CHAPTER III.
To the Ends of the Earth.
A Decadent Empire.—Joshua, succeeding Moses as the leader of Israel, conquered the land of Canaan and divided it among the twelve tribes. Then followed the reigns of the Judges, during which period Israel began to depart from God, and to invite, by rebellious conduct, the national calamity that had been predicted. The glories of the monarchy founded by Saul, David and Solomon being past, the curse, long suspended, fell, and the Israelitish empire hastened to its decay.
Ahijah's Prophecy.—In the reign of Rehoboam, the successor to Solomon, ten of the twelve tribes revolted, and choosing Jeroboam to be their ruler, set up the kingdom of Israel (in the north), distinct from the kingdom of Judah (in the south), over which Rehoboam continued to reign. During the days of Jeroboam, who had made idolatry the state religion of the northern kingdom, the dispersion of Israel was again predicted; the prophet Ahijah then voicing the word of the Lord to his disobedient people:
"The Lord shall smite Israel, as a reed is shaken in the water, and he shall root up Israel out of this good land, which he gave to their fathers, and shall scatter them beyond the river."—(I Kgs. 14:15.)
Amos and Hosea.—Another prophet who foretold the dispersion was Amos, who said that Israel should "surely go into captivity," and be "sifted among all nations" (7:11, 17; 9:9). Still another was Hosea, who, substituting rhetorically the past for the future, said: "Ephraim, he hath mixed himself among the people" (7:8).
Beginning of the Scattering.—In the year 721 B. C., soon after the time of Hosea's prophecy, and while a monarch of the same name was reigning over the kingdom of Israel, the Assyrians, under Shalmaneser, came against that kingdom and began to destroy it. In a series of deportations they carried away the ten tribes (Ephraim and all) into captivity.
The Lost Tribes.—These are the famous "lost tribes," concerning whom very little is known. Josephus, the Jewish historian, who wrote during the first century after Christ, says that the ten tribes were then beyond the Euphrates, the "river" referred to by Ahijah in his prophecy. Esdras, in the Apocrypha, declares that those tribes went a journey of a year and a half into the north country.
The Cairns of Scandinavia.—Missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, returning from Scandinavia, have told of rude monuments—cairns or piles of stones—in that northern region, concerning which tradition says that they were erected many centuries ago by a migrating people. Whether or not these were the tribes of the Assyrian captivity, it is interesting to reflect that it was an Israelitish custom to raise such monuments in commemorating events, especially the migratory movements of the nation.
Other Ancient Monuments.—If it be objected that monuments erected by the Ten Tribes, 721 B. C., could not have lasted down to this day, how will the objector account for the perfectly preserved monuments of Assyria, Babylon, Egypt, and other ancient empires, whose remains have been uncovered by modern archaeology? Such a theory will not stagger the faith of the Latter-day Saints, when they recollect that the ruins of Adam's altar are still to be seen in the State of Missouri, where they were identified by the Prophet Joseph Smith, A. D. 1838.
To Return from the North.—At all events, it is from "the north country" that the ten tribes are to return, according to ancient and modern prophecy; and it is also a fact that from Scandinavia and the nations of Northern Europe has come much of the blood of Israel—the blood of Ephraim now within the pale of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Are the Ten Tribes Intact?—A much mooted question among our people, particularly since the discovery of the North Pole, where theorists have insisted upon locating the ten tribes, is whether or not those tribes have lost their identity. The fact that no such people were found at the pole by Peary and other explorers, shatters the exact location theory; but does it dispose of the main issue—the supposed existence of the ten tribes as a distinct people, somewhere "in the land of the north?" Such a supposition might be well founded, and yet much of the blood of Ephraim be among certain northern nations. Some of the pilgrims might easily have "mixed" with peoples encountered on the way, while journeying to their ultimate destination. Beyond this suggestion, I have no theory to advance. A tradition of the Church has assigned to John the Revelator the mission of leading the ten tribes from the land of the north.—(D. and C. 77:14.)
The Babylonian Captivity.—After the predictions of Amos, Hosea, and others, in relation to the kingdom of Israel, came the prophecies of Isaiah and Jeremiah, foretelling the fate of the kingdom of Judah. This kingdom, about 585 B. C., was destroyed by the Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar, and the Jews were carried into captivity.
Lehi and His Colony.—Just before that disaster, Lehi and his colony left Jerusalem, and crossed over to this land—America—which, by them and by Mulek's colony that came later, was peopled with the descendants of Joseph and of Judah, both of whom are represented, in a degenerate state, by the American Indians.
Israelitish Characteristics.—Look at the features of the Indian. Are they not Jewish? Quite as strikingly so as that many of his customs and traditions are Israelitish. Who, than the savage Lamanite, better understands the Mosaic law of retaliation—"an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth"? Nor does he care whose eye or whose tooth it is, whether that of the person who injured him, or one of the latter's tribe or nation. He is too much of an Israelite to object to proxies and substitutes.
Jerusalem Rebuilt.—The Babylonian captivity lasted seventy years. Some of the Jews, under the permissive edict of Cyrus, then returned and rebuilt their city and temple. Only a remnant came back, however, a colony of fifty thousand, led by Zerubbabel and Joshua. The rest remained in their scattered condition. The Jews who rebuilt Jerusalem were those to whose descendants Christ came, and predicted, after their rejection of him, that their "house" should be "left unto them desolate" (Matt. 23:37, 38).
