1) 1 Samuel 17:12, where Jesse is called "that Ephrathite of Bethlehem Judah." This verse, Stade thinks, has been so seriously meddled with by a later hand that its beginning is entirely out of joint: hzh must at all events be removed, and, this being so, the preceding ytrp) may as well be thrown out as a redactorial addition. (2) Ruth 1:2, 4:11 these passages are claimed to prove nothing because the Book of Ruth is post-exilic. (3) Three passages in 1 Chronicles, Chapters 2:19, 50, and 4:4 here Ephrathah appears as the wife of Caleb and the mother of Hur, and is explicitly connected with Bethlehem. Stade maintains, however, that Bethlehem's connection with the clan Caleb does not rest on ancient tradition and both form and contents of the passages belong to the post-exilic period. He also appeals to the fact that the adjective ytrp) means, in all passages except 1 Samuel 17:2, "the Ephraimite," which renders it probable that the place called Ephrath known in pre-exilic times as the grave of Rachel lay on the border of Benjamin, i.e., still in Ephraim. The conclusion of the whole is according to Stade that Micah 5:1 appears to stand on a level with Ruth and Chronicles, two post-exilic products. [222] In regard to the other point, the smallness predicated of Bethlehem, he refers to Nehemiah 7:26, where the men of Bethlehem and Netophah are given as 188, a small number—so that this feature likewise would point to a post-exilic writer. [223]

In answering all this the one essential point should be kept distinct from the accessory questions which have clustered around it in the course of the controversy. [224] This one essential point is whether it can be proven that Bethlehem had nothing to do with Ephrath or Ephrathah in the time of Micah. But how can this be established? Let us suppose for a moment that Stade is justified in throwing out the "Ephrathi" in 1 Samuel 17:12, [225] and in declaring Ruth post-exilic. This by no means settles the question. It only yields the negative result that there remains no pre-exilic passage from which we can prove that Bethlehem was in early times associated with Ephrathah. This is something quite different from furnishing the positive proof that such an association cannot have existed. Still further, though Chronicles is post-exilic and Ruth is considered so by modern critics, at any rate they bear witness to the fact that in that period Bethlehem sustained a close relation to Ephrathah. This being so, what right have we to assume that not only the usage but the origin of the usage must be post-exilic, and that it cannot reach back into the eighth century B.C.? In one case only could such a conclusion be justified, viz., if it were possible to explain from well-known, specifically post-exilic data how the association or identification arose, or, what amounts to the same thing, to assign a definite motive for the interest of the writers of Chronicles and Ruth to bring the two names together. This has not been done nor can it be done. To quote the words of Kuenen: "It will not easily enter into the head of any man that the Chronicler's statements concerning Ephrath and her children are explainable from any sub-tendency. [226] On this point the Chronicler gives us simple facts in a genealogical form chosen by himself." Oort's hypothesis offered at least the advantage of explaining what interest the post-exilic writer had in transferring the name Ephrath from the house of Saul to that of David, but this hypothesis has been so entirely overthrown by Kuenen that even the author would not think of reviving it at the present day. [227]

As has been stated, Stade contends further that the smallness predicated of Bethlehem can be understood only from the standpoint of a post-exilic writer. Though it is true that the men of Bethlehem and Netophah appear in Nehemiah 7 as among the least numerous of the contingents there enumerated, yet we have no certainty that this relative smallness of the family resulted from the exile. It may have existed before. The writer of Micah 5:1 had a special motive for emphasizing this smallness. Obviously the thought was in his mind that the house of David when giving birth to the Messiah would be reduced to the former state of insignificance, naturally resulting from its numerical smallness, in which it existed before David's elevation to the throne gave it the highest rank among the families of Judah. In other words, the description of Bethlehem in Micah 5:1 serves the same purpose which is served by the peculiar phrase, "the stock of Jesse," in Isaiah 11:1. [228]

In two other respects, 5:1-3 have been declared out of harmony with their surroundings. Nowack, in criticizing Stade's analysis, remarks that in 4:11-13 there is no room for the conception of a Messiah since the total destruction of the Gentiles leaves nothing to be done by Him. And 5:2 is out of agreement with 4:11-13 because in the latter passage no "giving up" is expected. Both difficulties are met in principle by our remarks made above on 4:11-13. If the perspective here opening up before the prophet is determined by the antithesis between Jehovah and the Gentiles, and has its historical background in the Sennacherib-crisis, we at once understand why the idea of Israel's surrender to the nations and the figure of the Messiah find no place in it. But, although in the nearer fulfillment of this prophecy the Messiah plays no part and Zion appears as yet untouched by the profaning hands of the Gentiles, this by no means excludes its also finding a fulfillment in later developments which presuppose the deliverance from exile and the appearance of the Messiah on the stage of history.

Chapter 5:4, 5, are said to be inconsistent with the preceding context because they make no mention of the Messiah, whose place is here rather taken by the "seven shepherds" and the "eight principal men." Stade, who raises this difficulty, has himself suggested the solution, viz., that these verses do not describe the beginning of the Messianic period, but an episode during its course. The shepherds and principal men are servants of the Messiah. This simple explanation cannot be discredited by forcing the meaning of the words, "and this shall be peace," as if these of necessity must introduce a description of the opening of the Messianic era, which description would then differ from the one contained in verses 1-3.

Next we briefly notice the contradiction discovered between 5:6 and 4:11-13, in so far as in the former passage a mere remnant of Jacob is saved out of the judgment, whereas in the latter the daughter of Zion as such is promised victory over the many nations assembled against her. By abandoning the genuineness of 5:1-8, and placing it on a line with 4:11-13, Nowack has himself implicitly acknowledged that the inconsistency is merely apparent. The late writer to whom he attributes verses 6-8 knew, of course, that the daughter of Zion, who was in the future to destroy the many nations, consisted of the remnant of pre-exilic Israel.

A still further lack of agreement has been pointed out between 5:6-8 and 4:11-13, on the one hand, and the universalistic prophecy, 4:1-5, on the other hand. The first two passages breathe a spirit of hostility against the Gentiles, whereas the last is inspired by a sentiment of peace and goodwill toward all nations. If the point of comparison in the figure of the dew and rain in 5:7 be the refreshing and fructifying influence to be exerted by the remnant of Jacob upon the peoples, the writer must have thought that these two attitudes could go together, since they are placed in close proximity here as represented by the figures of verse 7 and verse 8 respectively. If the other exegesis be adopted, which finds the points of comparison with the dew and the rain in the prospective numerousness of the remnant and their sole dependence on Jehovah, even then ver. 8 does not exclude the ultimate realization of the ideal expressed in 4:1-4.

The last point in chapter 5 we must touch upon concerns verses 9-14. These verses contain a prediction that the objects of idolatry and the implements of war will be taken away from Israel. It is conceded by Stade, Wellhausen and others that as a whole the prophecy fits into the age of Micah. But it has become generally accepted among adherents of the modern view that the prophetic opposition to the Mazzeboth and Asherim in particular dates from the time of the Deuteronomic reform. The Isaianic reform under Hezekiah, so far as it is historical, aimed only at the abolishment of images. Josiah in his day still found an Asherah in the temple at Jerusalem as well as at Bethel. The fight against Mazzeboth and Asherim did not begin until the Bamoth were made an object of attack. From Hosea 3:4, 10:1, 2, Isaiah 19:19, Stade endeavors to show that in the estimation of the early prophets Mazzebah is = altar, no better, no worse. Isaiah 17:8 proves nothing to the contrary, because the style is unworthy of Isaiah and the contents do not fit into the circle of his ideas. The manner in which the author of Micah 5:9-14 throws together into an indefinite category "graven images," and "Mazzeboth," and "Asherim," betrays that he does not speak from experience, whereas the author of Deuteronomy 12:3 still stands sufficiently near the old cultus to distinguish sharply between its various objects.

Those who are at one with Stade in their general conception of the origin of the Deuteronomic movement, and would yet uphold the genuineness of our passage, have replied to this reasoning that the principles of reform enforced in that movement must have had a previous history and found earlier isolated defendants, and that nothing hinders us from counting Micah among the number of these. Although Isaiah did not oppose the Mazzeboth and Asherim, Micah shows himself independent enough of his great contemporary to warrant the surmise that in this point he may have differed from or advanced beyond him. [229] But this reply does not meet the real difficulty. As Stade has been quick in pointing out, the condemnation of Asherim and Mazzeboth in chapter 5:12 is not introduced as something new and unprecedented. The passage becomes intelligible only if we can place back of it a long polemic against the objects whose extermination is here predicted. This leaves us no other choice than either, with Stade, to find this earlier opposition in the Deuteronomic movement, which means to deny the passage to Micah; or to assume it in the prophetic labors of the men who preceded Micah, which will mean that the prophetic attitude on this point was from the very first in harmony with the principles of the reform under King Josiah. The passages in the early prophets which mention the Mazzeboth are Hosea 3:4, 10:1, 2, Isaiah 19:19. The Asherim occur in Isa.

