CHAPTER V
RESURRECTION
In regard to the future of Palestine the outlook of different writers varies perhaps as much as upon any similar question that could be named. Every one is familiar with the Utopian dreams which optimistic constructors of programmes cherish regarding it. On the other hand, grave and thoughtful writers have sometimes felt the misery of its present state so heavily as to abandon all hope for the future, and to acknowledge the most discouraging views as to the possibilities before the land. Apart from sentiment, or from some favourite method of interpreting prophecy, the reasons for such pessimism are mainly two. One is the change of climate, which appears from many indications to be an unquestionable fact. The other is the destruction of terraces, and the consequent washing away of soil from the higher regions of the country. These are serious considerations, which cannot be ignored. If this view be the correct one, the only permanent continuance of Syria will be as a symbol of judgment, a kind of Lot’s-wife pillar among the peoples, a sermon in stone upon the ethical principles which govern the fortunes of nations. The land will remain as a proverb, but will never again be a home.
Yet neither these nor any other such forebodings seem to the ordinary observer quite to be justified. If the climate has changed, may not that be due to causes that can be remedied? By proper drainage of swamps and planting of trees, it would seem perfectly possible to modify climatic conditions to an extent at least sufficient to allow the hope of prosperous agriculture and pleasant habitation. As to the terraces, if they have been constructed once they may be reconstructed with hope of result. There are tracts even in the desert itself where traces of former cultivation may still be seen. If the uncivilised or semi-barbarous tribes of the ancient time built up the land until handfuls of corn waved on the tops of mountains, surely it is not too much to expect that men armed with all the skill and appliance of modern engineering may yet repeat the process. The instance of Malta has been already cited; and, apart from that it is a very dusty world, and soil accumulates as if by magic where man provides for it a place to rest on.
It seems rash in one little qualified for the task to pronounce judgment of any sort on the future of Palestine, yet the conviction that all is not over with the land grows stronger, rather than weaker, with reflection. Renan speaks of “the little kingdom of Israel, which was in the highest degree creative, but did not know how to crown its edifice.” Put in another
form, this means that the Holy Land is a land of prophecies unfulfilled or half-fulfilled. But each such prophecy was an inspiration, by which the highest men saw possibilities for the nation, whose conditions the lower men failed to realise or to fulfil. Yet the possibilities were there, as to a great extent they still are there, and, as Coningsby puts it, “the East is a career.” As to what those possibilities and that career may actually be, the past history of the land may guide our speculation. Here, as elsewhere, the lines of hope for the future are pointed out by the failures of the past. The failure has been due to bad morality and disloyalty to religious faith; the hope of success lies in ethical and religious regeneration.
When we sought for an explanation of the misery of Palestine we were thrown back on the ethical aspect of the case. Had the land been faithful to her high calling her story would have been very different. Never was a country honoured with so lofty a trust as hers; never did a country so often betray her trust. This was the despair of her ancient lawgiver, and the burden of her later prophets. When Christ came to her, she knew no better thing to do with Him than to break His heart and to crucify Him on Calvary. Within the century Jerusalem was crucified in turn; and soon a Christian Syria took the place of the perished Judaism. That in its turn decayed. Its creed became artificial, its spirit effeminate, and its morality corrupt. The spirit of Christianity had sunk so low in Palestine before the Mussulman occupation as to manifest its zeal by using every effort to defile that part of the Temple area which they regarded as the Jewish Holy of Holies. The young faith of Islam, fresh and vigorous, and not as yet embittered, made an easy conquest of the effete religion, which has lived since then on sufferance, lamenting its sufferings, but never realising its desert of them. To this day the Christian travelling in Syria is oppressed by the sense of its desertion. Christ has forsaken the desolate shores of the Sea of Galilee. He walks no more in the streets of Jerusalem. It is the old story--“They besought Him that He would depart out of their coasts, and He entered into a ship, and passed over and came unto His own city.”
