On

modelled his own, and from which he adapted and imitated without reserve. It is difficult to say in these cases whether the imitation is direct, or whether each of the similar Community of Prophetic passages was taken from a common source. Writings. either hypothesis, however, the result is the same as to the community of the prophetic literature. Thus Amos1 refers back to Joel, Hosea 2 to some unknown Prophet, Isaiah3 to Micah, Obadiah, and Jonah to each other or to some unknown Prophet.4

In the New Testament the same practice still to a certain extent continued. The Second Epistle of S. Peter and S. Jude either borrow from each other or from a common source. This usage illustrates, and in some degree explains, the corresponding phenomenon of the first three Gospels. The best key to the difficulties of the Apocalypse is to be found by tracking back to their sources the numerous images and passages which it has taken from the older Prophets. And the principle finds its highest exemplification and sanction in the appropriation of the existing traditions of the Rabbinical schools, as well as the texture of the ancient Prophetic writings, by Christ Himself.

These are some of the most striking characteristics of the outward appearance of this vast institution. Even in the dry enumeration of facts which I have just made, it is impossible not to see its importance to the fortunes of the Jewish Church, and thence to the world at large.

Importance

The very name is expressive of its great design. If the derivation of the word, as given above from Gesenius, be correct-the boiling or bubbling over' of the Diof the Office. vine Fountain of inspiration within the soul-we can hardly imagine a phrase more expressive of the truth which it conveys. It is a word which, like many others in the Bible, is a host of imagery and doctrine in itself. In the most signal

instances of the sites chosen for the Grecian Oracles, we find that they were marked by the rushing forth of a living spring from the recesses of the native rocks of Greece, the Castalian spring at Delphi, the rushing stream of the Hercyna at Lebedea. It was felt that nothing could so well symbolise the Divine voice speaking from the mysterious abysses of the unseen world, as those inarticulate but lively ebullitions of the life-giving element from its unknown mysterious sources. Such a figure was even more significant in the remoter East. The prophetic utterances were indeed the bubbling, teeming springs of life in those hard primitive rocks, in those dry parched levels. 'My heart,' to use the phrase of the Psalmist in the original language,' 'is bursting, bubbling over with a ' good matter.' This is the very image which would be drawn from the abundant crystal fountains which all along the valley of the Jordan pour forth their full-grown streams, scattering fertility and verdure as they flow over the rough ground. And this is the exact likeness of the springs of Prophetic wisdom and foresight, containing in themselves and their accomplishments the fulness of the stream which was to roll on and fertilise the ages. Even in the other great class of languages— the Indo-Germanic-the same figure appears, and may fairly be taken to illustrate the Eastern metaphor. Ghost-Geistthe moving, inspiring spirit,2—is the same as the heaving, fermenting yeast, the boiling, steaming Geyser. The prophetic gift was to the Jewish Church exactly what these combined metaphors imply; the fermenting, the living element which made the dead mass move and heave, and cast out far and wide a life beyond itself.

The existence of such an institution in the midst of an Eastern nation, even if we knew nothing of its teaching, must be regarded as a rare guarantee for liberty, for progress, for protection against many a falsehood. Even of the modern Dervishes, with all their drawbacks, it has been said, that 'without them no man would be safe. They are the chief

' Ps. xlv. I.

? See this well brought out by Prof. Max

Müller (Lectures on the Science of Language, 2nd ed. p. 386)..

'people in the East, who keep in the recollection of Oriental 'despots that there are ties between heaven and earth. They restrain the tyrant in his oppression of his subjects; they are 'consulted by courts and by the councillors of state in times of emergency; they are, in fact, the great benefactors of the 'human race in the East.' 1

Such, in relation to the mere brute power of the kings of Judah and Israel, were the Jewish Prophets,-constant, vigilant watch-dogs2 on every kind of abuse and crime, even in the highest ranks, by virtue of that universal, and at the same time elevated position, which I have described. But they were much more than this. A great philosophical writer of our own time, Mr. John Stuart Mill,3 has thus set forth the position of the Hebrew Prophets :

'The Egyptian hierarchy, the paternal despotism of China, 'were very fit instruments for carrying those nations up to the 'point of civilisation which they attained. But having reached 'that point, they were brought to a permanent halt, for want of 'mental liberty and individuality,-requisites of improvement 'which the institutions that had carried them thus far entirely 'incapacitated them from acquiring; and as the institutions 'did not break down and give place to others, further improve'ment stopped. In contrast with these nations, let us consider 'the example of an opposite character, afforded by another 'and a comparatively insignificant Oriental people—The Jews. 'They, too, had an absolute monarchy and a hierarchy. These 'did for them what was done for other Oriental races by their 'institutions-subdued them to industry and order, and gave 'them a national life. But neither their kings nor their priests 'ever obtained, as in those other countries, the exclusive 'moulding of their character. Their religion gave existence to 'an inestimably precious unorganised institution, the Order (if 'it may be so termed) of Prophets. Under the protection, 'generally though not always effectual, of their sacred character, 'the Prophets were a power in the nation, often more than a ' match for kings and priests, and kept up, in that little corner 2 Isa. lvi. 10. 3 Representative Government, 41, 42.

