HEBREW RELIGION. The Hebrews were Western Semites, and from the Semites sprang Judaism, Christianity and Mohammedanism (or Islam). The part these three great mono theistic religions have played in history cannot be understood without taking into account the general characteristics of the Semites, and also the capacity for monotheism often ascribed to them. But monotheising tendencies are not so rare, and it is more important to observe what effects they have had.
I. Introductory.—By Judaism is meant the religion of the Jews (i.e., properly "Judaeans") based upon the Old Testament. There are, however, striking differences within the Old Testa ment, e.g., between the piety of the Psalms, the pessimism of Ec clesiastes and the eroticism of Canticles; or between the popular stories in Genesis and the priestly ritual in Leviticus. Moreover, it is instructive to compare and contrast the treatment of the history of the monarchy in Samuel—Kings with the parallel portions in Chronicles. Further, the prophets condemn the poly theistic and degrading cults of the Israelite religion of their day, although the Israelites felt that they stood apart from their neigh bours, whether Canaanites within the land, or other peoples without : Edom, Ammon, etc. In fact, "Israel" is a much more re stricted term than "Hebrew" (see JEws, § 3) . Israel, which strictly includes both Judah and the northern tribes (Joseph, Ephraim, etc.), was closely related to Edom (its "brother"), Moab and Ammon, the Aramaeans of north Syria and the Arabs of the desert. Hence, while the Old Testament (with the religion of Israel) led to both Judaism and Christianity, one must not ignore the religious belie's and practices over the larger world of which Israel formed part. The ideas which made the monotheistic re ligion of Israel unique are best appreciated when it is seen how they developed, now in touch with and now in reaction against, the contemporary religions. By Hebrew religion, therefore, we mean the religion of the Hebraic background upon which Israel grew up and developed its monotheism, and which extends outside the chronological limits of the Old Testament. (See BIBLE: Old Testament.) 2. Desert and Other Influences.—Intercourse over south west Asia, Egypt and the Levant, regular from a very early date, was at times pronounced. Under varying political and economic circumstances the tide of influence flowed now in one direction, now in another. In the age after Alexander the Great (332 B.C., see HELLENISM), the Greeks left their mark upon the East; but, later, Christianity belongs to a new Oriental revival and its con quests westwards, together with the activity of Rabbinical Juda ism, and the vitality of old Oriental pagan or semi-pagan cults and ideas, characterise the ages before the rise of Islam among the Arabs (seventh cent. A.D.). From time to time sweeping movements can be distinctly traced, others only inferred; and there is reason to believe that the history of religion in Palestine and Syria—Hebrew religion—was more complicated and more closely bound up with far-reaching external events than would be supposed from the biblical narrative alone. Yet even there the writers are convinced that the history of the religion of Israel was one of universal significance.
The rise of militant Islam, virile and enthusiastic, with the doctrine of a one and only god Allah, is not entirely unique in so far as the influence of desert tribes upon Semitic history and religion can be traced earlier. The Israelites themselves admit their indebtedness to the formative period in the deserts outside Palestine and to Kenites or Midianites. The story of the flight from Egypt, the Exodus, and the sweeping invasion of tribes under Joshua, the successor of their law-giver Moses, reflects the belief that the national religion of Israel, with the worship of a one and only god Yahweh (on the name see JEHOVAH), was introduced into a land of ancient, though depraved civilization by men who had lived under the simpler conditions of the deserts. On the other hand, the story of the "patriarchs" in Genesis and especially the connections with Ur of the Chaldees and Harran (see ABRAHAM), point back to famous ancient centres of culture. Difficult as it is to decide whether the desert (nomadic or semi nomadic) origin is more significant than the traditions (Gen. xi. sqq.) pointing to Babylonia, North Syria and even Armenia (Ararat), there are yet other factors to take into account : ex cavation and the monuments lead us to look for influences from Egypt, Asia Minor, Cyprus, Crete and the Aegean. Accordingly, the study of Israel's own literature (viz., the Old Testament), to gether with that of the "external evidence," brings many difficult problems, and scholars take different attitudes in regard to the evidence, and sometimes reach very divergent conclusions. On the line taken in the present article, see further JEws, PALESTINE: History.
Centuries of intercourse had created a common background of life and thought ; and the deities of one land were often known to another. In Palestine can be found Dagan or Dagon (probably a food god), Nebo (the messenger god), Sin (moon deity), Nergal and Ninurta. Certain Asiatic deities were known in Egypt : Resheph, Baal and the warrior mother-goddesses Anath, Kadesh and Astarte (Ishtar). Various Egyptian deities entered Palestine (Amon, Re, Hathor, etc.) ; and Egyptian colonies, temples and symbols (the Ankh or "sign of life," the winged disc) combine with archaeological evidence for contact with Asia Minor and the Aegean, to prove that then, as always, the land was the meeting-place of beliefs. Doubtless there were then, as later, local deities (Baal, fem. Baalatli), closely identified with local districts or possessing specialised functions, differing in name or attribute, but the centre of very similar beliefs and prac tices (see BAAL). Especially significant is the recognition of the supreme monarch, since it involved a tendency towards monothe ism (a one and only god), or rather henotheism (one god above all others). The Amarna letters show how, under Egyptian supre macy, Egyptian and Palestinian deities were co-ordinated or equated. The vassal princes call the king their Shamash and Addu; the former, the Sun-god, god of right and justice, was already familiar (cf. also the place Beth-shemesh near Jerusalem), and Addu (Hadad) god of rain, storm, etc., was known widely under other names (Ramman [Rimmon], Teshub, etc.). He was presumably "the Baal," the prominent god associated with thun der and lightning and, with the bull, often named in Egypt in the XIXth Dynasty. The name Shamshi-Adad, borne by five As syrian kings (1850–I o0o B.c.), definitely united the two pre eminent deities, and in a cuneiform tablet found at Taanach (in the Plain of Jezreel) a "lord of the gods" is invoked. Both in Egypt and in Babylonia (viz., the Code of Hammurabi) there is the conception of "a (or the) god"—not closely defined, but quite clearly understood—other than the named and recognised deities; and consequently important monotheising tendencies are to be recognised before the rise of the national religion of Israel.
