BOOK II.
CHAPTER I.
THE PROMISED LAND.
The way from Raphia to Gaza was travelled with very different feelings by the several members of our party.
Helon, as he proceeded, was constantly looking to the right, towards the hills of Judah, which rose black and dark in the starry night, to the eastward of the road which they travelled along the coast. His feelings grew more intense with every glance; passages from the Psalms and the Prophets perpetually rose to his lips; and all the fatigues of the journey over the stony and sandy soil were forgotten in the reflection, that every step brought him nearer to the Promised Land. The history of his people passed in review before his mind, and his imagination applied every thing around him to cherish the illusion. Instead of a caravan of Phœnician traders, he seemed to be in the pastoral encampments of Abraham; with Moses and the children of Israel in the wilderness; in the caravan of the queen of Sheba, when she came to visit Solomon; or amongst the exiles returning with Zerubbabel, to rebuild the ruined sanctuary.
Elisama was seated on his horse, his mind full of the glory of Israel which was about to be revealed; in the midst of the bitterness against the heathens, which was become a necessary excitement to his aged heart, and the inward ill-will which he harboured against Myron, he rejoiced in the triumph which he had gained over him by his narrative, which had been so complete, as to force the Greek, at last, to assent to the praises of Israel.
Myron’s feelings were of a very mixed kind, and some of them far from being pleasant. He felt the Jewish pride in all its force, and was perpetually tempted to keep it within bounds, by applying to it the keen edge of Attic wit. Yet when he reflected on the other hand, that the society of these Jews had enabled him to pass his time more pleasantly and instructively, than he would have done among the Phœnicians, and that the journey was now at an end, he thought it was not worth while to offend them, and so held his peace. He had a further reason for not wishing to come to a rupture with his fellow-travellers, that he might not lose the invitation to Jerusalem upon which he reckoned. For, notwithstanding all that was offensive to him, he could not but acknowledge, that the Jews were a people in the highest degree remarkable, and he had a great curiosity to see what they were in their native land, where he had often been told they could alone be fairly judged of.
With these feelings they came late at night to [Gaza]. Elisama, while the tents were erecting, paid the conductor of the caravan the sum agreed upon for the journey. As he intended, according to the ancient custom of his people, to make the journey to the passover on foot, he had already bargained with some one in the caravan for the purchase of the horses. They reposed for some hours, and rose again before the dawn.
The caravan still lay buried in profound slumber. By the time that the camels were loaded and themselves ready to depart, the morning began to dawn, and a singular spectacle was unfolded by it. The camels were crouching in a wide circle around the baggage, the horses, and the merchandise; and their long necks and little heads rose like towers above a wall. The men had encamped round fires or in tents. Most of the fires had burnt out, only here and there dying embers occasionally shot a flame, which feebly illuminated the singular groups around. Within the great circle all was still, save that the watchmen with their long staves were going their rounds, and calling their watchword in the stillness of the hour. In the distance were heard the hoarse sounds of the waves, breaking on the shore. On the other side of the camp was Gaza with its towers and ruins; and the fiery glow of morning was lightening up the scene of the fearful accomplishment of the word of prophecy. Gaza, once so populous, magnificent, and strong, when she committed the shameful outrage on Sampson, had no longer any gates at the spot where the mighty hero once lifted them up, and placed them on the hill opposite to Hebron.[[75]] Jeremiah had taken the wine-cup of fury from the hand of Jehovah, to cause the nations to drink of it to whom the Lord had sent him, and Gaza was amongst them, that they might reel and be mad because of the sword that he sent amongst them.[[76]] The shepherd of Tekoah had foretold this in yet plainer language.
Thus saith Jehovah,
Three transgressions of Gaza have I passed unnoticed,
But the fourth I cannot overlook.
And I will send a fire on the walls of Gaza,
Which shall devour the palaces thereof.—Amos i. 6, 7.
Zephaniah[[77]] had said, “Gaza shall be forsaken;” and last of all Zechariah[[78]] had declared,
Ashkelon shall see it and fear,
Gaza also shall see it and grieve,
The king shall perish from Gaza,
And Ashkelon shall not be inhabited.
What the prophets foretold against Gaza, which was one of the five principal cities of the south-west of Canaan, Alexander the Great had fulfilled. Her ruins bore witness also to the prowess of the later heroes of Israel, Jonathan and Simon. The city had been originally allotted to the tribe of Judah, and the Philistines never prospered in their unjust possession of it. It was the seat of the worship of [Dagon], a monstrous idol, whose lower half had the form of a fish, and the upper of a woman. Helon regarded the city as a monument of Israel’s revenge, placed on the very confines of the Promised Land. To-day he was to enter that land, and it seemed as if this awful spectacle had been exhibited to him, to impress indelibly upon his mind the transition from the land of the heathen to the land of Jehovah.
Lost in these thoughts, he stood unconscious of what was going on around him. Myron placed himself beside him, and, for a long time, watched him with earnest curiosity. “In good truth,” he at last suddenly exclaimed, “this is oriental contemplation! Helon, thou thinkest on Jerusalem!” Helon, disagreeably startled from his sublime reflections, replied, “I was not thinking on Jerusalem, but on that city of the heathens, on which, as our prophet predicted, ‘baldness is come.’”
“It is indeed a revolting sight,” said Myron, “and your prophet’s anticipation has proved correct. But you are about to depart to-day for Jerusalem. How I wish I could accompany you, and enter this temple, whose magnificence I have heard you describe, along with the train of pilgrims to the passover!”
“You would find yourself,” said Helon, “in a more disagreeable situation, than even on the journey from Pelusium to Gaza.”
“I should be able to stand my ground nevertheless,” said Myron: “I must now however go to Sidon. But I have a plan to propose.” He then told him what his own occupations were, and suggested, that as they would probably be terminated about the time when Elisama and Helon would have celebrated the two festivals, he should join them at Jerusalem, and after visiting together some other parts of the Holy Land, they should return to Egypt in company. With the address of a Greek he contrived to make his proposal acceptable even to Elisama, who, offended as he was at his sarcasms upon the Jewish people, cherished a hope that by knowing them better he might be persuaded to become, if not a proselyte of righteousness, at least a proselyte of the gate. Helon was convinced, that no true peace was to be derived from all the boasted wisdom of the Greeks, and ardently desired that the friend of his youth, who had sought this peace with him in philosophy, might be brought to confess with him, that it was only to be found in the law of Jehovah; and Elisama had often observed that the scoffer is most easily converted into a worshipper.
The zeal for making proselytes, by which Israel was distinguished, may be easily accounted for. Accustomed, for nearly two thousand years, to believe, and on no less authority than that of God himself, that salvation should proceed from them, and in them all nations of the earth be blessed, they could not for a moment relinquish the desire of carrying this prediction into effect; at this time they were more peculiarly urged to it by the openly expressed veneration or secret acquiescence of the wisest men. Religious faith, although the most deeply seated in the breast of any of our sentiments, is, singular as it may appear, that which we are most eager in communicating to others. Whatever too has been long suppressed, breaks forth with redoubled force when the obstacle is removed. Besides, the religious sentiments of the Jews were not, like those of the heathens, the speculations of human reason, but truths, confirmed by the sanction of God; and their zeal in making proselytes was not the vain desire to swell the numbers of a sect, but to deliver those who were under the dominion of error.
Myron and our travellers took leave of each other, in the hope of meeting after a few months. He went through the camp to seek for company as far as Tyre, and they took the road to Hebron.
From Gaza two roads conduct to Jerusalem. One passes by Eleutheropolis and the plain of Sephela; the other through the hills by Hebron. Although the former was the easier and more customary, Elisama preferred the latter. He had a friend in Hebron, whom he had not seen for many years, and in whose company he wished to perform the pilgrimage; and he was desirous of making Helon’s first entrance into the Land of Promise as solemn and impressive as possible. By taking the easier road, they must have gone a long way through the country of the Philistines, and not have been joined by pilgrims, till they reached Morescheth, and then only in small numbers. On the other road, they entered immediately on the Jewish territory, and their way conducted them through scenes adorned with many an historical remembrance. They had not proceeded far inward from the sea, in the direction of the river [Besor], when they reached the confines of Judah; they stood at the foot of its hills, and the land of the heathen lay behind them. Helon seemed to feel for the first time what home and native country mean. In Egypt, where he had been born and bred, he had been conscious of no such feeling; for he had been taught to regard himself as only a sojourner there. Into this unknown, untrodden native country he was about to enter, and before he set his foot upon it, at the first sight of it, the breeze seemed to waft from its hills a welcome to his home. “Land of my fathers,” he exclaimed, “Land of Promise, promised to me also from my earliest years!” and quickened his steps to reach it. He felt the truth of the saying, that Israel is Israel only in the Holy Land. “Here,” said Elisama, “is the boundary of Judah.” Helon, unable to speak, threw himself on the sacred earth, kissed it and watered it with his tears, and Sallu, letting go the bridles of the camels, did the same. Elisama stood beside them, and as he stretched his arms over them, and in the name of the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, blessed their going out and their coming in, his eyes too overflowed with tears, and his heart seemed to warm again, as with the renewal of a youthful love. See, he exclaimed,
The winter is past, the rain is over and gone,
The flowers appear on the earth;
The time of the singing of birds is come,
The voice of the turtledove is heard in our land.
The figtree putteth forth her green figs,
The vines give fragrance from their blossoms.—Cant. ii. 10.
They proceeded slowly on their way; Helon gazed around him on every side, and thought he had never seen so lovely a spring. The [latter rains] had ceased, and had given a quickening freshness to the breezes from the hills, such as he had never known in the Delta. The narcissus and the hyacinth, the blossoms of the apricot and peach, shed their last fragrance around. The groves of terebinth, the oliveyards and vineyards stood before them in their living green: the corn, swollen by the rain, was ripening fast for the harvest, and the fields of barley were already yellow. [The wide meadows], covered with grass for the cattle, the alternation of hill and valley, the rocks hewn out in terraces, and filled with earth and planted, offered a constant variety of delightful views. You might see that this was a land, the dew of which Jehovah had blessed, in which the prayer of Isaac over Jacob had been fulfilled, when the patriarch said, “God give thee of the dew of heaven, and of the fatness of the earth, and plenty of corn and wine.”[[79]] Helon drank of the pure, clear mountain stream, whose sparkling reflection seemed to him like a smile from a parent’s eyes on a returning wanderer, and thought the [sweet water] of the Nile, so praised by the Egyptians, could bear no comparison with it. Elisama reminded him of the words of the psalm:
“Thou[“Thou] lookest down upon our land and waterest it,
And makest it full of sheaves.
The river of God is full of water.
Thou preparest corn and tillest the land,
Thou waterest its furrows and softenest its clods;
Thou moistenest it with showers, thou blessest its springing,
Thou crownest the year with thy blessing,
And thy footsteps drop fatness.
They drop upon the pastures of the wilderness,
And the hills are encompassed with rejoicing:
The pastures are clothed with flocks,
And the fields are covered with corn:
All shout for joy and sing.”—Ps. lxv.
Helon replied to him from another psalm:
The springs arise among the valleys,
They run among the hills.
Here the thirsty wild beast cools itself,
The wild ass quenches his thirst.
The fowls of heaven dwell beside them,
And sing among the branches.
He watereth the hills from his clouds above;
The fruit of his works satisfieth the earth.
He maketh grass to grow for cattle,
And herb for the service of man,
Preparing bread from the earth
And wine that maketh glad man’s heart;
The fragrance of the oil for ointment,
And bread that giveth strength.
The cedars of Lebanon, tall as heaven,
He has planted, he watereth them!—Ps. civ.
“This,” exclaimed both together, “is indeed the Land of Promise;” and Helon called to mind the words of the prophet Ezekiel, “Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, I lifted up my hand to bring them out of Egypt into a land which I had promised for them, a land flowing with milk and honey, a land that is the glory of all lands.”[[80]]
These words Helon repeated incessantly as he proceeded. The pure mountain air, which he had never drawn before, inspired the body, as the feeling of home refreshed the mind. This moment, and that in which he had returned to the law, moments of deep and indelible interest, seemed to rise like lofty summits, far above the ordinary level of the events of life. When he thought on the narrative of his uncle, he was inclined to compare the former of these events with the terrific annunciation of the law from Sinai—the latter, with the joy of Israel, when, under the command of Joshua, they crossed the Jordan, and first set their feet on the Promised Land.
During the whole of this journey to Hebron, external impressions seemed to have no other power over him, than to awaken trains of thought, connected with the subject by which his whole soul was occupied. When Elisama pointed out to him Minois and Gerar, which lay far to the south; and reminded him that Gerar was the place where Abraham had involved himself in difficulties by the concealment of the truth from Abimelech;[[81]] and where the pious Asa had defeated the Ethiopians;[[82]] these hints were sufficient for his imagination to cover the plains with the flocks of the patriarch, and the hosts of the virtuous king of Judah.
They passed near Beersheba, which had given rise to the expression so common in scripture history, “from Dan to Beersheba,” to denote the whole extent of the Holy Land, from north to south. Beersheba was the frontier town on the south, distant from Dan a hundred and sixty sabbath-days’ journies, or fifty-three leagues. Elisama related how Abraham and Isaac had dug a well here, and called it Beersheba, in memory of the oaths exchanged between them and Abimelech;[[83]] how Jehovah had here appeared to Jacob, and permitted him to go down to Egypt to his beloved Joseph;[[84]] how Elias the Tishbite had fled hither from the face of Ahab and Jezebel;[[85]] how Samuel’s sons had judged the people here;[[86]] and how, in latter times, it had become a seat of idolatrous worship under Uzziah; in consequence of which, Amos had given the warning, “Pass not to Beersheba,”[[87]] and had denounced calamity on those who say, “The worship of Beersheba liveth.”[[88]] At the return from the captivity this was one of the first cities which the exiles repeopled. Notwithstanding the length of the journey, which they performed on foot, Elisama seemed to feel no fatigue; and every hill or valley, every town or village, which they passed, gave him fresh occasion to produce his inexhaustible store of historical recollections. Their road lay by Debir, called also sometimes Kiriath Sanna, sometimes Kiriath Sepher; and it reminded him of the heroic prize, the hand of his own daughter Achsa, which Caleb had proposed to the man who should conquer it.[[89]]
At length Hebron rose before them, and each approached it with characteristic feelings. Helon viewed it only as having been for seven years the city of David’s residence;[[90]] and could have imagined, that the tones of the sweet singer’s harp still lingered about its walls. Elisama longed to see the friend of his youth, and to repose under his hospitable roof. There was an unusual commotion beneath the towering palms at the gate and in all the streets. It was evident that they were preparing to depart for Jerusalem on the morrow.
