iii. But what had Isaiah to offer in the place of the policy of these

worldly and sacerdotal advisers of the king? It was the simple command "Trust in the Lord." It was the threefold message "God is high; God is near; God is Love."[510] Had he not told Ahaz not to fear the "stumps of two smouldering torches," when Rezin and Pekah seemed awfully dangerous to Judah? So he tells them now that, though their sins had necessitated the rushing stroke of Assyrian judgment, Zion should not be utterly destroyed. In Isaiah "the calmness requisite for sagacity rose from faith." Mr. Bagehot might have appealed to Isaiah's whole policy in illustration of what he has so well described as the military and political benefits of religion. Monotheism is of advantage to men not only "by reason of the high concentration of steady feeling which it produces, but also for the mental calmness and sagacity which surely springs from a pure and vivid conviction that the Lord reigneth."[511] Isaiah's whole conviction might have been summed up in the name of the king himself: "Jehovah maketh strong."

King Hezekiah, apparently not a man of much personal force, though of sincere piety, was naturally distracted by the counsels of these three parties: and who can judge him severely if, beset with such terrific dangers, he occasionally wavered, now to one side, now to the other? On the whole, it is clear that he was wise and faithful, and deserves the high eulogy that his faith failed not. Naturally he had not within his soul that burning light of inspiration which made Isaiah so sure that, even though clouds and darkness might lower on every side, God was an eternal Sun, which flamed for ever in the zenith, even when not visible to any eye save that of Faith.

FOOTNOTES:

[480] The first of these dates is highly uncertain, as is the entire chronology of this reign. I follow Kittel.

[481] 2 Chron. xxxi. 2-21.

[482] Josiah did this many years later (2 Kings xxiii. 13).

[483] Gen. xxxv. 14. See Spencer, _De legg. Hebr._, i. 444; Bochart, _Canaan_, ii. 2.

[484] Exod. xxiv. 4. Comp. Deut. vii. 5, xii. 3, xvi. 22; Lev. xxvi. 1; 2 Chron. xiv. 3, xxxi. 1; Jer. xliii. 13; Hos. x. 2; Mic. v. 13 (where the A.V. often has "statue" or "image"). Comp. Clem. Alex., _Strom._, i. 24; Arnob., _c. Gent._, i. 39.

[485] The rendering "grove" in the A.V. is borrowed from the ἄλσος of the LXX., and the _lucus_ of the Vulgate. On the connection of the Asherah with the sacred tree of the Assyrian, see my article on "Grove" in Smith's _Dict. of the Bible_; and Fergusson, _Nineveh and Persepolis Restored_, 299-304. On the worship of Asherah, see 1 Kings xv. 13; 2 Kings xxi. 3-7, xxiii. 4; 2 Chron. xv. 16; Judg. iii. 5-7, vi. 25, xviii. 18. Baudissin in _Herzog Realencykl._, _s.v._ We may well be startled by the prevalence of idolatry in Jerusalem revealed in Isa. x. 11, xxvii. 9, xxix. 11, xxx. 9, 22, etc.

[486] See Wellhausen, _Hist._, 235; Stade, _Gesch. d. V. I._, 460; W. R. Smith, _Religion of the Semites_, 171; Cheyne, _Isaiah_, ii. 303; Renan, _Hist. du Peuple d'Israel_, i. 230 (Prof. Driver, _Bibl. Dict._, i. 258, 2nd edition).

[487] _Hierozoicon_, ii. 3, § 13.

[488] Jer. xliv. 17. In the collection of antiquities of Baron Ustinoff at Jaffa are five or six dragon-headed serpents, with ears of copper and hollow inside. They are ancient, and were perhaps used as talismanic copies of Nehushtan.

[489] If this was a genuine relic, it must have been nearly eight hundred years old. It is never mentioned elsewhere.

[490] נְחֻשׁתָּן, "a brazen thing." The king certainly showed a horror of sacerdotal imposture and religious materialism. Yet Renan argues, from Isa. x. 11, xxvii. 9, xxx. 9, 22, that he must have had a certain amount of tolerance. See _Hist. du Peuple d'Israel_, iii. 30.