4. The Religious Significance of the Amarna Age.—The strenuous reforms associated with the name of Amenhotep IV., Ikhnaton (c. 138o B.c.), made the Sun the source of all power and life; and of his Sun-god (Aton) he was the "beloved son" and emanation, born of his rays, eternal. Ideas of the intimate bond uniting national god and king were not necessarily strange to Palestine ; and may have been further developed by the mar riage relations between the Amenhoteps and the non-Semitic dynasty in Mitanni (North Mesopotamia). Abdi-khiba of Jeru salem, most devoted of vassals of Egypt, was himself one of several dynasts who can be traced from Mitanni southwards. There, in the north, among various signs of Indo-European (Aryan or Iranian) influence, a treaty between Mitanni and the Hatti (Hittites) actually names Varuna, Mitra (later Mithra) and other Indian or Aryan deities. Indo-European thought in general is distinguished by the recognition of a reign of law, a rational or natural rather than a supernatural order (Sanskrit rita, Iranian arta), and to judge from various dynastic and other names, it was already known in Mitannian circles. A certain rationalism and pragmatism mark off Iranian (Persian) religion from Indian mysticism, pantheism and quietism; and accordingly it is prob able that there was an Aryan or Iranian influence in Palestinian or Hebrew religion centuries before the age of the Persian (Achaemenid) empire, when Zoroastrianism was an important factor in the history of Judaism (cf. 16).
In the Amarna age, which is approximately that of Moses, religion had reached an advanced stage, and ethical ideas fre quently recur in ancient Babylonia and Egypt, and were especially associated with solar deities. But apart from the O.T. no clear trace is to be found of Yahweh, at least as a prominent god, still less of the covenant with Israel at Sinai (Horeb), yet the Aryan Varuna and Mitra were gods of oath and covenant ; and the lofty ethical character of the former points to some earlier ethico spiritual reform outside the Semitic world, to which the rise of Zoroaster's Ahura-Mazda (who corresponds to Varuna) is a later parallel. The Amarna letters refer to a very powerful anti Egyptian movement. The land was rent by intrigues ; and, as always, religion and politics were one. The pro-Egyptian petty princes, both native and (like Abdi-khiba) foreign, would neces sarily favour the syncretistic religion that Egyptian supremacy involved, whereas the enemies of Egypt, the Khabiru, the Amor ites under Abd-Ashirta, whose name styles him a "servant of Ashirat" (Astarte or Ishtar), their Palestinian allies and their Hittite supporters, would promote the native religion. As often later, Palestine in politics and religion wavered between Egypt and the north (Mesopotamia, etc.). The religion was affected 'by and reacted against contemporary conditions, and the Amarna age marks the beginning of the decline of Egypt, and the increase of Hittite and Amorite influences. It is perhaps significant that "Baal" now becomes familiar in Egypt in the XIXth and XXth dynasties. External evidence throws no light upon the rise of I ahwism, as described in the O.T., but a new stage in the history of religion in Palestine can undoubtedly be recognised.
5. The Hebrew Monarchy.—During the next few centuries sweeping movements changed the face of the land. Hittite and Amorite elements gravitated southwards, and Ezekiel (xvi. 3) calls Jerusalem the offspring of an Amorite and a Hittite. New states came into being, and the Hebrew monarchy arose (c. 1025 B.c.) in a national movement which overcame the recently settled Philistine and other Levantine invaders (see JEws, § 5, seq.; PALESTINE, § 4, seq.; PHILISTINES). Yahweh has now become "the god of the Hebrews" (cf. the designation, Ex. iii. 18, etc.), and the people of Israel are his people. Archaeology and the monuments indicate continued intercommunication over a wide area ; and the changes since the Amarna Age are not so extensive as might be expected. But from Sam'al (Zenjirli) in extreme north Syria to Jerusalem and Moab we find an alphabetic script (see ALPHABET) with almost identical forms, and an almost identical language (Hebrew, Phoenician, Moabite) with a very similar type of thought. This "North Semitic" alphabet is beginning (c. 7oo B.c.) to develop along separate paths (Hebrew, etc., and Ara maean), and the Aramaic language in use in North Syria is ex tending, and is destined to be the Lingua franca of the Persian empire. Hence there would seem to have been some great bloc Amorite? Hebrew?—of interrelated states from Sam'al (the name itself means "north") downwards, and to this the traditions of the far-reaching sway of David and Solomon (qq.v.) might conceiv ably refer.
In Sam'al the dynasts have non-Semitic names, but the gods include Hadad, El ("god" par excellence) and Resheph. In Hamath are sun and moon deities, and gods of heaven and earth. The Baal of Heaven or Sky-god, found at Hamath and Tyre, and known earlier to Hittites and Amorites, was presumably Addu (Hadad) who, with his Aramaean equal, Ramman, is found in Hadad-rimmon, near where excavation at Beth-shan has illus trated the persistence of Egyptian, Aegean and northern in fluences. Yahweh of Israel, Chemosh of Moab and Milkom of Ammon are three parallel gods of three closely interrelated peoples, but the name Hadad appears in the dynasties further re moved—in Damascus and Edom. It is only to be expected that the Israelite Yahweh took over some of the attributes of the earlier gods, and the name Addu appears in the loth century in Adoram, the name of a prince of Hamath otherwise called Joram, and of one of Solomon's officers (also spelt Hadoram) otherwise called Adoniram, where Addu interchanges respectively with Yo (Yau, Yahweh) and Adon (as in Adonijah, etc.). Moreover, Yau (Yahweh) may probably be traced in the 8th century names Yaubi'di of Hamath and Azriyau of Yaudi. National and religious movements were one, and when Pharaohs spread the name and cult of their god, and Sargon II. sent skilled men to teach "the fear of god and the king" (Cyl. Inscr. 72–i4), successful kings of Palestine would not be behind.
Under the famous Omri dynasty (c. 887-841 B.c.) Ahab of (north) Israel was related by marriage to the Sidonian priest king of Astarte ; and was an important constituent of an alliance led by Hamath and Damascus against Assyria. Although Ahab recognised Yahweh, and his family bear the distinctive names Ahaziah, Jehoram and Athaliali, the age is one of (1) Elijah's firm stand for Yahweh against Baal, (2) separation from the northern alliance and (3) dynastic changes in the course of a revolt in which desert influence can be traced. The middle of the 9th century B.C. is, in fact, another great landmark in the history of Hebrew religion, though it is difficult to determine pre cisely the changes. (See ELIJAH, JEWS.) 6. The Rise of the Prophets.—The dynasty of Jehu perished, after a stormy century (c. 841–i45 B.c.). About 25 years later the northern kingdom fell, and the kingdom of Judah came face to face with Assyria (see JEWS, § 8, sqq., PALESTINE, § 7, seq.). With this, the Assyrian age, a line of prophets arose, and trans formed the old Hebrew religion, giving it its specific Israelite form (see PROPHET). To be more accurate, on the ordinary view of the O.T. they merely restated the religion introduced by Moses now many centuries previously, whereas modern critical opinion would hold that they "for the first time unfolded the true char acter of Yahweh, implicit in the old Mosaic religion." Opinion, however, would differ on how far the old religion could be re covered, or could be inferred from an analysis of the religion after the prophets ; and the view here taken is that the prophets are a surer guide than the compiled accounts of the pre-prophetic period.