They were received with the cordial welcome of early but long separated friends. Elisama had scarcely laid himself down, to have his feet washed, when the discourse between him and his host flowed as freely as if the old man had only walked a sabbath-day’s journey. Helon observed, that here the ancient custom was preserved of [crouching upon the carpet] at meals; while in Alexandria they reclined on Grecian cushions. He fell asleep, and night prolonged the dreams of day.
CHAPTER II.
THE PILGRIMAGE.
At the first crowing of the cock, all was in motion; their host was making the last arrangements for his departure, the neighbours entered to announce that the march was about to begin. Refreshments were offered to the travellers, and especially to Elisama; but he declared with earnestness, that, even amidst the idolaters of Egypt, he had scarcely ever allowed himself to taste food early in a morning, and much less would he do so in Israel, and in the city of David, and on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. The commotion in the street became greater and greater, and it was scarcely dawn, when they set forth. All the doors of the houses were open, all the roofs were covered with persons watching their departure. Helon, as he passed through the streets of [Hebron] in the ruddy light of the dawn, and by the palm trees at the gate, was reminded that Hebron was one of the oldest cities in the world, even older than Zoan in Egypt;[[91]] that it had been conquered by Joshua, and given as a portion to Caleb, the bravest and most faithful of the explorers of the land;[[92]] that it had afterwards become a city of the priests, and had been for seven years the residence of David; that it had been taken by the Idumeans, and reconquered by the Maccabees,[[93]] and once more incorporated with Judah. But when he had passed the gate, and gained a view of the lovely valley full of vine-yards and corn-fields, and looked around on the region where patriarchs had tended their flocks and pitched their tents, and lived in friendly communion with Jehovah, all the high and enthusiastic feelings of the preceding day were renewed in his mind. From all the cross-roads, men, women, and children were streaming towards the highway to Jerusalem. They had scarcely proceeded a sabbath-day’s journey, when they saw the [grove of terebinths]; cymbals, flutes, and psalms resounded from the midst of it, and hundreds were standing under the turpentine-tree of Abraham, a tree of immense size and wide-spreading branches. Helon entered the grove of Mamre with feelings of religious veneration. Here Abraham had dwelt, here the angels had appeared to him; beneath these trees Isaac had been promised, and the rite of circumcision instituted; here Ishmael had been born, and driven from his father’s tent; and not far off was the cave of Machpelah, where Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob and Leah were buried.[[94]] And on this spot, consecrated by so many recollections, the children of these patriarchs were now preparing to depart, on their festal pilgrimage to Jerusalem. The occasion and the place seemed to banish from all hearts every other feeling but piety and good-will; mutual greetings were exchanged; friends and relations sought each other out, and associated themselves for the journey, and all faces beamed with joy. “It is time to set out,” said some of the elders to the judge of Hebron: “already has the priest asked the watchman on the temple, [Does it begin to be light] towards Hebron?” The priests and elders led the procession; the people followed, and the slaves with the camels were placed in the midst of them, the Levites had distributed themselves with their instruments among the multitude, and as they set forward they sung this psalm:
How am I glad when they say unto me,
I will go up to the house of Jehovah!
My foot hath stood already in thy gates, O Jerusalem!
Jerusalem, thou beautifully built;
Chief city, where all unite together!
Thither do the tribes go up,
The tribes of Jehovah to the festival of remembrance,
To praise the name of Jehovah.
There are the thrones of judgment,
The thrones of the house of David.
Pray for the peace of Jerusalem;
May they prosper that love thee!
Peace be in thy walls,
Prosperity in thy palaces!
For my brethren and companions’ sake,
I wish thee peace!
For the sake of the temple of our God,
I bless thee with good.—Ps. cxxii.
It is impossible to conceive of the soul-felt exultation with which this psalm was sung, and of its effect on old and young. Now the voices rose, like the notes of the mounting lark, on the summit of the hills, now sunk again in the depths of the valleys. How differently did it operate now upon the heart of Helon, and when he sung it before to his solitary harp on his roof in Alexandria! How did he bless the memory of Samuel, who had given his schools of the prophets the harp and the flute;[[95]] and of David, who, bred up among them, did not forget them even when seated on his throne,[[96]] but appointed Levites for the cultivation of music; and himself often laid down his sceptre, to assume the harp. It was on such a pilgrimage, with such accompaniments, that the sublimity and force of the psalms, and the superiority of Jewish poetry, made itself fully felt.
Helon was astonished at the effect which they had upon himself and all around him. The youths and maidens bounded for joy, and tears of pleasure stood in the eyes of the aged. Those who were going up for the first time to the festival looked and listened to those who had already been there, as if to hear from them an explanation of the full meaning of what they sung. The old heard in these festive acclamations the echo of their own youthful joys, and while their hearts swelled with the remembrance of the feelings of their earliest pilgrimage, they beat yet higher with gratitude to Jehovah, who had permitted them, in their grey hairs, to behold such glorious days for Israel, the Syrian tyranny overthrown, and Hyrcanus seated on the throne.
Sublime are the acclamations of a people freed from a foreign yoke! But here was more. It was the fraternal union of a whole people, in the holiest bond of a common faith, going up to appear before the altar of Jehovah, and to commemorate the wonders of love and mercy which he had manifested towards their forefathers. They seemed a band of brothers. “In Alexandria,” said Helon, “Jew is against Jew, and family against family—but here is one holy people, loving each other as the children of one Israel, joint heirs of one great and blessed name.” Every one had bidden adieu to the occupations and the anxieties of ordinary life. They had come to give thanks and to pray, and no sounds but those of thankfulness and prayer were heard among them. The hostilities and alienations produced by self-love and the collision of interests appeared to have been left at home, and the general joy dispersed every melancholy feeling which an individual might have been disposed to indulge. On these pilgrimages they seemed as free from care as the people of old, when, rescued from Egyptian bondage, they were fed by manna from heaven, on their way to the land that flowed with milk and honey. Jehovah had promised to protect the whole country, so that no enemy should invade its borders, while the people went up, thrice in every year, to appear before him[[97]]—how much more confidently might each father of a family intrust his own household to his protection! Nothing was more remarkable than that the aged and the weakly were able to bear this journey of thirty-six sabbath-days’ journies, over hill and dale, without complaining of fatigue. It seemed as if the strong had given to the weaker a portion of their own vigour; or rather, as if Jehovah himself had strengthened the feeble knees for this journey. They expressed these sentiments, by singing, immediately after the former, the following psalm:
I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills
From which my help cometh.
My help cometh from Jehovah,
The Maker of heaven and earth.
He will not suffer thy foot to be moved;
He that keepeth thee will not slumber,
He that keepeth Israel neither slumbereth nor sleepeth.
Jehovah is thy guardian,
Thy shade upon thy right hand:
The sun shall not smite thee by day,
Nor the moon by night.
Jehovah shall preserve thee from all evil,
He shall preserve thy soul.
Jehovah preserveth thy going out and thy coming in,
From this time forth and for evermore.—Ps. cxxi.
It was a beautiful sight, when the procession came from the plain among the hills. The rocky walls, between which their path sometimes lay, re-echoed with their songs. Helon withdrew a little from the line, to an eminence which commanded a view in both directions, and could see the train, covering both the ascent and the descent of the hill, spreading over the plain, and winding like a wreath around the hill beyond.
In every town and village to which they came, they were received with shouts of joy. Before the doors of the houses stood tables with dates, honey, and bread. New crowds of persons, dressed in their holyday attire, were waiting at the junction of the roads, in the fields, and at the entrance of the towns, and joined themselves to the long procession. Here and there before the houses, in the fields or in the vineyards, stood an unclean person, or a woman, or a child, who had been compelled to remain at home, and who replied with tears to the salutation of the passing multitude. It seemed as if the people carried all joy with them from the country to Jerusalem, and only sorrow was left for those who remained behind. Before a house in [Bethshur], stood a fine boy of ten years old. Tears streamed from his large dark eyes, and the open features of his noble countenance had an expression of profound grief. His mother was endeavouring to comfort him, and to lead him back into the court, assuring him that his father would take him the next time. But the boy listened neither to her consolations nor her promises, and continued to exclaim, “O father, father, let me go to the temple! I know all the psalms by heart.” He stretched out his arms to the passers-by in earnest entreaty, and happening to see among them a man of the neighbourhood whom he knew, he flew to him, and clinging to his girdle and his upper garment, besought him with tears to take him with him, till the man, moved by his earnestness, asked his mother to allow him to go, promising to take care of him till he should find out his father.
“And this,” said Helon, “is the object of children’s longing in Israel; so early does the desire of keeping the festival display itself! Brought up in Palestine, he felt it would have been with him exactly as with the child.”[child.”]
They now passed through a wood and then descended a lofty hill whose slope was wholly covered with vines. In the valley before them lay the pools of Solomon. They slackened their pace, and the following psalm was sung:
How lovely are thy tabernacles, Lord of hosts!
My soul longeth and fainteth for the courts of the Lord,
My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.
As the bird that findeth her house,
As the swallow, a nest for her young,
So I thine altars, O Lord of hosts,
My king and my God!
Blessed are they that dwell in thy house;
They are still praising Thee;
Blessed is the man who placeth his confidence in Thee
And thinketh of the way to Jerusalem!
Should they pass through the valley of sorrow
They find it full of springs.
Blessings be on him who goeth before them,
They increase in strength as they go on,
Till they appear before God in Zion.
O Lord of hosts, hear my prayer!
Give ear, O God of Jacob!
O God, our shield, look down,
Behold the face of thine anointed!
A day in thy courts is better than a thousand.
I had rather be a doorkeeper in the house of God
Than dwell in the tents of wickedness.
For Jehovah our God is a sun and shield;
Jehovah giveth grace and glory,
No good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly.
O Lord of hosts,
Blessed is the man that trusteth in Thee!—Ps. lxxxiv.
They were now arrived at the pools of Solomon, into which the brook [Etham] was received, and which had formerly supplied Jerusalem with water, by means of a costly aqueduct. The three pools lay on different levels, one below another, on a sloping ground. Around each was a double row of noble palms, in which the whole of this spot abounded. Here, beside the springs and in the refreshing shade of the trees, the pilgrims encamped to rest at noon. They had accomplished twenty-six sabbath-days’ journies of their march and ten yet remained.
This aqueduct of Solomon’s was a stupendous work. The fountain of Etham, whose waters the pools received, was about one hundred and fifty paces above them. The pools were of an oblong form, the highest one hundred and sixty, the second two hundred, the lowest two hundred and twenty paces in length, and all ninety paces in breadth. The celebrated gardens of Solomon lay beneath these reservoirs, and were a work equally admirable in their kind. They lay in a rocky valley, enclosed by high hills, and were five hundred paces long and two hundred broad. A solitude, which had nothing in it wild or savage, made them a delightful retreat. In the stillness of this glen, amidst fruit-trees of every variety, the king might find a noble recreation from the cares of royalty. From these extraordinary gardens Solomon derived his imagery, when he said, “A garden enclosed is my sister, my spouse;[my spouse;]”[[98]] and when he speaks in the same passage of a spring shut up, and a fountain sealed, we are reminded of the fountain of Etham, which Solomon is said to have sealed with his own signet ring. Both may serve to explain the words of the Preacher. “I made me great works, I builded me houses, I planted me vineyards; I made me gardens and orchards, and I planted trees in them of all kind of fruits; I made me pools of water to water therewith the wood of green trees.”[[99]] Both the reservoirs and the aqueduct appeared, by the solidity of their construction, to have been designed to last for ever, and were worthy of the king by whom they were made, and of his times, of which the Book of Chronicles declares, that “Silver was in Jerusalem like stones.”[[100]] Our travellers blessed his memory, as they drank, beneath the shade of the palms, the refreshing draught of the cool rock water. It was just mid-day, the heat of the sun was intense, and all longed for repose and coolness.
After a short rest the sacks and wine-skins were unpacked from the camels, while others produced their humble stores from their mantles or their bosoms. The upper garments were spread for carpets, on which they lay for rest, or crouched to eat. Now you might see that these pilgrims were a band of brothers. It is true, the very poorest had brought something with him. For weeks before, ever since the feast of tabernacles, they had denied themselves, in order to save something for this festival; and on this day at least the command of Moses might appear to have been literally fulfilled, “There shall be [no beggar among you].” But besides this the rich had provided for the poor a supply of those things which on ordinary occasions they were not able to procure themselves. Some sent to the old men a cup of generous wine, or regaled the children with confectionary and fruits. From [Tekoah], the birthplace of the prophet Amos, which was not far off, came asses loaded with the celebrated honey of Tekoah; and from Beth-Cherem, celebrated for its wines, others with large and sweet raisins. From the cheerful mirth which pervaded the whole assembly, and the delightful coolness of the water and the trees, they seemed more like a company celebrating, in a fine evening, the festival of the new moon, than a caravan halting at mid-day. No one felt the heat or complained of weariness, except a few aged and weakly persons, who indulged themselves in a short rest.
Behind a hill the walls of Tekoah were discerned in the distance, and beyond it the desert of Tekoah, the free pasture of the bees, for whose honey the town was celebrated. “Does not this scene remind thee of the prophet-herdsman of Tekoah?” said Elisama to Helon. “How should it not,” replied Helon, “when I see his prophecy almost fulfilled before my eyes?”[[101]]
In that day will I raise up the fallen tabernacle of David,
And close up its breaches, and raise up its ruins,
And build it afresh as in the days of old,
That they may conquer the remnant of Edom,
And of all nations whom I will consecrate to myself,
Saith Jehovah who doeth this.
Behold the day cometh, saith Jehovah,
When the plowman shall overtake the reaper,
And the treader of grapes him that soweth seed.
And the mountains shall drop sweet wine,
And all the hills shall stream.
I will bring back the captivity of my people Israel
And they shall build the desolate cities,
And plant vineyards and drink the wine thereof,
They shall make gardens and eat the fruit of them,
And I will plant them firmly in their land,
And they shall no more be plucked out of their land which I have given them,
Saith the Lord thy God.
They waited another hour in this pleasant valley, till the great heat of noon was moderated. During this time some youths came to Helon, and said to him, “Though you speak our language you are not a youth of Judah, your turban betrays you.” Helon informed them that he was an Aramæan Jew, a native of Alexandria indeed, but one who had chosen Jerusalem, in preference to Leontopolis. They acknowledged him with joy as one of themselves, and invited him to accompany them in a walk around the encampment. Helon gladly accepted the offer.
