The Creation of God - Jacob Hartmann (readict TXT) 📗

the triumph and the glory they had enjoyed, and the decline of this people with its pride and pomp to a passing away. He had ample material to supply his imagination; he therefore dreamed, sang praises, saw visions, hoping for something to turn up, miraculous or otherwise, to save the remnant of his nation. He cannot be compared to the two strong, rough miracle-mongers of Israel, Elijah and Elisha, that had lived over a century before him.

This idealistic dreamer had not the slightest knowledge of coming events, of what was to happen seven hundred years later. The minds of men had slowly undergone changes.

The rigidity of the Mosaic laws had undergone some modification, and some change in interpretation as to the meaning of the many commands and usages. With every battle and with every invasion new notions, new customs, were introduced. The transition was surely laying the foundation for various schools, which was inevitable as the intelligence and education progressed.

After Isaiah Jeremiah comes, as a natural result of the age. Manasseh, king of Judah, had been carried captive to Babylon, and restored to power 677 B.C. Ammon and Josiah follow. The latter is killed, and his successor, Jehoahaz king of Judah, is deposed and carried to Egypt 609. Three years later Nebuchadnezzar conquers Jerusalem. Jehoiachin reigns three months, and he is carried off captive to Babylon, besides three thousand of the principal persons of dignity, and among these was Ezekiel (598 B.C.). Zedekiah was appointed king. He was the uncle of Jehoiachin, twenty-one years of age when he began his reign; a bad one it was, and he suffered for it. And he was the last of the kings of Judah. In 588 B.C. Jerusalem was captured and destroyed, the Temple burnt; the sons and friends of Zedekiah were slain; Zedekiah’s eyes were put out, and he was bound and taken to Babylon.

Jeremiah had spoken a good many truths, and given them ample warnings what would happen. He met with a great deal of opposition—was thrown into prison and made to suffer for his boldness. His exhortations and his appeals availed nothing.

The heads of the high priests and those of the rulers were cut off. The destruction was complete.

Jeremiah wrote fifty-two chapters, and Christian interpreters managed to find two places in this entire writing that indicated Christ’s kingdom:

Chapter xxiii, verse 5; “Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous branch, and a king shall reign and prosper and shall execute justice and judgment in the earth”—meaning, Christ shall rule and save them.

Chapter xxxi, verse 22: “How long wilt thou go about, O thou backsliding daughter? for the Lord hath created a new thing in the earth. A woman shall compass a man”—meaning, Christ is promised.

These are the only two spots whence any possible allusion can be drawn.

This man is unlike the visionary, romantic dreamer Isaiah, whose imagination and nervous exaltation kept him more or less in a state of excitability and carried him into regions of dreamland where his hopes and wishes were planted. Jeremiah writes up the historical occurrences; passes judgment on his own people and on the nations his people had to struggle with, bewailing their corruption, wickedness, wretchedness, misery. He never dreams of Christ or Christianity, nor does he in any part allude to Christ. He also, like Isaiah, wrote and acted in accordance with the times he lived in. He was a steadfast friend to his disciple Baruch. His lamentations describing the miserable state of Jerusalem, bewailing its calamities, are perfectly human, and perfectly natural for a patriot and a poet of his time.

Ezekiel was in Chaldea among the captives about 590 B.C. This man is also largely endowed with a prolific imagination; he is a visionary man. He adopts a new method of talking; when the word of the Lord comes to him, “Son of Man” is the manner in which he is addressed. Jeremiah uses the expression, “Sayeth the Lord,” or “the word to Jeremiah from the Lord saying”——Isaiah uses, “Thus saith the Lord.”

Ezekiel wrote forty-eight chapters. The following are interpreted to mean Christ:

Chapter xxxiv, verse 20: “Therefore thus saith the Lord God unto them: Behold I, even I, will judge between the fat cattle and between the lean cattle”—meaning, the kingdom of Christ.

Chapter xxxvi, verse 25: “Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you; and ye shall be clean; from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you”—meaning, the blessings of Christ’s kingdom.

Chapter xxxvii, verse 20: “And the sticks whereon thou writest shall be in thine hand before their eyes”—meaning, the promises of Christ’s kingdom.

The political methods of governing nations which had their origin in the ages of barbarism, ignorance, and brutality, left the rotten remnants to construct upon them a system of rules for the guidance of the masses, to control, subjugate, and restrain their mental faculties, the development and advancement of their understanding, and to perpetuate the suppression of their higher intellectual powers.

The beliefs in a God with the inferior natural human functions were handed down to us through many centuries, undergoing transitions and changes to suit the occasions, circumstances, and times.

The toning down of the Hebrew God is in the first instance mainly due to the beneficent influences of the heathen, as they were then called. The educational facilities the Jews enjoyed during their captivity were of a better and higher order, and how much of the entire book called scripture is due to these opportunities afforded them we shall never know. History teaches us, however, that Ezra, when Cyrus was king of Persia, 457 B.C., was permitted to go to Jerusalem to collect what manuscripts and data he could find, and he is credited to have written the Chronicles 453 B.C. How many more books or parts were written and compiled by Ezra and his companions will remain a mystery.