What the prophets condemn is not the absence of religion, but its quality—the ineffectiveness of the sacrificial and other offer ings, the festivals and the priests. Amos proclaims that Yahweh was a universal god of unchangeable righteousness, unfettered by any natural bond between himself and his own people. He attacks the old type of group religion where the god was an integral part of the local or national body, furthering the interests of worshippers who possessed the machinery for gaining his favour or placating his wrath. Such group religion was intensive and cohesive ; but although it involved a certain degree of morality within the group, it fostered unethical conceptions of the relation between gods and men.
In the days of Amos and Hosea (qq.v.) Israel had entered into world-history. Almost overwhelmed by its former ally Damascus, it had been brilliantly restored by Jeroboam II. These were no mere inter-state rivalries; the great powers of Assyria and of Urartu (Ararat, Armenia) themselves had been behind these vicissitudes. Yahweh's relation to Israel was that of Chemosh to Moab (Judg. xi. 24), and Chemosh had aroused Mesha (as he records on the Moabite Stone) (c. 85o B.c.) to recover lost territory. But Israel had now seen Yahweh moving history on behalf of his own people. It remained a characteristic conviction, and some prophets are more nationalistic than others. Amos, however, shifted the emphasis from Israel's god who had restored his people to a universal God whose relation to all peoples alike was based on an eternal moral law, and who required a higher standard of life from an Israel who claimed to stand in a unique relationship to him (Am. iii. 2). The prophets taught that Yah weh was behind history; Egypt, Assyria and Babylonia were tools in his hand—but no more than tools, and must not boast, for Yahweh who threatens Israel, or punishes her by defeat or exile, continued to be the god who sought his own people (cf. later Paul in Rom. xi.) . The prophets extended the group-con ception; Yahweh was the god not merely of the visible or ac knowledged body of Israel, but of the poor and needy, and of all who served him and sought his help. The old group-unit of group+ god was to depend, not upon the nature of the group, but upon what Yahweh demanded of the group that claimed to be his.
7. The Old Religion.—The prophets treat the cult as sec ondary, as an accretion (Am. v. 25, Jer. vii. 22). It is saturated with crude ideas and immoral practices that disintegrate society (cf. HIGH PLACE). Hebrew religion was anthropomorphic and passionate. Men fed the god, ate with him and saw his face (Hezekiah lays a letter before him, Is. xxxvii. 14) . It was neces sarily practical, for men depended upon trade (note the naive ideas in Deut. xxviii. 12. 44), and upon the fertility of man, beast and the field. No goddess is openly associated with Yahweh, though female deities abounded, and the numerous plaques of the mother-goddess, models of heads of bulls, and phallic objects unearthed by excavation, illustrate elemental ideas of growth and increase, and illustrate the prophet's condemnation of impure rites. Although the old religion included elevated ideas, it involved beliefs in the interconnection of men and nature, and it did not exclude the licentious practices (condemned, e.g., by Hosea) which were evidently more than mere immorality. It was a per sistent conviction that nature shared man's distress and that man's behaviour might react upon nature. The sensuous and sensual elements in religion proved almost ineradicable; and the fact remains that Hosea (second half of 8th cent. B.c.) in attack ing the impure cults, clearly a recognized part of the ordinary religion, has to teach, as though for the first time, that Yahweh, and not the local, or functional, Baals, gave nature's blessings and provided for man's most vital needs.
8. Jerusalem and the Monarchy.—The sanctuaries (Bethel, Gilgal, Shechem, etc.) have a bad reputation; Jerusalem was no better. Its religious history is pre-Israelite, and near by, at Ed Dra' in Moab, traces have been found of an ancient sacred locality, perhaps a place of pilgrimage, dating back to the Hyksos age. With Anathoth (the Anaths), Nob (Nebo), Tophet and the valley of Hinnom (Gehenna), Jerusalem with its sacred Mount Zion was a religious centre of unknown origin. The temple, the abode of the god and part of the royal buildings, with the pillars Jachin and Boaz, the horses of the sun and the sacred chariot, the cherubim and other belongings, the orgiastic festivals and extravagant sacrifices, was far from being the home of the spiritual religion which the reforming prophets called for, and the reforms of Josiah (q.v.) and the allusions of Jeremiah and Ezekiel, show to what slight extent the religious conditions were improved.
Jerusalem was the centre of the monarchical idea. Abdi-Khiba received his legitimation—and perhaps, like another vassal, the anointing oil—from his suzerain in Egypt. Later, the David dynasty has taken root. The royal throne was the throne of Yah weh upon which sat his "anointed" (mashi'ah) the representative and embodiment of Yahweh's people (cf. I Chron. xxix. 23, 2 Chron. ix. 8, etc.). The king, the "lamp" of the people (2 Sam. xxi. 17, cf. the "coal" in 2 Sam. xiv. 7), takes a prominent part in the national religion; divinely guided, he carries out the Divine Law (cf. Prov. xvi. I o–I 5) ; and is responsible for the national welfare. A recollection of priestly kings is preserved in the tradition of Melchizedek (q.v.), and of human sacrifice to the king-god in the worship of Moloch (q.v.). Traces of a divine kingship may be recognised in the Messiah (q.v.), especially as a superhuman being who shall bring peace and plenty. Sovereignty rests in the people of Israel, so (later) in Deuteronomy; or, as in post-exilic times, the high priest has all the powers and re sponsibilities of the king of old. The tendency to subordinate the king more deliberately to Yahweh (who appoints him through a prophet) or to the priest (so in Ezekiel's programme) reflects later developments. Characteristic of "biblical" religion is the endeavour to safeguard the supremacy of Yahweh who would have no other gods before him, no intermediary (like the god Marduk in Assyria), no ruler who would set himself upon an equality with the Most High (Is. xiv. 13 seq.). Kingship and Yahwism are, none the less, intertwined. The prophet Isaiah, who emphasizes the sterner aspects of Yahweh, develops the idea of Divine Sovereignty; but against the usual arbitrariness of ancient Oriental monarchy is directed the doctrine that "Yah weh is not a man to be capricious" (Num. xxiii. 19). And while, on the one hand, Yahweh's absolute freedom of choice is secured: "I shall be—just what I shall be" (Ex. iii. 14), prophetic teach ing centres upon Yahweh's absolute righteousness, and his ap parent arbitrariness is due, not to his mood, but to his "righteous ness" ; Israel's conduct inevitably bringing consequences which, whether beneficial or disastrous are "right." As is only to be expected, the very arbitrariness of the Hebrew autocrat, the representative and vicegerent of his god, brought the problem of Yahweh's character and his treatment of his people.