Yet somehow it is impossible to believe that He has gone from the land of His earthly home for ever. An incident which occurred to us in Damascus dwells in our memory with prophetic significance. We had visited the Great Mosque, which rose upon the ruins of an ancient Christian church. The original walls were not entirely demolished, and among the parts built into the new structure was a beautiful gate on whose lintel may still be deciphered the Greek inscription, “Thy kingdom, O Christ, is an everlasting kingdom, and Thy dominion endureth throughout all generations.” To see this inscription we climbed a ladder in the Jewellers’ Bazaar. At the height of some fifteen feet we stepped upon a ledge of rather precarious masonry, and after a short scramble along this came to the lintel, half concealed by a rubble wall running diagonally across it. A stranger was with us, a devout Christian from a town far south of Damascus. In the whole city nothing moved him so deeply as this stone, and he exclaimed, “It was the Christians’ fault--they were so rough, so rude, so ignorant--it was done by the wish of God--_but He will have it again_.” And He _will_ have it again, sooner or later! When Omar heard that Mohammed was dead he would not believe it, but proclaimed in the Mosque of Medina, “The Prophet has only swooned away!” But Mohammed had died, and it is his dead hand that has held the land these thirteen centuries. Christ, being raised from the dead, dieth no more; and the future of the land lies with Christ. To the Western world He has fulfilled His tremendous claim, “I am the resurrection and the life,” not only in the hope of immortality, but in the spring and impulse which His faith has given to national ideals. It is impossible not to hope for a fulfilment of the promise to the land where it was first spoken. Looking down from Tabor upon the hill of Dûhy, one has sight of Endor to the east, while Shunem lies just round the western slope, and between them is the village of Nain. It is as if that hill were a sanctuary from Death, where the grave could not hold its own. Palestine holds in trust for the world those empty graves, and one grave above all others from which He Himself came forth. Surely she, too, will rise, by His grace, in a faith and character purer than those which she has lost.
It would be impossible, within our present limits, to say anything of the political or national outlook of Syria, or of the many schemes and agencies which are dealing with such problems. The impression made by Christian missions, however, must have a word of record before we close these notes of travel. We have already described at considerable length the sadness of Palestine. As you journey from place to place the impression deepens. Sores, exposed and fly-blown, intrude themselves into the memory of many a wayside and city street. The dirt and stench of the houses make the sunshine terrible. After weeks of travel the feeling of a sick land has deepened upon you until it has become an oppression weighing daily upon your heart. Suddenly you emerge in a mission-station, and an indescribable feeling of relief possesses you. There is at last a sound of joy and health. These are the spots of brightness in a very grey landscape, little centres of life in a land where so much is morbid. The visiting of sacred places would be the most selfish of religious sentimentalities if it were done without a painful sense of helplessness against the misery that surrounds them. The only thing that turns pity into hope in Palestine is the mission-work that is being done there. No one can see that work without being filled with an altogether new enthusiasm for missions. Across the sea, one believes in them as a part of Christian duty and custom. On the spot, one thanks God for them as almost unearthly revelations of “sweetness and cleanness, abundance, power to bless, and Christian love in that loveless land.”
The names of Christian missionaries are imperial names in Syria. It is, indeed, an empire of hearts, and
its coming is not with observation. But of its reality and power there can be no question even now, and its sway is extending year by year. To those whose Syrian travels have given them the vivid imagination, vivid almost as memory, of the real fact of Christ in the past, this fact of Christ in the present is as welcome as it is evident. They feel, and the East too is feeling, that the Great Healer still goes about the land doing good. The future, whatever its political course may be, is religiously full of hope. It may take time--God only knows how long it will take. The ancient miracles of Christ did not reveal the Healer to the world in a day. Yet quietly and out of sight, the East is learning that Christ is indeed the Healer of mankind. It does not as yet confess this, even to itself. But the hearts of many sufferers know it, and every Christian knows that certainly “He will have it again.”