17:8 only where they are named in conjunction with the Hammanim or "sun-pillars." Besides this a reference to the Asherah has been found in Hosea 4:12, where Jehovah complains that His people ask counsel at their stock and that their staff declareth unto them, since the spirit of whoredom has caused them to err, and they have gone a-whoring from under their God. [230] Of these we must leave out of account Isaiah 17:8, since this verse is considered by recent critics an interpolation. That in Hosea 4:12 C( alludes to the Asherah is not impossible, but far from certain. [231] From Hosea 3:4 many writers have inferred that Hosea took nospecialoffense at the Mazzebah because it is here placed on a line with sacrifice as such, and with the two other pairs of king-prince, ephod-teraphim. That this conclusion is unwarranted appears from the fact that Hoses elsewhere openly condemns all images, and must, therefore, have opposed the teraphim on this principle alone if for no other reason. The sense of the passage is simply that all the representative forms of civil and religious life will be taken away from Israel. Whether these forms are in the prophet's view legitimate or illegitimate is not stated. In an indirect way we learn, however, that they must have been partly of the one, partly of the other category. For verse 4 gives in literal terms what verse 3 expresses in terms of the figure. Now the figure implies two thoughts: (1) That Hosea's wife shall be separated from her lovers; (2) that she shall be separated from her legal husband also. If verse 5 is to correspond to this, the same two elements must be included in it, and the prophet must have conceived of some of the things mentioned as illegal. Of course it is not possible to go farther and prove from the words themselves that the Mazzeboth in particular fell under his disapproval. Chapter 10:1, 2, speak of the Mazzeboth after a condemnatory fashion, and place them on a level with the many altars. It is significant that not the multiplication of the Mazzeboth, but the building of them as such is reflected upon. And inasmuch as the multiplication of the places of worship was certainly connected by the prophet with the paganizing influences at work among Israel, this passage rather favors the conclusion that he considered the Mazzebah likewise an adjunct of the Baal-cult and for that reason opposed it. [232]

The total silence of the early prophets on the Asherah (apart from Isaiah 17:8 and our passage in Micah) deserves attention. That we have no right to construe it as implying approval or indifference is plain. Otherwise Jeremiah might with equal warrant be quoted in favor of the Asherah, since he never names it explicitly and the Mazzebah only in chapter 43:13. [233] The probable explanation is that the Asherim were so closely associated with pronounced and avowed idolatry as to require no special condemnation beyond that included in the general polemic against the latter. Stade has indeed objected to this on the ground that by several passages the connection of the Asherah with Jehovah worship is placed beyond question, and has even gone to the length of denying the existence of a goddess Asherah, with whom the wooden Ashera would have been associated, except in the imagination of the later writers. [234] But this last position has been made untenable by the testimony of the El-Amarna letters. A goddess Asherah more or less closely identified with Ashtoreth did exist. [235] Of course this does not disprove that the ignorant idolatrous mass of the people also brought the wooden Asherah into connection with Jehovah, but it makes it at least highly probable that the prophets whose perception of the specifically pagan element in the popular cult was unquestionably keen would have been aware of the derivation of the symbol from the goddess, and consequently opposed it. Hosea's opposition to the use of the title Baal for Jehovah furnishes an analogy. [236]

The contents of verses 9-14, apart from the reference to the Mazzeboth and Asherim, fit better into the eighth century than into any other period. This is true especially of the announcement that the horses and chariots and fortified cities, i.e., all warlike implements, will be done away with. The condemnation of witchcraft and images also has its most striking parallels in Isaiah. It is the recognition of this by such critics as Kuenen and Wellhausen that has given rise to the double-faced hypothesis that verses 9-14 in their original form are from Micah and that the Deuteronomistic condemnation of Mazzeboth and Asherim was introduced by a later redactor of the piece. This proves that in all other respects the passage bears the impress of the time of Micah. No literary signs of redaction whatever are discoverable. This part of the hypothesis simply serves to get rid of an obnoxious element in an otherwise unobjectionable context.

We must now briefly review the difficulties found by the critics in the concatenation of the various pieces that compose Chapters 4 and 5. The first seam is located in 4:5, where the yb causes difficulty. Stade thinks the connection effected by means of it presupposes in the writer's mind the reflection that the foregoing prophecy had not been fulfilled. That is to say, if we understand Stade aright, the sentence introduced by yb was intended by a later writer to give the reason for theunexpressedthought of that writer that verses 14 had not yet come true. Whatever may be thought of the possibility of this exegesis, it is certainly not the most plausible one. If we place the emphasis of the verse on the last words, "for ever and ever," it will be seen to affirm the truth of the foregoing prophecy and to yield a perfectly natural connection. This promise will surely be fulfilled, because Israel is the only nation which will not need to change its God. [237] After this statement has brought the prediction of universalism to a fitting close, the transition to verses 6-8 as to another aspect of the eschatological hope is easily effected by the general term, "in that day." In regard to verses 9-14 seq. everything depends on the interpretation of the three "nows" in verses 9, 11, 14. Undoubtedly the first, ht(, marks a contrast to the opening phrase of both verse 7 and verse 6, inasmuch as the prophet returns from the remote future to the nearer present. This contrast, however, need not be pressed to the extent of limiting the ht( to the writer's historical present; it rather comprehends everything this side of the coming age. Why ht( should not be allowed this wider sense when by common consent of the critics the phrase )whh Mwyb is indefinitely used of the whole eschatological future, is hard to see. The only question is whether Micah could so use it, and this depends ultimately on whether the conception of the Messianic age had made a sufficiently deep impression on his mind to compress all preceding developments for his perspective into one scene. On this view of the matter the three visions relating to the pre-Messianic history stand between the two eschatological prophecies of 4:1-8 and 5:1-8. The grouping of the three is not determined by chronological reasons, but by the natural sequence of the main thoughts embodied in each. The promise of the restoration of the kingdom to the daughter of Jerusalem suggests the previous departure of this kingdom, the ensuing exile and the deliverance from Babylon. By force of contrast the prospect of the indignity and pain to be inflicted by the world-power upon the daughter of Zion calls up the vision of verses 11-13, where Zion appears victorious over the nations. In the third scene, 4:14-5:8, the same contrast between humiliation and victory is worked out with special reference to the present ruler and the future Messianic king, and thus the discourse returns to its point of departure in 4:8, but enriched by the personal Messianic element. Nobody will deny that this is at least a plausible development of thought. That the material might have been distributed as well, or perhaps to better advantage from the point of view of logic or historical sequence, does not prove that its present arrangement would have been unnatural or impossible to the prophet. To this must be added that there are several recurring phrases and constructions which closely link together the various pieces. Foremost among these is the repetition of the words, "many nations," which has already induced Stade to ascribe the three pieces in which these occur to one author. Further, "Mount Zion," or "Zion," is common to 4:1-5 and 4:6, 7, and "the daughter of Zion" to 4:8, 10, 13; Kyl( in 4:11 points back to Nwyc tb in verse 10; ht)w opens the sentence in both 4:8 and 5:1; the address, "be in pain and labor," in 4:10, is entirely like that in verse 13, "arise and thresh;" the phrase, "the name of Jehovah," appears in 4:5 and 5:3; l#m in 4:14 points back to hl#mm in 4:8; the coincidence in the figure of the shepherd between 4:6 and 5:3 has been already commented upon. In ordinary cases these resemblances would be considered sufficient to make out a strong case for unity of authorship. As it is, the critics have to explain them on the assumption that the later writer or writers purposely assimilated their work to the older material they wished to enlarge upon. But, if in a matter of form they exercised such care, the question becomes all the more pertinent why in the more weighty matter of the harmony and connection of thought they could be so artless and careless as the critical view implies. It is much easier to believe that the prophet himself used this freedom in the grouping of his scenes than that the later redactors or interpolators, who professedly wrote in order to harmonize his work with extraneous data either of history or of hope, should have failed to obliterate as much as possible all discrepancies of representation. [238]

In chapter 5 the second verse is the only one which requires comment in this connection. Volz believes that it breaks the continuity between verse 1 and verse 3, and must have been inserted at an even later date than the already post-exilic piece, 5:1, 3, 4a. His reasons for this opinion are the following. While Jehovah is the speaking person in verse 1, He is spoken of in the third person in verse 2. Or, if yl be referred to the writer, the incongruence remains between the subjects of )cy and Mnty. Further, according to verse 2, the Messiah is born in exile, whilst according to verse 1 He comes out of Bethlehem. Verse 2 does not place the figure of the Messiah sufficiently in the foreground. The writer of verses 1 and 3 does not look forward to a long period of oppression by the Gentiles. Nbl in verse 2 is meaningless. Neither the suffix in Mnty nor the conception of the hdly finds explanation in the context. The interpolation rests on Isaiah 7:14, and perhaps on Isaiah 9:5, and is due to a desire to account for the delay in the Messiah's appearance.

The first of these reasons may be disposed of by a reference to such passages as Isaiah 3:1, 4; Micah 7:18-20. Verse 2 does not state anything about the Messiah's birthplace, but simply makes His birth, or rather activity theterminus ad quemof Israel's surrender to the Gentiles. The interpolator could not have possibly meant to say with verse 1 before him that the Messiah was to be born in exile. If verse 2 is a mere definition of time, we do not expect it to dwell on the figure or work of the Messiah. That the writer of verses 1, 3, knows nothing of a period of "giving up" is indicated by nothing. Nbl makes perfect connection: it states as the reason why the Messiah must come from Bethlehem that the present royal state of the house of David shall come to an end through exile. Finally Mnty is without antecedent only if verses 1-3 are violently torn out of the context and placed by themselves. In the text as it stands the antecedent is given in 4:9, 11, 14, etc. That the verse presupposes Isaiah 7:14 or 9:5 is no argument against its genuineness for those who maintain the Isaianic origin of these passages.

Chapter 5:9-14 have been objected to on the ground that, while from their present position the import of these verses ought to be promissory, it is, in point of fact, of a minatory character, it not being said that Israel will voluntarily relinquish the objects specified, but that Jehovah will exterminate them. [239] This overlooks that in verse 13 the voluntary relinquishment on Israel's part is implied in the words, "thou shalt no more worship the work of thine hands." The ideal Israel is here addressed, who over against the wicked mass would consider even the violent extirpation of idolatry and of the implements of war a blessing. It should also be noticed that according to verse 15 this act will secure Israel's safety in the judgment which is to come upon the nations.

