041. I. The Prophet And His Surroundings
I THE PROPHET AND HIS SURROUNDINGS
During the closing years of Hezekiah’s life, whether they were two or ten, the prophetic party led by Isaiah appears to have had undisputed control in Judah. They carried through a reform of public worship the extent of which cannot be certainly determined. The remedy most in favor for the existing evils of worship and of government seems to have been a centralization, as far as possible, of all authorized activity at Jerusalem. Be that as it may, not long after Manasseh ascended the throne there was a reaction, supported by the king himself, in favor of the earlier freedom of worship, with all the objectionable practices which Isaiah had condemned. We can only conjecture the cause of this reaction. Isaiah had probably passed away; the hopes which his glowing promises had excited may have been too definite and literal, or the prophetic reforms may have been too precipitate and sweeping. At all events, a bitter and bloody persecution of the prophets and their adherents was sanctioned. Possibly Micah 6:9 to Micah 7:6 reflects this melancholy period. The years of quiet isolation that followed were fruitful years for prophecy. Heroic men (2 Kings 21:10 ff.) who proclaimed the judgment of God upon such ruthless wickedness were not wanting; but the greater number of the men of God used their enforced seclusion as a time for arranging and copying the valued sermons of the earlier prophets, for putting into practical and most effective form the precepts of national and social life which had been handed down from Moses, for tracing out and editing the records of the nation’s history, and, especially, for reflecting upon and reformulating the principles of the divine government over men. Thus, when another opportunity came, they were ready to grapple with Judah’s spiritual problems from a broader point of view. The utterances of Zephaniah, Jeremiah, and Habakkuk, are the fruitage of this half-century of thinking. The reigns of Manasseh and his son Amon lasted about fifty years. They were vassals of Assyria, and, with one slight exception, entirely submissive. Manasseh even introduced the star worship of Nineveh, and made it popular. In 639 B. C., Amon’s little son, Josiah, was placed on the throne by a revolution, the exact reason for which is not clear. Whatever its cause, it gave the prophetic party renewed recognition. The little king came under the influence of the prophets, and was educated into sympathy with them.
Close to the king at this time was Zephaniah, himself a relative through his direct descent from Hezekiah. His royal birth, however, did not prevent his unsparing condemnation of the share of the princes of the blood in the nation’s degeneracy. Like his favorite author, Isaiah, he was a clear-eyed citizen of Jerusalem, referring repeatedly to its different quarters, its types, and its perils. Though but little older than the young king, Zephaniah’s earnest, thoughtful face must have inspired those who knew him with confidence in his zeal and wisdom. His prophecies show that he was an eager student of the writings of Isaiah, although the altered circumstances of his age gave his thoughts a different form.
It was about the fourteenth year of King Josiah’s reign, in 625 B. C., that Zephaniah was impelled to give his powerful support in public addresses to the reforms which Josiah was aiming to carry through. He complains that the nobles and other leaders are still maintaining all the abuses of the past, so that even the professed believers in Jehovah are becoming skeptical of any success in bringing about reform. Such a state of affairs was in itself a trumpet-call of God to the truly prophetic soul, yet such a one would delay to utter his message until he could see an indication of God’s preparation for his work.
Just as the prophets of the eighth century saw in the Assyrian the scourge of God, so Zephaniah beheld some unnamed “guests” (Zephaniah 1:7) preparing to partake of Jehovah’s sacrificial banquet It is generally agreed that he had in mind the Scythians, a people like the Tartars, who, according to Herodotus, broke out from the northern mountains like a storm-cloud, and ravaged all Western Asia as far as Egypt. Since they made their way, about 626 B.C., to the very border of Egypt, they must certainly have been a menace to all Palestine.
It was to bring home to his people the awful nearness of God’s purifying judgment, and to urge them to repent before it should be too late, that the young prophet lifted up his voice in the streets of his city.