The Bible Unveiled

by M. M. Mangasarian

But perhaps the bible is great for its literary qualities. Much is said in praise of the bible in this respect. We are asked to admire it as a collection of literary masterpieces. But which are the masterpieces in the bible? Is it the book of Ruth? Is it Esther? Is it Jonah, or Daniel, or Ezekiel? Is it Leviticus, or Isaiah? Is it the Psalms of David, or the Songs of Solomon? The only book that comes near being a masterpiece is the book of Job, which, with the exception of the first and second chapters, in which Satan makes a fatal wager with Jehovah for the soul of Job, is the work of a sceptic. Is there any story or romance in the bible that can compare in beauty and might to the Faust of Goethe, or the Omar Khayyam of Fitzgerald, or to the Prometheus Unbound of Shelley? Is there a book among the five attributed to Moses, or the dozen or more attributed to the prophets, that is as entrancing as Victor Hugo's Les Miserables?

Is Joshua's story of brigandage to be likened to Schiller's drama of the Robbers? And where is the tale in the bible that permeates the thought with an indescribable sweetness as the David Copperfield of Dickens, or the Adam Bede of George Eliot? What is there in the two books of Kings, and the two books of Samuel, and the two books of Chronicles that can be mentioned in the same breath with the glories that enrich the pages of a Walt Whitman or an Emerson? Is there any wit or humor in the bible as refreshing, as innocent, as contagious, and as illuminating as that which made Mark Twain the darling of two hemispheres? Is there such music in the bible as throbs and swells in the lyric of Heine, in the thunder tones of Milton, or in the wild wonder of Byron's song? And in richness of style, in fluency and charm of language, in the sublimity and pathos of poise and period, in purity of diction, in felicity of expression, in soundness of conception and reasoning, is there any part of the Hebrew bible that can approach the incomparable authors of Athens and Rome, whose thought is the perpetual fragrance of the centuries? And I have not yet even mentioned the thousand-souled, the myriad-minded Shakespeare, whose monument is in the wonder and astonishment of the world, and whose cemetery is the heart of humanity, where he lies in such pomp and splendor that for such a tomb the gods even would wish to die!

And as for eloquence. I do not have to belittle the bible prophets in order to score a point in favor of the men and the voices which have thrilled the ages. I have read chapter after chapter from the preachments of Isaiah and Jeremiah without deriving any more meaning out of them than I do from the verbose pages of prophet Dowie or Eddy. All theosophist writers speak in cryptic phrases. It is the thought that is like a clear and transparent stream, flowing as a sparkling gem, and not the thick and muddy source, that inspires true eloquence.

If the bible prophets were to reappear in our midst, doing and saying the things they are charged with in the Word of God, I am sure they would be placed under bonds to keep the peace. Let us see what it meant to prophesy in bible times. In the first book of Samuel, the nineteenth chapter, we read that Saul sent a regiment to capture David. It so happened that his messengers, while en route, became prophets, every one of them. He sent a second regiment with the same result. A third set of messengers become also prophetic and began to prophesy. We will let the bible explain what these men did when they became prophets, by quoting the lines which describe the conduct of Saul, who, going in search of his regiments, became himself a prophet:

And he (Saul) went thither to Naioth in Ramah: and the Spirit of God was upon him also, and he went on, and prophesied, until he came to Naioth in Ramah.

And he stripped off his clothes also, and prophesied before Samuel in like manner, and lay down naked all that day and all that night. Wherefore, they say, is Saul also among the prophets?

Mark the word "also," which means that all his messengers had likewise stripped themselves when "the Spirit of the Lord was upon them." David did the same thing when he danced naked before the ark.

To the chief of the Old Testament prophets, Isaiah, came this instruction from heaven:

At the same time spake the Lord by Isaiah the son of Amoz, saying, Go and loose the sackcloth from off thy loins, and put off thy shoe from thy foot. And he did so, walking naked and barefoot. *

And he walked the streets, if the bible is to be depended, for three years "naked and barefoot.... for a sign and wonder upon Egypt and upon Ethiopia," whatever that may mean. Another prophet, Micah, declares he will not only go about "stripped and naked," but he will also "howl." ** And are these the men to be compared with the masters of eloquence in ancient and modern history?