The last section of Micah's book in which we are interested, chapter 7:7-20, does not call for such extended discussion as it seemed necessary to give to Chapters 4 and 5. Although the promise in this case follows quite abruptly on the denunciation of 7:1-6, yet it is carefully adjusted to the latter by the statement that a severe punishment must precede its fulfillment. Only over against "the enemy," the world-power, Israel is righteous. Now the question is, whether the standpoint of the speaker is the exile of reality or the exile anticipated in imagination. It should be observed that the writer does not speak for his own person, but in the name of the people. This self-identification with Israel may have made it easier for him to forget his actual present and to enter into the spirit of a future situation. So far as we know nothing has been pointed out inconsistent with this interpretation of the piece. On the other hand, the critical exegesis has been quite uncertain in defining the situation of the writer. At first it was thought that the exile satisfied all the requirements. But the omission of all reference to Babylon in verse 12 is decidedly unfavorable to this view. Hence, and in order to explain the broad contrast between Zion and the Gentile world, it has been found necessary to bring the prophecy down to the post-exilic period. [240] But here again verse 11 forbids to go beyond the time of Nehemiah when the walls were built. Was it as natural at that time to predict the return of the exiled people in the terms of verse 12 as it was from the standpoint of Micah? The same applies to the prayer for the restitution of Bashan and Gilead in verse 14, inasmuch as the depopulation of these regions must have been fresh in the memory of the prophet. The words, "as in the days of old," explain themselves from the fact that not so much the possession as the passing of these regions into the possession of Israel, is uppermost in the writer's mind. Cf. verse 15, "as in the days of thy coming forth out of the land of Egypt," etc. Nowack renders verse 14b, "which dwell solitarily in the wilderness in the midst of fruitful fields," and thinks that this proves the writer's standpoint to be post-exilic, because Israel is here represented as returned from exile but in possession only of the waste and infertile places, whilst all around the fruitful regions are occupied by the enemies. Apart, however, from the uncertainty of the exegesis, there is evidently a progress in the discourse between verse 12, which predicts the return, and 14, which pictures the situation in which the returned exiles will find themselves. This situation is explained by verse 13 when they come they will find the land desolate; hence the further prayer that the ancient conditions may be restored. Thus it is unnecessary to give Cr) in verse 13 the sense of "earth," a rendering which makes the statement come in very abruptly. [241]

The closing part of Micah's book, if its genuineness can be vindicated, will be seen to have an important bearing on the origin of the monotheism of the early prophets. According to the critical hypothesis, in its most widely accepted form, the monotheistic tendency of these writers was a correlate of the conviction that Jehovah would deal with Israel on the principle of strict justice. Specificallyasthe God of righteousness pure and simple, Jehovah appeared unique among the gods, therefore the only God. Micah 7:18-20 formally reverses this reasoning. Jehovah is unique not because He refuses but because He delights to exercise grace: "Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? He retaineth not his anger forever, because He delighteth in mercy. He will turn again, and have compassion upon us; He will tread our iniquities under foot: and will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea. Thou wilt perform the truth to Jacob, the mercy to Abraham, which thou hast sworn unto our fathers from the days of old."

[1] The Song of Deborah (Judges 5), David's Song of the Bow (2 Samuel 1:19-27).

[2] The oldest material in Judges and Samuel and in the story of Elijah and Elisha in 1 Kings 17-2 Kings 13.

[3] It is not accidental that the great evolutionary constructions of Israel's history date from the time when the posteriority of the Legal to the Prophetic period had become with the leading critics a settled conviction. Kuenen'sReligion of Israelcould not have been written before his espousal of the Grafian view between 1865 and 1869.

[4] It is difficult to conceive of a mental attitude toward ancient prophecy sufficiently convinced on the one hand of its absolutely divine origin to concludea priorithat certain elements must be contained in it, and yet unscrupulous enough, on the other hand, to manipulate those divine oracles for the purpose of supplementing what was wanted. If we may believe the critics, the later scribes united these contradictory mental traits in themselves.

[5] 1:14; 2:205-212;Z.A.W., 1:171.

[6] pp. 155-157. Cf. further Kuenen,Historisch-kritisch Onderzoek, 2:21-25; Smend,Alttestamentliche Religionsgeschichte, 183; Giesebrecht,Beiträge zur Jesaiakritik, 187-220, andDas Buch Jeremia(who, however, rejects Stade's theory of asystematicredaction of the prophetic canon by the later scribes). Nowack,Die Kleinen Propheten, recently published in hisHandkommentar zum Alten Testament, and Volz,Die vorexilische Jahveprophetie und der Messias, did not come to hand until after this article had been written.

[7] It would be an entirely different matter, of course, if one were to eliminate from the discussion such sections of the prophetic books on whose date critical opinion departs from the traditional view independently ofa prioriconsiderations. The testimony of Isaiah 40-66, for instance, might for argument's sake be excluded, without rendering further debate useless.

[8] Introduction to the Book of Isaiah, Prologue, xxi.

[9] Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, 4.

[10] Cheyne's Introduction to the new edition of Robertson Smith'sThe Prophets of Israel, xvi.

[11] Cf. Guthe,Das Zukunftsbild des Jesaia, 22.

[12] Hoffmann,Z. A. W., 3:96, and Gunning,De Godspraken van Amos, 16, would have Amos think of Jerusalem as the Davidic residence in which the ideal unity of entire Israel had its center. But the judgment on the surrounding nations, and indeed on Judah itself, has no apparent connection with the political idea of Israel's unity.

[13] Hoffmann's proposal (Z. A. W., 3:97), to take wnby#) as Hiph. of b#y, "I will not allow it (i.e., the people) to dwell," is artificial and has found no acceptance.

[14] Theologie der Propheten, 119.

[15] Theologisch Tijdschrift, 14:116; 25:125.

[16] Geschichte des Volkes Israel, 1:571.

[17] Einleitung, 176.

[18] Skizzen und Vorarbeiten, 5:71.

[19] Introduction to the new edition of Robertson Smith'sThe Prophets of Israel, xvi.

[20] The Prophets of Israel(new edition), 399.

[21] Hist. Krit. Onderzoek, 1:174.

[22] Cf. Isaiah 2:3; 2 Chronicles 17:3, 21:12, 22:3, 28:2.

[23] Robertson Smith well remarks: "In each case the appeal (to Jehovah's Lordship over nature) comes in to relieve the strain of intense feeling at a critical point in the argument" (The Prophets of Israel, new edition, 400). Cf. also Hoffmann (Z. A. W., 3:103): "[These passages] enable us to divine what the prophet saw before his eyes and is soon to mention by name." Wellhausen appeals to Hosea 13:4, where the Septuagint has a passage of similar character which is clearly an insertion. But it does not follow from this that the passages in Amos are to be placed on the same footing. For (1) that in Hosea fails in the Hebrew text; (2) it does not fit psychologically into the context as the verses in Amos do; (3) it may be easily explained as an imitation of the latter.

[24] Kuenen and others propose to throw out verse 7 as an intrusion from 6:12. But the latter passage is only partly similar.

[25] König,Einleitung in das A. T., 304. König observes that an interpolator would hardly have inserted the verses in a place apparently so inappropriate.

[26] Kuenen and Robertson Smith here also take a conservative position without fully realizing, it seems to me, the importance of the fact that such ideas were not merely natural to Amos himself, but that he could likewise assume familiarity with them on the part of his hearers. Kuenen compares Micah 1:2-4, but the expressions in Amos are stronger.

[27] The elimination of verse 26 by Wellhausen and Cheyne and that of 8:11, 12, by numerous critics, among these even König, is not directly connected with the development hypothesis. The former of these passages will be fully discussed in a later article.

[28] Wellhausen proposes to substitute "the sanctuary of Bethel."—Skizzen und Vorarbeiten, 5:12.

[29] In Robertson Smith'sThe Prophets of Israel, 401.

[30] Schwally, inZ. A. W., 10:227.

[31] Wellhausen,Skizzen und Vorarbeiten, 5:94; Smend,Alttest. Religionsgesch., 183, 184; Cheyne, Introduction to the new edition of Robertson Smith'sThe Prophets of Israel, xv.

[32] We pass by the argument that verse 11 cannot be by Amos because it regards the Judean captivity as past. This is the customary denial of the possibility of supernatural prediction. Besides it overlooks the fact that "the breaches" represent the tabernacle of David as still partially standing. Cf. Cornill,Einleitung, 176, who here sides with Kuenen against the other critics.

[33] Wellhausen characterizes the contents of verses 13-15 as "roses and lavender instead of blood and iron."

[34] Wellhausen,Skizzen und Vorarbeiten, 5:94; Smend,Allttestam. Religionsgesch., 184.

[35] Cf. chapter 3:12; 5:3, 15.

[36] The words "and David their king" in verse 5 are rejected by Wellhausen and Stade; the corresponding words in verse 4, "without king and without prince," in addition by Cornill; the whole fifth verse by Oort (Theol. Tijdschr., 24:362).

[37] This symmetry is destroyed by Steiner's and Kuenen's proposal to take away the harshness of the transition by placing 2:1-3 after 2:25. There are other serious objections to this arrangement, chief among which is that in their new position the transposed verses would be a weak repetition of what immediately precedes. Cf. especially verse 25 with verse 1. See Giesebrecht,Beiträge zur Jesaiakritik, 215, whose five reasons, however, are not all equally convincing. Nevertheless, the above-mentioned proposal has the value of showing that to cautious criticism there is a wide difference between the recognition that a passage may have become displaced and the readiness to infer from every apparent want of connection that a strange hand must have been at work.

[38] Calvin and Hengstenberg assume a reference to Genesis 22:17, 32:13, as to promises which would in no wise fail of fulfillment, notwithstanding the casting off predicted in verse 9. See the latter'sChristology of the O. T., 1:210.

[39] Giesebrecht,Beiträge zur Jesaiakritik, 215.

[40] Giesebrecht (l. c.) thinks that there is a conflict between 1:7, which promises the salvation, and 2:2, which presupposes the captivity of Judah. But unless "the land" in the latter passage be understood to mean the land of the exile (so Giesebrecht), there is no direct reference to the captivity of Judah at all. Besides this, is it not a fact that Isaiah also predicted both the final destruction of the southern kingdom with the exile of its inhabitants and the temporary deliverance of the same in the Assyrian crisis? If the two representations are inconsistent, why did not the interpolator consider them so? Or if they appeared harmonious later in view of what had actually come about, why should they not have appeared so beforehand in the prophetic vision of the future? Giesebrecht further objects to the clumsy phraseology of 1:7, "Jehovah will save Judah by Jehovah their God." But the disapproval of reliance upon the external instruments of war to the detriment of trust in Jehovah is a thoroughly Hoseanic thought and the peculiar phraseology simply serves to accentuate this idea.

[41] The "going up" is here taken in the sense of Nahum 2:2; 1 Kings 15:17. The land is not that of the captivity, but Canaan. See Nowack,Der Prophet Hosea, 14.

[42] Chapter 3:4 might be supposed to reject the kingdom as such, on the view that the words "and David their king" are a late insertion, for in this case it might be claimed that all the things mentioned here, by being deprived of which Israel is to be punished—king-prince, sacrifice-mazzebah, ephod-teraphim—were to the prophet's mind equally sinful. Even so, however, it would seem a straining of the point to make him reject these things in the abstract. No more could be safely inferred than that he considered them sinful in the form in which Israel used them. On the other hand, if the words "and David their king" are genuine, it follows immediately that Hosea expected the Davidic kingdom from his condemnation.