What a multitude of interesting groups presented themselves on every side, as they wandered from one palm tree to another! Every party as they passed offered them wine, mead, honey, dates and the like, and greeted them with friendly words. Boys had insinuated themselves among the circles of the men, and listened, with fixed eyes and open mouth, to every word which they uttered respecting Jerusalem and the festival. The boy whom Helon had seen weeping so bitterly before the solitary house had found out his father, was lying in his lap and repeating to him the psalms which he had learnt. A group of maidens were listening to a description of the magnificent vestments of the high-priest. They past[past] by a company of men, who were speaking of the heroic deeds of Hyrcanus and the Maccabees, and rejoicing that Edom and Samaria had been made subject by him to Israel. One feeling of joy pervaded all bosoms, but it expressed itself in various ways, according to the age or sex of each.
One group rivetted the attention of Helon so long, that he did not leave them till it was near the time of departure. Under almost the furthest palm trees sat seven robust young men, with an equal number of women and several children. “This is Mardochai of [Ziph], with his children and children’s children,” said one of the youths who accompanied Helon. They approached him, took him by the hand, and congratulated him upon being able to go up to the feast, with such a train of his descendents. “Yes,” exclaimed the old man, while tears trembled in his dark eyes, “Jehovah hath abundantly blessed me. I see my offspring, like the sand on the seashore—children and children’s children, to the number of fifty souls!”
This aged pair had not for several years gone up to the festival: but their children had now persuaded them to appear once more before Jehovah. They had been the last in the procession, and their sons and daughters had been obliged almost to carry them in their arms—a burthen which they had joyfully sustained—for they had refused either to ride or be conveyed in a carriage. “Where could a psalm of degrees be more in its place?” said a lively youth of the company. At the word several of them ran to fetch their musical instruments, and standing around the deeply moved old man, they sung the following psalm:
Blessed is every one that feareth Jehovah,
That walketh in his ways.
For thou shalt eat of the labour of thy hands:
Happy art thou, and it is well with thee!
Thy wife is a fruitful vine, by the walls of thine house,
Thy children, like olive plants around thy table.
Behold, thus shall the man be blessed that feareth Jehovah:
Jehovah will bless thee out of Zion.
Thou shalt see the prosperity of Jerusalem thine whole life long,
Yea, thou shalt see thy children’s children.
Peace be upon Israel!—Ps. cxxviii.
During this time others had come up, and soon the news was spread through the whole assemblage, that Mardochai of Ziph was once more among them; and nearly all the pilgrims came and formed a circle about him. The judges and elders of Hebron were among them, and all greeted the venerable pair and wished them peace.
“Ye shall lead the procession!” said an elder of Hebron! “The place of honour belongs to you. The pilgrims of Hebron cannot advance with any blessing better or more rare.”
The sons took their father, the daughters their mother, in their arms, the priests and elders followed, and the march began again to complete the ten sabbath-days’ journies which they were still distant from Jerusalem.
Far from the expressions of joy being exhausted by all the songs and acclamations of the morning, they seemed only to be beginning, when they set forward again. From the pools of Solomon they took their way through the hills to Bethlehem. The cymbals, cornets, and timbrels of the Levites struck up their music again, and many a soul-inspiring psalm was heard from the lips of an assemblage now swollen to several thousand persons. In a pilgrimage to the temple, could he be forgotten, whose pious heart first conceived the wish to build a house for Jehovah? The warrior-bard was commemorated in the following psalm:
Lord remember David!
All his afflictions.
How he sware unto the Lord
And vowed unto the Mighty One of Jacob;
Surely I will not go into mine house,
Nor go up into my bed;
I will not give sleep to mine eyes,
Nor slumber to mine eyelids,
Until I find out a place for the Lord,
A habitation for the Mighty One of Jacob.
Lo, we heard of it at Ephratah,
We found it in the fields of Jaar:
Let us go into his tabernacle,
Let us worship at his footstool!—Ps. cxxxii.
It seemed as if the multitude could not leave the last strophe, which they repeated over and over again. They then went on to the second part of the psalm, which was probably sung at the dedication of the temple, and repeated in the same way the elevating words with which it concludes,
Jehovah hath chosen Zion,
He hath desired it for his habitation.
The instruments now struck in with a louder tone, and the multitude lifted up its voice, as the words of Jehovah were repeated.
This is my rest for ever;
Here will I dwell: for I have chosen it.
I will abundantly bless her provision,
I will satisfy her poor with bread;
I will clothe her priests with salvation,
Her holy ones shall shout aloud for joy.
There will I exalt the might of David
And prepare a lamp for mine anointed.
His enemies will I clothe with shame,
But on his head shall the crown flourish.
Proceeding in this way they reached Bethlehem Ephratah, “little among the thousands of Judah,” and yet so highly honoured. Both its names allude to the fertility of the country in which it stands. Bethlehem signifies the place of bread; and Ephratah, fruitful. In its luxuriant pastures Jacob fed his flocks; in its fertile fields Boaz was reaping when he found his kinswoman Ruth. Here his seven sons were born to Jesse, and here the man after God’s own heart grew up, till the day when he came forth to avenge the honour of his people on the boastful heathen.
Bethlehem is a small town, six sabbath-days’ journies from the holy city. It is situated upon a narrow, rocky ridge, surrounded by vallies and hills, having an extensive view over the diversified country in its neighbourhood, the region around Jericho, the Dead Sea, and the Arabian mountains. Before its gates you look to the plain of the [valley of Rephaim], and all around is the garden of God. The Kedron flows through its fruitful fields, which are thickly set with olives and figtrees, with vines and corn. But its greatest glory is that of which Micah prophetically speaks, “And thou Bethlehem Ephratah, who art little among the thousands of Judah, out of thee shall he come forth that is to be Ruler in Israel, whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.”[[102]]
In Bethlehem they met with another company of pilgrims, coming from Lachish, Adullam, and Libna, which lie westward of Bethlehem. All who could, endeavoured to make Bethlehem in their way to Jerusalem on these occasions. It was the city of David, the road passed by the grave of Rachel, and it was dear to many, as the city to which the greatest of all the promises had been given.
The elders of the different cities had soon agreed about the order of the march from Bethlehem to Jerusalem. The venerable pair, Mardochai of Ziph and his wife, were borne before, the elders followed, but without any distinctive badge, and the people arranged themselves as they chose. Some time, however, elapsed before they set out. There were greetings of friends and acquaintance, who met after a long interval; those who had travelled furthest needed refreshment. At length the Levites began their music and their songs, and the people set forward. They had soon descended from the heights of Bethlehem into the valley of Rephaim. As the living stream poured down from the hills, among the corn-fields and mulberry-groves of the vale, this was the praise of Jerusalem which ascended in a mingled strain of voices and instruments.
They that trust in the Lord shall be as mount Zion,
Which cannot be removed, but abideth for ever.
As the mountains are around Jerusalem,
So the Lord is round about his people,
From henceforth and for evermore:
For the sceptre of the wicked shall not remain on the lot of the righteous.
Do good, O Lord, unto those that are good,
To them that are upright in their hearts!
As for those that turn aside into crooked ways,
Jehovah shall destroy them, with all the workers of iniquity.
Peace be upon Israel!—Ps. cxxv.
When they had proceeded about two sabbath-days’ journies, or a little more, from Bethlehem, they approached the [grave of Rachel].[[103]] At another time this place of the rest of Jacob’s beloved wife, the hardly earned recompense of his labours, might have produced some melancholy emotions, but now such thoughts were banished by the universal joy. Helon remarked to Elisama, that this was not the time of which their prophet had spoken: “In Rama was heard a voice, lamentation and bitter weeping; Rachel weeping for her children.”[[104]] “May it be always so with the children of Israel,” replied Elisama.
The eager haste of the multitudes now increased with every step, and their impatience for the first sight of Jerusalem was expressed in the following psalm:
Great is the Lord; and greatly to be praised
The mountain of his holiness in the city of our God.
Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole land
Is mount Zion, on the north of the city of the great King.
God is known in her palaces for a refuge,
We think of thy loving-kindness, O God,
In the midst of thy temple.
As thy name, so thy praise reacheth to the ends of the earth.
Thy right hand is full of righteousness.
Let the hill of Zion rejoice,
Let the daughters of Judah be glad
Because of thy judgments!
Walk about Zion, go round about her!
Tell her towers!
Mark well her bulwarks!
Consider her palaces!
That ye may tell it to the generation following.
For this God is our God, for ever and ever.
He will be our guide, as in our youth.—Ps. xlviii.
Expectation had reached the highest pitch. The last strophes were not completely sung; many were already silent, eagerly watching for the first sight of Jerusalem. All eyes were turned towards the north; a faint murmur spread from rank to rank among the people, only those who had been at the festival before continued the psalm, and these solitary scattered voices formed a solemn contrast with the silence of the rest of the multitude. Helon’s heart was in his eye, and he could scarcely draw his breath. When the psalm was concluded, the instruments prolonged the sound for a moment, and then all that mighty multitude, so lately jubilant, was still as death.
All at once the foremost ranks exclaimed, Jerusalem, Jerusalem! Jerusalem, Jerusalem! resounded through the valley of Rephaim. “Jerusalem, thou city built on high, we wish thee peace!” The children dragged their parents forward with them, and all hands were lifted up to bless.
The high white walls of the Holy City cast a gleam along the valley: Zion arose with its palaces, and from Moriah the smoke of the offering was ascending to heaven. It was the hour of the evening sacrifice. Scarcely had the multitude recovered a little, when they began to greet the temple and the priests:
Bless ye the Lord, all ye servants of the Lord,
Who stand by night in the house of the Lord!
Lift up your hands towards the sanctuary,
And bless the Lord.
So will Jehovah bless thee out of Zion;
He who made heaven and earth.—Ps. cxxxiv.
They had now reached the termination of their march. The day of preparation was beginning; the following evening was the Passover. From the gates of Jerusalem came forth, in every direction, the pilgrims who had already arrived and the inhabitants of the city, to welcome the new comers from Hebron and from Libna. The venerable pair, Mardochai of Ziph and his wife, who were still borne in front, received the blessings of all who met them.
Close by the gate, some one from behind laid hold of Elisama; “Art thou Elisama of Alexandria?” Elisama turned round and recognised Iddo, an old and faithful friend of his family. The old men met with inexpressible delight, and Elisama presented Helon to Iddo. The pilgrims had now reached the city, and were dispersing in different directions to their respective quarters. Iddo conducted the strangers through the Water-gate to his house on the open place.
CHAPTER III.
THE DAY OF PREPARATION FOR THE PASSOVER.
Their [reception] in the house of Iddo surpassed all Helon’s expectations. At the seasons of the festivals, no inhabitant of Jerusalem considered his house as his own. Their city was the city of the whole people, not of the inhabitants alone; and when Israel came up to appear before Jehovah, every citizen regarded his dwelling as belonging to his brethren as much as to himself. Jerusalem lies on the confines of Judah and Benjamin. Its names, the Holy City, the City of the Congregation of Israel, the Gate of the People, point out its destination. No other city was ever in the same sense the capital and centre of a country.
“You are at home,” said their host, as he led them into his house; “and at this time, I am not more so than you. The citizen of Jerusalem considers himself, equally with his brethren, as a pilgrim at the festival.”
In fact the whole house was filled with strangers. Elisama found among them many old acquaintances—but great was his joy when he discovered, in the number, Selumiel of Jericho, the brother of Iddo. His emotion overpowered his utterance, and he could only press him silently, and with tears in his eyes, to his breast. Selumiel had been the dearest friend of his youth; he had lived long in Alexandria, and they had spent the earliest days of manhood there together; they had imparted each to the other all their youthful plans. At a later period they had been separated, and had not met for more than thirty years: but their hearts had remained united, and their joy at meeting was mutual. Elisama seemed to be changed by the sight of him, as if youth itself had returned with the friend of his youth.
While the feet of the guests were washing, which is the first duty of hospitality in the East, and indeed properly their welcome, Elisama and Selumiel were engaged in uninterrupted discourse, as if they had been sitting alone in the court, and rapidly ran over earlier and later times, Alexandria and Jericho. In the mean time Iddo and some of the guests had joined Helon, and were congratulating him upon his first pilgrimage. Selumiel and Iddo had in common a hearty and straight forward character, by which they might have been known as brothers. But, besides that they were attached to different parties in religion, Iddo had more liveliness and cheerfulness. “My son out of Egypt,” he addressed Helon, “to-morrow at this time, when the Passover begins, thou wilt see what thou hast never seen before. Already, on [the tenth of the month], I chose a lamb without blemish for the occasion. Before sunset this evening, I fetched the water into the house, with which the unleavened bread is to be made. If you please you shall go with me after supper and seek the leaven in the house. A young Israelite, who has come for the first time to the Passover, should leave nothing unseen, but learn all the practices of Israel in the most complete manner possible. But I forgot, you are come from Hebron to-day, and must be weary.”
Helon seemed almost offended to be suspected of weariness, after a march made under such circumstances. With glowing cheek he repelled the imputation, and begged that Iddo would not spare him.
“Just like his father,” exclaimed his host, “jealous of nothing so much as of being thought a genuine Aramæan Jew. To-morrow, I will conduct thee to his grave in the valley of Jehoshaphat. In truth he was a noble-minded man, an Israelite without guile. He died in this house, and it was of thee, Helon, that he spoke to me in his last moments.” He then related the circumstances of his death, and many anecdotes of his intercourse with him. Their connection had been much the same as that of Selumiel with Elisama. Helon listened to him, as if his father’s spirit spoke from his lips, so intimate had been their friendship, so similar their characters.
In such discourse the time passed rapidly, and a servant came to call the guests from the cooling fountain of the inner court to the roof, where they were to sup. Here Iddo was accustomed to entertain his guests at the festival, when there was any one among them, on whom the spectacle, beheld for the first time, was likely to make an indelible impression. It was a fine, clear, cloudless night. The moon shone sweetly upon Jerusalem and changed the night to a softer and cooler day than that which had been twelve hours before. A breeze from the Mount of Olives cooled the heated air. The neighbours had in like manner brought their guests to sup on the roofs of their houses, and as far as the eye could reach on every side, feasting and illumination were seen. A busy hum ascended from the streets beneath, and the white tents glistened in the valley of Kedron.
What a scene! The whole environs of Jerusalem were turned into an encampment, all the hills and vallies, all the streets and open places were covered with tents. It was impossible that the houses should contain all the strangers, notwithstanding the unbounded hospitality which was practised on these occasions, and hence it was necessary that a large proportion of them should remain in tents during the festival. In the pleasant season of the year, at which the Passover was held, this had nothing inconvenient or disagreeable in it; it was the universal custom at the feast of tabernacles, and it reminded them of the patriarchal life, and the wandering in the desert. This gave to Jerusalem a singular but very interesting appearance. All was motion, life and animation, and the thought of the purpose for which these myriads of men had come up from near or distant regions, filled the mind with solemn and elevated feeling. [A million of human beings] have frequently been assembled here on such an occasion, all for the purpose of appearing with prayer and praise before Jehovah.