Index
Abana, 52, 59, 60
Achor, 47
Acre, 169
Agriculture, 71
Amphitheatres, 107
Angels, 220
Antipatris, 54
Aqueducts, 104
Arabia, Arab, 22, 29, 93 f., 149, 181, 198, 199
Aramaic, 69
Asceticism, 122
Athlit, 169
Baalbek, 108
Banias, 55, 168
Barbarossa, 161
Bashan, 44
Beautiful Gate, 83, 192
Bethel, 8, 102
Bether, 98
Bethlehem, 25, 46, 72, 74, 189, 214, 253
Bethshan, 41, 42, 72, 169
Beyrout, 66
Bible illustrations, 92, 93, 94
Booths, 178
Bridges, 57, 104
Burdens, 181
Cæsarea, 102, 163, 172
Calvary, site of, 78, 83, 114, 196, 222, 235, 236, 276
Capernaum, 64, 101, 105
Carpets, 16
Castles, 168
Caves, 214
Character, Syrian, 15, 33, 62, 232 f.
Children, 111, 187, 218, 231
Christianity, early, 115 f.
Church of the Holy Sepulchre, 79, 131, 150, 151, 156, 193, 235
Church of the Nativity, 133 f.
Churches, 129, 146, 160, 165, 171
Cities, 22, 65 f.
Clothes, 17, 181
Coast, 43
Colour, 7 f.
Commerce, 75, 78, 157, 159
Constantine, 115, 116
Cross, the, 147, 234 f.
Crusaders, 74, 157 f., 192
Damascus, 12, 13, 21, 35, 53, 60, 66, 75, 85, 137, 143, 146, 174, 185, 191, 193, 223, 241
Damascus Gate, Jerusalem, 53, 83
Dan, 54
Dead Sea, 11, 25, 37, 41, 51, 57, 60, 207
Death, 76, 190 f.
Dervishes, 140
Desert, 12, 14, 15, 20 f.
Detail, observation of, 32
Dew, 51
Disease, 222, 223, 227 f., 244 f.
Dog River, 54, 86
Earthquake, 212
East of Jordan, 22
El Aksa, 147 f.
Elijah, 61
Elisha’s Fountain, 143
Esdraelon, 9, 22, 26, 41, 42, 49, 59
Evil eye, 218
Fanaticism, 188
Fatalism, 201, 202
Fauna, 12, 220, 221
Feasts, 188, 201
Fellahin, 22, 69
Flora, 12, 67, 161, 207, 209, 210, 211
Future, 239 f.
Gadara, 60, 98, 108, 194
Galilee, 9, 45
Games, 185
Gardens, 177
Gaza, 64
Genii, 220
Geography, 32, 161
Gethsemane, 214
Ghosts, 190
Gideon, 64
Gilgals, 47 f.
Glass, 16
Gorges, 47
Great Deep, 53, 213
Greece, 100, 113, 197
Harod, Well of, 64
Hattin, 169
Hauran, 85
Hebron, 9, 46, 64, 74, 75, 90, 196
Hermits, 123
Hermon, 9, 11, 41, 44, 51, 54, 55, 220
Herods, 56, 101, 110, 171
Hezekiah’s aqueduct, 53, 88
Holy Fire, 133, 193
Holy Grail, 162
Hospitality, 35
Houses, 16, 67, 75
Huleh, Lake, 58, 60
Humour, 183
Immortality, 197, 198
Inscriptions, 87
Irrigation, 9, 233
Israelites, 88 f.
Jacob’s dream, 5
Jacob’s Well, 13, 48, 63, 119, 129
Jaffa, 72
Jehoshaphat, Valley of, 79
Jericho, 26, 49, 105, 227, 232
Jeroboam, 78
Jerusalem, 45 f., 53, 65 f., 76 f., 149, 228
Jesus Christ, 4, 5, 10, 31, 46, 49, 69, 84, 113, 114, 150, 173, 177, 204, 242, 243, 245
Jews, 30, 88 f., 195, 201
Jezreel, 41
Job, 96, 224, 233
John the Baptist, 146, 147
Jordan, 13, 23, 28, 40, 41, 42, 44, 49, 51, 55 f., 65, 121, 178
Joy, 188
Judea, 8, 9, 24, 34, 45 f., 47
Khan Minyeh, 64, 105
Kidron, 25, 46, 63
Knights, 151, 164, 170
Landmarks, 175
Lebanon, 44 f., 51
Legends, 62, 69, 103, 134 f., 150, 153
Leontes, 44, 58
Leprosy, 228
Lunacy, 222
Maccabees, 100
Magic, 3, 29, 154, 205, 217 f.