[43] Chapter 12:1 is the only apparent exception to this. But the text is very obscure and may be corrupt. Cornill, inZ. A. W., 7:285-289, proposes to read instead of Nm)n My#wdq M(w, and is faithful with the Holy One," dmcn My#dq M(w, "and is joined with Kedeshim."

[44] There would be much more cause to expect that a late writer would address Judah, his only audience.

[45] Giesebrecht (Beiträge zur Jesaiakritik, 214) tries to break the force of 4:15 by the suggestion that the statement may be a mere rhetorical one in the sense of "both need not have sinned; one could at least have obeyed; but both are equally condemnable." But that the prophet means to be understood literally follows from the subjoined warning that Judah should not come to Gilgal neither go up to Beth-Aven.

[46] Giesebrecht seeks to save the depth and spirituality of the words by making them expressive of a wish of the prophet, a view which destroys the connection with what precedes and follows alike.

[47] For parallels cf. 2:9, 5:6, 7:16.

[48] Chapter 8:1 is called in question by Wellhausen,Prolegomena(second edition) 443. InSkizzen und Vorarbeiten, 5:17, the words are retained in the translation. It is also rejected by Krætzschmar (Die Bundesvorstellung im A. T., 114). According to Oort (Theol. Tijdschr., 24:505), chapter 8:12 is possibly from the Deuteronomistic redactor.

[49] Duhm's partiality for the Maccabean period seems to spring from the desire to point out a definite historical situation for each prophecy. The second century B.C. offers the best opportunities for the satisfaction of this desire.

[50] Here, as also in regard to Chapters 9:1-6, 11:1-8, 32:1-5, 15-20 Duhm is more conservative than his companion critics; though with some hesitation, he yet in the end declares himself in favor of the Isaianic origin of these pieces.

[51] Z. A. W., 1:165; 4:292.

[52] Cf. on this question, Ryssel,Untersuchungen über die Textgestalt und die Echtheit des Buches Micha, 218-224.

[53] Z. A. W., 1:166.

[54] Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, 128-130, 146-148.

[55] Introduction to the Book of Isaiah, 9-15.

[56] Cornill,Z. A. W., 4:88, well remarks against Stade that our prophecy presents rather a naive way of formulating the thought of the inviolable character and central significance of Mount Zion, than a gross perversion of this thought.

[57] Cf.The Presbyterian and Reformed Review8:459. Isaiah's own first message came from the temple.

[58] Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, 128.

[59] Cf. Nowack's Handkommentar,Die kleinen Propheten, 64, which denies the verse to the prophet on account of this universalistic conception.

[60] Handkommentar,Die kleinen Propheten, 64.

[61] The words are applied to Stade's reasoning by none less than Kuenen,Hist. Krit. Ond., 2:40.

[62] We have left chapter 29:7 and 33:3 out of consideration here, the former because its genuineness is to be discussed later on, the latter because it stands in a context denied to Isaiah before the present movement in the criticism of the prophets.

[63] Another thought in chapter 18:7 objected to as un-Isaianic will receive attention afterwards.

[64] To be sure, this passage also has been recently denied to Hosea by Volz,Die vorexilische Jahveprophetie und der Messias, and by Nowack in his Handkommentar,Die kleinen Propheten, 23. Nowack's book did not come to hand until the article published in the April number had gone to press. In this place I can only enumerate the passages rejected in this newest contribution to the subject, so far as they had not fallen under the condemnation of the earlier critics and were therefore not touched upon in my article. These are: 2:4b, 6, 8, 9, 10c, 12, 16-18, 20-25; 4:6, 11, 14b, 15a; 5:3b; 7:4; 8:5b; 9:9b; 10:3, 5c, 10, 13, 14b; 11:9a, 10b, 11; 12:4b-7, 13, 14. Thus the critical process moves steadily onward. Volz goes so far as to speak of a Proto- and Deutero-Hosea.

[65] Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, 20, 21.

[66] The Presbyterian and Reformed Review8:460, 461.

[67] So Duhm, Wellhausen and apparently Stade (Z. A. W., 4:149-151). The latter finds the idea implied that Jehovah has previously left Zion, and, assuming that this idea first arose during the exile with Ezekiel, infers from it the post-exilic origin of verses 5, 6. But Hosea 5:15 alone proves the much earlier origin of this thought and shows how it might naturally associate itself in the mind of any prophet with that of the future captivity.

[68] Chapter 28:27.

[69] Alttestamentliche Religionsgeschichte, 222.

[70] Volz's treatise is known to me only from its review by Krætzschmar in theTheologische Literaturzeitung, No. 26, 1897.

[71] Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, 126.

[72] Cf. Smend,Altt. Religionsgeschichte, 307.

[73] This last point is mentioned by Cheyne also: "The divine king in his glory so filled the thoughts and imagination of Isaiah that there seems no room for any earthly king."

[74] Stade thinks differently on this pointZ. A. W., 1:95, Note.

[75] Cf. also chapter 32:1, although the genuineness of this prophecy is doubted by many critics.

[76] E.g., Kuenen,National Religions and Universal Religions, 113seq.

[77] Hackmann rightly maintains that the words of verse 1, "to walk in darkness," "to sit in the land of the shadow of death," must refer to a more protracted oppression than either the Syro-Ephraimitic attack or the campaign of Sennacherib can have occasioned to the Judeans. It is most natural to understand them of the captivity, but then of such a captivity as was associated in thought with one country. From the later post-exilic standpoint when the Jews were widely dispersed in several countries the expressions would be less natural.

[78] It cannot be denied that the meaning of 8:21, 22, 23a is rather obscure, but in itself this furnishes no reason for denying the connection between these verses and 8:23b and 9:1-6. All that the critics have been able to do is to make 8:21-23a, some of them including 20b, atorsolacking both beginning and end. This is an easy but purely arbitrary manner of removing the difficulty. Inasmuch as the figure of the darkness and light in 9:1 seems to point back to the use of the same figure in 8:22, it is safer, notwithstanding the obscurity of the text, to assume the continuity of the discourse.

[79] The limits of this article do not permit us to discuss the modern notion of varying and in important respects even contradictory "Zukunftsbilder" in the prophecies of Isaiah. Guthe distinguishes two of these, Giesebrecht even three. According to the former of these critics, Isaiah first expected the destruction of both Ephraim and Judah, the fall of the kingdom, a long period of captivity and after that the Messianic deliverance. This eschatological program is believed to date from about 734, the time of the Syro-Ephraimitic war. Later, after about 724, the prophet was led by the course of events to modify his expectations in two particulars: 1. He now believed that the judgment would stop short of the fall of Jerusalem and that the Assyrian while besieging the city would be destroyed by Jehovah. 2. He placed the new era immediately after this deliverance in consequence of which the figure of the Messiah dropped out of his program, because, if the present dynasty remained, there was no need for a new ruler and the work first ascribed to him. Giesebrecht inserts between these two programs an intermediate one in which he assumes the prophet to have expected the conversion of Judah entire after the judgment on Samaria and which he finds represented in such utterances as 10:20, 21, 28:1-6, where "the remnant" = Judah. Hackmann, while successfully refuting the schemes of Guthe and Giesebrecht, proposes a new one of his own in which he makes out a rectilinear development of the prophet's expectations. But the consistency of Hackmann's scheme is obtained by two radical measures: 1. The reference of Isaiah's early prophecies of judgment to the northern kingdom exclusively. 2. The denial of the genuineness of every prophecy which bases on the defeat of the Assyrian hopes for the salvation of Judah. Both positions seem to me untenable, as I hope to show in detail on a future occasion. Guthe and Giesebrecht do not deny the genuineness of the Messianic prophecy in chapter 11, but only the possibility of its contemporaneousness with the outlook of chapter 10. Nevertheless their detachment of chapter 11:1-9 from what precedes seriously weakens the defense of its Isaianic origin against such critics as Hackmann and Cheyne, because it favors the contention of the latter that the prophecy lacks contact with Isaiah's historical situation. For this reason it was necessary to point out briefly how in our view the consistency and contemporaneousness of the two viewpoints in Chapters 10 and 11 respectively can be maintained.

[80] Cheyne is non-committal in regard to the question whether verses 28-32 are intended to lead up to the climax that Jerusalem will be taken or to the anti-climax that the invader will be laid low. The whole structure of the description seems to us to speak in favor of the latter view, and is so far in favor of the Isaianic authorship also of verses 33, 34.

[81] Cf. Jeremiah 3:15 and 23:4 with 23:5, 33:15.

[82] Cf. Giesebrecht,Das Buch Jeremia,in loco; of the other passage, 33:15, the genuineness is denied by several critics.

[83] Die Messianische Weissagung(2d ed.), 138-140.

[84] The occurrence of an isolated Aramaic loan-word, especially of a military term like N)s, "soldier's boot," is easily explained in view of Isaiah 36:11. Cf. also Cheyne in the Introduction to Robertson Smith'sThe Prophets of Israel(new ed.), p. xxxviii: "All the comfort that I can offer is that, though, so far as the contents are concerned, the composition of these two prophecies can most easily be understood in the post-exilic age, yet the phraseological data are not on the whole markedly inconsistent with the authorship of Isaiah."

[85] Kuenen and Cornill still maintain the Isaianic authorship of chapter 19 as a whole.

[86] The literary evidence adduced in proof of the late origin of these sections has little weight. It consists partly of hapax legomena, partly of words occurring only once in Isaiah but vouched for by other ancient writings, partly of forms declared late on the ground of other disputed passages, one contingency being suspended on another. Nsxy, 23:18, is a hapax legomenon; so is q yt(, ibid.; hbcm in 19:19 is the only example of the word in Isaiah, but it occurs twice in Hosea; the late character of dy Pynh in 19:16 is supported by the late origin of 11:15, andvice versa. Similar lists might be gathered without difficulty from the undoubtedly genuine sections. There was nothing in Isaiah's style which forbade him the use of hapax legomena.

[87] Cf. chapter 8:18, and Guthe,Das Zukunftsbild des Jesaia, 24, 25.

[88] That y#, "a present," must be late, because elsewhere occurring only in two Psalms alleged to be late, is certainly a rash inference. Nor is Cheyne justified in describing the rule of Jehovah which the Ethiopians will acknowledge by tribute as "a Messiahless, Israelitish empire;" even if this were correct it should not be counted as bearing against the Isaianic authorship, since Cheyne himself elsewhere makes the prominence of the kingship of Jehovah an instance against the genuineness of the Messianic prophecies in Chapters 9 and 11.