Twelve Tribes Scattered.—Before the Savior's time, however, the prophets Ezekiel and Zachariah,—the former in exile among the Babylonians, the latter at Jerusalem after the restoration by Cyrus,—had added their predictions to those already uttered relating to the dispersion of Israel. That the fated nation was pretty well dispersed in the days of the apostles, is evident from the Epistle of James, who addresses himself "to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad."
Dispersion by Titus.—But there were to be other acts of dispersion. One of the most notable occurred in the year 70 A. D., when Titus the Roman came against Jerusalem, besieged and captured it, and sold the inhabitants, such as had survived the horrors of the siege, into slavery, or scattered them through different parts of the empire. To follow the fortunes of this branch of the house of Israel, in all their subsequent wanderings and scatterings, would fill volumes.
The Blood that Believes.—Next, let us consider the question: In what way did these calamities upon Israel prove a blessing to the human race? How, by the dispersion of the children of Abraham, was the promise to the patriarch fulfiled, that in him and in his seed should all the nations of the earth be blessed? I answer, that by this dispersion the blood of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—the blood of faith, the blood that believes—with choice spirits, answering to that blood, and selected for that purpose, were sent into those nations where the Gospel was afterwards preached; spirits capable of recognizing the truth, and brave enough to embrace it regardless of consequences; thus setting an example to others and influencing them in the same direction. Manifestly this was of far more importance than the carrying by the captive Israelites of their laws and traditions into those nations; though this would also help to prepare the way for greater blessings to follow.
Spread of Christianity.—And such things told in after years. One of the marvels of history is the rapid spread of Christianity in the days of the apostles, who, unlettered as most of them were, and in the midst of the fiercest persecution, planted the gospel standard in all the principal cities of the Roman Empire, spreading the tidings of Christ crucified, from India on the East to Britain on the West, and from Scythia on the North to Ethiopia on the South; all within the short space of fifty years.
"Mormonism's" Growth.—A similar marvel is the spread of "Mormonism"—ancient Christianity restored—through the Gentile nations of modern times, a work yet in its infancy. Villages and congregations converted at a sweep, as in Lancashire and Herefordshire, England; in America the gospel preached to white men and red, and the Church established in the tops of the Rocky Mountains, with nearly half a million souls for a nucleus, and others continually coming from the various nations of the earth. And then—the extraordinary attention attracted by the Latter-day Saints—altogether out of proportion to their numbers; for after all, they are only a handful, compared with the hundreds of millions of earth's inhabitants. What more strikingly fulfils the prophetic picture drawn by the Savior: "Ye are as a city set upon a hill, which can not be hid."
How could such things be, had not Divine Wisdom prepared the way by sending the blood of Israel, with spirits answering to that blood, among all nations, prior to pouring out upon them the spirit of the gospel and of the gathering?
Many Nations Sprinkled.—Others before Abraham had shown their faith by their works; but this does not invalidate his claim to the title, "Father of the Faithful." Neither does it prove that the believing blood, even in the veins of the Gentiles, is not Abraham's blood, with which God has "sprinkled many nations." The Latter-day Saints themselves are of a mixed lineage—Gentile and Israelitish; most of them having descended from Ephraim, who "mixed himself among the people."
The Centurion's Faith.—Was not the blood of Abraham in the veins of the Roman centurion, whose faith caused even the Savior to marvel? The centurion's daughter was sick nigh unto death, and her father said to Jesus: "Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter beneath my roof, but speak the word and my daughter shall live." "Be it according to thy faith," was the reply, and straightway she was healed. This incident caused the Son of God to say: "Such faith I have not found in Israel." Moreover, it formed the basis of a prediction, that many should come from the East and from the West, and sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of God, while the children of the kingdom, such as were degenerate,—salt that had lost its savor,—would be cast into outer darkness.
Other Gentile Believers.—Other cases in point are those of Cornelius and the woman of Samaria—Gentiles, in whose veins was the blood that believes, "the salt of the earth," sprinkled over the world for its preservation. The Moabite maiden, Ruth, who was numbered among the ancestors of Jesus Christ, is another example of the same kind. They are of Abraham who do the works of Abraham.
According to Their Faith.—God works among men according to their faith. Jehovah, as Jesus, came unto his own, and his own received him not. He could not do many mighty works among the Jews, "because of their unbelief," at which he marveled, as much, no doubt, as he marveled over the faith of some of the Gentiles. And so, leaving the latter to be converted by the Holy Ghost, he who had been sent to the lost sheep of Israel, turned from Judah unto Joseph, from the Jews unto the Nephites, whose faith was greater, and among whom, in consequence, more if not mightier miracles were performed.
The "Other Sheep."—From the Nephites, the Savior went to "other sheep," not of the Nephite fold, nor of the Jewish fold, but still of the house of Israel, and therefore entitled to his personal ministry. These may have been "the lost tribes," or they may have been other scattered sheep, unknown to man, but known unto God, "keeping watch above his own," in the mystical and remote regions whither his judgments had driven them.