Carried away by the sight, Helon involuntarily exclaimed,
Behold how good and how pleasant it is
For brethren to dwell together in unity!
It is like the precious ointment upon the head of Aaron,
That ran down upon his beard,
That went down to the skirts of his garments.
So the dew of Hermon descends
Upon the hills of Zion:
For there hath Jehovah commanded his blessing,
Prosperity for ever more!—Ps. cxxxiii.
The guests gazed on him with surprise. “Why,” continued Helon, “do you not see before your eyes the application of the psalm? On such an evening as this, or at least in the view of such a spectacle as this, must it have been composed. Is it not the dew of Hermon,—are not these the sons of Israel from the Tyrian Climax and the plain of Jesreel, which fall here on the hills of Zion?”
“Listen!” said Iddo. Through the uproar of the streets they could discern a distant sound of cymbals, trumpets, and song, which came in the direction of the New City. “The Galileans are entering by the gate of Ephraim; they are late; and yet they cannot this time have been [obstructed by the Samaritans]; Hyrcanus has removed that obstacle from their way.” The distant sound of music and song, heard in this calm, soft night, seemed to Helon even more beautiful than the jubilation with which the march from Bethlehem had been attended. Penetrating through all the tumult of the city, which he heard not as he drank them in, the spiritual and ethereal tones seemed to him almost like the heavenly host, when they ascend from earth, to keep an eternal festival before the presence of Jehovah. On such an evening, what flight of imagination could be too bold for a youth of such enthusiastic temperament?
The guests had laid themselves down upon the carpets, when Iddo took Helon by the arm. Elisama had been compelled to occupy the place of honour, and Selumiel and he were inseparable. “You will stay by me,” said his host to Helon, “and we will occupy as is becoming, the lowest place. Look down below on the square; there it was that Ezra once stood, when the people returned from the captivity, and read the law to them.”
“I remember it,” said Helon; “it is written, Ezra read upon the open place before the Water-gate, from the morning until mid-day, and praised the Lord the great God; and the people answered Amen, Amen, with lifting up their hands, and bowed their heads and worshipped the Lord with their faces to the ground.”[[105]]
“Often have I stood here,” said Iddo, “contemplating that spot, with this history in my mind, and have thought, with gratitude to Jehovah who has delivered his people, on that Amen, sent up by the assembled multitude, lifting their hands to heaven. But let us eat and be merry.”
Their mirth was such as suited the age and the piety of the company, and their enjoyment was heightened by the expressions of joy which they heard all around them. The old men discoursed of the felicity of the times, and the glorious reign of Hyrcanus; above all, of the victory which his sons had obtained over the Samaritans, and the destruction of the abomination of Gerizim.
In the mean time the master of the house called upon his younger guests to assist him in [purifying his house from the leaven]. This was the evening of the fourteenth day of the month Nisan, the preparation day for the Passover. Lest the command of Jehovah, to eat unleavened bread for seven days, and to allow no leaven to be seen any where, should chance to be violated, they performed the ceremony of putting away the leaven on this evening. The master of the family gave each of his guests a torch, and led them in a solemn procession through the house. He had himself a dish and a brush in his hand, and he said “Praised be thou, O Lord our God, king of the world, who hast sanctified us by thy precepts, and hast enjoined upon us to put away the leaven.” All present said Amen. They then proceeded to examine every corner of the house, opening every drawer, chest, and cupboard. Here and there lay a piece of leavened bread, purposely left in the way; the master took it up, laid it in his dish, and carefully swept the place. When the company had gone round the house, to the outer door, he said, “Whatsoever leavened thing there is in my house, which I have not seen nor put away, may it be scattered in pieces and accounted as the dust of the earth.” The search had lasted two hours; the dish was locked up, and the guests retired to sleep.
Unable, however, to obtain sleep, from the crowd of feelings which coursed each other through his mind, when he thought that he was at length in Jerusalem, in the Holy City, Helon was one of the first who arose. He went immediately to the roof of the house—the Alijah was open; he entered it and performed his morning devotions, with a fervour which he had never felt before, put the Tallith on his head, bound the Tephillim on his brow and his hand, and recited the Kri-schma. His whole body was in agitation; now he lifted his hand towards heaven, now threw himself on his face on the ground, now bent his head to the middle of his body. In the earnestness of his prayer he seemed to wrestle with God. Here in the Holy City, how much had he to ask from the God of his fathers!
When his prayer was ended, and he came out upon the roof, he looked down upon Jerusalem, which now lay before him in all the brightness of daylight. As yet all was still; even from the temple, which [rose in elevated majesty] above the towers and palaces of the city, no sound was to be heard. The loud tumult of the strangers on the preceding evening was hushed, and it seemed as if the repose which announced the vicinity of the sanctuary, had diffused itself around and reduced all to silence. All the lofty emotions of his heart returned with equal strength, but not the same impetuosity as on the preceding evening. His inward delight was even greater, but it was calm and holy. He felt that near the presence of Jehovah, in the solemn assembly of his people, on the spot where the noblest and wisest of his countrymen had met together for such high purposes, his joy ought to be tranquil and sober, and the emotion, thus driven back upon the heart, only became the deeper and more vivid.
Helon felt that this was his initiation into a new life. When the day dawns, on which all the visions of childhood and the dreams of youth are about to be fulfilled—to which the man awakes, in the firm belief that it will realize every thing for which his heart has longed, there is a stillness, an earnest expectation, a humble confidence which take possession of such a youthful bosom, from which it is easily anticipated, that a period decisive for the formation of the character has arrived, and that what is now felt and done will have a predominating influence over all the future life.
Sallu came to him, to ask his commands. When he had received them, he remained standing a little while and said, “Master, I am only a servant in Israel, but I too am of the seed of Abraham, and I feel that this is the land of our fathers and of their God. Let us not return into Egypt!”
When Elisama arose, his first occupation was to open the baggage and take out thence the presents destined for his host. It was his rule never to come empty-handed, and on this occasion he had indeed come with his hands full. To the mistress of the house he sent all that remained, and it was no trifling store, of the provisions for the journey, some skins of delicious Chian wine, which he had purchased in the caravan, and a quantity of the finest Egyptian linen. To Iddo he gave a turban curiously wrought, of a costly stuff, and an Alexandrian robe of ceremony, informing him that it had been his brother-in-law's, and that his sister had destined it for him.
To Selumiel he carried a book. It consisted of several pieces of [papyrus], the stalk of which is divided with a needle into thin leaves, which are then laid together and fastened with the water of the Nile. Several of them were then laid upon each other and fitted together, and on these oblong leaves the book was written. It was an Egyptian invention and very highly prized. “I have brought you,” said he to Selumiel, “the Hebrew work of Jesus Sirach, the same which his grandson has translated into Greek. It is highly esteemed in Egypt both by Jews and heathens. I could easily have procured a transcript of the Greek version, from one of our literati in the Bruchion; but that would not have answered my purpose; it was with difficulty that I could obtain this copy of the Hebrew. I give it thee for the sake of the passage on friendship. Read here; ‘A faithful friend is the medicine of life, and they who fear the Lord shall find him. For he who feareth the Lord shall be happy in his friendship, and as he is, such shall his friend be also.’[[106]] And here too, ‘Forsake not an old friend.’” Selumiel smiled, a thing which he rarely did, and said, “I accept the present, on the condition that you come to Jericho with me, in order that I may be able to return it.” “We shall see,” said Elisama, “but in so doing I should be giving little, to receive much in return.” “Friendship,” said Selumiel, “has all things in common.”
As our [travellers came from a heathen land], it was necessary they should be purified before they could go into the temple. This would have prevented Helon from attending at the morning sacrifice, and besides he wished first to discharge a duty of filial piety, and to visit the grave of his father, before he appeared in the presence of Jehovah, whom his father had taught him to honour.
When the ceremonies of bathing, cutting off the hair, and others in which purification consisted, were over, he went forth to the valley of Jehoshaphat, to his father’s tomb. It was by his own dying request that he had been interred there; for Iddo would fain have given him a place in the sepulchre of his own family. From the words of the prophet Joel, “I will gather all nations, and will bring them down to the valley of [Jehoshaphat], and will plead with them there for my people,”[[107]] it had become a prevalent opinion, that this would be the scene of the general resurrection and of the judgment of Jehovah, and therefore many of the Jews wished to be buried there. It took its name from the king Jehoshaphat, who was said to have been interred in that place.
Iddo, Elisama, and Selumiel accompanied Helon. Leaving the city by the Water-gate, they turned to the south-east and kept along the brook Kedron. Willows and tall cedars threw their shadows upon the graves. They wandered silently along the Kedron, till they saw a large stone, such as the Jews are accustomed to place upon every grave, as a warning rather than a monument, to prevent the passers-by from defiling themselves unawares. To-day especially, it was necessary for them to keep at a distance of several paces from it, if they would not render themselves so far unclean, as to incapacitate them for taking any part in the religious rites of the day. Helon felt an irresistible impulse to throw himself upon the grave, but the others forcibly held him back. Tears streamed from his eyes as he incessantly exclaimed, “My father! my father!” With head and breast inclined forward he was supported by his companions, scarcely conscious what he did, to the Horse-gate, where they set him down. They spoke to him of the virtues of his father, of his surviving parent at Alexandria, of the happiness of being buried in the valley of Jehoshaphat. By degrees he became more calm; his tears continued to flow, but they were rather the effusion of tenderness than of sorrow, and he seemed to have found his father, rather than to have lost him. Iddo, whose manner was somewhat abrupt, reminded him of his obligations to them for having prevented him from making himself unclean by throwing himself on the grave, which would have compelled him to keep the feast, with the rest of those who were unclean, in the following month. “Bethink thee, too, that Jehovah himself has commanded that we should be cheerful on this day. Thou shalt rejoice before Jehovah thy God, at the place which the Lord thy God has chosen that his name should dwell there.”[[108]]
They now made a circuit round the city, from the Horse-gate, which lies northward from the Water-gate, till they came to the Water-gate again. The whole circuit might be as much as [five sabbath-days’ journies]. Their object in making it was rather to give Helon a general view of the different quarters of the city, and divert his thoughts by variety of scene, than to examine any part minutely, which indeed would now have been impracticable, the whole ground being covered with tents.
[Jerusalem]forms something of an irregular oblong. In the middle of the eastern side, which was one of the longest, rose the temple on mount Moriah. Around the temple lay the city, divided into three parts, built on three hills. Directly behind the temple, in the middle, and due west from it, was the Lower City, on the hill Acra. On the other side south-west from the temple, the Upper City crowned the hill of Zion; north-west lay the New City, on the hill Bezetha; and a small hill, Ophel, lay southward from the temple. Thus it might be said that the city, though of an oblong shape, lay in a crescent round about the temple.
Jerusalem stood on a very elevated range of hills; the last eighteen sabbath-days’ journies in approaching it were almost a continued ascent. Only towards the north, joining the [New City], there was some level ground, on the other three sides it was surrounded with vallies. On the eastern side, where the temple stood, was the valley, which, from the winter torrent which flowed through it, was called the valley of Kedron. The Upper City was skirted on the south side by the valley Ben-hinnom, where, under some of the last of the kings, children had been burnt to Moloch, at a place called Tophet. On the western side, the valley of Gihon bordered the Upper City, the Lower City, and the New City.
Two walls surrounded Jerusalem: one enclosed the Upper City and with it the southern part of the temple; the other began from this, and fortified the Lower City, joining the castle of Baris, which lay above, to the north, near the temple. The New City had at this time no wall. On the first wall were sixty towers, on the second fourteen, each twenty cubits high.
The city had [twelve gates], the number which Ezekiel had prophesied on the banks of Chebar. But in regard to the position and names of the gates, the instructions of Jehovah by his prophet had been as little attended to as those which he had given in the same passage for the form of the city (which was to have been a regular square) or for the division of the country.[[109]] Every side was to have had three gates, and each gate the name of one of the twelve tribes, but in rebuilding the city they adopted the names and sites of those which the Chaldeans had destroyed.
In the middle of the eastern side was the Sheep-gate, which led from the valley of Kedron to the temple. At the building of the walls under Nehemiah,[[110]] the superintendence of it was on this account given to the priests, and when it was ended, they consecrated it with thank-offerings and prayer. Higher up towards the north, but on the same side, was the Fish-gate, leading from the valley of Kedron into the New City, and not far from it the Old-gate, leading from and to the same places. It had its name from the circumstance of its not being destroyed, when the others were razed by the Chaldeans.
On the north side was the gate of Ephraim, and quite towards the west, the Corner-gate, both leading into the New City. On the west side the Valley-gate led from the valley of Gihon and Siloam, into the Lower City, and the Dung-gate and the Well-gate into the Upper City.
On the eastern side you entered from the vale of Kedron, by the Water-gate, close to which was the open square, on which Iddo’s house stood; and further up, by the Horse-gate and the Eastern-gate, into the Upper City. Lastly, the gate Miphkad, or the gate of Judgment, so called from justice having been long administered there, gave entrance into the precincts of the temple. It was near the Sheep-gate from which our survey began. In the space now described about 120,000 inhabitants commonly dwelt, but at the time of the Passover not fewer than a million have been assembled here.
The arrangement of the city bore some [analogy] to that of the camp in the wilderness. There the tabernacle was placed in the middle, and called the camp of the Majesty of Jehovah; around it were encamped the 22,000 priests and Levites, and round them, in a still wider circle, was the encampment of the twelve tribes, called the camp of Israel. So here at Jerusalem, the temple was called the camp of the Majesty of Jehovah, the exterior courts, the camp of the Levites, and the city, the camp of Israel. Thus the stranger, when he came from foreign parts, to celebrate the festival of Israel’s deliverance from Egypt, found here the names and divisions which had been in use among his ancestors in the desert, and the whole city became as it were a permanent encampment, a standing memorial of that wonderful event, which is incomprehensible to those who consider Israel as only under human guidance. By remarks of this kind Elisama endeavoured to divert Helon’s thoughts from himself, to what concerned his nation. The names of the different parts and public buildings of Jerusalem had recalled many historical events to his mind; its glory under David and Solomon; its forlorn and ruined state when Jeremiah poured forth his lamentations over its smoking ashes, its new splendour when, under Nehemiah, it arose from its ruins.