[89] Z. A. W., 4:256-271.

[90] Juda und die Assyrische WeltmachtinProgramm der technischen Staatslehranstalten zu Chemnitz, 1885, p. 13.

[91] The same has been suggested by the late Prof. Kosters inTheol. Tijdschrift, May, 1898, p. 313.

[92] Sörensen even upholds against Stade the genuineness of the larger part of Chapters 32 and 33.

[93] M. Brückner,Die Komposition des Buches Jesaia,Kap. 28-33, 1897.

[94] As chapter 37:35 expresses it, "For I will defend this city to save it, for mine own sake, and for my servant David's sake."

[95] Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, 101.

[96] "The Book of the Prophet Isaiah," inThe Sacred Books of the Old and New Testaments("Polychrome edition"), 141. Cf. also F.C. Porter inJournal of Biblical Literature, Vol. 14, p. 29: "If he (Ahaz) believed in the prophetic word against Israel, he would not do what Israel did, play at politics and war, and he would fear, not an outward foe, but the God who judges righteously."

[97] It is, e.g., impossible that the comparative estimate of the religious value of the so-called Deutero-Isaiah and Trito-Isaiah should not be affected by the former being assigned to the exilic, the latter to the post-exilic period. Trito-Isaiah can never quite recover the reputation he had so long as his work was connected with Chapters 40-55.

[98] Cf. what Cheyne says in reference to the late version of the history of the Sennacherib-crisis contained in Chapters 36-37 "The alteration introduced into the portrait of Sennacherib by the Jewish writers is, for the historian, the most unfortunate of their inaccuracies. But who that rightly appreciates the spirit of the later Jews can seriously blame them?The cultivation of a frame of mind out of which in due time evangelical religion might spring was of more consequence to them than historical exactness," (the italics are mine) (Introduction to the Book of Isaiah, 237).

[99] In accepting a fixed law as the expression of Jehovah's demands of Israel, prophetism is thought to have sacrificed the freedom which once had been the chief source of its power. By condescending to regulate the cult it succeeded, in part at least, in uprooting it from its original soil of naturalism and making it subservient to higher ethical aims: but the cult, however much purified, remained something external, in approving which the prophets relaxed their absolute insistence upon righteousness alone. If not yet in Jeremiah, in Ezekiel the new legal leaven so vigorously asserted itself as to modify essentially the prophetic spirit. The Deuteronomic reform laid the first foundation of Judaism. Cf. Wellhausen,Israelitische und Jüdische Geschichte, 94-95; Smend,Alttestamentliche Religionsgeschichte, 279-291.

[100] Cf. Hackmann, who remarks against Sörensen that Isaiah's energy of faith and political discernment suffice to account for the prophecy of chapter 18, and that it is not necessary to explain the prophet's confidence by his having heard of the approach of an army marching against the Assyrians (Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, 99).

[101] Chapter 29:17; 32:15.

[102] Chapter 33:14.

[103] Wellhausen's view, that verses 1-4 do not relate to the real Samaria at all, but simply to Jerusalem ominously so called, and therefore date from the same period as the following sections, besides being too bold, does not account for hl) Mgw in verse 7; for these words referring to the Jerusalemites show that the prophet distinguished between them and the inhabitants of Samaria.

[104] Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, 27-29.

[105] Beiträge zur Jesaiakritik, 53-69.

[106] We should go farther than this and say that not merely is there no place for such expectation as late as 724, but urge against Hackmann's own view that there is no place for it at any point of Isaiah's ministry, not even in the earliest period. The proof for this is chapter 6.

[107] So Dillmann, who, however, would confine "the residue" to those that will be left of the northern kingdom. But although Isaiah in his earlier prophecies clearly distinguishes between the judgment of Israel and that of Judah, he frequently represents the remnant as an organic unity proceeding from both. Cf. 8:23, 9:6, 10:20, 11:11-16, 17:6-8.

[108] Cf. Meinhold inStudien und Kritiken, 1893, 7-46, who thinks that not only verses 1-6 but chapter 28 as a whole dates from 724 and was prefixed by Isaiah to the later discourses of Chapters 29-31 as introduction.

[109] The figure of the hailstorm and tempest of 28:2 recurs more than once in Chapters 28-31. Cf. 28:17, 29:6, 30:30. This would seem to be an indication that Isaiah, in pronouncing or penning the Sennacherib-discourses, had in mind the oracle against Samaria delivered twenty years before, and furnishes an additional reason for believing that the prophet himself placed 28:1-6 at the head of the collection.

[110] To a minor degree the same complexness of situation is already prefigured in the crisis of the Syro-Ephraimitic war (chapter 7). The deliverance of Judah is foretold and King Ahaz invited to exercise faith in it. He is rejected for his unbelief. Nevertheless the promise stands, and it is precisely the course determined upon by the unbelieving king which Jehovah uses to make true the predicted deliverance. But the deliverance itself again is double faced; while giving temporary relief it opens the door for the interposition of the Assyrians who will ultimately overwhelm Judah.

[111] Cf. Giesebrecht (Beiträge zur Jesaiakritik, 188), who thinks that the admission of abruptness and unintelligibleness in the prophetic discourse still shows the lingering influences of the Hengstenbergian view, and directly contradicts the true character of prophecy. We on our part suspect that the one-sided emphasis thrown upon the ethical mission of prophetism and the modern form in which this is conceived of has more or less affected the psychology of prophetic revelation. Hence the seer is obscured by the preacher and popular orator. Of course the naturalistic tendency of the modern view works to the same effect, inasmuch as the visionary element in the prophetic experience marks most distinctly the direct contact with the supernatural.

[112] The suddenness in the succession of the events themselves is emphasized by Isaiah (cf. 29:5, 6).

[113] Beiträge zur Jesaiakritik, 187-220.

[114] He does not apply it to Hosea 2:1-3, but joins with other critics in declaring this passage an interpolation, on which see above.

[115] Hackmann suggests that Ewald would probably have explained the intermingling of the two opposite elements from the literary revision and rearrangement to which Isaiah subjected his prophecies. He thinks, however, that such explanation is not only insufficient in this particular instance, but inadmissible in every case in the present state of Isaiah-criticism, because it is far from certain that Isaiah was a literary prophet at all. The traditional conception of him as a writer has been thoroughly discredited by the latest results of the analysis of the book bearing his name. One might well ask whether this consequence of the critical operations should not of itself suffice to compromise the latter in the eyes of all sober-minded people. Amos and Hosea, who were both plain men, are admitted to have written; how then can we believe that Isaiah, who moved in the highest circles of the capital, could have neglected the opportunity offered him to secure by this means a wider hearing and longer life for his prophecies? Then there is also the problem of accounting for the transmission of so many confessedly genuine prophecies in so pure and perfect a form. If Isaiah did not write himself, and if for their preservation we are indebted to his disciples, the character of their work is such that we shall have to assume some sort of supervision by the prophet himself and this brings us back again to a point not so very far removed from the old conception of the literary prophet.

[116] Duhm and Cheyne both insist that verses 9-12 lack all connection with the preceding oracle concerning Ariel. But neither of them is successful in his interpretation of the imperatives in verse 9. Cheyne makes the verse mean "that the rulers are culpably insensible to the divine teaching in prophecy and history." Insensibility, however, is not synonymous with amazement. Cheyne's translation is: "Feign astonishment, and ye shall be astonished indeed; feign blindness, and ye shall be blind indeed;" this takes the second imperative in each pair as consecutive to the first, and understands the second of amazement and blindness produced by the events of the judgment when these come. Still the question remains why a prophecy of disaster from Isaiah should have made the rulers feign astonishment. And the thought that the reality of the judgment willblindthe sinners is far from natural. The latter remark bears against Duhm also, who refers all four imperatives to the future effect of the judgment and speaks of a blindness resulting from contact with the supernatural.

[117] rpsh in verse 12 has the generic article. A different book from the one mentioned in verse 11, not sealed but open, is meant. The above explanation seems to me more plausible than the application of the twofold form of the figure to the two classes of the educated leaders and the uneducated mass. There will be still another reference to the strange character of the prophet's discourses if we may follow up a suggestion of Meinhold in regard to the interpretation of chapter 28:9-13 (Studien und Kritiken, 1893, 26-30). Meinhold thinks that "the word of Jehovah" (verse 13) characterized by the syllables Zaw Lazaw Zaw Lazaw, Kaw Lakaw Kaw Lakaw cannot, as the usual exposition takes it, consist in thesermo realisof the invading Assyrians with their strange tongue, because the construction with N(ml shows that the speech referred to is to render ripe for judgment and consequently not identical with the judgment itself: "The word of Jehovah has become unto them Zaw Lazaw, etc.,in order thatthey might go and fall backward, etc." It must, therefore, be the speech of Jehovah through the prophet. But Isaiah intimates that this speech now assumes a mysterious form for the purpose of hardening and blinding the unbelievers. Interrupted in their debauch, they had mockingly described Isaiah's words of verse 7 as Zaw Lazaw Zaw Lazaw, Kaw Lakaw Kaw Lakaw, i.e., as meaningless, stammering sounds such as are used to teach children, just weaned from the milk and drawn from the breasts, the first rudiments of speech (cf. the form of 7 in the original). The prophet accepts this charge of the mockers, but adds that the dark, oracular sounds issuing from his mouth are intended to lead them on to destruction. There is much in favor of this interpretation. It is possible that expositors have been too hasty in inferring that verse 13a must express the same thought as verse 11. Isaiah may well have replied to the charge of the revelers in a twofold way: (1) that his childish language is but the preface to a more fearful strange tongue they will hear from Jehovah in the accents of the Assyrian conqueror (verse 11); (2) that the very form of the prophetic address serves the purpose of judicially confirming them in their culpable inability to understand the truth (verse 13). The common view according to which Zaw Lazaw Kaw Lakaw signifies "precept upon precept, line upon line," or "level upon level, plumb-line upon plumb-line," and is intended to ridicule the censoriousness of the prophet's word with its everlasting admonitions, is not without difficulties. The appeal to verse 17 in favor of it is not conclusive. True, wq occurs here in the sense of "measuring-line," but if an allusion to verses 10 and 13 had been in the prophet's mind, he would have used wc in parallelism and not the different term of tlq #m. If Meinhold's exegesis were to be adopted it might be perhaps slightly modified by understanding hyhw in verse 13 as a consecutive perfect: "The word of Jehovah shall become," referring not merely to what precedes, but also to the character of the following discourses. The whole matter, however, is uncertain, so that I have not made use of it in the discussion above.