Mar Saba, 25, 27, 123, 125 f.
Martyrs, 116, 123
Medicinal springs, 201, 222, 227
Melancholy, 31
Michmash, 47
Miracle, 3, 4
Mirage, 212
Missions, 95
Mohammedanism, 2, 74, 137 f., 142, 242
Monastic establishments, 122
Morasses, 211
Mosaics, 102, 168
Mosques, 146
Mosque of Omar, 53, 79, 80, 131, 144, 149 f., 159
Mount of Olives, 154
Mountains, 40 f., 49
Muezzin, 143
Music, 31 f.
Mystery, 206
Nablus, 64, 74, 92
Nain, 68
Names of places, 39, 160
Nazareth, 48, 62, 69, 72, 114, 189, 218
Oppression, 229
Past, the, 2
Paul, St., 172
Persecutions, 116
Phœnicia, 10
Pilgrimages, 117 f.
Pools, 211
Prayer, 142
Providence, 233
Quarantana, 5, 46, 49
Rachel, 195
Railway, 86, 182
Relics, 2, 119, 152, 160
Religion of Israel, 39, 65, 97 f., 173 f., 187
Revelation, 97 f.
Richard Cœur de Lion, 163, 167
Rivers, 51 f.
Roads, 77, 99 f., 174
Rib Roy canoe, 57, 91
Romans, 56, 77, 83, 98 f., 107, 108, 113
Russians, 119 f.
Safed, 90
St. Christopher, 135
St. George, 134, 168, 193
Samaria, 9, 45, 47, 48, 102, 110, 146
Samaritans, 92
Sanur, 48
Scents, 179
Sea, 21, 24, 78, 212, 213
Sea of Galilee, 11, 15, 37, 58, 59, 208, 209, 210
Shirky, 26
Siloam, 53, 76, 81, 88
Sites, identification of, 165
Smallness of the land, 37
Solomon, 78, 153
Spectral, the, 205 f.
Springs, 54
Stones, Jewish, 82
Straight Street, 103
Sun, 14, 16, 28
Synagogues, 79
Tabor, 45, 48, 128, 165
Tattoo, 18, 75
Tell Hum, 128
Tents, 22 f.
Terraces, 50, 240
Terror, 206
Tiberias, 90, 91, 201, 209
Titus, 84
Tobacco, 93
Toil, 227
Tombs, 81, 140, 174, 186, 191
Towns, 65 f., 71
Travel, 2, 161
Trees, 67, 210, 211
Truth, 206
Tyre, 10, 72, 75, 160
Underground waters, 52, 213
Unfinishedness, 174
Villages, 11, 15, 65 f.
War, 49, 50
Welis, 141
Wells, 62
Zionists, 90
THE END
FOOTNOTES:
[1] _Eothen_, ch. xxiii.
[2] The natives have at last borrowed the sloping red-tiled roofs from the Franks who introduced them. Cf. a letter written by Professor G. A. Smith to the _Spectator_, October 1891.
[3] _Tent Work_, p. 54.
[4] Cf. _The Semites_, Robertson Smith, chaps. iii. and v.
[5] For these and other instances cf. _Historical Geography_, p. 52, and Appendix I.
[6] Cf. _The Least of all Lands_, Principal Miller, ch. 1.
[7] Cf. p. 15.
[8] _The Rob Roy on the Jordan_, p. 129.
[9] Cf. _The Semites_, Robertson Smith, p. 97.
[10] _Rob Roy_, p. 102.
[11] _Tent Work_, p. 120.
[12] The _Rob Roy_ has contributed gallantly to its exploration. To her captain’s book this chapter is under many obligations.
[13] _Tent Work_, chaps. xx., xxi.
[14] They are cut with a cross-chiselled margin, and rough outstanding rustic work in the centre. Their size and weight are enormous. One writer, whose sense of humour is hardly equal to his knowledge of Scripture, in describing them is carried away into the statement that “the Jewish architects, taught by their Phœnician neighbours, bestowed special care upon the corners of their great buildings. They show a finish, a solidity, and choice of material superior to other parts.... And how beautifully expressive is the language of the Psalmist, ‘our daughters are corner-stones, polished after the similitude of a palace’--one of the corner-stones of this angle weighs over a hundred tons”!