On the day of preparation it was customary in Jerusalem to take an early meal, in order to have time for the arrangements necessary before the evening. The time of this meal, however, had been long past, when they returned to the house; the unleavened bread had been already baked and lay on the tables in the women’s saloon, and the cakes designed for the festival had been taken from the oven in the adjacent room. That which was the portion of the priest, was of greater size than the rest; it was baked the first, and lay on a separate table, adorned with flowers. The father of the family was to carry it to the temple in the afternoon. “The first and best of every thing,” said he, “belongs to Jehovah; in honouring his servants we think we honour him, and we set apart the first portion for the priest who lives by the law.”
A short meal, at noon, was taken under the palm-trees in the inner court, beside the fountain. The greatest neatness reigned in the whole house—all the furniture and vessels, all the floors had been washed. Only the white unleavened bread was seen at table. The pilgrims had eaten it on their journey, but this was the day on which it began to be exclusively used. It consisted of thin flat crumbling cakes, made of water and meal, full of little holes, that not the smallest tendency to acidity might be occasioned. It was the food of haste and sorrow, and they had been commanded to eat it, as a memorial of their being thrust out of Egypt, without time for the preparation of their food.
Immediately after the removal of the dishes and carpets, a fire was made behind the women’s saloon, in a small garden belonging to the house. When it blazed up, the guests and members of the family came and placed themselves around it, and Iddo, bringing the dish which contained the leaven, threw it into the fire, saying at the same time, “May all the leaven which I have seen or not seen, which I have brought out or not brought out, be scattered and destroyed, and accounted as the dust of the earth!”
This ceremony had just been ended, and some other trifling preparations for the festival been made, when the trumpets from mount Moriah announced the commencement of the Passover, and a thousand horns, in the streets, from the houses and the tents, replied to the signal. The walls of the front court were hung with tapestry, which had before been suspended between the holy and most holy place. Our pilgrims went up to the temple to complete their purifications, and to show the impatient Helon at least its general arrangement. It was now about the eighth hour.
The [ground-plan of the temple] had been familiar to him from his youth. The mountain Moriah had an average length and breadth of five hundred cubits; its lowest part was towards the east. As it could not contain all the buildings of the temple, Solomon had carried up a wall of great height and strength from the valley of the Kedron, and filled the intermediate space with earth, thus extending the mountain into the valley. After the return from the captivity, the people are said to have erected huge masses of masonry, composed of squared stones, from the valley, on the eastern, southern, and northern sides, between three hundred and four hundred cubits high.
Iddo led his friend through the Water-gate into the valley of Kedron, that they might receive an impression of the magnificent exterior of this wonderful work, before they explored the interior. They ascended a flight of steps in the outer wall, and by the Beautiful-gate, called also the gate Susan, entered the court of the Gentiles. This court, a square of five hundred paces, had porticoes on all four sides, three on the south and two on the others. The double row of pillars on the eastern side was called the porch of Solomon. At its western end, but more to the north, stood the [sanctuary] or temple, properly so called, with its courts. Strangers from heathen countries and uncircumcised persons were admitted into the court of the Gentiles, but were warned by an inscription, in Hebrew and Greek, on the railing at the north-western end, not to proceed any further. Behind this railing you ascended fourteen steps and reached a level court, called [Chel], ten cubits in breadth, in which was the house of the exposition of the law. It ended with five steps, leading to a second wall, which on the outside was forty and on the inside twenty-five cubits high. In it was the Lower-gate. Here began a court, called the court of the Women, or the Outer court, one hundred and thirty-five cubits long and of equal breadth. It was divided by a wall from the next court, the court of Israel, which had also one hundred and thirty-five cubits of length from north to south, and eleven of breadth from east to west. To go from the court of the Women to the court of Israel, you ascended fifteen steps, and passed through the gate of Nicanor. Next was the court of the Priests, of the same dimensions as the court of Israel. At its termination stood the altar of burnt-offering, fifteen cubits high and fifty in length and breadth. Beside it was the bath which supplied the place of the brazen sea in Solomon’s temple.[[111]] At the distance of twenty-two cubits the sanctuary with its triple division arose; being besides twenty-two cubits higher than the court of the Gentiles. Along the sides of these courts were porticoes, and a multitude of considerable buildings; the floor was throughout of marble.
When Helon reached the Beautiful-gate, it was scarcely possible to pass, so great was the crowd of men and lambs. [The children of Israel], out of all the tribes from Dan to Beersheba, from the extreme point of Galilee to the desert of Arabia, strangers from Egypt, Cyprus, Syria, Cappadocia, and Babylon, were here assembled in their festive attire. Every master of a house carried his lamb upon his shoulder, or had it driven before him by his servants. In the spacious court of the Gentiles stood vast flocks of lambs and kids, the dealers in which carried on a very extensive traffic at the time of the Passover. The bleatings of the sheep and the exclamations of their drivers resounded between the shouts of joy and the hymns of praise.
Helon passed through the court of the Gentiles, scarcely noticing what was going on there, to the enclosure behind the railing, keeping his eye fixed upon the altar of burnt-offerings. He looked up the fifteen steps, on which the Levites were already standing with their instruments, through the gate of Nicanor, and gained a view of the interior of the sanctuary. It was like a glimpse of heaven to him. He saw not the riches and splendour of the gold; he felt not the pressure of the crowds around him. A feeling of intense devotion wrapt his soul, and for a time suppressed every other emotion.
His companions roused him, by directing his attention to the court of the Priests. The evening sacrifice, which this evening was killed an hour earlier than usual, was already brought to the altar, the holy place was illuminated, and they were burning incense in it. Helon gazed around him, on the sanctuary, the altar, the courts, and the multitude which filled them, bewildered and overpowered, and incapable of fixing his attention upon any single object in the scene. He did not even notice the absence of the high-priest, whom in his imagination he had always pictured as ministering at the altar, or in the holy of holies; at this moment he was engaged in some of the adjacent buildings, making preparations for the festival.
The paschal lamb must be killed between the two [evenings], the greater, which lasted from the middle of the seventh hour to the middle of the tenth, (half past twelve to half past four) and the lesser, which lasted till sunset, or about six o’clock. Iddo conducted Helon about this time into the court of the Gentiles, where the slaves with Sallu were waiting. The lamb must be without blemish, more than eight days and less than a year old. The people had divided themselves into three great bodies in the court of Israel. When the evening sacrifice was over, a priest opened all the folding-doors of the court of the Priests, and allowed one division to enter. The priests stood in a row, reaching from the place where the lambs were killed to the altar, each holding in his hand a basin, pointed at the bottom. Iddo was among the first. He presented his lamb and mentioned the number of the company who were to partake of it. They must not be fewer than ten, nor more than nineteen. He then drew his knife through its throat, the priest who was nearest to him received the blood in his basin, and handing it to his neighbour, it was passed from one to the other, till it reached the priest who was next to the altar, and who poured the blood upon it. Each as he handed the full basin to his neighbour received an empty one from him with the other hand; thus all was done with incredible despatch.
The [father of each family] killed the paschal lamb himself. In ordinary cases the priests were the sacrificers, but once in the year the master of the house was himself a priest, as a memorial that Israel was a nation of priests. The Levites in the mean time sung on the fifteen steps the great Hallelujah, and at each psalm the priests on the pillar which stands by the altar [blew the trumpet] three times. Iddo carried the lamb to the pillars, hung it to one of the hooks, and taking off the skin and the fat, gave the fat to the priest, who salted it and laid it upon the altar. He then carried the lamb home. So did every one of the body who had been first admitted; and when they had all finished, the folding-door opened again, and a second body was admitted. Without the greatest regularity, it would have been impossible in so short a time that such a multitude of lambs should have been killed. Helon descended the steps with Iddo, who had also offered a thank-offering; and as he paused at the gate and looked back, he mentally exclaimed, “Better is a day in thy courts than a thousand elsewhere!”
CHAPTER IV.
THE PASCHAL LAMB.
The Passover was now begun. The day of preparation was past; every master of a house had killed his paschal lamb on Moriah, attaining for this day an equal dignity with the highest order in the state, and exercising a sacerdotal function. The festival was called in Hebrew Pesach, or according to the Chaldee pronunciation, which was then become universal, Pascha, the deliverance, or the passing through. The companies who were to eat the paschal lamb were already assembled, and the lambs were roasting in the [deep ovens] in the women’s apartments.
These ovens were excavations in the ground, about two feet and a half broad, and five to six feet deep. The sides were covered with stones, which were heated by a fire kindled at the bottom, and then the lamb was suspended within, on a piece of wood running lengthwise, and crossed by another between the forefeet. It was expressly commanded by Jehovah, “Ye shall not eat of it raw, nor sodden with water, but roast it with fire.”[[112]] The [fifteenth day of the month Nisan], or Abib (our April) the first of the sacred year, was now arrived. The Jewish day began with sunset, an emblem that primeval darkness had preceded the birth of light, and that all life has its origin in a period of darkness.
When all the preparations were ended, and the Passover just about to begin, Helon hastened to the roof of the house. He looked down on the open place and up to Moriah and Zion, to the mount of Olives, and on the vallies of Gihon and Kedron. “Wherever I look,” thought he, “hundreds of thousands of the children of Israel and the seed of Abraham reassembled to commemorate their deliverance from Egypt. They have come up to the hill where Jehovah hath made his name to dwell, and their minds are filled with the thought of their fathers, and the mighty works which the God of their fathers had done in their behalf. Well is it said, Israel is Israel only in the Holy Land.” He entered the Alijah, and remained long in fervent prayer. When he came again upon the roof, the last glow of evening over Zion was illuminating the city, and the lamps which were kindled in every house and tent shone through the thin veil of vapour which was spread over the prospect. He lingered on the roof till the golden margin of the western clouds had disappeared and the stars had begun to twinkle in the firmament.
When he went down and entered the inner court, he saw within the porticoes three rooms brilliantly illuminated. It was not possible for all the guests to [eat the Passover] with the master of the house, because each company was not to exceed twenty. Two other apartments had therefore been prepared for other parties. On such occasions, we have before observed, no citizen of Jerusalem considered his house as his own, but cheerfully resigned it for the use of strangers, who, according to ancient custom, acknowledged his courtesy, by the gift of the skin of the paschal lamb. The light was streaming through the lattices of all the rooms, and Helon entered, with a beating heart, that which was appropriated to the use of Iddo and his peculiar guests. A multitude of smaller lamps were suspended from the walls, and one of great size stood in the middle. Costly carpets were spread on the floor, tapestry was hung on the sides, and gold and silver glittered on the [divan], though it was not used on this evening; for the paschal lamb was to be eaten standing. The air was filled with the fragrance of Arabian frankincense and the most exquisite perfumes. The women were all richly clad, especially the mistress of the house, who appeared this evening in all her choicest ornaments, a mother in Israel in the city of God. It was only on this day that the women ate with the men; even the men servants and maid servants were not excluded. The whole household of every rank and age, even the children, if they had begun to taste flesh-meat, must be assembled, and all must be Levitically clean. Of the inhabitants not disqualified by uncleanness none were to be absent, but strangers of the gate, hirelings, and all uncircumcised persons: for such had been the command of Jehovah, “There shall no stranger eat thereof.”[[113]] All the rest were on this night brethren, for all had been delivered by Jehovah from the house of bondage. The bondsman was as the freeman, the woman as the man; and all partook alike of the festivity; all were the people of Jehovah, and equal in his sight.
In the middle of the room stood the table, which [in the east is always low], because the guests either lie around it on sofas, or sit on carpets. On this occasion, however, there was neither sofa nor carpet near the table, which stood apart, as if the preparations were but half finished. It was about the middle of the second hour of evening (half past seven) when the company, consisting of nineteen persons, assembled around the table. Every one, though splendidly clad, appeared prepared for a journey. With sandals on their feet, which at other times were not worn in a room, but given to the slaves to be placed at the door, with their garments girt, and a staff in their hands, they surrounded the table. A large vessel filled with wine immediately from the cask, stood upon it, and the meal began by the master of the house blessing it. He laid hold of it with both hands, lifted it up with the right, and said, “Blessed be thou, O Lord our God, thou king of the world, who hast given us the fruit of the vine;” and the whole assembly said, “Amen.” Next he blessed the day, and thanked God for having given them the Passover: and then, drinking first himself from the cup, sent it round to the rest. When this was over, he began again; “Blessed be thou, O Lord our God, thou king of the world, who hast sanctified us by thy precepts, and commanded us to wash our hands.” He and the whole company then washed their hands in a silver basin, with water poured from an ewer of the same metal. This was the emblem of purification, and implied, that every one should come with a pure heart, as well as clean hands, to partake of the paschal meal. The unleavened bread, (flat cakes with many small holes in them,) the bitter herbs, a vessel with vinegar, the paschal lamb, were placed upon the table, and last of all the charoseth, a thick pottage of apples, nuts, figs, almonds, and honey, boiled in wine and vinegar, and not unfrequently made in the form of a brick or tile, to remind the Israelites of their Egyptian slavery, and strewed with cinnamon, in imitation of the straw which was mixed with the clay. The master of the house then spoke again; “Blessed be thou, O Lord our God, who hast given us of the fruits of the earth.” He dipped some of the herbs in vinegar, and the whole company did the same. At this moment, the mistress touched her little grandson, a child of ten years old. Children were always present at this festival, and one design of its establishment was, that the son should learn from the lips of his father the event to which it referred, and the remembrance of it might thus be propagated to the most distant posterity.[[114]] The child understood the hint, and asked his grandfather, why on this night alone the guests stood around the table, instead of sitting or lying. With dignity and solemnity, the grandfather, turning to the child, related to him how their forefathers had been oppressed in Egypt, and how the Lord had brought them out thence with a mighty arm. He described to him the evening which preceded their flight from Goshen, their busy preparation, and their anxiety to conceal it from the Egyptians. The lamb was slain and the blood sprinkled on the door-posts, that the destroying angel of the Lord might pass by their houses when he slew the first-born of the Egyptians. It was to be roasted, not boiled, that it might be sooner ready, and strengthen more those who partook of it; it was to be eaten in a standing posture, as by men prepared for instant departure; it was to be consumed entire, for the whole people were to quit their dwellings and never to return to them; and no bone of it was to be broken, for this is the act of men who have time and leisure for their meal. The bitter herbs were then eaten, and the 113th and 114th psalms sung. This formed the first half of the great song of praise, which was called emphatically the Hallel, consisting of six psalms, from the 113th to the 118th, sung on all great festivities. A second washing of the hands followed, the cup was a second time blessed and sent round. The master broke off a piece of the unleavened bread, wrapped it in the bitter herbs, and, having dipped it in the charoseth, ate it, and then distributed a portion to each of the company, who did the same; and now the eating of the lamb began, in which the paschal feast properly consisted. Along with the lamb the boiled flesh of the thank-offering, which Iddo had made in the temple, was placed upon the table, and blessed by the master of the house. The lamb was wholly consumed, it being forbidden by the law that any part of it should remain till the next day. If any part were not eaten, it was to be burnt. The bones were not to be broken, for every thing was to remind them of their hasty flight from Egypt.