[118] (n.b. Vos's table has been converted to sentence form—J.K.)

[119] The following shows which sections of Chapters 28-33 are retained as Isaianic by the various recent critics: Duhm: 28:1-4, 7-22, 23-29; 29:1-4a, 5c-7, 9-10, 13-14, 15; 30:1-5, 6-7, 8-17, 27-33; 31:1-4a, 5b-c, 8a, 9b; 32:1-5, 9-14, 15-18a, 20. Hackmann: 28:1-4, 7-22, 23-29 (?); 29:1-7, 9-12, 13-14, 15; 30:1-5, 6-7, 8-17; 31:1-4; 32:9-14 (?), 15-20 (?). Cheyne: 28:1-4, 7-13, 14-22; 29:1-4a, 6, 9-12 (9-10), 13-14, 15; 30:1-5, 6-7, 8-17; 31:1-5a.

[120] The words M)tp (tpl hyhw, "it shall be at an instant suddenly," ought to be read at the beginning of the sixth verse. So Duhm and Cheyne.

[121] Cf. 5:28, 9:18, 10:17, 17:13, 30:13, 27, 30.

[122] The case of chapter 30:13, where the similar words (tpl M)tp refer to the coming catastrophe, is totally different, because here no description of the instrumentality of the judgment precedes.

[123] The other explanation of Ariel, which at present finds most favor, is likewise beset with difficulties. The use of the article in Ezekiel 43:15 seems to exclude the view that it is a compound with El, "the altar-hearth of God." To take it as altar-hearth simply, yields no sufficiently transparent symbolism. There must be some connection between the meaning of Ariel and the fact of David's encamping there. The Septuagint rendering makes it probable that some words of verse 1 have been lost, and it may be owing to this that the problem has become insoluble.

[124] In verse 3 read with the Septuagint dwdb instead of rwdb, "I will encamp like David against thee." From the obvious connection between these words and verse 1 it follows that the Septuagint is right in translating: polij hn epolemhse Dauid, "the city against which David fought."

[125] Duhm considers verse 4b as a gloss, and rejects 5a-b and 8 as editorial enlargement of verse 6, reproducing with substantial correctness Isaiah's meaning in the last-mentioned verse. Stade, on the other hand, would omit verse 7 and retain verse 8, thinking that the former arose from a misunderstanding of the figure in verse 8.

[126] Even if it could be admitted that "a dream," "a vision of the night" (verse 7) were suitable figures for expressing the multitudinousness of the enemies, the words, "the multitude of the terrible ones shall be as chaffthat passeth away" (verse 5), admit of but one meaning, viz., that the besiegers will be suddenly swept off the scene.

[127] Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, p. 36, Note 1.

[128] Cyr( is, to be sure, most naturally understood of the foreign tyrant, although even it does not bear that meaning exclusively. Cf. Jeremiah 15:21. But the case is altogether different with Cl and the other terms used. As Cheyne well puts it: Cyr( is the external, Cl the internal foe of Israel. Nevertheless, a few lines later, he himself again confuses the matter by saying that the Mycl are described as Mycyr( (Introduction to the Book of Isaiah, 195).

[129] "They look not unto the Holy One of Israel, neither seek Jehovah! yet He also is wise, etc."

[130] The words, "Is it not yet a very little while" (verse 17), show how the immediate nearness of the vision of regeneration, due to the peculiar prophetic perspective, contributes toward rendering the contrast all the more effective.

[131] Cheyne thinks that the author boldly conceives of Jehovah as being Himself visibly present among Israel to teach the pious, and that this points to a time when prophecy no longer existed. But this interpretation of verse 20, "thy Teacher shall not behidden any more," is far from necessary. The supposition is rather that at one time Jehovah was visible, when His prophets were heard, that afterwards He became hidden, and that in the future He will become visible again in precisely the same sense He was so originally, i.e., through prophetic revelation. The silencing of the prophets (verses 10, 11) is a wicked removal of Jehovah, the resumption of prophetic teaching (verses 20, 21) will be a reappearance of Jehovah; both cases are entirely parallel. The reference to conversion from idolatry in verse 22 also makes it probable that in verses 20, 21, something is described which forms a contrast to the people's previous conduct.

[132] Introduction to the Book of Isaiah, 203, 204.

[133] So the Revised Version, Ewald, Dillmann, Bredenkamp and others.

[134] Cf. Isaiah 29:7, 8; Zechariah 14:12.

[135] The lion in the figure is not represented at the point where he has already seized the prey, but as uttering the growl that usually precedes his leaping upon it (cf. Isaiah 5:29). The idea is that the shouting of the shepherds fails to deflect him from his purpose. So it is declared of Jehovah in verse 2 that "He will not call back his words."

[136] From the above it appears how unfounded is Cheyne's charge of lack of consecutiveness against the passage (verses 5-9). The inner arrangement of these verses is perfectly logical and their coherence with what precedes of the closest. Especially verse 8 points back most significantly to verse 3. The Assyrian is to fall indeed, but not until all human power arrayed against him has been disposed of. Cheyne himself is constrained to admit that at least the rhythm and style of verse 8a are characteristically Isaianic. The same may be said of verse 9b.

[137] An exception is Sörensen,Juda und die Assyrische Weltmacht, p. 24.

[138] Z.A.W., 4:269-271. Similarly Guthe,Das Zukunftsbild des Jesaia, p. 45.

[139] Cheyne,Introduction to the Book of Isaiah, 178.

[140] Cf. 28:29, 29:24, 30:20, 21.

[141] So Guthe,Das Zukunftsbild des Jesaia, 44; Cheyne,Introduction to the Book of Isaiah, 173.

[142] Cf. Micah 5:4.

[143] Cf. Dillmann'sCommentar, p. 285; Bredenkamp'sCommentar, p. 190.

[144] Cf. Duhm's remarks on 32:1 (p. 210): "This verse presents a strong obstacle to the post-exilic dating of the prophecy; not as if it would have been impossible for a post-exilic writer to speak of afutureking, but because he could not have spoken of him after such a matter-of-fact fashion, and would inevitably have made the Messiah more conspicuous."

[145] Cf. the excellent remarks of Hackmann on this point,Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, 98. The case of chapter 3:16-4:6 is entirely parallel to that of the present passage. Guthe tries to make out a difference, because in chapter 3:16 seq.a judgment is threatened which strikes at the specific evil denounced, whilst here the punishment lacks all adaptation to the sin of the women. On the explanation suggested above this difference does not exist.

[146] Duhm surmises that the style of verse 9 is that of the conventional beginning of a popular song and remarks: "The discovery that there must be imitation of some other passage in this is not calculated to increase our respect for criticism."

[147] Cf. Micah 3:18; Jeremiah 26:12.

[148] Still a different view of the relation of the two passages is taken by Cheyne, who thinks that 32:15 is the older one, and that both speak of a raising of conditions above their normal level. Cheyne further suggests that the writer of 29:17 took lmrb in 32:15 for the ridge of Mt. Carmel and hence substituted Lebanon for rbdm, the sense being that Lebanon will in the future have vines not only on its slopes, but on its summit, and Carmel become so thickly set with noble trees as to resemble a forest. This misunderstanding of 32:15 would of course exclude the authorship of Isaiah. But the variation between Lebanon and rbdm need not have had this origin. Both signify wild regions. And the use of rbdm in his model would of itself have been sufficient to warn the writer that lmrb was not intended as a proper name. Apart from this peculiar exegesis, the main point of Cheyne's view, viz., that both passages refer to an improvement of conditions, offers no obstacle to the genuineness of either, except it be held that Isaiah could not have twice expressed the same thought.

[149] Duhm has well shown that this phrase is not intended as an indefinite oracular statement (so Stade), but resembles the Germanüber Jahr und Tag, being equivalent to the less idiomatic phrase of 29:1.

[150] Cheyne goes no farther than: "It is tempting but unnecessary to bring down the date as low as the oppression of the Jews by Artaxerxes Ochus."

[151] Cf. Tiele,Babylonisch-assyrische Geschichte, 1:292.

[152] Tiele proposes to reverse the order of 2 Kings 18:17-37 and 19:10-13, making the embassy from Libna precede the sending of the army corps from Lachish. His reason for this is twofold: 1. Because the Assyrians could not reach Lachish except by way of Libna; of this I am not competent to judge. 2. Because the sending of letters obviously represents the first mild attempt to reduce Hezekiah to submission, whilst the dispatch of an army corps marks a second more vigorous step of procedure. Against this it should be observed, that Sennacherib, after hearing of Tirhaka's approach and perceiving the necessity of withdrawing the troops sent to Jerusalem and concentrating his forces, would naturally before doing so make a last effort to obtain some result from his expedition, even though he could hardly expect a bare message to succeed when the appearance of his soldiers had failed.

[153] Cf. Bleck'sEinleitung, 256.

[154] That, while denying the genuineness of the discourse, Cheyne yet acknowledges its natural connection with the history of Isaiah's time in the form above stated, shows how plainly the situation of the year 701 is written on its very face.

[155] Introduction to the Book of Isaiah, 169, 170.

[156] Cf. Dillmann'sCommentar, p. 293.

[157] Cf. what has been said above on chapter 32:1.

[158] Of course the concrete enemies which the prophet has in mind and which form the substratum of his typical vision of the future are the Assyrians. But the situation was so self-explanatory that it was unnecessary to mention them by name.

[159] Verse 13-26 are true prediction as well as verses 1-12 and not to be assigned to a somewhat later time. There is no necessity for bisecting a chapter which by its very form evinces its unity of composition.

[160] The later Jews had a crassly materialistic conception of the fiery base on which the throne of God's glory was supposed to rest and out of the stream of which angels were believed to be continually created (Cf. Weber,System der altsynagogalen Palästinischen Theologie, 160, 161.

