"Sing ye to Jehovah, for He hath triumphed gloriously;

The horse and his rider hath He thrown into the sea.

Whatever be the meaning of this passage-whether it implies that Miriam took the verse first as a solo, and the band of maidens repeated it after her, or merely that the prophetess led off the song, the use of a refrain to embody the intention of the whole poem is plainly shown.

Of the ceremonies in which we can see the propriety of introducing songs so constructed as to allow a great number of people to combine their voices at marked intervals or as feeling dictated, the first to claim our notice is the funeral. A marked feature of Oriental mourning is its studied publicity, and, amid the various ways in which this was gained was the employment of hired mourners, to lament over the corpse and "go about the streets" (Eccles. xii. 5; 2 Chron. XXXV. 25). Some of the sad burdens have been preserved. They may sometimes have been very short, mere interjections and cries of woe (Amos v. 16). In such as these the friends or even the passers-by could join (Job xxvii. 15; 1 Kings xiv. 13; Jer. xxii. 18). How effective must such outbursts of feeling have been when they were controlled and directed by poetical genius like that of David! The burden of the "Lament over Saul and Jonathan" is woven with consummate skill into the texture of the poem. Immediately after the opening line, it bursts out as if with irrepressible feeling—

"The beauty of the forest, O Israel, is slain upon thy heights: How are the mighty fallen !”

It is then silent for two short strophes, which speak of the bravery and renown of the dead, and appeal to the daughters of Israel to weep for the monarch whose favours they had so often received. They respond to the appeal by raising again their short sad wail, the poet taking their lament as the starting-point of a new “lyrie cry”—a tribute of affectionate sorrow over the loved friend and brother Jonathan. This has hardly died away, when once more the loud lament rises from the chorus, and the elegy abruptly ends

"How are the mighty fallen,

And the weapons of war perished!'

In the more formal and stately ceremonies of religion, the processional chants, festival hymns, or dedication odes, a more regular employment of the refrain was practised. These public services were directed by a leader of the choir, who acted as the coryphæus, or conductor. The names of several of those who had charge of the musical performances in David's reign have been preserved (1 Chron. xxv. 1—7).

Without conductors the performance of an elaborately constructed dramatic ode like Ps. xxiv. would have been impossible. In like manner the improvements of orchestral performances doubtless reacted upon the poets. It is in the compositions which may without

doubt be assigned to this period that we see evidence of a wish to secure a regular arrangement of similar or equal strophes. The most beautiful of these, constructed with a refrain, belong, however, to later times. In these the burden has assumed its proper place, the close of the strophe, where the chorus naturally joins in with its confirmation or repetition of the verses just sung. In some of the hymns which, by their allusions, are shown to have been composed for the service of the Temple, and which would not have been perfect had not room been made for the voices of all the assembled worshippers, the prevailing arrangement is into three strophes. What determined the preference for this number does not appear, but the influence of the custom adopted in the Temple songs is plainly visible in poetical compositions of another kind.2 The most perfect examples are given by Ps. xlvi., xlviii. The burden in each of these has evidently dropped out from the close of the first strophe. In the former the refrain consists of a couplet, in which the parallelism is of the progressive kind. In the latter, one line, which is varied in the last recurrence, forms the chorus. Ps. xlvi. has been arranged by Ewald in strophes of four couplets each.

I.-God a refuge in storm and tempest. "God is our refuge and strength,

A very present help in trouble;

Therefore will we not fear though the earth do quake,
Though the mountains totter in the midst of the sea,
Though the waters thereof rage and swell,

And though the mountains shake at the tempest of the

same.

Jehovah, Lord of Hosts, is with us;

The God of Jacob is our tower of strength.

II.-As the stream of Siloam, so hath been His presence to the besieged. "There is a stream the waters whereof make glad the city of God,

The holy places of the tabernacle of the Most High,
God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved;
God will help her, the morning draweth nigh:
The nations raged, the kingdoms were moved;
At the sound of His thunder the earth melteth.
Jehovah, Lord of Hosts, is with us;

The God of Jacob is our tower of strength.

III. His wonders in destroying the Assyrians. "Come hither and behold the work of Jehovah, What wonders He hath wrought upon the earth! He maketh wars to cease in all the world, He breaketh the bow and knappeth the spear in sunder, and burneth the chariots in the fire,

Be still, then, and know that I am God:

I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be cxalted in the earth.

Jehovah, Lord of Hosts, is with us;

The God of Jacob is our tower of strength."

