aziah's blood revenge for his father is punctiliously limited to the murderers themselves, and in the succeeding verse, with no provocation stated, "he slew of Edom in the Valley of Salt ten thousand" (II K. 14:5-7).

We have seen that in the books of Kings we have a conception of God's control of all nations built upon the thought of the pre-exilic writing prophets. As in their conception, Yahweh is not now a God who fights with His own people against another nation supported by its own god, but the one God who brings either victory or defeat upon His own special people according as their obedience or disloyalty may deserve. His one concern is for them to obey His requirements as given in Deuteronomy, with emphasis on the demand for worship at Jerusalem alone. Other nations serve as means of reward or punishment, but do not count for anything in themselves.

D FRAMEWORK OF JUDGES

We have previously discussed the sections of Judges that are akin to the J and E documents, so we shall now need to glance at only the deuteronomistic framework in which these earlier writings were set. It was probably during the exile that writers with religious conceptions similar to those of the author of Kings retouched all the earlier historical writings. Except in Deuteronomy itself, their work is most prominent in Judges. The D writer carries out more completely E's idea of the people's apostasy and oppressions and the nation-wide significance of the judges. The spontaneity and individualism and vivid coloring of the heroic deeds of that rough age are here lost in the impression of an inevitably recurring cycle of national experience. The people worship other gods and provoke Yahweh to anger; for punishment, He sells them into the hands of some enemy nation; for a definite period they are oppressed by this conqueror; then Yahweh answers Israel's cry for help by raising up a "judge" who delivers the whole people and then "judges" them as a sort of theocratic deputy; under his good influence, they serve Yahweh again, but with his death a new cycle begins with apostasy from His worship. (Cf. 2:11-12,

14-15, 18-19; 3:7-15; 4:1-4; 6:1-6; 8: 276-28, 33-35; 13:1; 15: 20.)

During the period treated in Judges, there was of course no central sanctuary, Jerusalem being still in the hands of the Jebusites, so the deuteronomists could not here bring out Yahweh's requirement of centralized worship, but in other respects the idea of Yahweh is like that found in Kings.

DEUTERO-ISAIAH

One of the Jewish exiles in Babylon, a poet of deep religious sensitiveness, became assured that Yahweh's hand was directing the movements of Cyrus, in order to free His people from captivity, and he summoned his fellow-captives to joyous preparation for the deliverance that would soon be wrought for them. Though this man, in certain of his poems, uttered one of the most unusual and challenging messages ever given to mankind, his work was not preserved under his own name, but became attached to the book of Isaiah, as chapters 40 to 55, and is commonly referred to as Deutero-Isaiah.

Besides making a unique contribution, which will be treated later, Deutero-Isaiah conserves and develops further many of the ideas of former prophets.

Yahweh's creative power and present omnipotence in nature, though not a new idea, is here the theme of such majestic passages that the reader realizes in a fresh way His absolute control (40:12; 42: 5; 44: 24; 45: 7, 12, 18). In comparison with Him, men are as insignificant as grasshoppers (40: 22-24), and the nations that think themselves so great are like "a drop of a bucket" or "the small dust of the balance"-"less than nothing, and vanity" (40: 15-17). Chariots and armies are "quenched as a wick" (43: 17).

These considerations support the constantly repeated claim that Yahweh is the only God in the universe, the everlasting God, the One who has had foreknowledge of everything from the beginning, who has ordered the cosmos entirely alone, "the first and the last" (e.g., 40: 28; 43: 10-11; 44: 6-8; 46: 9-10). He alone can "make peace, and create evil" (45:7). It is

ridiculous to think of an idol as anything but a piece of lifeless wood or stone, utterly futile and senseless (40:19-20; 41: 7, 21-24, 29; 42: 8, 17; 44: 9-11; 45: 20; 46: 1, 5-7).

As Deutero-Isaiah thus carries to their furthest limit the monotheistic ideas of some of his predecessors, so also he deals with his second ancient theme, Yahweh's special relation to Israel, with a beauty and thorough-going consistency hardly matched by any other writer.

Yahweh is not only the Creator of heaven and earth-He is in a very intimate way "the Holy One of Israel" (e.g., 41: 14, 20; 43: 3, 14; 54: 5), or even "the King of Jacob" (41: 21; cf. 43:15; 44:6). He has in a special way created or "formed" Israel (e.g., 43: 1; 44: 2, 21).

Yahweh is a God who punishes His people's iniquity, even in fierce anger (42: 24-25; 43: 27-28), but afterwards He pardons and restores-and it is almost solely the latter phase of the divine attitude that this prophet of the exile longs to portray to his disheartened countrymen. "I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins: return unto me, for I have redeemed thee" (44: 22). "For a small moment have I forsaken thee; but with great mercies will I gather thee. In overflowing wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment; but with everlasting lovingkindness will I have mercy on thee, saith Jehovah thy Redeemer" (54:7-8). (Cf. 40: 2; 43: 24b25; 51: 17-23; 55: 6-7.) The Redeemer of His people-this is Yahweh's most prominent rôle (e.g., 41: 14; 43: 1, 14; 44: 6, 22-24).