Festivity and cheerful conversation now reigned among the whole assemblage. Whether it be that a people, which had suffered so much calamity and oppression, naturally enjoys the more keenly a temporary interval of pleasure, or that every approach to God is to the pure mind a source of joy and peace, certain it is, that no nation has ever more carefully studied to remove all trace of sorrow from religious services than the Jews. If the service of the law was a heavy burthen, the service of God was freedom and happiness. All the regulations enjoin this, all the customs of Israel proceed from this principle, that the marks of mourning should be carefully removed from their worship. To praise, to give thanks and sing, to make a joyful noise unto the Lord, to be glad on the day which he had made, to rejoice in him, are all expressions by which their religious services are described. The same principle was kept in view in the purifications which preceded the Passover. He who had touched a dead body was held to be unclean, and excluded from the feast. It was a sin for the high-priest to make himself unclean, even by the body of his nearest relative: for he was to exhibit the divine life in all its purity before the people. How earnestly do Ezra and Nehemiah exhort the people to lay aside their mourning, when the law was read at the feast of tabernacles, and the curse on its violation made known! “This day is holy unto the Lord your God; mourn not nor weep; neither be ye sorry, for the joy of the Lord is your strength. Go your way, eat the fat and drink the sweet; for this day is holy unto the Lord.”[[115]]
The company in Iddo’s house were not unmindful of these precepts, and the time passed on rapidly in animated discourse. The servants were not excluded from their share; the innocent playfulness of the children was not repressed, and the gaiety of the females lent wings to the conversation. Iddo was the most animated of all, and Helon thought he had never seen an old man so full of vivacity. “See, thou mother in Israel,” said he to his wife, “the Lord has blessed us and permitted us to keep one Passover more, before we are gathered to our fathers. Let us thank him for his mercy, by the cheerfulness with which we celebrate it. Who knows but this may be our last? seldom does a year elapse, but some one dies of those who kept the Passover together at the beginning of it, and our turn, though long delayed, must come at last. We were blithe in our youthful days, half a century since, what prevents our being so still? Thou hast seen thy children and children’s children. Join with me in her praise, my friends.—The Lord has given her store of children and of guests; and she has received them both as the gift of God, and tended them faithfully!”
All present congratulated the venerable pair, and Iddo continued, “Why didst not thou, Selumiel, bring thy wife and Sulamith, who is lovelier than the fairest rose of Jericho? A prize for some fortunate youth, for as Solomon has said, ‘A virtuous wife is more precious than pearls.’”
“What would Israel be,” said Elisama, as the sounds of festivity from the adjacent apartments penetrated into theirs, “what would Israel be without the festivals of Jehovah? Here we are all assembled before the Lord, to praise his faithfulness which is great, and his mercy which is renewed every morning. What compared with these are the Grecian games at Olympia and Nemea? Would that Myron were here! We children of Israel are one people; we have one God, and one city of the Lord; and every Jew in Egypt, Asia, Syria, and Chaldea, always turns his eyes in his prayers towards this one place. Think, my friends, that while so many hundreds of thousands are assembled in Jerusalem, millions in the remotest countries, into which our people has been scattered, cast longing looks this evening towards us, envying us our joy, and desiring nothing more, than to to be in the Holy City and in the courts of Jehovah! I only regret that Gerizim and Leontopolis——”
“Hush,” interposed Iddo, “to-day speak only of pleasing subjects. Our prince has subdued the rebellious daughter Gerizim. Jehovah ceases not to concern himself with the injuries of Joseph.”
“The prophet,” replied Elisama, “has declared that all the nations of the earth shall be united in the valley of Jehoshaphat, and when the Messiah comes the sceptre of Judah shall be extended over the whole earth.”
“Hyrcanus stands beside the altar,” said another of the company, “and the family of the Maccabees is flourishing. Who knows whether the Messiah will not speedily appear from among them?”
“No,” said Elisama, “the Messiah must come from the family of David, and the Maccabees are Levites of the family of Jojarib. The Jewish people and the priests consented that Simon should be their prince and high-priest, till God raise up the true prophet unto them. The Messiah, therefore, will not be a Maccabee though [Hyrcanus] unites in himself the three offices to which he will be anointed. But would that he who is promised were come! His way is prepared; Israel is once more free, and a people. What would I give, if in my grey hairs I might yet be permitted to behold him! What a glorious passover will that be, when He keeps it with us, in Baris or on Zion, and his people accompany him with palm branches and Hosannas! I envy you, Helon, for you may live to see that day.”
“It will be a happy day,” said Helon,[Helon,] “but not more happy than this.” The old men smiled at his enthusiasm, and rejoiced that among the youth of Israel there should be such joy in keeping the festivals of Jehovah.
It was now become late. The hired servant, stationed by the waterclock in the court, called the fifth hour of night, and the paschal meal was not permitted to last longer than to the end of the [first watch of the night], which terminated somewhere about an hour before midnight. There were two other watches between this and daylight, divided by the two cock-crowings. They heard the guests in the other apartments reciting the song of praise, and hastened to conclude. With the same prayer as before, they washed their hands again from the silver basin, and Iddo having again blessed the cup, they drank once more from it. This was called the cup of thanksgiving. The second part of the Hallel was now sung, consisting of the 115th, 116th, 117th, and 118th psalms. Helon thought of the words of Isaiah, “Ye shall sing as on the night of a holy feast, and rejoice in your hearts as when they go with a pipe to the mountain of the Lord, to the refuge of Israel.”[[116]] When the Hallel was finished, hands were again washed, and the cup was blessed and sent round for the fourth and last time. Helon would gladly have joined in praying the [great Hallel], as they call the series of psalms from the 120th to the 137th, after which it was customary to send round the cup a fifth time, but midnight was already too near. The company broke up, and all retired to rest, designing to be early in the temple on the following day.
CHAPTER V.
THE DAY AFTER THE PASSOVER.
While the paschal lamb was eaten by the people, the priests in the temple were cleansing the altar of burnt-offering. This was commonly done in the last watch of the night, towards the cock-crowing, but on this occasion during the first. Next they themselves partook of the paschal lamb, and [soon after midnight] the gates were opened, for the ingress of the children of Israel, many of whom were there, even at this early hour, in order to see the splendour of the illuminated temple. As soon as the watchman had answered in the affirmative the customary question of the priest, “Does it begin to be light as far as Hebron?” all the streets leading to the temple were filled with men, dressed in their gayest clothes. On no other occasion of the year was the temple so crowded as on the morning after the Passover.
The [usual morning sacrifice] was first of all offered. The lamps were extinguished, incense was burnt upon the altar, and the lamb was sacrificed to Jehovah, with the usual meat and drink offering. Then followed the special offering for the feast, two young bullocks, a ram, seven yearling lambs with meat and drink offerings. Next, a goat was offered as a sin-offering; the Hallel was sung, and the blessing pronounced. The whole body of the priests was assembled; on ordinary days, only some families of the fathers were present; on the sabbath the whole course; but on high festivals the whole twenty-four courses, the collective body of the priesthood.
Helon had been among the first who had come up to the temple of Jehovah, at the crowing of the cock. He beheld all with deep interest and profound devotion, and as he gazed on the temple and the splendid ritual performed in it, the fond wish of his early childhood awoke in his heart, that he too might be thought worthy to become a priest of Jehovah, and to minister at his altar. With increasing eagerness he looked for the appearance of the high-priest, the head and crown of the tribe of Levi and of all Israel. He had expected him to appear yesterday, and during the morning sacrifice, but he had not shown himself. Helon felt an enthusiastic admiration for the heroic family of the Maccabees, and none of them all had risen to such an eminence as John Hyrcanus. In Egypt, in Hebron, on the pilgrimage, and through the whole preceding day, he had been hearing the praises of the man whom he was now about to see.
He was standing upon the lowest of the fifteen steps, which led from the court of Israel to that of the women, when there arose a cry among the thousands who surrounded him, “The high-priest is coming!” He came from an adjoining building and walked towards the altar. The breastplate with its precious stones beamed from his breast. Over the ordinary [white robe] of the priests, which descended in folds to his feet, he wore a magnificent upper robe of a blue purple. The bells between the pomegranates, on the borders of his robe, gave a clear sound as he walked. Over this upper garment he had a third, which was shorter, called the ephod, splendidly embroidered with purple, dark blue, crimson and thread of gold, on a white ground. On his head was a white turban, and over this a second, striped with dark blue. On his forehead he wore a plate of gold, on which the name of Jehovah was inscribed; and being at once high-priest and prince, this was connected with a triple crown on the temples and back part of the head.
The priests made way for him, as he entered in his glory, and stepped in majesty along. Arrived at the altar, he looked round on the innumerable multitude that were assembled, while silent congratulations were addressed to him by every heart. Helon thought on the splendid description of the high-priest Simon, the son of Onias, in the book of Jesus the son of Sirach.
“When he came from behind the veil, he was as the morning star in the midst of a cloud; and as the moon at the full. As the sun shines on the temple of the Most High; as the rainbow with its beautiful colours; as the beautiful rose in spring; as the lily by the rivers of waters; as the branches of the frankincense tree in time of summer; as fire and incense in the censer; as a vessel of beaten gold, set with all manner of ornaments of precious stones; as a fair olive-tree, budding forth fruit; as a cypress tree growing up to the clouds! When he put on the robe of honour, and was clothed with all his glory, and when he went up to the holy altar, he adorned the sanctuary all around. When he took the portions out of the hands of the priests, and stood by the hearth of the altar, and his brethren stood around him, he was as a young cedar in Lebanon, and they surrounded him like palm-trees. All the sons of Aaron in their glory had the oblations of the Lord in their hands before all the congregation of Israel. And he fulfilled the service at the altar, and offered up a pious oblation unto the Most High. He stretched out his hand to the cup and poured out the blood of the grape, he poured it at the foot of the altar, a sweet smell to the Most High, King of all. Then shouted the sons of Aaron and blew the curved trumpets and made a great noise to be heard, for a remembrance before the Most High. Then all the people straightway fell down upon the earth upon their faces, and worshipped the Lord God Almighty, the Most High: the singers also sang praises with their voices, there was made sweet melody with great variety of sounds. And the people besought the Lord, the Most High, by prayer, that he would be merciful, till the worship of the Lord was ended and they had finished the service. Then he went down and lifted up his hands over the whole congregation of the children of Israel, and gave them the blessing of the Lord with his lips, and wished them peace in his name. And they bowed themselves down to worship a second time, that they might receive a blessing from the Most High; and said, ‘Now therefore bless ye the God of all, who alone doeth wondrous things every where, who keeps us alive from the mother’s womb and deals with us according to his mercy: may he grant us joyfulness of heart, and that there may be peace in our days in Israel for ever, and that his mercy may abide with us, and that he may deliver us at his time.’”[[117]]
This description had often awakened the enthusiasm of Helon, but now he saw it realized, in the most impressive service ever performed in Israel—that of the morning after the Passover. There stood the high-priest, spiritual and temporal sovereign of the people, on the mountain of Jehovah, in sight of his sanctuary, and looked through the lofty portico, full upon the curtain of the most holy place. On the other side, through all the courts even to the foot of mount Moriah, was a countless multitude, all occupied with prayer and praise, all waiting anxiously for his blessing, and expecting to be purified by his offering. Around him were all the priests of Israel, obedient to his nod, ministering to him in the most sacred employment of the people, their appearance before Jehovah. He himself, the man who bore the name of Jehovah on his brow, with every thing that oriental splendour could accumulate, lavished on him, in honour of that name, surrounded by the flames of the altar of burnt-offering, which flashed up to heaven! It was a sight to awaken every sublime religious feeling of such a mind as Helon’s.
The Hallel was sung. The priests, stationed on the pillars near the laver, accompanied the song with the sound of their trumpets and the [Levites] on the fifteen steps sung it, with their cymbals, cornets and flutes. David had appointed four thousand Levites for musicians and singers, and their number was probably not much smaller now.[[118]] The multitude responded, with its hundred thousand voices, to the song of the choir; and when the Hallelujah, with which the psalms begin and end, was thrice repeated with the united volume of vocal and instrumental sound poured forth at once, a less lively imagination than Helon’s might have fancied that Jehovah himself appeared in the flames of the altar, to receive the homage of his people. It was here only that one of these psalms, so full of the boldest flights and of the deepest emotion, must be heard, to be fully felt. Such a moment had inspired them; such a moment alone could revive that intensity of feeling, which is necessary fully to comprehend them.
Helon was so absorbed, that the wave of the people had forced him, unconscious of it, far down to the extremity of the court. He could only see from a distance the movements of the high-priest about the altar. His majestic figure, as he passed to and fro before the flames which arose in the back ground, received from them a strong illumination, which to Helon’s fancy gave something solemn and unearthly to the form. When the sacrifice and the Hallel were ended, the people fell on their knees, and bowed their faces to the earth to receive the high-priest’s blessing. He washed his hands with the usual solemnities, and advanced to the steps of the Levites, praying thus; “Praised be thou, O Lord our God, thou king of the world, who hast sanctified us with the consecration of Aaron, and commanded us to bless thy people Israel in love.” He then turned first to the sanctuary and afterwards to the people; then [lifting his arms] to the height of his shoulder, and joining his hands together, so as to leave five intervals between the fingers, with eyes cast down on the ground, he laid the name of Jehovah on the people and said,
The Lord bless thee and keep thee,
The Lord make his face to shine upon thee and be gracious unto thee,
The Lord lift up the light of his countenance upon thee and give thee peace!—Num. vi. 24.
At every repetition of the word thee, he turned to the north and the south. The people replied; “Praised be the name of his kingdom for ever!” They continued a while when the benediction was concluded, each praying to himself, while the high-priest, turning to the sanctuary, said, “O Lord of the whole world, we have done what thou hast commanded us, and thou wilt do what thou hast promised. Thou wilt behold us from the habitation of thy holiness; thou wilt look down from heaven and bless thy people Israel!”