[15] For an account of these and others cf. Palestine Exploration Fund, Quarterly Statement, October 1901.
[16] See, however, Professor G. A. Smith’s _Jerusalem_, vol. i. pp. 189, 190.
[17] _Haifa_, Laurence Oliphant, pp. 317, 318.
[18] “Love among the Ruins,” Robert Browning.
[19] _The Dawn of Art_, Martin Conway, pp. 58-76.
[20] St. Symeon was a shepherd from the borderland between Cilicia and Syria.
[21] Cf. Schaff’s _Church History, Nicene and Post-Nicene Period_, chap. iv.
[22] St. Jerome, Ep. xiv.
[23] Cf. pp. 27, 30.
[24] _Arabia, the Cradle of Islam_, Zwemer, p. 179.
[25] _Mediæval Christianity_, Schaff, p. 150.
[26] Written in 1904.
[27] _The Crusades_, Cox, p. 72.
[28] _The Crusades_, Cox, p. 215. Of these children only 5000 crossed the Mediterranean. They were sold, when they landed, in the slave-markets of Alexandria and Algiers.
[29] Map has the credit of introducing the Grail story into Arthurian romance; Borron of adding the early part which traced it to Joseph of Arimathea.
[30] Cf. _Chivalry and Crusades_, Stebbing, vol. ii. chaps. iv. and v.
[31] _Haifa_, Laurence Oliphant, p. 189.
[32] _The Semites_, Robertson Smith, p. 29.
[33] _Ibid._ pp. 244, 257.
[34] Deut. xxviii. 47, 48.
[35] Deut. xxviii. 47, 48.
[36] _Robert Browning_, William Sharp, p. 203.
[37] Gen. xxxv. 16, 19.
[38] _Haifa_, pp. 270-272; _Tent Work_, p. 85.
[39] Cf. _The Dawn of Art_, Martin Conway, p. 95, etc.; _Some Aspects of the Greek Genius_, Professor Butcher, p. 30.
[40] Cf. _Rationalism in Europe_, Leckie, ii. 197.
[41] Cf. the sprightly figure of Glaucon in Plato’s _Republic_, B, x, § 9: “Do you know,” says Socrates, “that our soul is immortal and never dies?” “By Jove, I do not,” replies Glaucon. “Are you prepared to prove that it is?”
[42] _Arabia, the Cradle of Islam_, Zwemer, xiii.
[43] The rags which are hung on trees or fences near certain tombs suggest the medicinal value of holy places, which attracts men to them from selfish interests.
[44] _Talisman_, xxviii.
[45] _East of the Jordan_, Dr. Merrill, p. 496.
[46] _Tent Work_, p. 314.
[47] _Marius the Epicurean_, Walter Pater, i. 44.
[48] _Rob Roy on the Jordan_, p. 260.
[49] _Eothen_, ch. viii.
[50] Cf. _Geschichte des Jüdischen Volkes_, Schürer, ii. 819, 820.
[51] Cf. _The Semites_, W. Robertson Smith, iii. v.
[52] Cf. _The Semites_, W. Robertson Smith, pp. 197, etc.
[53] _Tent Work_, pp. 68, 204.
[54] Cf. _The Semites_, Robertson Smith, pp. 16, 17.
[55] _East of the Jordan_, Merrill, p. 193.
[56] The early Christian belief that the gods of paganism were demons has died hard, if indeed it be quite dead. The “weird horsemen” who in windy nights are to be heard galloping down lonely valleys lead us back to that interesting custom by which a horse was actually provided in some of the temples of the Syrian Herakles, to that the god might ride forth at night.
[57] _Haifa_, Laurence Oliphant, p. 300.
[58] Job iv. 14-16.
[59] _The Cradle of Christianity_, D. M. Ross, p. 60.
[60] See p. 36.
[61] Professor G. A. Smith, in his chapter on “The Walls of Jerusalem,” has given the results of an exhaustive study of the most recent research on this subject, and his conclusion is that “on our present data it is hopeless to decide between the rival and contradictory arguments.”--_Jerusalem_, vol. i. p. 249.