THE SONG OF THE SWORD
One of Ezekiel’s grandest poems is the Song of the Sword. The sword from the North in the hand of Nebuchadrezzar comes forth against Jerusalem and destroys the last remnant of life in the perishing city. The introduction to the Song of the Sword is an allegory such as Ezekiel loves; he looks in prophetic trance towards the south and sees a fire approaching from thence which seizes upon the forest of the south and devours the green tree and the dry. Then he solves the riddle, thus interpreting the vision. By placing the riddle and the interpretation in parallel columns, we obtain a classic example of strict responsion.
As a third example of the responsion I select Matthew vii. 13, 14,
| Enter ye in by the narrow gate: | |
| For wide is the gate, | For narrow is the gate, |
| And broad is the way, | And straitened the way, |
| That leadeth to destruction | That leadeth unto life, |
| And many be they that enter in thereby. | And few be they that find it. |
In order to grasp the fundamental idea, that of the responsion, let us once more clearly define that of the strophe and antistrophe.
STROPHE AND ANTISTROPHE DEFINED
The strophe consists of a number of verses combined so as to form a larger whole; it contains a sheaf of ideas which express a single idea, just as a sheaf of rays unites to form a single light.
The antistrophe represents an analogous or contrasting idea, which is, like the former, the sum or product of another sheaf of ideas, and answers to the former in some or all of its component parts.
Accordingly the responsion, thus conceived of, is the formal expression of this relation of two or more strophes to one another. Where the principle of the responsion is strictly carried out each line of the first strophe corresponds to the corresponding line of the second, either verbally or substantially, and in the latter case either by parallelism or antithesis. The similarity of the majority of lines which thus correspond throws the differences at certain points into strong relief and renders them all the more forcible and impressive.
The highest organic structures have been analysed and found to be built up from a single cell. All the preliminary conditions which enable the cell to form organisms lie dormant in it already, but the germ cannot become an organic being except by a slow process of development. What we now have to do is to find the germ from which the responsion has developed; and the germ of this phenomenon is the parallelismus membrorum which constitutes the vital element of apothegm and verse in the Semitic languages, and more particularly in Hebrew. But two things may be parallel one with another not only by analogy but by contrast. The parallelismus membrorum places side by side two or more ideas, analogous but not identical, and adapted by their slight diversity to give an image of what the poet desires to convey. Such sentences abound in the prophetic discourses, as in Isaiah i. 3,