Ps. xlv. affords an example of another kind. It seems to be a royal marriage song, composed to celebrate the entrance of a bridal procession into the palace. The strophes are of unequal length, and the refrain, which varies on every occasion of its recurrence, is introduced by the word therefore. "With the spiritual insight of the Hebrew poets, who saw the Divine element underlying all human joy and woe, the Psalmist cannot

look on the king's justice in the judgment-seat, his prowess in the battle, or even on his personal beauty and the happiness of the present hour, but as blessings sent from God, and as proof of the king's union with the Divine ruler of the world." What an emphasis was given to this faith by the uplifted voices of the chorus, chanting in unison

"Therefore doth God bless thee for ever!"

"Why art thou so heavy, O my soul,

And why art thou so disquieted within me?

O put thy trust in God, for I will yet give Him thanks, Which is the help of my countenance and my God." Ps. lvii. offers another good example. It belongs also to the Captivity, and expresses the hope of restoration, which was the only earthly consolation left to the Israelites at that time. This hope forms the burden at the end of each of the two strophes into which the

without end."

For the longer Temple hymns a standard form of chorus was used, occupying in the old worship much the same place as that taken by the Gloria Patri in the services of the Christian Church. It is repeatedly referred to in the historical books (1 Chron. xvi. 34; 2 Chron. v. 13; vii. 3; Ezra iii. 11; Jer. xxxiii. 11), and is woven into four psalms (cvi., evii., exviii., cxxxvi.). In Ps. exxxvi. it is repeated after every verse, an arrangement imitated in the "Song of the Three Children.” In Ps. cvi. and cvii. this form occurs only as a prelude, being joined in the latter with another couplet, which is introduced in a new and striking manner into each strophe, so as to complete it, although it does not form the concluding verse.

From the services of the sanctuary and occasions of public rejoicing, the refrain passed into general poetic use to give prominence to the poet's leading feeling or idea. In compositions of a mournful kind a more plaintive tone is given by this arrangement. The refrain recurs with the same effect as in the elegies for the dead. Ps. xlix., xlii.-xliii. (these two are evidently one composition) are beautiful specimens. The latter is in three equal strophes, each one closed with the words on which the Psalmist, evidently an exile, tries to support his drooping courage by reciting his trust in God.

"Set up Thyself, O God, above the heavens,
And Thy glory above all the earth."

In a still later psalm (lxxx.) the refrain, which consists of a pathetic appeal to God for mercy and restoration

and

"Turn Thee again, Thou God of Hosts;

Look down from heaven, behold and visit this vine." The prophets made a striking use of the refrain. It gave an awful solemnity and force to the woes which fell from their lips, tolled forth like nature's funeral knell; and it served too the prophetic aim, which was to create a succession of vivid images, all bearing on the same moral truth and pointing to the same end. The the value of the refrain to preserve this unity, and Book of Isaiah affords some magnificent instances of bring back the attention to the dominant thought. In chapters ix. and x. there is a fine ode of regular strophes, with this chorus four times repeated.'

"For all this His anger is not turned away,
But His hand is stretched out still."

Other instances will be found in chapters ii., xlv., li.
1 Chap. v. 25 would seem also to have formed part of the same
prophecy.

CHAPTER V.

THE RISE OF THE MACCABEES.

T no period in their history did the Chosen People, and the holy religion they professed, appear so near to extermination. But as the darkest hour always precedes the dawn, so it was at this crisis in their fortunes that the Divine Providence interposed, and by the patriotism, valour, and self-devotion of a single family, raised the nation from its condition of prostrate misery to a height of power that excelled the days of David and Solomon. There was living at this time at Modin, a town situated on an eminence between Jerusalem and Joppa, a priest of the course of Joarib,' named Mattathias. He was himself advanced in years, but his sons were in

1 The first of the twenty-four courses, 1 Chron. xxiv. 7.

the prime of life, and were five in number, Johanan, Simon, Judas, Eleazar, and Jonathan.

The persecution of Antiochus Epiphanes had already roused his utmost indignation, when a royal commissioner, named Apelles, came to Modin, and required the people to offer idolatrous sacrifice. The old man not only declared his own resolution to live and die in the faith of his fathers, but when a Jew approached an altar, which the commissioner had erected, to renounce his faith, struck him down, and then, aided by his sons and the inhabitants of the town, slew Apelles himself, and tore down the altar. Thus the first blow was struck for national freedom, and many of his countrymen rallied round the aged priest, who now fled with his sons to the mountains of Judæa, B.C. 168. Here their number rapidly increased, but a large

21 Macc. ii. 15-29.

force having been sent against them by the Phrygian Governor of Jerusalem, they suffered a serious check, and upwards of a thousand were slain. The attack was made on the Sabbath-day, and Mattathias saw that the patriot forces would be rooted "out of the earth," if he did not sanction defensive warfare on that day.