The offerings which were now concluded had a reference to the whole people; it remained that individuals should offer for themselves, both [thank-offerings] and burnt-offerings, in order not to appear empty-handed before Jehovah. The thank-offerings might only be offered on this day, the burnt-offerings on the following day also. Elisama had bought a goat without blemish, for a thank-offering, in the court of the Gentiles. The choicest parts, the breast and the shoulder, belonged to the priest, the fat to Jehovah; all the rest was cooked in some of the out-buildings of the temple: for Iddo had made engagements for their feasting there. On this day no other flesh might be eaten, than that of thank-offerings; the majority of those who sacrificed carried the portions which they retained for themselves, to consume them in their houses or their tents. Elisama had invited to his feast, his host, his host’s family, and some Levites; bearing in mind the precept, “Thou shalt not neglect the Levites as long as thou livest upon the earth.”[[119]] They assembled in a saloon allotted for this purpose, in one of the courts on the south. Elisama, as the offerer of the sacrifice, blessed the bread and the wine, and they were all merry and thanked the Lord. Helon, to whom this meal, eaten within the precincts of the temple, seemed like an anticipation of his future priestly functions, thought of the passage of Isaiah, “They that have gathered corn shall consume it and praise Jehovah, and they that bring in their wine shall drink it in the courts of the sanctuary.”[[120]]
They remained together till the evening sacrifice, and Helon did not leave the temple till after it, in order that he might witness the ceremony of the [wave-sheaf]. This is the commencement of harvest, which begins at the time of the Passover, with the barley (in the warm valley of the Jordan still earlier) and is finished about Pentecost, with the wheat. Every thing which concerned the people of Israel, the harvest especially, must begin and end with religious solemnity.
At sunset, the citizens who had been appointed to cut the wave-sheaf by the Sanhedrim came down through the courts, accompanied by a great concourse of people, and Helon joined in the procession. They went to the nearest field of barley before the city: the sixteenth of Nisan was begun, and the evening star was already visible in the sky. The person who was appointed to reap asked aloud, “Is the sun gone down?” The people who stood around answered, Yes.—“Shall I cut.” “Yes.”—“With this sickle?” “Yes.”—“In this basket?” “Yes.” The questions, thrice repeated, being thrice answered in the affirmative, he cut as much as would furnish an omer, and binding the sheaves together, carried them to the temple. The barley was there roasted by the fire, cleared from the husk, ground into meal, bolted thirteen times, and the omer (a measure containing about forty-three eggshells) of the finest meal was kept till the following day.
Helon, having witnessed this ceremony, reluctantly left the temple, and in his dreams seemed to live over again the events of this interesting day. The stately form of the high-priest seemed to be before him, and the sacred name upon his brow to shine with a lustre too dazzling for him to behold. Then he appeared to be in the crowd, urged by some irresistible but inexplicable impulse, to force his way amidst the waves of people, seeking something which he could not find, and examining every face, but without finding that of which he was in search. Again, he seemed to be beside the high-priest, and a feeling of unutterable joy spread through all his frame. His uncle appeared to him pale and sad, and beckoned him from the temple to the valley of Jehoshaphat, where he sat by his father’s tomb and wept. A graceful and lovely form stood by his side, and pointed towards the west; he followed her, and as they went she too turned pale and sighed. A murky, sultry atmosphere gathered around him; the lightning struck a lofty cedar, the deadly vapour almost choked his breath, and he ran forward, a long and dreary way, without finding any resting place[resting place]. At length a star appeared, and twinkled on him with so mild a ray that his oppression was relieved and his cheerfulness returned. He looked around him, and found himself on the north-west side of the city, on a plain which he darkly remembered that Iddo had called Golgotha. In his astonishment he awoke.
CHAPTER VI.
THE REMAINING DAYS OF UNLEAVENED BREAD.
It was the morning of the second day after the Passover. Helon was lying by Elisama on the divan. Glad to be delivered from his dream, he started up, performed his morning devotions in the Alijah, saluted Moriah and Zion from the roof, and endeavoured to shake off the disagreeable impressions of the night, which returned upon him with something of an ominous import. When he came down into the court, he found Iddo sitting under the palm-trees. He endeavoured to think only of his present happiness, and he felt, that as man is never more purely and vividly happy than in the morning of childhood, so the morning of each day is the time, when he has the most lively consciousness of every thing that is agreeable in his condition.
They all went together to the temple to pray. After the usual morning sacrifice of a lamb, followed, as the day before, an offering appropriate to the festival, of two young bullocks, a ram, and seven yearling lambs, as a burnt-offering; and a goat, as a sin-offering. The high-priest ministered as before at the altar, and the priests around him. The crowd was scarcely less than yesterday, and nearly the same ceremonies were repeated.
Next followed the offering of the first-fruits, the omer of barley-meal which had been prepared from the sheaves, cut the preceding evening. A priest fetched the meal, in a golden dish, from an apartment in one of the buildings, mixed it in the presence of all the people with a log (six eggshells) of the finest oil, and scattered upon it a handful of incense. He brought it to the high-priest, who stood beside the altar, and he waved it towards all the four winds, from east to west and from south to north, and then ascended the altar. On the southern side lay salt, with which he salted the meal and threw a handful of it, with another of incense, upon the flame. Immediately after, a special sacrifice, a lamb with the meat and drink offering that belonged to it, was offered; and the high-priest concluded by giving his benediction. The harvest was now solemnly begun, and Israel might pursue its joyful labours. The spectators dispersed themselves in different directions; and many of the pilgrims, who had neither time nor means to spend the whole week of the festival in Jerusalem, returned home on this day.
Only those remained behind, who purposed to offer the [burnt-offerings of the appearance before Jehovah], and these were the wealthier part of the worshippers. Elisama, Helon, and Sallu went down into the neighbourhood of the porch of Solomon, to purchase a victim for this purpose. A dealer in cattle, from Capernaum in Galilee, furnished them with a calf of extraordinary beauty, which they drove to the gate on the northern side, at which the sacrifices were admitted. Here they were compelled to wait a considerable time, as a large number had been admitted just before their arrival. At length they entered: the animal was examined and killed on the north side of the altar, the offerers having first washed their hands, and laid them upon it. The priests received the blood and sprinkled it on the altar. The sacrificers then took off the skin, took out the fat and the entrails, and divided the flesh. The whole was given to the priest, along with the meat and drink offering; he salted it and threw it into the fire. A burnt-offering was to be wholly consumed, except the skin, which belonged to the priest. While the priest was sacrificing at the altar, Elisama, Helon, and Sallu were praying that Jehovah would graciously accept their offering; and when it was ended, they and the rest of those who had been admitted with them, went out at the southern gate. Helon, while he had witnessed the solemn ceremonial and the deep and reverent silence of the spectators, had felt the dignity of the priestly office, and as he prayed, had said with David,
One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after;
To dwell in the house of the Lord, as long as I live,
To behold the glorious worship of the Lord,
And to wait in his temple!—Ps. xxvii. 4.
In the afternoon Iddo conducted him to one of the places of public instruction, called by the Greek name of Synagogue. Such buildings had come into use only since the captivity, but there were already a considerable number of them in Jerusalem. In the days of David and Solomon we find no trace of them. It is true, we find very early mention of the [schools of the prophets], from which they may be considered to have taken their rise. In the days of Elisha it was customary to visit the prophets on the day of the new moon and on the sabbath.[[121]] In the captivity the people must have felt the necessity much more of assembling on solemn days, to obtain consolation and hope from the discourses of some man learned in the scriptures. On the fifth day of the sixth month, it happened, we are told in the book of the Prophet, that Ezekiel “was sitting in his house and the elders of Judah were sitting before him.”[[122]] After the return from the captivity this custom was kept up, from the experience of its utility; and these assemblages were held at first in the porticoes of the temple, afterwards in buildings appropriated to the purpose. Sacrifices could be offered only in one place, the temple, but prayer might be offered, and instruction communicated, any where.
They went into a [synagogue] in the Lower City, where an eloquent expounder of the law was accustomed to teach. The arrangement of the building had a good deal of resemblance to that of the temple. A large quadrangular space was surrounded on all sides with covered walks or porticoes, resting upon a double row of columns. In the middle, a circular roof rested upon four pillars, and beneath it, on a raised place, lay the rolls of the law. The people stood upon the open space, which was covered with an awning, and in rainy weather took shelter in the porticoes, one of which was set apart exclusively for the women. Before the rolls of the law stood the reader and expounder, who was also called the apostle or ambassador of the assembly. He read the law and the letters of other congregations; he delivered the prayer, and thus, as it were, was the messenger of the people to God, and the interpreter of their desires. Besides him there was also a ruler of the synagogue, or superintendent of the school, who maintained order, several elders of the congregation who assisted him in his functions, a gatherer of alms, and a servant. [Any one who chose], not excepting strangers, might stand up and teach.
The synagogue was already full when Helon and his friends entered it, and after the usual salutation, the service began by praising God. The reader then going up to the rolls, which lay under the circular roof, read a passage from the law, which he at the same time interpreted to the people. After a second ascription of praise, he read the following passage from the prophet Jeremiah: “Ah Lord God; behold thou hast made the heavens and the earth, by thy great power and thy stretched-out arm, and there is nothing too hard for thee: thou showest loving-kindness unto thousands, and recompensest the iniquities of the fathers into the bosom of the children after them. The great the mighty God, the Lord of Hosts, is thy name: great in counsel and mighty in work art thou, whose eyes are open upon all the ways of the sons of men, to give to every one according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings; who hast shown signs and wonders in the land of Egypt, even to this day, and in Israel, and among other men, and hast made thee a name, as it is at this day, and hast brought forth thy people Israel out of the land of Egypt, with signs and with wonders, and with a strong hand and with a stretched-out arm, and with great terror; and hast given to them this land, which thou didst swear to their fathers to give them, a land flowing with milk and honey.”[[123]] When he had read this passage, and translated it into the common dialect of the country, the celebrated teacher of the law, whom we have mentioned, rose up, and proposed to deliver a discourse.
Myron had objected to his friend Helon, that the people of Israel were destitute of skill in all the fine arts; and in respect to eloquence, resembled their lawgiver, who was “slow of speech and of a slow tongue.”[[124]] To the former part of the imputation Helon had already replied; to the latter he might have answered, that although his nation never possessed an Isocrates or a Demosthenes, no people ever had orators, whose eloquence was more vigorous, animated, or spirit-stirring than the prophets in Israel. What artificial rhetorician, of the schools or the Agora, ever graved his words so deep in the hearts of his hearers as they did? They spoke the word of Jehovah, by the command and inspiration of Jehovah; the Greeks, the words of human wisdom, at the suggestion of vanity, or to promote the purposes of ambition. How different is the effect of a discourse, in which a divine power dwells, from those which have been composed with the strictest adherence to the rules of art!
Such might have been Helon’s answer to his friend; for such was his own experience, in listening to the orator in the synagogue. His language was simple and unartificial, but for this very reason the energy of the prophet’s words, which he expounded, was the more strongly felt. First of all he went through the passage which had been read, and explained the contents of the prayer, which, sublime in itself, was still more so from the circumstances in which it was spoken. He painted the forlorn condition of the people when the land fell into the hands of the Chaldeans, and the prophecy which was involved in the purchase of the field of Anathoth. When he came to speak of the signs and wonders which Jehovah had shown in Egypt, and of his having brought out his people with an out-stretched arm, he pointed out to the audience, that this great deliverance was to be regarded as an everlasting pledge of his redeeming mercy. For a thousand years past it had served this purpose, and every Passover revived and strengthened the impression. He painted to them the condition of Israel in Goshen, their inhuman oppressions, the evening of the first Passover, their wanderings in the wilderness, their rebellions against God, and the firmness of their lawgiver. Thence he past rapidly to the glorious days of the first temple, and described the magnificence of Solomon and the prosperity of Israel, while the eyes of all his audience glistened with sympathetic delight. Next he spoke of the captivity in Babylon, of the silent tears of the people as they sat by the streams of the Tigris and Euphrates, and of the evening of the Passover, when the fourteenth day of Nisan came and no paschal lamb could be eaten, but only the unleavened bread. No one drew his breath while he delineated the picture of this misery. “Unhappy, forsaken people!” he exclaimed; “ye had sinned and Jehovah visiteth the iniquities of the fathers upon their children. O thou almighty and jealous God, thine eyes are open on all the ways of the children of men!” He paused for a moment, as if overpowered by the contemplation of the might and justice of Jehovah. Every bosom was agitated. “Woe, woe to me and to my children!” exclaimed at once a woman, so carried away by the words of the speaker, that she forgot herself and the presence of the multitude. “Woe to us all,” resumed he, “if we forsake Jehovah, the living fountain, and hew out to ourselves broken fountains which hold no water.” In conclusion he praised the restoration of the worship of God, and the happy times in which they lived; and earnestly exhorted them to celebrate the feast of unleavened bread and of the appearance before Jehovah, with becoming gratitude, and faithfully to observe the law, in the land flowing with milk and honey into which he had brought them.
When the discourse was ended, praise was again ascribed to God, and the prayer called Kri-schma repeated. This was a feast-day; but independently of this, it was the duty of every adult Jew, on the second and the fifth day of the week, as well as on the sabbath, to pray, with the Tallith on his head, and the Tephillim on his brow and on his hand. The benediction was given, to which the assembly replied Amen! and at the close of all, alms were collected for the poor.
As they left the assembly, Helon remarked to Elisama, how much superior, in regard both to sacrifice and instruction, was the condition of Israel to that of the heathens. They offer sacrifice to their gods—but they are ignorant of the law; they have temples and altars, but no houses of religious instructions; they have priests, but none to explain their duty to them. On the following day, the third after the Passover, the same offerings were made as before; but the evening increased the solemnity, by [the approach of the sabbath]. It was announced as usual by six blasts of the trumpet, blown by a priest out of the chamber which was situated on the southern side of the temple, at the extremity of the court of Israel, and which served at the same time for the watch-room of the priests and Levites. In the country towns the annunciation was made by blasts of the horn. At the ninth hour (three in the afternoon) the first blast was sounded, as a signal for the cessation of all labour in the field. Troops of reapers and other labourers were immediately after seen coming from all the adjacent country into Jerusalem. At the tenth hour, the second blast was sounded, to announce the time of closing the shops and manufactories, completing the domestic preparations for the sabbath, and putting on their best attire. In every house, two loaves were placed upon the table, as a memorial of the double measure of manna, gathered in the wilderness on the day before the sabbath. At the third blast, the mother of the family lighted the two lamps, which were to burn through the whole of the sabbath. Light, being the symbol of joy and of knowledge, was appropriate to such a solemnity; hence the altar blazed, and the household lamp was kindled. The mother, assuming the priestly office, spread out her hands towards the lamp when she had lighted it, and said “Blessed be thou, O Lord our God, King of the world, who hast sanctified us by thy precepts, and commanded us to light the [sabbath-lamp].” The fourth, fifth, and sixth blasts followed each other rapidly, as soon as the sun was set; and the sabbath was now begun.