There are solar, lunar and nature traits in Yahwism, explicable in view of the earlier religion in Palestine, and the way in which it had to satisfy elemental needs. The calf-cults (see AARON ; CALF, THE GOLDEN ; JEROBOAM) associate themselves with the old Hadad, and Yahweh as a war-god (e.g., Ex. xv. 3) goes back to the earlier warrior-god Baal. The human sacrifices and licentious cults which the prophets denounce, the fierceness of Levitical reformers and the barbarities of warfare reflect an intensely emo tional religion, characteristic of ancient Oriental peoples, and account for the god fiercely "jealous" of a rival and "zealous" for his people (Ex. xx. 5, Zech. i. 14). Passionate as preachers of a new faith like the prophets, or as priests upholding the holiness of Yahweh, or as kings spreading the kingdom of their god, the Hebrews are distinguished by an intense self-conscious ness and confidence which, striking enough in the later stages of the religion, would not be less so before the ethical teaching of the prophets had begun to take effect.
9. Uniqueness of the Prophets.—Amos is the first of the "written prophets" and although he and his successors are pre eminent for their powerful theistic idealism, they are not wholly isolated. "The Hebrew, whether prophet, psalmist or sage, was a thorough-going partisan, identifying himself with his circle, and identifying his interests with the eternal order" (C. C. Toy, Comment. on Proverbs, p. 27). Israel felt herself to be an essen tial part of the course of history, and the prophets felt that their deepest personal experiences (cf. notably Hosea's tragic mar riage) had a universal meaning. But whereas the group and god were united in the social group-unit, the individual prophet found in his consciousness of God eternal principles that must work themselves out in the history of individuals and nations. Con scious of an eternal order he, like the group (tribe or nation), felt himself one with past history and future destiny, and he embodied within himself the people for whom he spake as surely as did the representative of the dynasty (or, later of the priesthood), or the individual member of a corporate Israel.
The great prophets mark, however, an immense advance in ideas of God, Man and the Universe. They attacked an old "un differentiated" type of thought where there was no clearly-drawn distinction between man and "nature" (a relatively modern term), between what is ceremonial or ritual and what is ethical. The step they took corresponds to that from the old Aryan Varuna, the guardian of cosmic (social and natural) order, to the specifically Zoroastrian ethical order, which is under the care of the ethical god Ahura-mazda. The date of Zoroaster (q.v.) is disputed, but the rise of Amos and his successors may be associated with the prominence, not only of Assyria and its god Asshur, but also of Urartu (Armenia), and with the imminent rise of the Medes, the forerunner of the Persians. Hebrew religion thus reached another definite stage, and the dawn of authentic prophecy is part of widespread movements as truly as are the Amarna Age of the now distant past, and the better known com plex of events in the Persian age (cf. § 14).
1 o. Jeremiah and Ezekiel.—If Christanity has always found it easy and natural to pass from the prophets of Israel to its own rise, it is because pregnant ideas do not advance continu ously, and many centuries had to pass before there again dawned an age as creative as that of the 8th and 7th century B.C. The first four prophets (Amos, Hosea, Isaiah and Micah) belong to the decline and fall of the northern kingdom and the extension of Assyrian power as far as Judah and the gates of Egypt (see JEws, § II). A century later Judah entered upon its decline and the prophets Jeremiah and Ezekiel form another landmark. How far the books named after them represent schools or tendencies is uncertain; at all events their enunciation of individual re sponsibility belongs to a day when religious and social organiza tion was rapidly breaking up, and with it the old corporate re sponsibility of communal life. Jerusalem and the Temple were shortly to be destroyed by the Babylonians (586 B.c.) and re ligion stripped of its national limitations. Jeremiah is charac terized by his indifference to city, temple and cult; Jews in exile could be both loyal to their new home and worshippers of Yahweh (ch. xxix.). Jeremiah hardly anticipated a restoration of the old regime, and Ezekiel is distinctly catastrophic in his ex pectations of ruin before restoration. But while Jeremiah looks for the New Covenant which Yahweh would write upon men's hearts, Ezekiel demands a purer priesthood (viz., Zadokites of Jerusalem), and these shall safeguard the "holiness" of Yahweh which priests and people had defiled. Yet with all their threats and denunciations the prophets are Israelite, in the widest sense: Yahweh, whose mouthpiece they were, could not for ever forsake the people whom they represented.
The view here maintained, that the popular history is approxi mately of about the sixth century B.C., finds confirmation in Deuteronomy (q.v.) . This book, which had an independent liter ary history before it became part of the Pentateuch, is distin guished by its appeal to men of Israel to secure the well-being of the community. Israel has come of age. There is a law, but it is within everyone's reach ; and self-conscious covenanters deci sively separating themselves from pagan neighbours are united to Yahweh who, while allotting objects of worship to other peo ples, is himself Israel's God (cf. Deut. xii. 8, xiii. 6 sqq., xxvi. 16-19, xxx. 14). Apostasy and idolatry are to be mercilessly burnt out ; religion and reward are organized, and upon the purity of the religion will depend nature's blessings and all prosperity. Whereas the earlier prophets condemn an errant nation and in culcate new ideas of Divine Holiness and Righteousness, Jere miah, Ezekiel and Deuteronomy look forward, and a new reor ganization is in process. In the archaic ideas of the Pentateuchal legislation is reflected a primitive stage of society, rather than a society with a long and continuous history behind it. There are signs of the inauguration of new conditions: in land laws (cf. Lev. xxv. 1o), and in Ezekiel's curious, impracticable scheme for the division of the tribes (Ez. xlviii.). Hence, while the Penta teuch has always seemed to point naturally to the beginning of Israelite religion, all the weight of evidence appears to be against dating it in or about the Amarna Age, and in favour of the age at and after the collapse of the old Hebrew kingdoms, when new social and religious conditions were inaugurated, and led up to post-exilic Judaism.
From an analysis of Deuteronomy and "Deuteronomic" litera ture it would seem that the prominence of Jerusalem is not an original feature of our narratives. A reforming movement which probably began in (north) Israel, in Samaria, and perhaps at the ancient sanctuary of Shechem with its "covenant god" (El Berith), becomes specifically Judaean, and the latest literature is hostile towards the brother people of the north. But foreign and pagan though the population of Samaria may have been, Jeremiah and Ezekiel regard it not without sympathy; both north and south are Yahweh's, and Ephraim is his first-born (Jer. xxxi. 9). The book of Deuteronomy in its earlier form is probably northern, of exilic date, and represents a Pan-Israelite standpoint (with R. H. Kennett). It is possible that the restoration of Judah and the Messianic zeal of Zerubbabel (52o-516 B.c.) led to plans for the restoration of a Davidic empire with the inclu sion of an unwilling Samaria. At all events, in the time of Nehe miah and Ezra—such is the natural order—Judah is desolate, surrounded by jealous neighbours, and the bitter divorce of Judah and Samaria implies an earlier period of close union. The im portance which the temple and ritual of Jerusalem gain in the later literature stands in contrast to the indifference of the earlier great reforming prophets to the cultus. So, the history tells how the place which Yahweh shall choose—perhaps originally Shechem —proved to be Jerusalem, how David the head of its dynasty was preferred to the faithless Saul (contrast the praise in 2 Sam. I), and how depraved priesthoods were ultimately supplanted by Zadok, the first priest of the temple built by David's son Solomon.