The work of resuscitating the nation—to recover its former importance, to reëstablish some of its former glory—was attempted seventy years later, under Cyrus, who granted the Jews the privilege to return and rebuild the Temple.

They were prompted to do this out of pure motives of patriotism, and it can be regarded only as a struggle to continue to exist as a portion of a historic people. The Levites were instrumental in bringing about their return. The tribes were those belonging to the kingdom of Judah.

At this time an opposition temple and an opposition religion was established by the people of Samaria, a mixture of Cutheans and Israelites. The rivalry and hatred towards each other was as intense as the hatred and bitter factional fight had been between the Ten Tribes and the two tribes Israel and Judah.

Affairs did not succeed well. There were quarrels, wrangles, application to higher authorities to arbitrate and decide their differences and disputes. New kings, new powers, came for conquest and plunder. New leaders, new governors, deceit, treachery, rebellion, assassination, mark these centuries under Assyrians, Persians, Greeks, and Romans, until 63 B.C., when Judea was made a Roman province. Meantime new sects had organized under different names, each one giving its interpretation as to the signification of the laws contained in the books that were handed down to them. From the multiplicity of opinions, sects, factions, and fanaticisms, the already modified ideas were about to undergo a farther transition, that helped to inaugurate what might well be termed a reformation.

While this nation was crumbling to pieces other nations had advanced in civilization, in art, science, and literature, that never claimed to have done anything under the influence of a Jehova, or any symbol representing him. These nations—Greeks, Romans, Persians—seemed to have succeeded better with mythological gods than the Jews with theirs. They had laws to govern them, which required neither smoke nor thunder to make them. Man, plain man, made them. Some were surrounded with mysterious ceremonies, symbols; others were not. Lycurgus reforms the constitution of Sparta 884 B.C. Carpets are made for tents about this time. The art of sculpture rises in Egypt. Buddha’s religion is introduced into India, and an attempt is made to discover the primitive language of mankind by Psameticus; and, what is of considerable importance, children are being educated in the Grecian language and manners 660 B.C.

These facts are mentioned to show that nations that were not hampered with the Jehovistic religion, that had no miracles, wonders, or arks, were more advanced in the national sciences, had made farther progress in the general civilization of mankind, than the Hebrews. The electricity of amber was discovered by Thales, and he also taught the spherical form of the earth as the true cause of lunar eclipses, 640 B.C. Schools of learning flourished in many places. Authors appeared whose writings are classic to this day—Sappho, Alcæus, Æsop, Pittachus. Solon’s legislation in Athens superseded the laws of Draco.

It was not the Mosaic God that made these people intelligent, gave them their understanding. Their enlightenment was due simply to the natural processes of the great nervous centers, independent of all supernatural interference.

The school of statuary was opened at Athens by Depoenus and Scyllis. Comedies were enacted on a cart by Susarian and Dolon. Dials were invented by Anaximander, etc. Learning is encouraged at Athens, and a public library is founded. All this and much more occurs about 540 B.C.

Persia, too, is rapidly spreading its empire; growing powerful; progressing in wealth, commerce, and learning. Zoroaster founds his philosophy, without bloodshed, rapine, or murder.

Rome is in a nourishing condition; takes its first census 565 B.C.—811,700 citizens—spreading its empire.

We must ever bear in mind that all these nations were called heathen, and their methods of belief are looked upon by Christian teachers as much inferior to their own.

Confucius, the Chinese philosopher, is not inferior in his morality to any of the moralists of the age in which he lived, 522 B.C. And we may safely say he is equal even to the morals of to-day. Manners, methods, and fashions change, but certain principles remain.

We can examine the pages of the history of other human races and compare them with the Jews, God’s own chosen race, his own people, and the heathen takes the prize in every branch of science, art, and the progress of civilization. The Hebrews for many, many centuries, with their blind infatuation with the supernatural, their constant superstitious practices of their ceremonial, their senseless devotion to an imaginary piece of extravagance, were so steeped in stupidity and ignorance that they had neither time nor inclination to observe and examine nature and its workings, so remained slaves to their preposterous practices.

Republics become fashionable. Corinth starts with her republican form of government 582 B.C., and Rome follows in abolishing a regal government and establishing a republic 509 B.C.

The Carthaginians make a voyage to Great Britain for tin, etc.

Sophocles, Plato, Socrates, Aristophanes, and a host of renowned men rise to teach the world how to think, how to speak. Philosophy, medicine, morality, poetry, history, comedy, tragedy, arts, and science had a firm hold on the public mind. A degree of refinement both in manner and in conduct prevailed among all classes.

It was about this time that Ezra and his companions were compiling—rather collecting—fragments for composing the book of Chronicles. Other books may have been compiled or written.

Nehemiah followed Ezra. He rebuilt and repeopled Jerusalem. For all that, nothing good of a permanent character was accomplished.

Time goes on, centuries accumulate; intelligence, experience, and a higher grade of civilization appear. Nations grow more powerful. The struggle for supremacy continues, and Judah, like a shuttlecock, is thrown about from nation to nation, now under one dominion and now under another.

Religious opinions, however, are forming. They are hostile, bitter, inimical towards one another; accompanied with all the hatred, jealousy,