Accordingly this relaxation of an over-scrupulous observance was made, and the war was continued with signal success. Their ranks recruited by zealous adherents of the law, the forces of Mattathias lay hid for a time in their mountain retreats, and thence poured down upon the towns, destroying the heathen altars, and punishing all apostates who fell into their hands. But Mattathias was old and grey-headed. He was unfitted for the fatigue of active service, and having exhorted his followers to constancy and devotion, and delegated the command of his little army to Judas, his third son, died B.C. 166, and "was buried in the sepulchre of his fathers at Modin."

Though young in years when called to lead the war of independence, Judas was at once prudent and discreet. He had already distinguished himself as a leader, and now being called to the chief command, he devoted himself to the task of uniting for common action all who were zealous for the national faith. "By night attacks, by sudden surprises, he taught his people how to conquer. Alert of foot and quick of brain, yesterday in the mountains, to-day in the plain; now marching on a fort, now storming a castle; in a few months of service he changed his rabble of zealots into an army of solid troops, capable of meeting and repelling the royal hosts commanded by generals trained in the Macedonian school of arms."3

He first unfurled the banner of the MACCABEES. The origin of the name is uncertain. Some derive

it from the combination of the initial letters of the Hebrew sentence, Mi Camo Car Baalim, Jehovah, i.e., Who is like unto Thee among the gods, Jehovah ?^ Others would derive it from the banner of the tribe of Dan, which is said to have been inscribed with the three last letters of the names Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. More probably it was a personal appellation of Judas himself, meaning the Hammer, just as Charles Martel derived his name from his favourite weapon.5

Whatever may have been the precise meaning of the term, the Syrian chiefs soon felt the weight of the arm of the new general. Apollonius marched against him, but was signally defeated and slain. Seron, deputy-governor of Cole-Syria, bent on avenging the disaster, attacked him at Bethhoron with a large force, but only to be repulsed as disastrously as the Canaanites before Joshua on the same battle-field. Stung to the quick by the news of this double defeat, Antiochus Epiphanes, while himself undertaking an expedition against Persia in the hope of recruiting his im

598

poverished exchequer, entrusted the command of the Palestinian provinces to Lysias, one of his nobles, with instructions to destroy utterly and "root out the strength of Israel and the remnant of Jerusalem.” Eager to carry out his orders, Lysias dispatched upwards of 48,000 troops into Judæa under the command of Gorgias and Nicanor. But Judas was not daunted. After keeping a solemn fast at Mizpeh,' and making a public confession of the national sins, the Jewish leader fell upon the Syrians at Emmaus, and attacking them by night defeated them with great slaughter. In the following year Lysias himself marched to meet him at the head of 60,000 infantry and 5,000 cavalry. The battle took place at Bethsura or Bethzur,1o and again, the Maccabæan chief, though at the head of a far inferior force, gained a decisive advantage."

9912

Mortified and disgraced, Lysias now withdrew to Antioch, and Judas was enabled to enter Jerusalem, and occupy the whole of it except "the Tower." A sad scene of desolation met his eyes when he once more set foot in the precincts of the Holy Temple. The gates. were destroyed, the priests' chambers were in ruins, shrubs grew in the courts as in a forest, as on one of the mountains; the sanctuary itself was empty and exposed to the eyes of all. Judas at once cleared the sacred enclosure, removed the altar to Zeus Xenios, which had replaced the brazen altar of burnt-offering, restored the priests, rekindled the sacred flame, and exactly three years after its profanation by Apollonius, celebrated the re-dedication of the Temple on the 25th of the winter month Chisleu, B.C. 165.

CHAPTER VI.

JUDAS MACCABÆUS.

THE year succeeding the re-dedication of the Temple was spent in border wars, and Judas carried his victorious arms into the territory of the Idumæans and Ammonites, while his brother Simon fought many battles in Galilee, chased the Syrians to the gates of Ptolemais, and recovered many Jewish captives.14 Meantime Joseph and Azarias, who had been left in Judæa, in direct violation of orders they had received, had attacked Jamnia, a seaport, but had been signally defeated by Bacchides, the most skilful of all the Syrian generals. Judas avenged the defeat, but not without considerable loss, and, removing all the Jews beyond the Jordan, confined the boundaries of his kingdom to the more defensible ground of Judæa.1

Meanwhile Antiochus Epiphanes, the terrible oppressor of the Jews, had passed away. Struck with an incurable disorder, while engaged in an expedition against the rich temple of Nanea, at Elymais, he died at the

"

4 Exod. xv. 11. and the "Malleus

1 Mace. iii. 10-12. 7 1 Macc. iii. 13-21; Josh. x. 10, 11.

Hæreticorum" of the Middle Ages.

