SPECIAL AUTHORITIES FOR THE HISTORY OF THE KINGDOM OF JUDAH. 1. The “Book of the Kings of Judah and Israel (2 Chr. xxv. 26; 2. The "Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah"; in the 4. The "Visions of Iddo the Seer against Jeroboam" (2 Chr. ix. 29); 5. The "Book (Words ') of Jehu, son of Hanani" (2 Chr. xx. 34). 7. The "Sayings (Words) of Hozai" (2 Chr. xxxiii. 19). II. The extant Historical Books: 1. The Prophetical "Book of the Kings," completed at the time of the Captivity (2 Kings xxv. 27-30). 2. The Chronicles-"The Words of the Days," the last in the Canon -one book, divided by LXX. into two books, under the name of Paralipomena, "Omitted Parts." Compiled from various sources, of which the latest appears to be of the time of Alexander the Great (1 Chr. iii. 21-24). III. Illustrations from contemporary Prophets: Joel; Hosea; Amos; Micah; Isaiah i. — xxxvi.; Zephaniah; Zechariah xii. — xiv.; Habakkuk; Obadiah; Jeremiah; Ezekiel; Isaiah xl. — lxvi. IV. Illustrations from the Psalms. V. Illustrations from Assyrian and Egyptian Monuments. VI. Jewish Traditions (1) in Josephus, Ant. viii. 10 -x. 8; (2) in the Quæstiones Hebraica, attributed to Jerome; (3) in Fabricius, Codes Pseudepigraphus Vet. Test. VII. Heathen Traditions in Herodotus, ii. 141, 159. LECTURE XXXV. THE FIRST KINGS OF JUDAH. THE history of the kingdom of Judah is the history of a dynasty, rather than of a nation of a city, rather than of a country. Its title reveals to us its strength as well as its weakness. The tribe of Judah, the city of Jerusalem, the family of David, had acquired too much fame during the preceding reigns to be easily lost. It is a striking instance of the influence of a great name on the course of human history. The long hereditary line attracted a prestige which in Israel was shattered by the constant vicissitudes of the royal houses. The " lamp' "1 or "torch" of David was always burning, even although it seemed at times on the very verge of extinction. There was a pledge given as if by "a covenant "of salt," that the House of David should never perish. The interment or non-interment in the royal tomb was a judgment passed on each successive King, as the highest honor or deepest disgrace that he could reach. A royal funeral was more than a ceremony, its costly fragrance, its solemn dirges, were regarded as a kind of canonization. The King was the person round whom the hopes of the Prophet Ruler constantly revolved, even though they were constantly disappointed. An ideal was always bound up with the royal office which 1 1 Kings xi. 36; 2 Kings viii. 19. 22 Chr. xiii. 5. kept it, in a peculiar sense, in the sight of the people. Jerusalem, the most recent, but also the most potent of the sanctuaries in its religious associations, represented, as no other place could, the national unity. The Temple of Solomon was the only building worthy of the national faith. All the most sacred relics of the primitive history were there stored up. Much as its splendor suffered from sacks and spoliations, yet its worship was only twice interrupted. Even the Pagan Kings, such as Rehoboam and Abijah, respected its sanctity, made costly offerings, and frequented its services. Athaliah and Manasseh established their own heathen rites under the shadow of its walls. The Priesthood, which had gained a new development at the time of the formation of the separate kingdom, became, as it advanced, one of the firmest institutions of the state. And when, after the fall of Samaria before the Assyrian power, the little kingdom of Judah remained erect, it gathered into itself the whole national spirit. From this time began that identification of a single tribe with the people at large, which is expressed in the word Jew.1 Only by an anachronism do we apply the words Jew and Jewish to times before the overthrow of Samaria. Had Israel remained faithful to her call, the charm which now invests the names of Jerusalem and Zion might well have been attached to Shechem and Samaria. But Judah and Jerusalem rose to the emergency, and therefore"out of Zion went forth the law, and the word of "the Lord from Jerusalem." The very smallness of the kingdom acted as a stimulus to its internal independence and strength. Again and again the fewness of the people, the narrowness of its territory, are contrasted 1 "Jew," "lovdałoç, is Jehudi, i. e. a man of Judah.” 2 2 Chr. xiv. 11; xx. 12; xxxii. 7, 8. 3 Micah iv. 1; Isaiah ii. 2. with the vigor of its moral strength, the width of its spiritual dominion. These were the main preservatives of the kingdom of Judah. They were also amongst the main causes of its distractions and of its ultimate fall. The overweening prestige of the royal family threw a disproportionate power into their hands. The polygamy which followed on the example of David and Solomon, in common with other Oriental monarchs, was far more persistently carried out in the south than in the north. Even the best of the Kings, such as Joash and Josiah,1 had more than one wife. There was a local genius of evil as well as of good haunting the walls of Jerusalem itself that ultimately fostered the growth of heathen idolatry and of orthodox superstition to a degree beyond the worst excesses of Samaria and Jezreel. The Temple became a talisman; the Priesthood a centre of superstition and vice.2 It is the struggle between these contending elements to which, after the shock of the disruption, the External kingdom and church of Judah was exposed, struggle. that gives the main interest to the period of the seven first successors of Solomon. Both kingdom and church were menaced with destruction at its commencement. At its close both were established on a basis sufficiently solid to withstand the dangers of the later period for two more centuries. It is necessary first briefly to trace the steps by which the kingdom was raised from the state to which it had been reduced by the loss of its external dominions. In this crisis, Rehoboam showed himself not altogether unworthy of his ancestors. The plan B. C. 976. of defensive operations which he adopted in the pres 1 2 Kings xxiv. 31, compared with 36. 2 See Lecture XL. Rehoboam. ence of the appalling perils of his situation showed, as the sacred narrative expressly indicates,' that he still retained a spark of the "wisdom" of his father. He "dwelt himself" in Jerusalem. Unlike the northern Kings, who immediately began to shift their capital, he perceived the immense importance of retaining his hold on the city of David. This central fortress he surrounded with a chain of fortresses; in part carrying out the designs of his father, but in part increasing their number and providing them with garrisons, arms, and provisions. These garrisoned cities, in which he placed those princes of his house whom he did not intend for the succession,3 were not, as might have been at first sight expected, on the northern frontier against the rival kingdom, but on the southern and western side of Jerusalem. The reason for this soon become apparent. The great Egyptian monarchy was now not allied with the House of Solomon, but with the House of Jeroboam. And now, for the first time since the Exodus, Judah was once more threatened with an Egyptian bondage. Shishak. On the southern side of the temple of Karnac at Thebes is a smaller temple built by Rameses B. C. 972. III. Of this one corner was sculptured inside and outside by the King, called in the Egyptian language Sesonchosis, in the Hebrew Shishak, in the LXX Susakim, perhaps by Herodotus Sasychis.* He copied almost exactly the figures already carved on the other parts of the temple, so that their forms and attitudes are mostly conventional. But in one of the processions thus represented there is to be found the only direct i 2 Chr. xi. 23. 2 Ibid. xi. 5-12. Ibid. xi. 23. Compare Ps. xlv. 16. 4 Herod. ii. 136; see Kenrick' Egypt, ii. 6. |