Thus, the old Hebrew religion was freed from earlier national limitations by the spiritual prophets. The way was prepared for a religion founded upon a common tradition. The old Israel (in the wide sense) became a Judaean Israel based on Jerusalem, the north was rejected, and the true Israelite tribes of the north are supposed to be carried away centuries earlier. The history is artificially handled, with the result that Judah, the survivor of the true Israel, goes into exile, and Judah returns to a heathen land and restores the religion of which it had been the guardian. Jerusalem accordingly becomes the only centre of the only true religion, which was not to be found elsewhere (cf. the standpoint. 2 Chron. xiii. 8 seq. xxv. 7) ; and the old religion is thus trans formed—under influences and circumstances which have been concealed and forgotten—until the religion in its post-exilic form was believed to be that of the Mosaic age. And in days to come the religion of the late pre-Christian age was dated even from the pre-Mosaic period (see JUBILEES, BK. OF ; TESTAMENTS OF THE TWELVE PATRIARCHS). One is tempted to speak of the transition from the prophets to the priestly post-exilic religion as a retrogression. But Zoroastrianism, too, with its fine ethical universalism was followed by a priestly organization, and in the words of Israel Abrahams, "ritual may be machinery for applying principle ; Law the means of making simple prophetic ideas work in the complex life of society" (in Peake, People and Book, p. 14. The Servant of Yahweh.—These changes of epoch making importance for the history of religion can be only im perfectly and hypothetically reconstructed, and in them a place must be found for the superb idealism of Is. xl. seq. and the "Servant of Yahweh." Hebrew monotheism here reaches its height, and the doctrine of Yahweh's absolute sovereignty is no where else so impressively and decisively set forth. There is no return to some past monotheism, for monotheising tendencies are to be estimated by their content and efficiency. From various writings (e.g., Jeremiah, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Is. xl. seq., etc.), it can be seen that serious minds were utterly overwhelmed by the changing conditions in and about the sixth century. To this period (approximately) belong both blank scepticism—Yahweh may be safely ignored (Zeph. i. 12) and the crudest cults even of a totemistic character (Robertson Smith, Religion of the Semites, p. 628 seq.). When the "scheme of things" had been shattered and the disintegration of life and thought allowed room for new combinations of a higher and lower type, the conviction of Yahweh's supremacy over and immediate intervention in the world received new strength. It was not that—as in India—the world was illusion (maya), for the Semites were characteristically "this worldly" ; but God was so real and immediate that the Israelite saw through the world unto his God. He would repudi ate the Indian formula "that art thou"—tat tvans asi—the ulti mate identity of man, God and the world ; but would view the world as, so to speak, the sea that both severs man from and unites him to God. So, a writer (or it may be a school) in a series of passages of unequalled force passes from the unique monotheistic teaching of Israel's God to the unique destiny of His people Israel. A "servant" had been anticipated, as the de liverer of an oppressed people ; "the servant" had come and passed unrecognized, indeed rejected—not without apparent rea son. New convictions arose of the efficacy of sacrifice and of Israel's function in history as a "servant," of an Israel within an Israel, and of an Israel as a light to the world. The interpreta tion of the biblical passages is, it is true, keenly disputed (see IsAIAH) ; but there is no doubt that the religious idealism of Israel here attained its zenith; a new era, it was felt, had been inaugurated ; and the Deutero-Isaiah takes its proper place along with epoch-making religious events elsewhere—China (Lao-tse and Confucius), India (Mahavira and Buddha), Greece (Or phism, etc.) ; see G. F. Moore, Hist. of Religions, i. p. viii. seq.
So penetrating is the thought of the Deutero-Isaiah in its sig nificance for Semitic self-consciousness and energy that all earlier conceptions of the special relation between Yahweh and Israel (e.g., Am. iii. 2) here reach their climax. Israel felt herself called for high office, and this required a preparatory purgation (cf. the call of Isaiah, ch. vi.; also Jer. xv. 19). The "servant" who bore the penalty of Israel's sins becomes an Israel, neither a "prophet" nor a "priest" people, but the sacrificial victim for the world. So naturally does the idea of the Servant lead on to the age when Jesus of Nazareth brought new conceptions of God and Man that it is only to be expected that some fateful events lie behind Is. xl.–lvi. But whereas later a Jewish sect had to cut itself off from Judaism in order to live, here Jewish history has thrown a veil over vicissitudes which must have had the pro foundest influence—the fact that the chapters are preserved is itself significant—and the events and the leading figures in them have passed into oblivion.
Political aggrandisement is renounced : a last effort is charged against Nehemiah (vi. 6 sq.) ; but the High Priest has more than the glories of the old monarchy, and in the performance of his priestly office evoked scarcely less enthusiasm (Ecclus. 1.). Yah weh lives in the very centre of Israel, amid the most meticulous ritual. The gulf between Yahweh and man is not ethical or spiritual (cf. Is. lvii. is), but ceremonial; and the ideas of "sin," too, are prevailingly material and ritualistic. The past crises had manifested the utter dependence of Israel upon an omnipo tent Yahweh and the necessity of safeguarding his holiness. Hence "sin" and the need for Atonement (q.v.) are more con spicuous than before ; and upon the Temple depend the ordinary needs of life. In the place of the "democratic" covenant between Yahweh and Israel and its material effects as in Deuteronomy (e.g., ch. xxviii.), the crops depend upon the temple-service (cf., Hag. i. 9, Mal. iii. I o, Zech. xiv. 17), and are endangered by a faithless priesthood (Mal. ii. 3). It was an old belief in a new dress. Israel's conviction of her meaning for the world fluctuated between a Prophet-people possessing the Truth and a Priest-people that controlled the Rites—a "suffering servant" was an alien conception. The enhanced supremacy of Yahweh exalted his people Israel and the officiating priesthood, and it is easy both to imagine what Hebrew religion was before the prophets gave it new form, and to understand how Rabbinical Judaism was convinced of the real benefits accruing to the world through Israel and her merits.
