Seeing that Abishai started at the question, she turned to the portion of the roll which contained the prophecy of Isaiah, and read aloud:—
"Unto us a Child is born. Here is clearly an announcement of human birth; yet is this Child revealed to us as the mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace" (Isa. ix. 6).
"Such thoughts as these are too high, too difficult, for the human mind to grasp," exclaimed Abishai, pressing his brow. "The frail vessel must burst that has such hot molten gold poured within it. All that I can answer to what you have said is this. I believe not—and never will believe—that when Messiah, the Hope of Israel, shall come, He will be rejected by our nation. Were it so, such a fearful curse would fall upon our race that the memory of the Egyptian bondage, the Babylonish captivity, the Syrian persecution, would be forgotten in the greater horrors of what God's just vengeance would bring upon this people. We should become a by-word, a reproach, a hissing. We should be scattered far and wide amongst the nations, as chaff is scattered by the winds, until—"
Abishai paused, and clenched his hand and set his teeth, as if language failed him to describe the utter desolation and misery which such a crime as the rejection of the Messiah must bring upon the descendants of Abraham. As Abishai did not finish his sentence, Hadassah completed it for him.
"Until," she said, with a brightening countenance—"until Judah repent of her sin, and turn to Him whom she once denied. Hear, son of Nathan, but one more prophecy from the Scriptures. Thus saith the Lord:—I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon ME whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for Him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for Him, as one that is in bitterness for his first-born (Zech. xii. 10). And the Lord shall be King over all the earth" (Zech. xiv. 9).
Abishai left the dwelling of Hadassah with a perturbed spirit, unwilling to own to himself that views so widely differing from his own could have any foundation in truth. The idea of a rejected, suffering, dying Messiah was beyond measure repugnant to the soul of the Hebrew.
"See what comes of concentrating all the powers of the mind on abstruse study!" Abishai muttered to himself as he descended the hill. "Hadassah is going mad; her judgment is giving way under the strain."
[1] Of course, the Hebrew roll was not divided into chapters; they are but given for facility of reference.
[2] "God," in the original, is "Elohim," a plural word.