[Footnote 1: Matt. xiv. 12.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. xiv. 13.]
[Footnote 3: Matt. xiv. 15, and following; Mark vi. 35, and following;
Luke ix. 11, and following; John vi. 2, and following.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. xi. 7, and following; Luke vii. 24, and following.]
[Footnote 5: Matt. xi. 12, 13; Luke xvi. 16.]
The prophet Malachi, whose opinion in this matter was soon brought to bear,[1] had announced with much energy a precursor of the Messiah, who was to prepare men for the final renovation, a messenger who should come to make straight the paths before the elected one of God. This messenger was no other than the prophet Elias, who, according to a widely spread belief, was soon to descend from heaven, whither he had been carried, in order to prepare men by repentance for the great advent, and to reconcile God with his people.[2] Sometimes they associated with Elias, either the patriarch Enoch, to whom for one or two centuries they had attributed high sanctity;[3] or Jeremiah,[4] whom they considered as a sort of protecting genius of the people, constantly occupied in praying for them before the throne of God.[5] This idea, that two ancient prophets should rise again in order to serve as precursors to the Messiah, is discovered in so striking a form in the doctrine of the Parsees that we feel much inclined to believe that it comes from that source.[6] However this may be, it formed at the time of Jesus an integral portion of the Jewish theories about the Messiah. It was admitted that the appearance of "two faithful witnesses," clothed in garments of repentance, would be the preamble of the great drama about to be unfolded, to the astonishment of the universe.[7]
[Footnote 1: Malachi iii. and iv.; Ecclesiasticus xlviii. 10. See ante, Chap. VI.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. xi. 14, xvii. 10; Mark vi. 15, viii. 28, ix. 10, and following; Luke ix. 8, 19.]
[Footnote 3: Ecclesiasticus xliv. 16.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. xvi. 14.]