punishment. Yea, more; that grand feature of the divine administration by means of rewards and punishments is not modified by the introduction of the mediation of Christ. Sin is no less an evil now, than it was under the law. The destruction that it will bring upon the guilty will be no less terrible, than under any former dispensation. On the contrary, now under the gospel, the certainty and the dreadful nature of the ruin that sin will bring upon the guilty are far more impressive than they were before Christ came.

National punishment is as clearly an element of the divine administration as personal retribution. The Scriptures teach that such is the case. National prosperity and

happiness are promised to those who are virtuous; while wicked nations are threatened with severe calamities. All faithful histories contain indubitable proofs, that God is constantly pouring out blessing and cursing upon nations, according to their moral character.

National punishments differ essentially from personal retributions. The nation is treated very much as if it were but one person. The citizens are considered as members of one body. In pouring out the calamity, Providence makes but little if any distinction between the innocent and the guilty. Sinners of all grades, as well as those who are not old enough to be sinners, are involved indiscriminately. In this respect therefore, the punishment of the Canaanites did not differ from all other national punishments. It is not necessary for the settlement of the question now discussed, to enter into the exposition of the wisdom and justice of national punishments. Whatever obscurity may rest on these dispensations of Providence, whatever objection may be raised against them, concern no more the Canaanitish wars, so called, than all other national punishments. If the Canaanites alone of all wicked nations were punished, it might be difficult to account for such a peculiarity. But there is no singularity in the dispensation now under review. It is in perfect conformity with the stated administration of Providence.

The guilty cannot reasonably object against the manner in which the rightful authority may choose to punish him, provided there is nothing in the punishment unbefitting, or disproportionate to the crime. As to the Canaan

ites, it was obviously of no consequence whether they were slain with the sword, or consumed with fire, as their brethren, the inhabitants of the cities of the plain, were punished centuries before.

The manner in which the Canaanites were punished can be objected against, if objected to at all, only in its bearing upon the instruments of the punishment and upon other nations. Then the question is, which method of punishment is to be preferred, whether to be punished directly by God, or indirectly through agents, i. e. whether it was better that God should punish by means of angels, or the powers of nature, such as the plague, famine, or earthquake, or by the hands of men? It is of no special importance that we should settle this question. For national punishments do not wear a uniform type. The inquiry concerns any other public calamity sent by God, as much as the one now under consideration.

Still we know that had God been pleased to punish the Canaanites in the days of Joshua as he did the Sodomites in the days of Abraham, no believer in the Bible would have felt any perplexity in regard to it. But had they been so punished, without a series of the most astonishing miracles the country would have been destroyed, or rendered uninhabitable for an unknown period.

God might have slain the Canaanites as he did the firstborn in Egypt. But it would be impossible, we think, to show that it would, as to moral influence, have been better that these guilty men should have been slain by angels than by men.

Nor can we conceive that any thing would be gained by employing the pestilence, in the room of the instruments that were chosen. The Deity has, in multitudes of instances, employed such an agent; but in a greater number of cases he has used foreign nations. It would be particularly unadvisable that some deadly malady should have been employed in the instance now before us. This would exceedingly discourage the Israelites. For, when the spies, years before, reported that the land of promise was an evil land--a land that killed its inhabitants, the people refused to obey the plain command of Jehovah. Were the inhabitants of the land all carried away by some fatal sickness, they would have more reason to believe than formerly, that the climate was exceed

ingly unhealthy, and the second rebellion might be worse than the first.

Still this mode of punishment may be objected to on the ground that it would exert a deteriorating moral influence over the instruments of it. There can be no doubt that war degrades and brutalizes those who carry it on. A nation has more reason to fear its own disbanded army, who have chased the invading foe beyond the boundary, than it had to dread the enemy in the firmest array. The military camp is second to none, as a school of corruption. Now since God led the Israelites into the land of Canaan for the express purpose that they might learn his ways, why should he at the outset conduct them through a course of discipline so unfriendly to such an end?

This objection is founded on the supposition that the destruction of the Canaanites was literally a war. But we have seen that such was not the case. It remains yet to be proved that, to be witnesses of, or instruments in the infliction of divine wrath upon the guilty, is prejudicial to good morals. If the influence is as the objection supposes, we do irreparable injury to those men whom we appoint to execute our laws; for in the prosecution of their duty it is necessary for them to use violence.