Being all-powerful, Yahweh is absolutely free to choose whatever instrument He will to carry out His purposes. To redeem Israel, He has called Cyrus, and endowed him with power to subdue the nations. "I have raised him up in righteousness, and I will make straight all his ways: he shall build my city, and he shall let my exiles go free" (45: 13; cf. 41: 2, 25; 44: 28; 45:1-4; 46: 10-11; 48: 14-15).

Yahweh's marvelous care for His people, His constant regard for their need, His miraculous preparations for their safe return to their land and His promise of food and drink and protection all the way, are celebrated in unforgettable passages throughout these poems. (Cf. 40:27; 41:17; 42:16; 43: 1-2, 5-7, 20; 44: 3-5; 46: 3-4; 48: 17-21; 49: 8-13; 51: 1-3, 16; 52: 12, 55:1-5,

12-13.) His love finds expression occasionally in words of even deeper tenderness. "Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, these may forget, yet will not I forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands" (49: 15-16a; cf. 54: 10; 40: 11).

The combined ideas of Yahweh's power and His love for Israel lead sometimes to an exaltation of the might that will be used on her behalf. "Jehovah will go forth as a mighty man; he will stir up his zeal like a man of war: he will cry, yea, he will shout aloud; he will do mightily against his enemies" (42: 13; cf. 40: 10; 51:9).

The conception of the discomfiture of Israel's enemies, so necessary a part, evidently, of the thought of restoration, appears occasionally even in Deutero-Isaiah. "They that war against thee shall be as nothing" (cf. 41: 11-12, 15). The Redeemer and Holy One of Israel will take vengeance upon Babylon for merciless oppression of His people, temporarily given over into her hand (ch. 47; cf. 49: 25-26; 51: 22-23). Elsewhere, Israel is magnified at the expense of other nations in general, rather than just Babylon. Other peoples will be given as a ransom for Israel's life (43: 3-4); the Egyptians, Ethiopians, and Sabeans will come in chains as suppliants, recognizing that God is in Israel only-while Israel herself "shall be saved by Jehovah with an everlasting salvation" (45: 14-17); she will be brought back to her land by the nations, kings and queens licking the dust of her feet (49:22-23). After Zion's restoration, "no weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper" (54: 15-17).

Such ideas as these might be matched by passages from many other exilic and post-exilic writings, and if they represented Deutero-Isaiah's dominant thought, we should not accord him any place of peculiar importance. The use of Yahweh's great power for the exaltation of His chosen people is an old story; this prophet's unique contribution is a conception really contradictory to the one just discussed, a new solution of the problem created by Yahweh's universal power but special love.

According to this new conception, Yahweh purposes that righteousness and salvation shall reach the very ends of the earth (45:8; 51: 4-7). He has, indeed, chosen Israel as His beloved, but as a "servant"-not merely for Israel's own sake,

but rather to be the means of giving the true religion to all the nations, near and far, that they may know and worship Yahweh (49:6; cf. 45: 22-23). Israel's mission is to "bring forth justice [or a universal moral religion] to the Gentiles,' (42:1-4); to be "a light of the Gentiles, to open the blind eyes, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison-house" (42: 6-7). In the longest of the "servant poems," 52: 13 to 53: 12, the other nations are represented as actually recognizing and accepting the salvation mediated to them through Israel.

Yet, remarkable as is this thought of Israel's mission to the whole world, the method of its accomplishment is even more astonishing. Israel's suffering is to bring the salvation of the nations! The servant's quiet suffering and non-resistance are portrayed in a number of passages. "He will not cry, nor lift up his voice, nor cause it to be heard in the street" (42:2). "He was despised, and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief" (53: 3a). "He was oppressed, yet when he was afflicted he opened not his mouth; as a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth" (53:7). At last the other nations realize in amazement that this one whom they thought to be smitten by God as a punishment has in fact been suffering for their sake. "Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows; he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed" (53: 4-5; cf, vss. 6, 10, 12). Such an unprecedented method will prove effectual! The nations will be won by vicarious suffering: "He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by the knowledge of himself shall my righteous servant justify many; and he shall bear their iniquities" (53:11).

Here, then, is a new principle of life. The suffering of a nation, instead of being avenged by force, is to be borne without resistance and used-used as a means of redeeming even the nations that have caused the suffering. Yahweh has purposed this (53:10)-it is His method of bringing the nations to know Him. The "suffering servant poems" offer on the one hand a new explanation of suffering-on the other hand, and more im