'Dr. Wolff's Travels.

'of the earth, the antagonism of influences which is the only 'real security for continued progress. Religion consequently was not there--what it has been in so many other places—a 'consecration of all that was once established—and a barrier ' against further improvement. The remark of a distinguished 'Hebrew, that the Prophets were in Church and State the equivalent of the modern liberty of the press, gives a just but 'not an adequate conception of the part fulfilled in national ' and universal history by this great element of Jewish life; by 'means of which, the canon of inspiration never being 'complete, the persons most eminent in genius and moral 'feeling could not only denounce and reprobate, with the 'direct authority of the Almighty, whatever appeared to them deserving of such treatment, but could give forth better and 'higher interpretations of the national religion, which thence'forth became part of the religion. Accordingly, whoever can 'divest himself of the habit of reading the Bible as if it was one 'book, which until lately was equally inveterate in Christians 'and in unbelievers, sees with admiration the vast interval 'between the morality and religion of the Pentateuch, or even 'of the historical books, and the morality and religion of the 'Prophecies, a distance as wide as between these last and the 'Gospels. Conditions more favourable to progress could not 'easily exist; accordingly, the Jews, instead of being stationary, 'like other Asiatics, were, next to the Greeks, the most pro'gressive people of antiquity, and jointly with them, have 'been the starting-point and main propelling agency of modern 'cultivation.'

In what way this grand result was produced, not merely by their office, but by their teaching, and in what that teaching consisted,-how it is that this prophetic element, pervading the whole literature of the Hebrew nation, that is, the whole Bible, renders it the storehouse of instruction to the clergy and the teachers of all ages, and at the same time the one inestimable Book, dear to all true lovers of human progress and religious freedom, to be studied, understood, and reverenced, through good report and evil,-will be the subject of the concluding Lecture.

IN the foregoing Lecture the Biblical enumeration of the Prophets alone has been alluded to. But it may be well to add briefly the enumerations in the Jewish, Mussulman, and Early Christian traditions.

I. In the Jewish Canon the Prophetical Books are thus given :— 1. Joshua. 2. Judges. 3. The Books of Samuel. 4. The Books of Kings. 5. The three greater Prophets (not Daniel, or Lamentations). 6. The twelve minor Prophets.

1

In the Rabbinical traditions 1 there are reckoned 48 Prophets and 7 Prophetesses.

IO.

The 48 Prophets :- 1. Abraham. 2. Isaac.2 3. Jacob. 4. Moses. 5. Aaron. 6. Joshua. 7. Phinehas. 8. Elkanah. 9. Eli. Samuel. II. Gad. 12. Nathan. 13. David. 14. Solomon. 15. Iddo. 16. Micaiah. 17. Obadiah. 18. Ahijah. 19. Jehu. 20. Azariah. 21. Jahaziel (2 Chr. xx. 14). 22. Eleazar. All these were in the days of Jehoshaphat. And in the days of Jeroboam, son of Joash, 23. Hosea. 24. Amos. In the days of Jotham, 25. Micah. In the days of Amaziah, 26. Amoz (Isaiah's father). 27. Elijah, 28. Elisha. 29. Jonah. 30. Isaiah, In the days of Manasseh, 31. Joel. 32. Nahum. 33. Habakkuk. In the days of Josiah, 34. Zephaniah. 35. Jeremiah. In the Captivity, 36. Uriah. 37. Ezekiel. 38. Daniel. In the second year of Darius, 39. Baruch. 40. Neriah. 41. Seraih. 42. Maaseiah (Jer. li. 59). 43. Haggai. 44. Zechariah. 45. Malachi 46. Mordecai. In this list, by some Shemaiah (2 Chr. xi. 2; xii. 15) is substituted for Daniel, and some add, 47. Hanameel, and 48. Shallum (Jer. xxxii. 7). The 7 Prophetesses:-1. Sarah. 2. Miriam. 3. Deborah. 4. Hannah. 5. Abigail. 6. Huldah. 7. Esther?

II. The Mussulman authorities 3 reckon from Adam to Mohammed 124,000 Prophets, of whom 40,000 were Gentiles and 40,000 Israelites; of these, however, only 314 or 315 possess supernatural illumination or 'apostleship.' Of these again 25 are

'Given, from the Seder Olam, by Fabricius, Codex Pseudepigraphus V. T., 896-901.

2 Those names which vary from the Biblical enumeration are in italics.

3 Jelaladdín, 281.