صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

good-will; mutual greetings were exchanged; friends and relations sought each other out, and associated themselves for the journey, and all faces beamed with joy. "It is time to set out," said some of the elders to the judge of Hebron:" already has the priest asked the watchman on the temple, Does it begin to be light towards Hebron ?" The priests and elders led the procession; the people followed, and the slaves with the camels were placed in the midst of them, the Levites had distributed themselves with their instruments among the multitude, and as they set forward they sung this psalm:

[ocr errors]

How am I glad when they say unto me,

I will go up to the house of Jehovah!

My foot hath stood already in thy gates, O Jerusalem!
Jerusalem, thou beautifully built;

Chief city, where all unite together!

Thither do the tribes go up,

The tribes of Jehovah to the festival of remembrance,

To praise the name of Jehovah.

There are the thrones of judgment,
The thrones of the house of David.
Pray for the peace of Jerusalem;
May they prosper that love thee!
Peace be in thy walls,

Prosperity in thy palaces!

For my brethren and companions' sake,

I wish thee peace!

For the sake of the temple of our God,

I bless thee with good.-Ps. cxxii.

It is impossible to conceive of the soul-felt exultation with which this psalm was sung, and of its effect on old and young. Now the voices rose, like the notes of the mounting lark, on the summit of the hills, now sunk again in the depths of the valleys. How differently did it operate now upon the heart of Helon, and when he sung it before to his solitary harp on his roof in Alexandria! How did he bless the memory of Samuel, who had given his schools of the prophets the harp and the flute ;* and of David, who, bred up among them, did not forget them even when seated on his throne,† but appointed Levites for the cultivation of music; and himself often laid down his sceptre, to assume the harp. It was on such a pilgrimage, with such accompaniments, that the sublimity and force of the psalms, and the

*1 Sam. x. 5,; xix. 20.

† 2 Chron. vii. 6.

superiority of Jewish poetry, made itself fully

felt.

Helon was astonished at the effect which they had upon himself and all around him. The youths and maidens bounded for joy, and tears of pleasure stood in the eyes of the aged. Those who were going up for the first time to the festival looked and listened to those who had already been there, as if to hear from them an explanation of the full meaning of what they sung. The old heard in these festive acclamations the echo of their own youthful joys, and while their hearts swelled with the remembrance of the feelings of their earliest pilgrimage, they beat yet higher with gratitude to Jehovah, who had permitted them, in their grey hairs, to behold such glorious days for Israel, the Syrian tyranny overthrown, and Hyrcanus seated on the throne.

Sublime are the acclamations of a people freed from a foreign yoke! But here was more. It was the fraternal union of a whole people, in the holiest bond of a common faith, going up to appear before the altar of Jehovah,

and to commemorate the wonders of love and mercy which he had manifested towards their forefathers. They seemed a band of brothers. "In Alexandria," said Helon, "Jew is against Jew, and family against family—but here is one holy people, loving each other as the children of one Israel, joint heirs of one great and blessed name." Every one had bidden adieu to the occupations and the anxieties of ordinary life. They had come to give thanks and to pray, and no sounds but those of thankfulness and prayer were heard among them. The hostilities and alienations produced by self-love and the collision of interests appeared to have been left at home, and the general joy dispersed every melancholy feeling which an individual might have been disposed to indulge. On these pilgrimages they seemed as free from care as the people of old, when, rescued from Egyptian bondage, they were fed by manna from heaven, on their way to the land that flowed with milk and honey. Jehovah had promised to protect the whole country, so that no enemy should invade its borders, while

the people went up, thrice in every year, to appear before him*-how much more confidently might each father of a family intrust his own household to his protection! Nothing was more remarkable than that the aged and the weakly were able to bear this journey of thirtysix sabbath-days' journies, over hill and dale, without complaining of fatigue. It seemed as if the strong had given to the weaker a portion of their own vigour; or rather, as if Jehovah himself had strengthened the feeble knees for this journey. They expressed these sentiments, by singing, immediately after the former, the following psalm :

I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills
From which my help cometh.
My help cometh from Jehovah,

The Maker of heaven and earth.

He will not suffer thy foot to be moved;

He that keepeth thee will not slumber,

He that keepeth Israel neither slumbereth nor sleepeth.
Jehovah is thy guardian,

Thy shade upon thy right hand :

The sun shall not smite thee by day,

*Exod. xxxiv. 23.

« السابقةمتابعة »