According to the principles of human nature, the destruction of the Canaanites ought to have the most beneficial influence on the Israelites. They were made most thoroughly acquainted with the miserable end of their predecessors in the land of promise, and were given distinctly to understand that it was not through some unaccountable fatality they came to such an end; but their miseries were the direct and inevitable result of sin. All along they were charged to remember that if they disobeyed the laws of God, they would most certainly bring upon themselves like punishments.

This service in which the Deity employed the Israelites was eminently fitted to teach them to trust in him. How mighty they were when God was on their side! What were the gods of the Egyptians or of the Amorites on either side of Jordan, to be compared with their God? What advantage could they promise to themselves by exchanging him for an idol? Numerous enemies might af ter this rise up against them. But the remembrance of the walls of Jericho, and of that amazing day, when in

the words of Jazer, "the sun and the moon stood still," would defend them from all fear.

The knowledge that their arms were clothed with such terrible efficiency would dispose the neighboring nations to live at peace with them, and thus occasions for war would be cut off.

There was nothing in the discipline through which the Deity was conducting the Hebrews, to cause them to become intoxicated with their success, and induce them to become a warlike nation, greedy of conquest. They were taught never to venture on any warlike undertaking without special command. For in all those instances in which they did venture on their own responsibility, they were cut down by their enemies. They were taught that all their strength and all their success depended on their strict obedience.

D.

ARTICLE IV.

THE BOOK OF ESTHER.

Translated chiefly from the German of Hävernick.

BY THE EDITOR.

1. TITLE AND CONTENTS OF THE BOOK, AND ITS RELATIVE POSITION IN THE SACRED CANON.

THE book contains a detailed account of the destruction which threatened the Jews in Persia under the reign of Xerxes, and of their deliverance through the active cooperation of Esther, a Jewess, who was exalted to be the wife of the king, and Mordecai, her kinsman and fosterfather. From the name of its principal hero, the book is commonly called ESTHER. With the Jews it is entitled, by way of eminence, Megillah, the roll-probably because, at an early period, the book was written on a separate roll to be used in the synagogue on the feast of Purim.* More seldom occurs in manuscripts the title Megillah Ahashverosh.

* Comp. Hottinger, Thes. Phil., p. 494. Carpzov, p. 351.

According to the Jewish division of the Hagiographa, the book belongs to the five Megilloth; and it commonly stands after the book of Ecclesiastes,* with reference to the order in which the Megilloth were read in the synagogues. But its position varies in different manuscripts, and hence also in the earlier editions of the Bible.† The place in the sacred canon assigned to it by Christians is much more arbitrary. This arises in part from the apocryphal additions joined with it in the Septuagint; hence it is often put with the Apocrypha. In the Vulgate it stands after Tobit and Judith, with reference to a chronological arrangement. Luther assigns to it its proper place, after Nehemiah.

2. HISTORY OF THE BOOK. OBJECTIONS TO IT ARISING FROM ITS HISTORICAL CHARACTER AND CONTENTS.

The book of Esther has always been held in the highest estimation among the Jews. Its legend-like history had a special charm for the Jews of Egypt, and their imaginative genius gave to it many additions and embellishments. More than one attempt to enlarge and adorn the book was made by them-perhaps to give importance to the feast of Purim, which was early introduced among them. This is demonstrated by the different recensions of the additions to the book of Esther, in the Apocr pha. Perhaps the material for these inventions already existed as historical memoranda among the Jews of Palestine, and was obtained from them by the Jews of Alexandria. It is certain that they found great currency with the former. So Josephus testifies (Ant. XI, 6, 1 seq.): the same appears from the Aramæan monuments of the Jews, both of earlier and later times. The tractate Megillah in the Talmud, as well as many other eulogiums upon the book, some greatly exaggerated, and proceeding from the worst of religious motives-show in what veneration it is held by the modern Jews. Their admiration of the book

* See Elias Levita. Pref. in 1. Masoreth Hammasoreth, p. 19.

+ Carpzov, p. 352.

Comp. Eichhorn, Einl. in die Apokryphen s. 501 seq.

To these the subscription of the book in the LXX doubtless refers. Dositheus, there spoken of, seems to be no other than the heresiarch, who plays so important a part in the Alexandrino-Samaritan traditions and the fabulous stories of the church-fathers. See Mosheim, Inst. Hist. Christ. Maj. s. I. p. 376 seq.

Comp. Pfeiffer, Thesaur. Hermeneut. p. 597 seq. They assigned to the book the same rank with the Pentateuch *** The feast of Purim was the favorite feast of the Jews, etc.