Stories of the Prophets Part 14

_Working With the Remnant._

Isaiah called his little band of disciples and followers "The Remnant."

He referred to them as "The Remnant" because he knew that, if only these remained true and faithful to G.o.d, for their sakes G.o.d would not forsake the Fatherland.

It was upon "The Remnant" that he placed the future welfare of his country. Through these few he hoped to regenerate the rest of his people, despite the corruption and wrongdoing of their leaders. He aimed, especially, to prepare the young generation for patriotic, G.o.d-fearing, G.o.d-trusting lives.

The prophet had set for himself no easy task. He met opposition from many directions. The king himself opposed him for political reasons.

The priests, who sided with the king in his introduction of a.s.syrian rites and practices in the Temple service, opposed him on religious grounds; so that, for many years, Isaiah simply devoted himself to teaching and preaching moral living, just and righteous dealing and absolute trust in G.o.d.

"Hear, O heavens, and give heed, O earth, for the Lord speaketh: Sons have I brought up and placed on high, but they have proved false to me.

The ox knows its owner and the a.s.s its master's crib, But Israel has no knowledge; my people have no insight; Ah! Sinful nation, people deep laden with guilt, Race of evil-doers, perverse children!

They have forsaken the Lord; They have spurned the Holy One of Israel; They have become rebellious.

"On what place can you yet be smitten since you continue rebelling?

The whole head is sick and the whole heart faint, From the sole of the foot to the head there is no soundness, Only wounds and bruises and fresh sores, Which have not been dressed nor bound up nor softened with oil."

With words of this kind, and in similar speeches, Isaiah tried to describe the condition of Judah to its people. The cowardice of Ahaz in throwing himself at the feet of the a.s.syrian had, indeed, smitten the land and the people very sore. The large tribute to Tiglath-Pileser had to be collected and paid. The burden was terrible to bear. In the meantime, Judah's enemies from the south and along the Mediterranean coast took advantage of the weakened condition of Judah and attacked the country from many points.

Isaiah tried, with all his might, to bring the people, as a whole, to an understanding of Judah's condition. He wanted them to join "The Remnant" and to live their lives in accordance with his teaching, which were really not his, but G.o.d's. Only in this way, Isaiah said, could a country that had fallen deeply into sin and unrighteousness, and was at the mercy of its enemies, be saved:

"Your land is a desolation, your cities are burned with fire, Your tilled land--before your eyes strangers devour it; And the daughter of Zion is left like a booth in a vineyard, Like a lodge in a field of cuc.u.mbers, like a watchtower.

Unless the Lord of hosts had left us a remnant, We should almost be as Sodom, We would have been like Gomorrah."

This simile, comparing Jerusalem to these ancient cities of evil repute, was answered by Isaiah's opponents with the statement that the people of Sodom and Gomorrah were idol worshipers, but that the people of Judah brought their sacrifices to the Temple and observed the holydays in accordance with the ancient laws. This was the same kind of an argument as the citizens in Samaria gave to Amos and Hosea.

Isaiah, however, who knew, and had taught "The Remnant" that sacrificing animals was not the true manner of worshipping G.o.d, replied as follows:

"Hear the word of the Lord, ye Rulers of Sodom; Give heed to the instruction of our G.o.d, ye people of Gomorrah!

What care I for the great number of your sacrifices? saith the Lord.

I am sated with the burnt offerings of rams and the fat of fed beasts, And in the blood of bullocks and lambs and he-goats I take no pleasure.

When ye appear before me--who has required this of you?

Trample no more my courts, bring no more offerings, Vain is the odor of incense--it is an abomination to me; I am not able to endure a fast and a solemn a.s.sembly.

Your new moons and your appointed days my soul hateth.

I am tired of bearing it.

When ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you.

Also, if ye make many prayers, I will not hear."

Then Isaiah launched forth into one of the most beautiful speeches that he delivered in his whole career. In it he brought home to the people the true idea of the religion which G.o.d had commanded to Israel, and through which Judah could be regenerated, strengthened and saved:

"Your hands are stained with blood; Wash, that ye may be clean; Remove the evil of your deeds from before mine eyes.

Cease to do evil; learn to do good; Seek justice; relieve the oppressed; Vindicate the orphan; plead for the widow."

In one of the sublimest pa.s.sages that any prophet ever uttered, Isaiah promised the people G.o.d's forgiveness in the following wonderful appeal:

"Come now, let us argue together, saith the Lord.

Though your sins be as scarlet, They may become white as snow; Though they be red as crimson, They may become as wool; If ye willingly yield and are obedient, Ye shall eat the good of the land, But if you refuse and rebel, Ye shall be devoured by the sword.

The mouth of the Lord hath spoken it!"