[161] It should be observed that in chapter 6:5 also the conception of dwelling in the midst of an unclean people, as disqualifying for the vision of Jehovah, is significantly brought forward. Here nobody thinks of understanding that which terrifies Isaiah as a material fire. In like manner chapter 6:7 may be said to contain the germ of 33:15. Attention should be called to the intimate connection in which the ideas of chapter 33 stand to the fundamental teaching of Isaiah. This has been well exhibited by George Adam Smith in theExpositor's Bible.

[162] Dillmann,Commentar, 258.

[163] 28:29 has obvious points of contact with verse 21 and still more with 29:14.

[164] Guthe,Zukunftsbild des Jesaia, 28, thinks the parable is intended to justify the prophet's change from his earlier and darker representations of the judgment to the milder and more hopeful view of the later discourses in which the deliverance of Judah is promised. But to express this thought the figure would have been badly chosen, for itspointlies precisely in the intelligence and consistency of the husbandman, who in all his doings from the very first has his eyes on the harvest. If Jehovah through the prophet had predicted at one time a severer and at another time a milder issue of His judgments, He would have shown Himself in so far lacking in such intelligence and consistency.

[165] Cheyne's argument against the genuineness of the parable, that it cannot have been addressed to the sinners addressed in the preceding, ahs no weight, because, the piece does not introduce itself as addressed to the same persons. In reference to the alleged imitation of Genesis 4:23 in verse 23, see above; the linguistic phenomena will be discussed later; the Isaianic words are here particularly numerous.

[166] The dependence of verse 28a on chapter 8:8a is doubtful, the similarity being confined to the use of the figure of the stream reaching to the neck; if real it proves nothing against the Isaianic authorship. Equally general is the resemblance between verse 28b and chapter 29:5, which again would be conclusive only if first the secondary character of the latter verse was established.

[167] Cf. October number, p. 615.

[168] Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, p. 100, Note 2.

[169] Hackmann alone hazards the view that verses 18-25 refer to Northern Israel, and omitting verses 15 and 17 connects verse 18 directly with verse 16. But the fact that in chapter 8:1-8 a threatening against Syria-Ephraim is immediately followed by one against Judah renders a similar sequence here probable.

[170] Cf. Prof. Porter inJournal of Biblical Literature, vol. 14.

[171] Duhm, to be sure, takes the impossible view that the peoples and far-off countries come under consideration only as witnesses, not as enemies to be defeated, and that the real assailants of Judah to which the oracle refers are Syria and Ephraim.

[172] Hackmann follows Stade in denying the genuineness of the verses.

[173] Introduction to the Book of Isaiah, 37.

[174] Both Duhm and Cheyne have an original way of dividing the text. After eliminating the words l)wgm( yb (taking the suffix in Kcr) as a corruption of yb) they separate vers. 8b from what precedes and assume that it is the close of a sentence of which the first part has been lost. Cheyne in particular thinks that the wings spoken of are Jehovah's wings and that their stretching out over the land is meant in a favorable sense. Against this proposal cf. Kittel in the sixth edition of Dillmann's Commentary,in loco.

[175] Prof. Porter thinks that no argument in favor of Isaiah's reputation as a promissory prophet can be drawn from Jeremiah 26:17-19. He argues that, if the friends of Jeremiah did not appeal to Isaiah as a prophet of evil, at least his enemies did not appeal to him either as a prophet of the inviolability of Zion. But the two cases stand not alike. On the critical hypothesis Isaiah's prophecies were well-nigh entirely prophecies of destruction. How could the friends of Jeremiah have failed to shield their protégé with this great name, if such was really the historical tradition concerning Isaiah? In our view Isaiah's prophecies contained the announcements of ruin and of salvation for Jerusalem in close juxtaposition and curiously intermingled. This made them an unsuitable weapon in the hands of those who attacked Jeremiah.

[176] Cheyne puts it in 711 as a companion piece to chapter 20. He combines it with the prophecy 10:5-9, 13, 14, of which, in his view, it once formed the close.

[177] According to a third view represented by Duhm and Dillmann, chapter 17:12-14 form the introduction to chapter 18. In this case it would belong, together with the latter, to the Sennacherib-period.

[178] Cheyne would put the embassy described in chapter 18 as sent from Egypt after the embassy sent from Judah to Egypt according to chapter 30, 31. Hackmann adopts the reverse order, and this is to be preferred, because it is easier to understand how Isaiah could first speak of the Egyptians in the tone of chapter 18 before as yet serious thoughts were entertained at Jerusalem of an alliance, and afterwards when the secret negotiations with that power were in full progress in the totally different tone of chapter 28-31, thanvice versa. Cf.Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, p. 98.

[179] The exegesis of Sörensen, who finds in chapter 18 the prediction of a military defeat of Sennacherib's host and thinks that the approach of the Egyptian army produced such confidence in Isaiah, has found no acceptance.

[180] Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, 103-107.

[181] Duhm and Cheyne reject verses 10-12, but on insufficient grounds. The term "idols" (if we do not emend the text of verse 10 by reading hl)h twblmml for lyl)h twblmml) does not make the Assyrian king speak from the standpoint of monotheism, but is the natural result of his having to speak with the vocabulary of Isaiah. For the expression of the thought that all the other gods were powerless before his gods no stronger word offered itself than lyl), elsewhere used by the prophet to describe the powerlessness of the idols as contrasted with Jehovah. The term may have had a stronger meaning when thus predicated by Isaiah of false gods, but this would not disqualify it for forcibly expressing the conviction of the pagan king that the gods of other nations were practically nothing when arrayed against his own.

[182] Cheyne,Introduction to the Book of Isaiah, 135.

[183] Hackmann,Die Zukunftserwartung des Jesaia, 108.

[184] Sörensen thinks that the words "tomorrow we die" are simply the proverbial epicurean justification for enjoying the present life; Cheyne assumes that the Jerusalemites resorted to the banquet-table to drown their apprehension of a possible return of the enemy. Both seem to me less plausible than the ordinary view given above.

[185] Whether verses 1-14 are one continuous discourse or consist of two distinct prophecies is difficult to decide. In the former case the present verses 1, 2 must be a present of retrospective vision; though speaking after the deliverance, Isaiah transports himself back to the time when the city was still besieged and the people at their mad carousal. Then from verse 6 onward this vivid realization of a present scene gives way to the calmer description of the past. In the other case verses 1-5 were actually spoken during the siege and subsequently prefixed in writing to the discourse of verses 6-14, dating from after the deliverance.

[186] For earlier defenders of this view, cf. Ryssel, p. 10.

[187] Wellhausen, in the fourth edition of Bleck's Introduction to the Old Testament (1878), p. 425 (note).

[188] According to Oort, in both passages of Genesis the words "the same is Bethlehem" are due to a misunderstanding of the redactor, or are at least inserted by a later hand.

[189] Cf. Genesis 35:16-23; the words, "Ophel of the daughter of Zion," are made an interpolation like Lehem in 5:1.

[190] Oort assumes that the combination of Bethlehem and Ephrathah had no basis in fact, but was entirely due to the post-exilic scribes, who first changed the meaning of Micah's prophecy in favor of David's house, and then introduced the identification of Ephrathah and Bethlehem thus obtained into the Genesis-passages, 1 Samuel 17:12, Joshua 15:59 (Sept.) and into the book of Ruth (Theol. Tijdschr., 5:510.

[191] On p. 273seq. of the same volume Oort formally acknowledges the shipwreck of his hypothesis, but also declares that, after its abandonment, Micah 4, 5, become more of a mystery than ever. This statement is followed (p. 279seq.) by some remarks of DeGoeje, proposing several emendations of the text and in general endeavoring to elucidate the connection of thought on the assumption of its genuineness as a whole. In reference to the Ephrath-question, DeGoeje suggests that it is not necessary to assume a Benjaminitic place of that name, since in Genesis after all the Judean Ephrath may be referred to, the expression Cr)h trbb "some way" (to Ephrath) being perhaps sufficiently indefinite in character to apply equally well to comparatively long as to shorter distances. A third part of the article consists of some further observations by Kuenen, who insists upon the two Ephraths and upon considering the words "this is Bethlehem" in Genesis a mistaken geographical gloss. While rejecting most of DeGoeje's conjectures, Kuenen makes a valuable contribution of his own toward the better understanding of chaps. 4 and 5.

[192] It will be observed that this was written before Stade himself had fully grasped the new critical principle of the one-sidedness ofallearly prophecy as a prophecy of judgment pure and simple. He here still assumes that Micah appeared unique in this respect to the post-exilic reader. The present idea is that Hosea as well as Amos, Isaiah almost as much as Micah, were found deficient in the element of promise and were all expanded and supplemented accordingly.

[193] Theologische Literaturzeitung(1881), pp. 443, 444. For a later view of Giesebrecht, cf.Beiträge zur Jesaia Kritik.

[194] Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft(1883), p. 4seq.

[195] Z. A. W.(1884), p. 88 (note).

[196] Z. A. W.(1884), pp. 277-291.

[197] Cf. Robertson Smith on Micah in theEncyclopedia Britannica, where the same proposal to excise 4:11-13 had been made.

[198] Geschichte der Heiligen Schriften Alten Testaments(1881), p. 314; cf.Z. A. W.(1883), p. 1seq.

[199] The Prophets of Israel(1882), L. vii (Notes 4 and 6). In excising 4:11-13, Robertson Smith follows Oort, without, however, approving of his general treatment of the context.

[200] The Cambridge Bible for Schools, Micah(1882), p. 34.

[201] De Profetie van Micha, pp. 65-108.

[202] Historisch-Kritisch Onderzoek, 2:369-380.

[203] One more defender of the authenticity of the entire prophecy arose in Wildeboer (De Letterkunde des Ouden Verbonds, 1893, pp. 174-183). On most points this author sides with Ryssel, although showing some inclination to follow Kuenen in his rejection of the passages mentioned above. An earlier treatise of Wildeboer on Micah (1884) is not accessible to me. The genuineness of Chapters 1-5 was further upheld by Pont inTheologische Studien(1888, 1889). He assigns 6:1-7:6 to the reign of Manasseh and 7:7-20 to the post-exilic age.

[204] Roorda explained as follows: The false prophet admits that Jerusalem may be besieged, but maintains that it cannot be conquered, because the enemy will be compelled to raise the siege when numberless troops of warriors under the leadership of God Himself stream together to protect the walls and to beat back the enemy.