12 1 Macc. vi. 18, 19.

villlage of Tabæ, near Mount Zagros, on the road to Babylon, B.C. 164. Before his death he had appointed his foster-brother, Philip, regent of Syria, and guardian of his son Antiochus V. But Lysias, who was himself of the blood royal, no sooner heard of his death, than he assumed the reins of government as guardian of Antiochus Eupator, and the son of the deceased king. His first act was to invade Judæa, and, having captured Bethzur, laid siege to Jerusalem. But the stronghold of Zion resisted all his efforts. Attack after attack was made in vain, and Lysias hearing that Philip had been appointed regent, and had succeeded in capturing Antioch, hastily concluded a treaty with the Jews, guaranteeing to them the use of their own laws, and full liberty of worship, and returned to Syria, while Judas was recognised as governor of Palestine, B.C. 163.

Shortly afterwards Lysias fell into the hands of Demetrius, the lineal heir to the throne of Antioch, who had escaped from Rome, and landed at Tyre.1 The accession of the new king brought with it fresh troubles to the Jews. Lysias had conferred the priesthood on ono Jakin, or Joachin, of the stock of Aaron, but not of the pontifical family. The new high priest assumed 'the Grecian name of Alcimus, and proved a zealous adherent of the Hellenising faction.3

In him Demetrius saw a fitting instrument for sowing discord amongst the Maccabean patriots. He confirmed him in his new dignity, and sent him, accompanied by Bacchides, to claim his sacerdotal rights. With a large force the two appeared before Jerusalem, and the zealots for the law, attracted by the title of high priest, admitted Alcimus within the walls. But no sooner had the high priest got his enemies into his power, than he basely murdered sixty of them, while Bacchides also resorted to cruel severities. So long as the Syrian general was by his side, Alcimus was able to assert his authority. But no sooner had Bacchides withdrawn his troops, than Judas quickly regained his old influence, and succeeded in compelling the high priest to fly to Antioch.

By dint, however, of large bribes, he succeeded in inducing Demetrius to assist him in recovering his authority, and Nicanor was sent with a large army into Judæa. Taught by past experience to respect his dreaded adversary, Nicanor at first tried to get the Maccabæan chief into his power by treachery. Failing in this, he attacked him first at Caphar-Salama, and afterwards at Adasa, about thirty stadia from the glorious field of Bethhoron. In both engagements he was utterly defeated, and in the last fell himself amongst the slain, B.C. 161. This signal victory restored peace for a short time to the Jewish patriots, and Judas resolved to improve the interval by concluding a treaty with the Romans, of whose fame he had heard much. But before the ambassadors he had sent to the great capital of the West could return, the Syrian

king had sent Bacchides, with the entire force of his realm, into Palestine to avenge his recent defeat.

Never was Judas in more perilous circumstances. His attempted alliance with the Romans had alienated the more extreme Jewish party from him. Conse. quently he was able to bring but a small force into the field, and of these a considerable number deserted him on the eve of battle. With eight hundred men, however, he ventured to attack the Syrians at Elusa, not far from Ashdod, and actually succeeded in discomfiting one wing of the enemy's army. But the odds against him were desperate, and the Lion of Judah fell, fighting bravely, at this Jewish Thermopyla. His body was recovered by his brother, and buried in the ancestral tomb at Modin, B.C. 161.5

CHAPTER VII.

JONATHAN MACCARÆUS.

THE death of Judas was a sad blow to the aspirations of the Jewish patriots. The Syrians were everywhere triumphant, Alcimus was reinstated in the priesthood, and Bacchides wreaked a terrible vengeance on the followers of the Maccabæan party.

At length the patriot forces rallied, and offered the command to Jonathan, surnamed Apphus (the wary), the youngest of the sons of Mattathias. In view of their present circumstances, the new leader did not venture on maintaining himself in the open country, and retired to the lowlands of the Jordan, and the wilderness of Tekoa, where the Syrian general in vain attempted to surprise and capture him. Thence he crossed the Jordan, and employed himself in carrying a guerilla war, while Bacchides strengthened his garrison in the Acra at Jerusalem, and the fortifications of several important towns in Judæa. Before long, however, Alcimus died B.C. 160, and the Syrian general, losing the active support of the Hellenising party, returned to Antioch.

on

Thereupon Jonathan quitted his hiding-place, and reappeared in Judæa, and for two years was left unmolested by his foes, who had by this time been forbidden by the Roman senate to molest their new allies. But the Hellenising faction opposed the reforms of the Maccabean chief, and Bacchides was invited to return and crush him. Bacchides came, but was feebly supported. His successes were insignificant, and at length, wearying of a campaign which brought him no glory, he acceded to terms which Jonathan offered. and promised to abstain from invading the land again. Jonathan was now formally recognised as deputy governor of Judæa, and establishing himself at Michmash, gradually extended his power over the country, though Jerusalem and many of the stronger towns were still held by garrisons of Syrians or apostate Jews.8

Before long, however, a revolution took place in Syria, which produced a marked change in his fortunes.