16. Universalism.—The Jews were only a small part of the mighty Persian empire which with a lingua franca (Aramaic) , a well-organized and international administration, and the pos session of the lofty ethical god of heaven, Ahura-Mazda, favoured an at least external unification of religion. The Persian kings treated other religions with tolerance and, for a century at all events, the Jews seem to have been especially favoured. But while the Jews found much in ethical Zoroastrianism to appre ciate, there was the danger that in this cosmopolitan empire their Yahweh would be placed on a level with the pre-eminent gods of other peoples. To identify Yahweh with Ahura-Mazda might be easy; but the more the name of Yahweh was extended be yond the limits of Israel—to become "great among the nations" (Mal. i. I I), the graver the risk of weakening the uniquely inti mate bond beyond Yahweh and Israel. Universalism had its dangers. Moreover, while the later prophets extol the future glory of Jerusalem, the resort of pilgrims and tribute-bearers, this extension of Yahwism was a sort of religious imperialism. Was the world ruled by Yahweh alone or through his vicegerents at Jerusalem? That Israel had a mission, she was convinced; but was she to carry the light among the nations, were the na tions to see in her stirring history the principles of Divine Gov ernance, or was Jerusalem to be the centre of tribute-bearing worshippers of Yahweh? It is as a universal history that the Pentateuch opens, gradu ally narrowing its scope until the history of the Chosen People begins with the choice of Abraham. The Pentateuch, which as sumed its present form during the Persian period, was the char ter of Judaism, preserving the scattered Jews and giving them solidarity against attack. It was at once their pride and their gospel. But, including as it does both the priestly source, P, and the earlier and more popular J and E (see BIBLE : O.T. Grit.), it is a compromise, and that a compromise should ever have been determined is of outstanding interest, though what events lie be hind it are unknown. Although the Pentateuch consequently cov ered a wide range of interest, it never precluded the further de velopment of tradition and myth. Archaeological and other evi dence testifies to the persistence of magic and superstition, and to the profound difference between the Pentateuch, and all it stood for, and the social religious conditions amid which the Jews lived. When the sage could declare that "the name of Yahweh was a strong tower" (Prov. xviii. 1o), the use of the Holy Name for magical purposes by other classes of society is entirely intelligi ble ; and while simple piety, as in the Psalms, knew how readily the troubled soul could call upon Yahweh's name, priestly re ligion surrounded Yahweh with a cordon of priests, and the utter ance of the Name was avoided. Divine Transcendence charac terises post-exilic religion, but Yahweh was completely in as well as completely over the world ; and one of the problems of Yahwism was to keep between the extremes of an esoteric cult exclusively in priestly hands and a universalism which tended to deprive the Jew of all that made Yahweh his own God, and Israel his "peculiar treasure" (Mal. iii. 17).
17. Intermediaries.—Persian idealism is characteristically ethical and rational, and incompatible with Jewish theism; and when Artaxerxes II. B.c.) officially recognized the cult of Anahita an old goddess of the Astarte-Ishtar type, and of Mithra, the mediating solar god (cf., Mitra above, § 4) , his defer ence to popular religion would repel orthodox Judaism. It was, in any event, difficult to uphold a strictly monotheistic doctrine of Yahweh's supremacy, and even a Psalmist could praise Yahweh as greatest among other gods (Ps. lxxxvix. 6). Earlier, the angel or messenger of Yahweh was partly a temporary self-manifesta tion of Yahweh and partly an independent being (Ex. xxiii. 21, Judg. vi. 13-22, etc.), and whatever the sacred "Presence" (lit. "face" Is. lxiii. 9) and "Name" (Is. xlviii. 9, etc.), may have meant, in Phoenician the goddesses Tanit and Astarte are re spectively styled Baal's "face" and "name." Various mediating terms come into use, e.g., "Holy Spirit" (see esp. Is. lxiii. so sq.), and the Rabbinic Memra (Logos), Shekhinah, etc., but the popu lar tendency was to regard them as independent entities. So also the Zoroastrian Amesha-Spentas, the attributes, phases or quali ties of Ahura-Mazda came to have independent existence.
Numerous angels and demons are met with in the Palestine of the Persian and Greek periods. They are usually ascribed to Persian influence, but the polytheism and demonism of ancient Babylonia and the figurines, amulets, etc., unearthed in Palestine show that these post-exilic beings, who are embodiments or causes of good and evil, etc., are the descendants of the Baals, demons, satyrs and other beings of the older times. To the Persian con ception of tutelary beings, presiding genii, there are parallels in O.T. and later literature ; and Michael (q.v.) the patron angel and champion of Israel, with whose fortunes Israel is bound up (Dan. x. 13, 20), goes back to archaic ideas. The fate of a tribe or people might depend upon the safety of the image of its god, or its king might be an effective and responsible representative; Yah weh himself appears as Israel's go`el or champion (in the Deutero Isaiah). But he could not be at once the god of Israel alone and also god of all nations. On the other hand, Michael is the more anthropomorphic genius of Israel, a more national figure than the Persian Mithra, the contemporary universal all-seeing god of light and conqueror of evil. Later, in the Apocalypse of St. John, which preserves a number of old Hebraic elements, Michael fights against the dragon Satan, thus taking over the conflict which was otherwise waged by Marduk god of light in Babylonia, by Yah weh (Is. li. 9) and by Ahura-Mazda. See DEVIL.
Ideas of conflict between light and darkness and good and evil were further developed. The more nearly Yahweh was brought into the world the more distressing became the problem of evil. That God might send misfortune (rat) as well as what was good (tab) was admitted; but when ethical ideas became more ex plicit, how could God be responsible for what offended ethical conscience? Already some old religious usages were a stumbling block, and human sacrifice, it had been said, either had never been ordained by Yahweh (Jer. vii. 31, xix. 5), or was a just penalty (cf. Ez. xx. 25; Ps. lxxxi. 12) . Averse from speculation, the Jew found answer to all his tormenting questions in God. Job (q.v.) comes to learn that though the God who was so vin dictively tormenting him was the God of the Universe, he could escape from the one to the other. Even if God cannot deliver man, yet He and not Nebuchadrezzar's image is the object of worship (Dan. iii. 18) ; and though He should fail to relieve man's needs, yet in the past He had shown His might, and Israel would still "rejoice in Yahweh, and joy in the God of his Salvation" (Hab. iii.). Here too was the solution of the problem of life after death. The prophets had attacked certain mourning-customs, resort to the dead and other practices, probably bound up with ancestor cults, traces of which continue to persist. The archaeological evidence also shows that death was not believed to be the end of man's existence, though it cannot be definitely asserted that Egyptian influence in Palestine had introduced the Egyptian ideas of another life. The name of the dead could be kept alive by being "mentioned" and Yahweh had a "book of the living" (Ex. xxxii. 32 seq.; Ps. lxix. 28). But the older belief that a man's life was inextricably part of the more permanent life of the fam ily or national group explains the care taken to preserve the group. This belief becomes more explicitly theistic when the em phasis is laid solely upon the relationship between the individual and Yahweh ; and in the knowledge of this man neither fears not speculates (cf. Ps. xxiii. 4, lxxiii. 25).