While Isaiah thus pleaded and threatened, he gained many additions to "The Remnant," but he failed to create a deep impression either with the reigning house or with the powerful priesthood or with the majority of the rich in Jerusalem and Judah.

In the meantime, a va.s.sal of a.s.syria, in far-off Babylonia, rebelled successfully. Immediately, various Palestinian states, including Judah, began to prepare a similar attempt to free themselves from the a.s.syrian yoke.

Ahaz had died in 721, the year in which Sargon the Great captured Samaria, after a two year's siege, and effectually reduced the kingdom of Israel. Hezekiah, his young son, to whom Isaiah looked for the ideal prince he had pictured, succeeded him.

The calamity of the northern kingdom did not seem to bring Isaiah or Ahaz any warning. The king had been paying his a.s.syrian tribute regularly and faithfully; the prophet had centered his hope in "The Remnant" and in the crown prince, and bided his time.

When, however, six years later, in the year 715, Hezekiah joined the coalition of Palestinian states against a.s.syria, Isaiah was not only disappointed, but became greatly alarmed.

To permit Hezekiah to follow the advice of his father's counselors, Isaiah knew would be national suicide. For three years, therefore, while the agitation for coalition and rebellion was going on, Isaiah cast off his prophet's mantle and sandals, and walked barefooted and in the garb of a captive through the treets of Jerusalem, as an object lesson to the people of Judah, to show them what might await them if they rebelled against a.s.syria.

But even this, for the time being, was of no avail. Rebellion was in the blood of the king and the court clique. Somehow the very thought of it in Jerusalem seemed to reach the a.s.syrian capital. Hardly had Hezekiah begun to carry his contemplated revolt into action when Sennacherib, the new a.s.syrian king, was on the march.

Once more Judah was invaded by the a.s.syrian hosts, and once more Judah's rulers bent their knee in submission and undertook to pay a tribute that was heavier than ever before.

Yet Isaiah, though heartbroken, was in no way dismayed. His unbounded faith in the final triumph of G.o.d's purposes led him to go on, fearlessly, to oppose the king and his a.s.sociates to the very end.

CHAPTER VII.

_Like Father, Like Son._

A chain, we are told, is as strong as its weakest link. The weak link in the long chain of a.s.syrian provinces was the fact that whenever a new king came to the throne, if he happened to be away, fighting in the field, he had to hurry back to the capital, backed by the complete military force under his command, in order to establish himself firmly in his dominions.

Immediately upon the withdrawal of the king's armies from the field, all the provinces that hated a.s.syria bitterly, rebelled. Naturally, all the work of conquest had to be done over again. Then, when another change took place in the rulership of a.s.syria, the new king met the same conditions and the same difficulties.

When Tiglath-Pileser died, Shalmaneser IV., who laid siege to Samaria, was forced to reconquer all the Syrian and Palestinian tributaries.

The great Sargon, who reduced Samaria and carried its inhabitants captive into the northern part of the a.s.syrian Empire, left his successor, Sennacherib, no better legacy.

With Sennacherib's ascension to the throne in the year 704, therefore, the usual thing happened--rebellion broke out all along the line of his possessions.

In Palestine, King Hezekiah of Judah became the leader of a movement for a strong organization of all Palestinian and Syrian states and cities with the purpose of concerted rebellion against the new king.

So strong was the patriotism aroused among the various peoples that Padi, king of the city of Ekron, who would not join the proposed coalition, was captured by the citizens, bound in chains and handed over a prisoner to Hezekiah in Jerusalem.

It did not take Sennacherib long to make up his mind what to do. His predecessors had shown him the way. He organized a strong force, composed mostly of mercenaries, and marched at once into Phoenicia.

City after city fell before his prowess and he worked his way rapidly into Palestine. Unfortunately for Hezekiah and his allies, no concerted action could be agreed upon by them. Each one feared for himself; each one tried to be on the safe side.

Sennacherib took advantage of the situation in this rebellious district of his empire. He marched his armies, victorious throughout Phoenicia, into Palestine, meeting with success after success. The city of Tyre resisted most n.o.bly on its own account, but it was no match for the a.s.syrians. Immediately after that Ekron, too, fell, and Judah itself was overrun by Sennacherib's troops.

The great disappointment of the Palestinian allies in this struggle for independence during the years 703-701, was that the help they looked for from the Arabian tribes to the south was very meagre, and that the horses and chariots they counted upon from Egypt did not materialize at all.

In Jerusalem, the prophet Isaiah counseled against the proposed rebellion from its very beginning. He warned Hezekiah, the leaders in Jerusalem, and even the nations who were entering into the coalition with Hezekiah, of the folly of this step. Knowing, as he did, the situation, the weakness of the leaders, the corruption within Judah and the demoralization of the army and the people generally, because of greed and oppression, he understood that Sennacherib's forces would rout the Palestinian forces unmercifully.