[205] Ewald assumed that Micah originally wrote the words in the margin as an example of false prophesying, and that against his intention they were afterwards put into the text by a transcriber.

[206] Kleinert sought to make the above interpretation plausible by rendering the closing words of verse 11, "and were to prophesy to this people." As Ryssel shows, this rendering is excluded by the construction.

[207] The Prophets of Israel, 2nd ed., pp. 290-292; Introduction, p. xxvii.

[208] Cf. Nowack's Commentaryin loco.

[209] For the various possibilities of interpretation cf. Elhorst, pp. 43-48. Ryssel compares Hosea 2:1, 2. But even if "the children of Israel" in verse 10 be here referred to Northern-Israel, and the gathering together of Israel and Judah of verse 11 be understood as taking place in Palestine, it should be remembered that Hosea's perspective, especially in the first part of his book, represents an earlier stage of prophecy than that of Micah. To him the exile of Judah had not been as clearly revealed as to the latter, so that his picture of the restoration could more easily assume the form of a bringing back of exiled Israel to Judah. In the case of Micah such indefiniteness of speech was no longer possible.

[210] Cf. 3:8, where a similar contrast is marked by ybn) Mlw)w.

[211] Quoted by Hengstenberg,Christology(English translation), 1:411.

[212] In reference to the various attempts to find for 2:12, 13, another more suitable place in the Book of Micah, cf. Ryssel, p. 213. Ryssel thinks Steiner's proposal to put the verses after 4:8 not without plausibility. Elhorst places our passage between 3:11 and 12. On this cf. the criticism of Kosters,Theologisch Tijdschrift(1893), p. 251.

[213] Cf. Kosters,Theologisch Tijdschrift, 1893, p. 263.

[214] Kosters,l.c., thinks that all the passages quoted from Isaiah as bearing on this question prove no more than that Jehovah surpasses in power the gods of the Gentiles, and is able to protect his people from their attacks. Isaiah, however, not merely teaches that Jehovah can protect Israel from other nations, but also that Jehovah summons and brings these nations to execute judgment upon Israel, which is quite a different matter, and goes far beyond the theology Kosters would ascribe to that prophet. And this is true of Micah as well as of Isaiah.

[215] Cf. Nowack,Z. A. W., 1884, p. 280.

[216] Kosters,Theologisch Tijdschrift, 1893, p. 264.

[217] Though there is nothing about the disputed clause to suggest its spuriousness, it should not, on the other hand, be allowed to prejudice against the genuineness of its surroundings those who find it unacceptable ona priorigrounds. The three words can be taken out without destroying the sense of what remains. "Thou shalt dwell in the field; there shall Jehovah redeem thee," would on this view mean that the daughter of Zion must be reduced to a state of helplessness and utter exposure, symbolized by the open field as over against the fortified city. This thought is in full harmony with Micah's judgment on fortresses and cities elsewhere. Hosea 2:16 would be a parallel. Cf. Kuenen, inTheologisch Tijdschrift, 1872, p. 298, against a proposal of DeGoeje to include in the alleged gloss also the following words up to verse 11.

[218] Cf. Keil's Commentaryin loco.

[219] That this is actually the point of view from which the whole prophecy of verses 11-13 wishes to be understood may be seen from the closing words of verse 13; the gain and substance of the nations are devoted to Jehovah, i.e., to His sanctuary, because they attempted to rob Him and to defile His dwelling-place.

[220] Another way of removing the conflict is to take the two prophecies as referring to different times. Thus Hengstenberg finds in verses 9, 10, the Babylonian captivity predicted; in verses 11-13, the Maccabean conflict; in verse 14 the Roman oppression. Others, like Caspari and Keil, while not assuming a precise chronological succession, yet insist upon placing the event of verses 11-13 as an eschatological episode between the exile and the Messianic developments described in verse 1 seq. The weakness of this exegesis lies in its rendering of ht(w in verse 11 as "then," whereas in verses 9 and 14 it obviously means "now" and designates the writer's real or ideal present. Since the three "nows" are correlated they must be rendered alike in each case.

[221] This would not apply to Genesis 48:7, which is assigned to P, but Stade gives everything after Krd to the redactor who copied from the passage in chapter 35.

[222] Z. A. W., 1883, p. 4seq.

[223] Z. A. W., 1884, p. 293.

[224] Thus the question whether the words Mxltb )wh in the Genesis passages are a gloss is entirely immaterial. We do not believe this assumption necessary. DeGoeje's explanation, given in a previous note, seems quite satisfactory. It is significant that neither in Jeremiah nor in 1 Samuel 10:2 is the name Ephrath mentioned in connection with Rachel's grave. But even if the disputed words are a gloss and express a mistaken identification of Bethlehem-Judah with the Ephrath near which Rachel was buried, the glossator could not have made the mistake unless Bethlehem had been called Ephrath in his day. The whole question, therefore, reduces itself to this—whether this designation as it was then current reached back into ancient time or was a novel usage. Equally immaterial is the question whether the original reading in Micah 5:1 is Beth Ephrathah or Bethlehem-Ephrathah. According to Roorda the first Hebrew text was htrp) tyb and the original rendering of the Septuagint corresponding to this oikoj Efraqa. Then Mxl tyb was written in the margin of the Hebrew in explanation. A copyist took this to mean that tyb should be read Mxl tyb and made the change. Thus originated the present Hebrew text. A comparison of the original Septuagint with it suggested as a compromise bhqleem oikoj Efraqa, which is the present Greek text. Roorda's conjecture may possibly be correct. It is equally possible, however, that the Septuagint text contains an explanation of the Hebrew as it now stands. In that case the latter may well be original. Cf. the combination Bethlehem-Judah.

[225] There is more reason to believe that ytrp) belongs to the original text (whatever may be the truth about hz) and that the words Mxl tybm were added either by the writer or by a later hand to guard against the misinterpretation of ytrp) as "Ephraimite."

[226] Kuenen, of course, makes 1 Chronicles 2, as a whole, a tendency-piece. Cf.Theologisch Tijdschrift, 1872, p. 49.

[227] No weight can be attached to Stade's argument, based on the constant use of ytrp) = Ephraimite, because this adjective may well have borne a double meaning. Indeed this must be assumed on Stade's own theory, since the word must have belonged to both the place Ephrath and the larger territory of Ephraim.

[228] Cf. Volz, p. 67, who admits that an indirect polemic against the Davidic nobility must be implied. Elhorst thinks he has discovered a way in which the identification of Bethlehem and Ephrathah may be post-exilic and yet Micah the author of 5:1. Reading Beth-Ephrath, the suggests that David's family, though residing in Bethlehem, came originally from Ephrath, near Ramah, and was for this reason called Ephrathite. A post-exilic copyist then would have made the mistake of identifying Bethlehem and Ephrath. The difficult about this is that Micah, a Judean prophet, would hardly have designated the royal house by a name recalling its Ephraimitic descent. Cf. Kosters,Theologisch Tijdschrift, 1893, p. 263.

[229] Nowack,Z. A. W., 1884, p. 284; Elhorst, p. 52.

[230] Pont finds in Micah 1:7 an allusion to the immoral significance of the Asherim. This possible allusion would become an explicit reference if, with Wellhausen, we were to change hynnt) in hyr#), a conjecture which has much in its favor; the term "hires" appears strange between "graven images" and "idols," and the "burning with fire" goes well with the Asherim which it is proposed to substitute.

[231] Kosters,Theologisch Tijdschrift, 1893, p. 267, suggests that the reference may be to the use of Teraphim, and that the Asherah cannot be meant, because the latter had nothing to do with the giving of oracles.

[232] By making Isaiah 19:19 late, the critics admit that the interpretation of the Mazzebah here as a symbolic stone must be allowed.

[233] Jeremiah 2:27 is no more decisive or explicit than Hosea 4:12.

[234] Geschichte des Volkes Israel, 1:184, 460. Cf. also Meyer,Geschichte des Alterthums, 1:248.

[235] Cf. Wolf-Baudissin in Herzog'sReal Encyclopedia, 3rd ed., 2nd Vol., Art. "Astarte" and "Aschera," p. 158; Tiele,Geschiedenis van den Godsdienst in de Oudheid, 1:286.

[236] The critics have all the more reason to take the view given above regarding the prophetic silence on the Asherah, since their J and E of the Hexateuch, assigned to this same period, are supposed to have changed the Mazzeboth into memorial stones for the purpose of obliterating their original meaning. Since no such attempt is made in reference to the Asherim, J and E must have either thought that these were more innocent than the Mazzeboth, which is impossible to believe, or must have thought them too inherently pagan to admit of a similar idealization. If then the silence of J and E is to be explained form the utter disapproval of the Asherah, why cannot the silence of the early prophets be construed in the same manner?

[237] Cf. Kuenen inTheologisch Tijdschrift, 6:290.

[238] This point has been rightly insisted upon by Elhorst, pp. 46-48, 54-58. Elhorst has also shown that neither Stade nor Kuenen succeeds in making out a much better continuity of thought than exists at present. Stade's 4:1-4, 11-5:3, 6-14 is hardly more rational than the text as it stands. Especially ht( and verse 2 cause difficulty on Stade's view. Kuenen's hypothesis does not explain what was the motive for the insertion of 4:6-8, and the removal of these verses leaves the subject addressed in verse 9 in doubt. Nowack finally and Volz do not make clear how the words which they tentatively concede to Micah could have existed in or been reduced to their isolated fragmentary state, nor do they make intelligible the process through which this nucleus passed so as to attain its present size and composition.

[239] Kosters,Theologisch Tijdschrift, 1893, p. 265.

[240] Cf. Giesebrecht,Beiträge zur Jesaia-Kritik, p. 217.

[241] Ryssel has already called attention to the following points of contact between 7:7-20 and the other parts of the book: Mlw( ymy in verse 14 cf. 5:1; ll(m verse 13 cf. 2:7 and 3:4; the contrast between Zion and the world is conceived of in 7:10 after the same manner as in 4:11-13; d( )wb, verse 12 cf. 4:8b; the shepherd-figure of 7:14 recalls 4:6 and 5:3. Little can be built on the play in verse 18 on the name of Micah ("who is a God like unto Thee?"). The critics might make use of this to explain how the later prophecy came to be put on the name of Micah.

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