18. Wisdom.—On the one side, an internationalism wherein differences in religion could be reconciled or ignored, and, on the other, the conviction that God was a transcendent being, behind all things, led to the transition from theism to deism, and charac teristic of the age of Greek influence is the so-called Wisdom Literature. Where the devotee found a single Divine Being, the sage found a single Law ruling all life, and this "wisdom" (Hokmah) itself becomes the centre of speculation. It is some thing almost mythological, self-existent ; "got" by Yahweh before the creation of the world; the guide of rulers and the controller of morality and intelligence (Prow. viii.) . It is the world-plan, causing things to be what they are; and Ben Sira (Ecclus. xxiv.) identifies it with the Jewish Law or Torah (i.e., "direction"). The sages agree with the prophets that conduct is better than ritual. Morality pays, and the obvious offences (e.g., adultery) bring obvious penalties. It is better to be poor than to be rich by illgotten gains, and pity for the poor brings a divine reward (Prov. xix. 17) . Yahweh's blessings enrich a man (x. 22), and he treats men as they treat him (iii. 34) . He is not to be blamed for the consequences of one's own folly (xix. 3) ; and no one can be harmed by an undeserved curse (cf. xxvi. 2) . In the place of the inner life of the PSALMS (q.v.), the sages recommend prudence and sagacity; and the instructive and typical differences between personal piety and a moral philosophy find parallels out side Palestine, as far afield as the land of Lao-tse and Confucius. See further WISDOM (BOOK OF) and WISDOM LITERATURE.
IQ. Apocalypse.—An eternal world-order could be in the care of a righteous God (so the prophets), or it could be a moral order (so the sages) ; but it might also be viewed by the sceptic pessi mistically as a pre-determined scheme from which there was no escape (cf. ECCLESIASTES). Distressful conditions and the fail ure of religion and philosophy to teach men to be at home in the world encouraged what is called APOCALYPTIC LITERATURE (q.v.). It came to be felt that the age of prophecy belonged to the past ; and whereas the prophets worked to create history, apocalypse awaited it. The prophet moved in Yahweh's world and was filled with a living experience; whereas the apocalyptist placed a gulf between this world and the supernatural order: God had made two worlds (4 Ezra vii. 5o). Yahweh did nothing without telling the prophets (Am. iii. 7), and there are stories of detailed proph ecies of a somewhat mechanical type (e.g., 2 Kings xiii. 2-5, xxiii., 16 seq.) : but apocalypse foreshadows the working-out of a predetermined drama and reveals the future. It was an ancient belief that earthly things had a heavenly pattern, or that history had been written as "heavenly tablets" or could be deduced from the stars; and apocalypse is extraordinarily interesting for its ideas of history and destiny.
There was a feeling of impending, inevitable change, and that God would intervene in some spectacular or catastrophic way (as earlier, I Kings xix. 1 i seq.) . Things might be kept in reserve, to be brought forth at their time (cf. Is. xlviii. 6), and great changes could be betokened by a new name (Is. lxii. 2 seq., cf., Abram-Abraham, Jacob-Israel) . Or the old might come again in a new form : a new Exodus, a new Elijah (Mal. iv. 5) , or a new heaven and earth (cf., Is. lxv. 17). Characteristic is the use of an old name for new teaching (cf., Baruch, Enoch, Moses, etc., in the apocalyptical literature) ; truth is represented as unchanging, or as given from the first. Yahweh's world-plan pre-existed. He chose men from the womb to achieve his purposes, Jeremiah (i. 5), Cyrus (Is. xliv. 24), even the ideal Jacob-Israel (ib. v. 2), and at times there was some special supernatural intervention (Isaac, Gen. xvii., Samson, Judg. xiii.). Moreover, on the old group idea a man was born of the group which lived on in the indi viduals; and he was so far pre-existent in that he carried on the life of the pre-existing group to which he belonged; or the "spirit (or breath)" of man comes from and returns to its eternal divine source (cf., Eccles. xii. 7). More explicitly some part of man is believed to pre-exist (cf. Wisdom viii. 19 sq.), and according to 2 Enoch xxiii. 5, it is the soul. Ideas of man's place in the uni verse were indeed further developed, but Yahweh's purposes for either Israel or mankind had not yet been accomplished and were awaiting fulfilment.
20. The Maccabaean Age.—Greek culture had penetrated deeply after the conquests of Alexander the Great (333 B•c.), though the paucity of historical material and the difficulty of dat ing the literature make it impossible to trace clearly the steps in the religious development. The stirring deeds of the Maccabees (q.v.) must have called forth and must have been shaped by literature of a national "prophetical" stamp, and many scholars have sought to discern Maccabaean passages in the Old Testa ment, as apart from the book of Daniel (q.v.) evidently con temporary in its present form. Antiochus Epiphanes attempted to establish throughout his domain a single religion, symboli cal of his own supremacy as the "god made manifest." Jews and Samaritans alike were threatened, and fought to maintain the supremacy of Yahweh against the Zeus Olympius and the Zeus Xenius to whom the daring king had dedicated the temples of Jerusalem and Gerizim respectively. Then the Jews, triumphant in their victories, became as of old fanatical nationalists, fighting both non-Jews and especially their less rigorous and Hellenizing brethren. Before long, John Hyrcanus is conquering the Samari tans, destroying their temple; the Idumaeans (the earlier Edom ites) are forcibly Judaized, and a Jewish kingdom, almost Solo monic in its extent, flourishes between the end of the Seleucid and the beginning of the Roman period (141-63 B.c.). If the Davidic dynasty arose, as some evidence suggests, under South Palestinian or semi-Edomite auspices, it was through the Idumaean Herods that the Jews entered upon their last period of prosperity under Roman patronage, and with all the dangers this meant for na tional Judaism. And the final catastrophe was witnessed—if not hastened—by the last of this strangely non-Jewish family, Agrippa II.
Meanwhile the Maccabaean revolt against a semi-Greek and semi-Oriental life had purified the priesthood, and had given a fresh endorsement to Judaism shortly to become part of the Roman empire. It was a newly consolidated Judaism that now entered upon the western phase of its history, with a profounder conception of the part it was to play in universal history. The Jew with his Law, his traditions and his universal God, had some thing to offer a world from which, however, his own religion tended to keep him aloof. Judaism had already attracted the at tention of the world, whether the curious Hecataeus of Abdera (c. 290 B.C.), or his contemporary the anti-Jew historian Mane tho. Judaism felt a world-call, and its proselytising zeal was favoured by the Romans, at least up to the time of Hadrian. In deed there is a remarkable vigour throughout the Oriental re ligions, and many diverse tendencies of thought and a variety of sects characterise the eastern Roman empire at the birth of Christianity, primarily another Jewish sect. Besides certain strik ing ethical tendencies, and also the more impressive Messianic expectations (see MESSIAH), a Damascus body of Jewish cove nanters, whose date unfortunately is seriously disputed, look for a "Teacher of Righteousness" who is to be followed by a Messiah not of Davidic origin. Their appreciation of the Law and of the Prophets combines Ezekiel's reforming Zadokite priesthood and Jeremiah's new covenant, and they testify to some reforming movement, whose further history is unknown, outside Judaea, and therefore in districts more remote from the narrower exclu sive Judaism of Jerusalem. Similarly the book of Enoch (q.v.) appears to proceed from a North Palestinian (Galilaean) district, largely non-Jewish. See further, PHARISEES, SADUCEES, SCRIBES.
