ks were
studied, not the real everyday experience of living people.

JESUS WAS A WISE MAN RATHER THAN A SCRIBE

When Jesus came he was a teacher more like those more ancient wise men
of the city gates. Like them he taught his listeners out of doors by
the shores of the lake or on the hillside as well as in the
synagogues. He reverenced the Bible, the Law and the Prophets, as
God's word, but he listened for that word also in the sights and
sounds of the streets and country lanes. He heard his Father's voice
as he listened to house wives chatting with their neighbors, or to
vineyard keepers hiring harvest hands.

"When He walked the fields he drew
From the flowers and birds and dew
Parables of God.
For within his heart of love
All the soul of man did move--
God had his abode."

STUDY TOPICS

1. Look up in the Bible dictionary under "Scribes" and "Rabbi."

2. What impressions of the scribes do you get from Matthew 7. 28-29,
Matthew 15. 1-9, and Mark 12. 28-34?

3. Read Luke 1. 5-6; 2. 25-36. Where and how do you think these good
men and women, among whom Jesus was born, got their training?

CHAPTER XXIX

NEW OPPRESSORS AND NEW WARS FOR FREEDOM

After the death of Alexander the Great his empire was broken into
fragments ruled by those of his generals who were able to snatch these
smaller kingdoms for themselves. One of them named Ptolemy seized
Egypt. His descendants, known as the Ptolemies, reigned there for
centuries. Another, named Seleucus, gained control of the greater part
of the old Persian empire. He built the city of Antioch, in northern
Syria, naming it after his father Antiochus. His descendants, on the
throne of the new kingdom, are known in history as the Seleucids.

THE JEWS UNDER GREEK RULERS

Canaan at first became part of the kingdom of the Ptolemies, and this
continued for about a century. During this period the Jews seemed to
have been treated with a fair degree of kindness and justice. At least
they were left most of the time in peace. But about B.C. 200, Canaan
was taken from the Ptolemies by the Seleucids, and this turned out to
be for the Jewish people an unhappy change. In the year 175 B.C.,
there came to the throne in Antioch a young prince named Antiochus
Epiphanes who, like Alexander the Great, thought of himself as a kind
of missionary for Greek art and civilization. He became more and more
angry because so many of the Jews refused t