[491] 2 Kings xviii. 4. _Vayyikra_ is like the English indefinite plural. The impersonal rendering (as in other passages) is adopted in the Targum of Jonathan, the Peshito, etc., and by Luther, Bunsen, Ewald, and most moderns.

[492] This relic is still shown in the Church of St. Ambrose at Milan. It used to be the popular notion that it would hiss at the end of the world. The history of the Milan "relic" is that a Milanese envoy to the court of the Emperor John Zimisces at Constantinople chose it from the imperial treasures, being assured that it was made of the same metal that Hezekiah had broken up (Sigonius, _Hist. Regn. Ital._, vii.). It is probably a symbol used by some ophite sect. See Dean Plumptre, _Dict. of Bibl._, _s.v._ "Serpent."

[493] 2 Kings xvi. 8; Driver, _Isaiah_, 68.

[494] The diverting of the water-courses enabled him to bring the water into the city by a subterranean tunnel. The Saracens took a similar precaution (Gul. Tyr., viii. 7). See Appendix II., where the inscription is given; and compare 2 Chron. xxxii. 30. Apparently it carried the water of Gihon to the south-east gate, where were the king's gardens. Ecclus. xlviii. 17: "Ezekias fortified his city, and brought in water into the midst thereof: he digged the hard rock with iron, and made wells for water." For "water" the MSS. read "Gog," a corruption probably for ἀγωγὸν, "a conduit" (Geiger) or "Gihon" (Fritzsche).

[495] Psalm xlvi. 1-11.

[496] 2 Chron. xxviii. 18.

[497] 2 Kings xviii. 8: comp. xvii. 9. Josephus says that he failed to take Gath (_Antt._, IX. xiii. 3).

[498] A.V., "treasurer" (_soken_; lit., "deputy" or "associate": Isa. xxii. 15). He was "over the household." The Egyptian alliance had for Judah, as Renan points out, some of the fascination that a Russian alliance has often had for troubled spirits in France (_Hist. du Peuple d'Israel_, iii. 12).

[499] Renan says that he may have been a Sebennyite, and his name Sebent.

[500] Isa. xxii. 17, 18: "Behold, the Lord shall sling and sling, and pack and pack, and toss and toss thee away like a ball into a distant land; and there thou shalt die" (Stanley). The versions vary considerably.

[501] Isa. xxxvii. 2. There can be little doubt that there were not _two_ Shebnas.

[502] Mic. i. 10-16. See the writer's _Minor Prophets_ ("Men of the Bible" Series), pp. 130-133, for an explanation of this enigmatic prophecy.

[503] Jer. xxvi. 8-24. He tells us that the prophecy was delivered in the reign of Hezekiah. See my _Minor Prophets_, pp. 123-140.

[504] Isa. x. 28-32. It would involve a cross-country route over several deep ravines--_e.g._, the Wady Suweinit, near Michmash. In 1 Sam. xiv. 2, Thenius, for "Migron," reads "the Precipice." Some take Aiath for Ai, three miles south of Bethel. Renan says (_Hist. du Peuple d'Israel_, iii.): "Nom d'Anathoth, arrangé symboliquement."

[505] Isa. x. 14. The metaphor of a bird's nest occurs more than once in the boastful Assyrian records.

[506] Isa. xxx. 1-7. Rahab means "fierceness," "insolence." For the various uses of the word, see Job xxvi. 12; Isa. li. 9, 10, 15; Psalm lxxxix. 9, 10, lxxxvii. 4, 5.

[507] See Dr. S. Cox (_Expositor_, i. 98-104) on Isa. xxviii. 7-13.

[508] Acts xvii. 18.

[509] Isa. xxviii. 7-22.

[510] Professor Smith, _Isaiah_, i. 12.

[511] Bagehot, _Physics and Politics_, p. 73; Smith, _Isaiah_, 109.