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CHAPTER VI.

Isaiah is by far the most unintelligible of all the greater prophets. There is such a confusion of persons and tenses, and such a total want of connexion between consecutive sentences, in the same chapter, that it is impossible in many, very many instances, to divine his meaning. I will refer the reader to a few. In the last verse of his Eth chapter, he 66 says: They (meaning the wizzards, or those who advised to consult them, no one can tell which,) shall look upon the earth, and behold trouble and darkness, dimness of anguish; and they shall be driven to darkness; nevertheless, (continues the 9th chapter,) the dimness shall not be such as it was in her vexation, when, at the first, he lightly afflicted the land of Zebulon and the land of Napthali, and afterwards did more greviously afflict her by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, in Galilee of the nations."

Next verse. "The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light, they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon these the light hath shined." Any connexion between this and the preceding?

But we will go to the next verse.

"Thou hast multiplied the nation, (what nation?) and not increased the joy: they joy before thee according to the joy in harvest, (what, not increased the joy, and yet they rejoicing like the husbandman in harvest! they must have been very happy before they were increased,) and as men rejoice when they divide the spoil." Any connexion between this and the previous verse? Again, the next verse: "For thou hast broken the yoke of his burden, (the school boy would ask, here, for the antecedent of this pronoun his,) and the staff of his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, as in the day of Midian." What burden? what staff? what oppressor? and what connexion between a man, the burden of whose yoke has been broken, and the nation, whose joy has not been increased? Again, the next verse: "For every battle of the warrior is with confused noise and garments rolled in blood; but this shall be with burning and fuel of fire.” because, the burden of his yoke, the staff of his shoulder, the pressor, have been broken, there is to be a terrible battle. battle to be fought? between whom, and for what cause?

verse'

For, that is, rod of his opWhere is this

Again, the next

"For unto us a child is born; unto us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulders, and his name shall be called wonderful, counsellor, the mighty God, the everlasting father, the prince of peace." For,

that is, because, there was to be a most terrible battle, with burning and fuel of fire, a son was born, to be called, among other great Hebrew names, the prince of peace.

Now, I ask any honest man, if he can discover the least connexion whatever between these verses? Is it not evident, that some editor or compiler picked up scraps here and there, and, as the printers say, threw them into pi. Strange as it may seem, in this great obscurity, your doctors have discovered a future Christ, a saviour, a son of God, and God himself. I shall speak more particularly hereafter of this son, barely remarking, at this time, that he was the same son, or child, that is spoken of as to be born in the 7th chapter, the account of whose birth is given in the 8th; whose father was Isaiah himself, and whose mother was the prophetess, Isaiah's wife; that us means Isaiah and his wife; that he gave this boy some very extravagant or significant names, as he tells us he was wont to give such to all his children: "I and my children are for signs and for wonders;" that these names are not more wonderful than hundreds of other Hebrew names, such as Elias, signifying God the Lord, or the strong Lord; Eliphalet, God of deliverance; Elisha, salvation of God; Abimael, a father sent from God; Absalom, father of peace, and the like; and, finally, that the translators put these names, that Isaiah chose to give his boy, into English, in order to astonish the credulous and sluggish, and make them yield the point, that here was a God foretold, but which, had they, like other Hebrew names in the bible, been left in the original, would have excited no wonder at all. As a still further proof of this pi operation, many chapters of Isaiah and Jeremiah are historical, and some of them are exact copies of some of the chapters found in the historical books. Some of Jeremiah's chapters are biographical sketches of himself, written in the third person. The same verses are also found in different books of the prophecies.

A conclusive proof that Kings and Chronicles must, at least, have been edited, if not written by the same person, or if by two, at the same time, is, that each refers to the other. I could refer to a book already written, but the author of the supposed book could not refer to mine, which was not written.

I must pay more than a passing notice to the finding of the book of the law in the rubbish of the temple, by one of Josiah's scribes, which, we are told, had been lost for at least four or five hundred years. Josiah, and the whole nation of the Jews, were wholly ignorant of its contents; of course, there had been no book of the law for this great length of time among the Jews. It follows, also, that they never had but one. That a book which, we are asked to believe, was the very foundation of their national polity and religion, should have been lost, and nothing said about its loss in all

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their previous history, is too wonderful to believe. That a people should have had but one copy of such book, is also past belief.

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A majority of our people are fully persuaded, that, in the time of the Judges and Kings, the bible, just as we now have it, was read to the Jews in their synagogues every Sabbath day. If they will reflect but a moment, they will become convinced, that a great part of the bible could not possibly have been written at that early period. They should also be aware, that synagogues are not once mentioned in the old testament. These small temples, in which the law was taught, were first erected during the interval of five hundred years. The inner court of the temple was the only place at which a Jew was permitted to worship. Nehemiah, in his 8th chapter, says, that Ezra, and the other priests, caused the people to understand the book, by reading it to them every Sabbath day. No such practice of teaching existed before the captivity. They were made to understand the law; consequently, they were ignorant of it before. They were also told, by Nehemiah and Ezra, that the first day of the seventh month was holy unto the Lord, and that they must not weep nor mourn. "For all the people wept when they heard the words of the law." From all this it appears that these Jews, the whole body of them, knew nothing of one of their great feasts, until taught out of Ezra's book. Nehemiah expressly tells us, that the feast of tabernacles was wholly unknown to all these Jews, and had not been kept from the time of Joshua. How did Nehemiah know that it was kept in Joshua's day?