[To take a family meal] was the first thing done. The master of the house filled the cup, when all were assembled around the table, and blessed it, and said, “On the sixth day were the earth and the heavens and all their glory completed. For God finished by the seventh day all the work which he had done, and rested on the seventh day from all his labour, and hallowed it, because on it he rested from all the work which he had created and made.”
After a short pause, he proceeded, “Blessed be thou, O Lord our God, who hast created the fruit of the vine, King of the world, who hast sanctified us by thy precepts, and commanded us to keep thy sabbaths, and hast appointed them to us of thy good pleasure, as a memorial of the work of creation. It is also the beginning of the assembling of thy saints, and of the going out of Egypt: for thou hast chosen us out from among all nations, and hast sanctified us and hast appointed to us the holy sabbath. We praise thee, O Lord, that thou hast made the sabbath-day holy.” The cup was emptied, the master of the house blessed the bread also in the usual form of words, and the meal began.
In the mean time the course of priests had been changed in the temple, that which had been on duty in the preceding week, giving place to that whose turn of service it was for the week following. The shew-bread was changed, twelve of the priests bringing each one of the new loaves in a golden dish, and two others censers with incense. Then all the children of Israel laid themselves down to rest, in their own houses or in the temple, in joyful expectation of the sabbath-dawn.
The sabbath was so solemnly and strictly kept, that it was not allowed to be broken even by the greatest of the festivals; it may indeed be said, that as being the oldest, it was the root and parent of all the rest. It was not merely a day of cessation from labour; its celebration was a weekly acknowledgment, that the One God was worshipped as the creator of heaven and earth; and thus it stood in the closest connection with the first of the ten commandments which God had given upon mount Sinai. The command for its observance, however, is as ancient as the first revelation made by God to man, forming a part of the narrative of the creation. At the giving of the law, the precept for its observance was renewed and enforced, “Remember the sabbath-day to keep it holy;” and its high import was expressed by the words, “Verily my sabbaths shall ye keep, for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations, that ye may know that I am the Lord that sanctifieth you. Six days shall ye work, but the seventh is the sabbath, a holy rest unto the Lord.”[[125]] And in the renewal of the law it is said, “Thou shalt remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence with a mighty and an outstretched arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath-day.”[[126]] So the prophets call the sabbath the sign of the covenant between Jehovah and his people.[[127]] It was besides a day of remembrance of the deliverance from Egypt, a weekly passover. The violation of the sabbath was punished with the severest penalties. “Whosoever maketh the sabbath unholy shall surely be put to death;” and when it is added, as an explanation, “whosoever doeth any work on the sabbath-day, he shall surely be put to death,” this deeper meaning is conveyed, that there is a rest, which is more holy than labour. Outward rest, consisting in the cessation of motion and exertion, was the sign of that holy and inward rest. While in the desert Moses commanded the children of Israel, saying, “Behold the Lord hath given you the sabbath; therefore he giveth you on the sixth day the bread of two days. Let every man therefore remain in his own place, and let no man go out on the seventh day.”[[128]] What a picture do these words convey, of so many millions of human beings, by whose activity the surrounding desert was enlivened on every other day, but of whose existence every trace seemed to vanish, as the sun went down on the evening when the seventh began! In pious fear of transgressing this law, the Jews, in later times, never went further than two thousand cubits; because they reckoned that the remotest tent in the camp would be one thousand cubits distant from the tabernacle, and that their forefathers must have gone and returned this distance, in order to appear before Jehovah.[[129]]
But if the sabbath was a mark of the covenant between Jehovah and his people, and also a day of rest, it could not be otherwise than a day of joy; and so it was always considered in Israel. In the burning east, rest is of itself a pleasure; and as every thing else connected with the service of Jehovah bore the character of cheerful enjoyment, so also did the sabbath. “If,” says Isaiah, “thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, and do not thy pleasure on my holy day, and callest the sabbath a delight, a solemnity of Jehovah, a day of honour; then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord, and I will cause thee to ride over the high places of the earth, and will feed thee with the inheritance of Jacob thy father—the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.”[[130]]
If, however, the sabbath could not be suspended by the festivities of the Passover, they might receive additional solemnity from the sabbath. Helon felt its sanctity with double force, in this combination. He had risen early in the morning, and could scarcely wait till the hour arrived, for his going up with the old men to the temple, for the first time in his life, to spend a sabbath there. The morning sacrifice consisted on this day of the usual offering of a lamb; then followed the [special offering] of the sabbath, two lambs of a year old, with the meat and drink offering that belonged to them. Last of all, the festival-offering, which consisted of two young bullocks, a ram, seven yearling lambs as a burnt-offering, and a goat as a sin-offering. In the mean time the sabbath psalm was sung by the Levites from the fifteen steps.
It is a good thing to give thanks unto the Lord,
And to sing praises unto thy name, O most High!
To show forth thy loving-kindness in the morning,
And thy faithfulness every night,
Upon an instrument of ten strings, and upon the psaltery,
Upon the harp with a solemn sound.
For thou, Lord, hast made me glad through thy work,
I will triumph because of the works of thy hands.
O Lord! how great are thy works;
Thy thoughts are very deep!
A brutish man knoweth not this,
Nor doth a fool understand it.
When the wicked spring as the grass,
And when all the workers of iniquity flourish,
It is that they may be destroyed for ever:
But thou, Lord, art most high for evermore.
For lo! thine enemies, O Lord,
For lo! thine enemies shall perish!
All the workers of iniquity shall be scattered.
But thou exaltest my horn like the unicorn’s;
I am anointed with fresh oil;
And mine eye shall see my desire on mine enemies,
And mine ear shall hear my desire of the wicked that rise up against me.
The righteous flourisheth like the palm-tree,
He groweth like a cedar in Lebanon.
They that are planted in the house of the Lord
Shall flourish in the courts of our God.
They shall still bring forth in old age,
They shall be full of sap and flourishing,
To show that Jehovah is just,
He is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him.—Ps. xcii.
Helon remained the whole day in the temple, witnessed the evening-sacrifice, and heard the sound of the trumpet which proclaimed that the sabbath was at an end. The old men retired soon after the morning-sacrifices leaving him to his own reflections, and rejoicing that one was found among the youth of Israel, so full of enthusiasm for the service of Jehovah. Helon, as he wandered about the courts of the temple, was revolving a design, which had long been forming in his bosom, and which had been rapidly matured by the feelings of the last few days.
CHAPTER VII.
THE CLOSE OF THE FEAST OF THE PASSOVER.
Although the greater part of the people had already returned to their homes, to begin the harvest, and large companies had taken their departure every morning with the music of cymbals and psalms, all the priests and Levites still remained, and a great multitude of the people. Not fewer than [100,000 men] were still to be seen assembled in the courts of the temple.
One day Helon was present at the evening-sacrifice, and was witness of a novel scene. He was standing beside the [thirteen chests], which were placed in the court of the Women. Each of these chests was inscribed with the name of the gift which was to be deposited in it. Some were for the capitation tax, others, for the money which remained over and above of the destined sum when the victim had been purchased; others, for voluntary gifts for the benefit of the temple. A Jew of Cyrene came to bring the capitation tax of his countrymen. The law had enacted as follows: “The Lord spake unto Moses, saying, when thou takest the sum of the children of Israel, they shall give every man a ransom for his soul unto the Lord, when thou numberest them, that there may be no plague among them when thou numberest them: this shall they give, every one that is numbered a half-shekel, according to the shekel of the sanctuary: a half-shekel shall be the offering of the Lord. Every one, from twenty years and upwards, shall give an offering to the Lord; the rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less, than a half-shekel, that it may be for a memorial unto the children of Israel before the Lord, to make an atonement for your souls.”[[131]] The shekel is a coin which contains twenty gerahs,[[132]] and has at different times been of different values, but since the time of the high-priest Simon, has been equal to a Grecian stater. The coin, as struck by him, has a beautiful stamp: on the one side is seen, in the centre, the budding rod of Aaron, with the legend around it, “The holy Jerusalem:” on the other side is a pot of manna, and the words “Shekel of Israel.” Whole and half shekels were coined. It was such a half-shekel that every Jew of twenty years and upwards was bound to give, as an acknowledgment of his belonging to the people of Jehovah. It might be considered as a capitation tax levied in the last month of the ecclesiastical year. On the first day of this month, Adar, the Sanhedrim sent messengers through the whole country, who demanded the half-shekel, and fifteen days were given for the payment. On the fifteenth day of Adar, the receivers of the half-shekel took their seats beside the chests, in the court of the Women, and all who were twenty years and upwards brought their contribution. If any one neglected to do so, compulsory measures were resorted to, in order to obtain it. To the very poorest persons a further respite of a year was granted, and for this reason a chest for the past year was placed by that which received the contributions of the present. At this time a multitude of the poorer class were seen soliciting alms from the rich, to enable them to discharge their debt. This was the only kind of begging which the law allowed in Israel. Strangers, who came to Jerusalem chiefly at the festivals, were accustomed to take these opportunities of discharging the debt, especially at the Passover, which was some weeks later than the day of the month Adar, on which it became due.
The Cyrenian had brought the sum which was due from his Jewish brethren in Cyrene, and was about to deposit it in the chest. But it was necessary that it should be paid in [shekels], and he had only foreign coin. As this was a case of frequent occurrence, the receivers of the shekel were also money-changers, and had their tables beside the chests. For a certain premium they gave Jewish shekels for the Cyrenian coins. Helon witnessed the proceeding with no small dissatisfaction.
He had the true [Mosaic dislike of commerce] and trade, of which, in the whole law, no single instance of encouragement is found. Though Canaan lay on the shore of the Mediterranean, and the example of their nearest neighbours, the Phœnicians, encouraged the Israelites to commerce, it was not the will of Jehovah that his people should devote themselves to traffic; agriculture, on the contrary, was consecrated by its union with religion, and all the great national festivals were as much agricultural as historical. In this respect Israel resembled the Greeks more than the Orientals, among whom commerce is usually held in high estimation, constitutes an order of nobility, and engages even the prime ministers of the state. The Greek, on the contrary, at least in the earliest and purest times, considered such occupations as a surrender of his dignity, and inconsistent with the magnanimity of a free man. Helon would fain have seen the same spirit continuing to animate the Israelites, though for a different reason. The constant intercourse with foreigners, necessarily produced compromises and conformity, which diminished their attachment to the law and usages of their forefathers. He disliked the mercantile character of the Hellenists of Alexandria, as much as their love of allegories, and deduced indeed from the former their neglect of the law, their indifference to the temple on Moriah, and their endeavour to pacify their conscience by allegorizing those precepts, which in their literal acceptation too obviously rebuked their practices. If the children of the captivity, he thought, had not taken up the pursuit of commerce on the banks of the Euphrates and the Tigris, they would have returned in much greater numbers, and so many of them would not have been induced to prefer gain in a foreign land to the recovery of their own. “And had they returned in greater numbers,” he exclaimed, “how soon would the Samaritans have been expelled, Galilee purified, and the Philistines been forced to bow their necks! Jerusalem would have been inhabited by a totally different race of men, and the days of Solomon might have returned!”
With such feelings, it was natural that he should turn away in disgust from all that seemed to change the proper character of the festival. This mixture of commerce with the religious solemnity was indeed not new: it seemed almost to arise necessarily out of the circumstances of the case. The festivals were not merely occasions of appearing before Jehovah, for pious services, nor merely anniversary assemblages of the people; they were also the great national fairs. One end of the court of the Gentiles served as a market-place; the most extensive dealings carried on in it were in cattle. Vast droves of sheep, goats, and bullocks preceded the pilgrims on their way to the city, to supply the sacrifices which were to be offered there. As the animals so offered must all be clean, it was necessary that this branch of trade should be wholly in the hands of Jews. The sheep came from the wilderness of Judah; the bullocks from Galilee; Tekoah and Hermon furnished honey, and Gilead its precious balm. Phœnicians also came to the festival, and brought with them foreign merchandise, purple, Egyptian linen, &c.
Elisama was frequently among the merchants, and judged of their wares with the eyes of one experienced in such matters, for he had himself been a merchant. But Helon could never be persuaded to follow his uncle’s occupation, and had been accustomed at Alexandria to take refuge in the Bruchion, when exhorted to engage in commerce. “O! that a prophet would appear,” he exclaimed one day in the temple, when his zeal was more than ordinarily kindled, “who should overturn the tables of the money-changers, and drive those who buy and sell from the courts of Jehovah!”
These things however were only trivial diminutions of his pleasure, small specks in the bright glory which invested the temple and its services to his imagination. When he went up, morning or evening, and entered by the Beautiful-gate, he hastened as speedily as possible from the objects the sight of which displeased him, to reach a scene more congenial to his feelings, to ascend the flight of steps which conducted to the altar of burnt-offering, to wander in the spacious porticoes, to follow with the eye the majestic steps of the high-priest, or listen to the psalms of the Levites. He had not words to describe the delight in which he thus passed his hours away. He inwardly resolved to become as it was then called, a Chasidean, i. e. a perfectly righteous man. He thanked Jehovah that he had so happily escaped from the meshes of the Greek philosophy, and had so pure and ardent a love for the law of his fathers. He prayed to the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, to be enabled to fulfil the law in all its rigour, and he was conscious of a warmth of attachment to it, and an energy of purpose, which left him no doubt of succeeding.
The close of the festival was at hand; Helon could scarce refrain from tears when, on the evening of the seventh day, the sound of the trumpets announced that it was over. The last day, the twenty-first of the month Nisan, was as holy as the first, and no work could lawfully be done on either of them. The festival-offering was presented on this as on every other of the seven days: the ashes from such a multitude of sacrifices, never having been cleared away, had accumulated to a lofty heap upon the altar. All those who had remained in Jerusalem had assembled in the temple; in the afternoon they went to the synagogue, and with sunset the feast of unleavened bread was over.
Helon went down from the temple, with slow and melancholy steps. The pilgrims were preparing for their departure, and the citizens returning to their ordinary occupations. On the following morning they were present at the sacrifice, and returned thanks to Jehovah for permitting them to join in the celebration of his Passover. The tents were then struck; the different companies arranged themselves, and with the sound of cymbals poured out from the different gates, after having taken a hearty farewell of their respective friends.
Helon stood upon the roof, and saw the commotion in the streets and at the gates. The city gradually became more empty and silent. He listened, as the songs of the pilgrims died away in the distance, and when he heard from the road to Bethlehem, where he had himself joined in the chorus, the psalm which they were singing on their return, the sound fell on his heart, like the knell of departed joy.