21. The Last of the Prophets.—Only the briefest account can here be given of the final act in the history of the old Hebrew religion. It is played upon a large stage amid the recurrence of the psychological characteristics of the VIth century B.C., viz., the intense anticipation of approaching cataclysmic changes (cf Ezek. xxxviii., seq.), and the need for a New Covenant (cf. Jer. xxxi.). The Galilaean Jesus of Nazareth, with uniquely height ened conceptions of God and of the individual is in the line of the great prophets. He demands a higher type of "righteousness," and a new life (cf., the "new" heart and spirit of Ezek. xviii. 31) ; not ceremonial rectitude, but social ethical conduct (cf., already Mic. vi. 8). As at an earlier inauguration of new conditions (§ 12) the individual's worth and his responsibilities are alike increased; there is a yoke, but it is easy (Matt. xi. 3o, cf., Deut. xxx. 11-14). Instead of a divinely-chosen Israel, or Davidic dynasty, or Aaronite priesthood, it is the individual who is sought after, as a lost sheep or coin. A new group-idea is formed ; it is not that of a Jewish nation or church, or an inner Israelite circle or fellowship, but a Christian body or body of Christ. The real group is based (as with the prophets, § 6 end), not on its recog nised members, but on Christ and what he demands of those that would be his, or—even unconsciously—do his will. The individual is the atom, but Jesus is "the individual," an ideal representative of humanity.
The old Israelite ideology finds its further development, espe cially the Deutero-Isaiah. Jesus is the Servant (cf. § 14), the Messiah, with a kingdom, though he is not a king. He is "Son of Man" (i.e., a man) ; the title once applied expressively to Ezekiel the priest-prophet, watchman, representative and inter mediary, later gains a deeper significance when used as a term of comparison for a glorified people of God, an Israel the possessor of a universal and everlasting kingdom (Dan. vii. 13) . Again, in place of this ideal Israel, the Son of Man becomes, in the book of Enoch, a pre-existent Messiah, the vicegerent of the Almighty. Israel, as Yahweh's people, had had its representative king or priest, or prophet, or its Michael; but Israel was also the inter mediary between God and the world. From the religious idealism of the Old Testament we pass to Christ as the representative and intermediary, and to the Christian body corresponding to the Israel of old.
Jesus and Paul share the uncompromising thoroughness and the iconoclasm of the great prophets. The old claims, doctrines and dogmas become secondary, e.g., the descent from Abraham and all it entailed (cf., John the Baptist, Matt. iii. 9). Israel pos sessed no natural or inherited claims; for God had no favourites, absolute freedom of choice was his. A new doctrine of evolution was virtually introduced; Jewish branches are lopped off and the Gentiles grafted on, yet there is a real continuity. But the Gen tiles must not boast for, like the prophets before him, Paul can not conceive an ultimate separation of God and Israel; and, in a remarkable conception of Destiny, sees the ultimate "salvation" of Israel (Rom. xi. 26). The reign of Christ will lead up to the establishment of God's kingdom (I Cor. xv. 24) ; like the Law in its day and the present enmity of the Jews, all are part of a majestic world-process, as it had been in the day when He let Israel go into exile.
22. The End.—The Messiah came and went. It was the end of a complete cycle, from the beginning of sin to the act of re demption, from Death to Life, from the First Adam to the Second. But the end of one cycle was the beginning of another; and now there is much more that awaits "fulfilment," and a new finale before the end of things. Thus, there will be an anti-Christ, the embodiment of all evil, or a Dragon (in Rev. xiii., the late Hebraized form of an old myth), and there will be a false Mes siah, a false God (2 Thess. ii. cf. Matt. xxiv. 5, I 23 either stark evil or the more subtle evil of what looks like Re ligion but is its worst enemy. There is a perplexing and mutually inconsistent medley of ideas in early Christianity, due partly to the earlier experience of conflicts, and to earlier reflection upon world history, and partly the world of thought in which the new sect was reflecting upon the significance of Jesus.
Of peculiar value is the book of Revelation (see APOCALYPSE) where, with its traces of old Babylonian, Persian and other ele ments, the old Hebrew religion may be said to come to an end. The unique type of experience which characterizes the best Semites has here produced a final conception of world history which looks back to the Creation (Gen. i.) and forward to a New Heaven and Earth—the influence of the Deutero-Isaiah is perspicuous (see Rev. xxi. 1-8). All history is contained within Yahweh, who is First and Last (Is. xliv. 6), or within God, who is Alpha and Omega (Rev. i. 8, xxi. 6; said of Christ in i. 17, xxii. 13). So the Jewish-Christians feel themselves one with all that has gone before, and the unity and continuity of which they are conscious covers a remarkable development of ideas of God and man, yet a development so natural that there is a "fulfilment" far more impressive than the rather mechanical and artificial examples of "fulfilment" which the less sensitive and more prosaic minds sought and found, comparing the history of Israel with Jesus of Nazareth, a rather mechanical process which tended to obscure the fact that the close of one age was the be ginning of another with another process of development. All the great stages in the development of religion in Palestine are part of the larger field of history and religion in which Palestine was involved. With the sweeping changes in South-west Asia during the eighth and following centuries a new type of religion was in troduced, which broke with the old national religions and nature cults. Whatever be the cause, from China to Greece there was "a maximum in the tides of religion" a "simultaneity in progress and decline comparable to geological epochs of upheaval and subsidence" (G. F. Moore, op. cit. pp. vi.–ix.). The Hebrew prophets make the difference between an old and dying Egypto Semitic world and the developments under Persian, Greek and Roman rule. The most significant period extends from Jeremiah to Jesus, or rather from Amos to Paul. The essential religion of Israel broke away from the old Hebrew, and was thereby pre served, and, as the curve proceeds, Judaism flies off at a tangent and uses the Old Testament in its own characteristic way (see MIDRASH, TALMUD). Yet when Judaism had first canonised the Pentateuch with its most diverse sources, and later fixed the canon of the whole of the Old Testament with all its extraordinary range of interest, it established a working rather than a systematic synthesis; it manifested an insight not less precious than that of the Western Christian Church when it determined to retain the Apocalypse, and so enabled the western mind to gain the profoundest conceptions of the nature of religious development and human progress.