If there had been a written history of the Jews, from the time of Moses, till the restoration; such a history as Nehemiah intimates there was, in which this feast and the reason of its institution were found; or if they had had the law of Moses as we now find it; it is impossible to believe that this feast would have been discontinued for a single year: for, the same reasons that induced the Jews to hold this feast in Nehemiah's time, would have been in continual operation. The conclusion is, that no such history or law had existed among the Jews. This feast must have been instituted then viz, in the days of Nehemiah. How could he have

known, I repeat, that this feast of tabernacles was held in Joshua's time?
He must have learned it either from a written history or tradition. If there
were either, then, as before argued, this feast could not have been discon-
tinued for a single year.
The same argument applies to the assertion of
the author or authors of Kings and Chronicles, that such a passover as
Josiah's had not been held since the days of the Judges. Truth cannot
exist amidst such confusion.

It is fair to presume, that, if Nehemiah had given us an account of the assembling of the people on the fourteenth day of the first month, he would

have told us, that heand Ezra in formed the chiefs of the fathers, the priests, and the Levites, and all the people, by reading, from the law, that that day was the feast of the passover; for there is no more reason why they should have forgotten one than the other. Both are found in the same chapter, in the pentateuch, and are said to have been instituted at the same time by Moses. Here is another strong argument that your feast of the passover was not uninterrupted. But I ask, if it be not wonderful, and past belief, that all the Jews, except Ezra and Nehemiah, should have totally forgotten any one of their great feasts during the seventy years captivity? Jeremiah, it is said, was corresponding with them. Daniel was with them during the whole term; for, it is said, he lived till the restoration. Many old men returned who had seen the first temple. Can it be believed, that all these fathers had forgotten their great feasts? If the people of these United States were to be taken captive over the rocky mountains, and kept there for seventy years; would those, who were but little boys when taken, forget the fourth of July, or what is called Sunday? No one can believe it, for a moment. The case supposed is in point. That a lone individual might, if taken when a child, and not suffered to hold any communication with any other individual of his nation, forget its institutions, I think is very probable; but that a whole people, who were suffered to hold, and did hold, communications with each other after their captivity, many of whom became dignitaries in the greatest empire of the globe, and one of their females an empress the capitol of which empire was not more than one or two hundred miles from their own-should all but two forget their great feasts in the course of seventy years, is beyond belief.

The period that elapsed between the return of the Jews, under Zerobabel, and the birth of Christ, is remarkable for the following particulars in reference to the Jews:

First. The introduction of what is called synagogue worship on the Sabbath day.

Second. The division of this people into many bitter and opposing sects, two of which are mentioned by the writers of the new testament, viz: the Sadducees and Pharisees. The latter embraced a new doctrine not taught by any Jew before the captivity. I allude to the resurrection of the dead. You would make the people believe, that Christ was the first who taught this notion to his countrymen, when you know that his biographers expressly state, that there were Pharisees in Judea, when he commenced his ministry, and that they believed in the existence of Angels, and Spirits, and the resurrection of the dead. Now, of thesetwo sects, you must confess, that the Sadducees must have been the one that followed what are said to be the institutions of Moses. These are denounced, by your own great

apostle, as carnal ordinances, and imperfect, because they did not teach this great Pharasaical or christian doctrine. The question then naturally arises, where, or from what source, the Pharisees derived this doctrine? Certainly not from these carnal institutions of Moses. Did God reveal it to any leading Pharisee? If so, who was he? when and where was this revelation made? This fact would have been as worthy of record as the appearance of God to Moses. But we have no such record. As they could not have derived it from the writings attributed to Moses, nor from those of the prophets; and as there is no pretence that it was directly revealed to any one of them, some one must have originated the notion, or they must have obtained it from the heathen philosophers. My promise is not to go out of the book to show its falsity; but I must be permitted to state, here, what every body believes: that the heathen philosophers, long before Christ, taught the immortality of the soul. I will further add, that there never existed a people, except the Jews, with whose history I am acquainted, that did not have some notion of a future existence, and who did not make it a principal item in their religious creed. I pronounce it proved, beyond cavil, that Christ was not the first to declare this doctrine to his countrymen.

Third. During this interval, the practice obtained of converting simple historical narrations, the mad ravings of some infuriated partisan, and snatches of old songs, into prophecies of some wonderful chief, who was to arise and govern the Jews, and conquer their enemies.

Fourth. During this period the Romans conquered Canaan, and made it one of their dependencies. At the birth of Christ, the king of the Jews was a descendant of Esau, the proscribed; so the scepter had departed from Judah, and gone over to a descendant of his abused uncle, before your Shiloh came. Herod, to whom I allude, was not an independent prince, but held his crown at the will of the Roman emperor.

That some of the Jews, while in captivity, might have anticipated, or rather hoped for, a restoration, is highly probable. That they might have corresponded on this subject, so important and interesting to them, and even written songs about it, is equally probable. That some bungler, after the restoration, collected extracts from these letters and songs, threw them into pi, and inserted it in a book, bearing the name of Isaiah, thus making him the author of what was written at least a century after his death, is aimost certain. Every honest man, after a careful perusal of the writings of those called prophets, must be convinced, that all their songs were in reference to the restoration, which took place under Zerobabel and others. No gentleman will contend that these writers looked beyond their then approaching restoration, to another captivity and another restoration. It

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