t each other, the fact that these chapters have
always been connected with the writings of Zechariah ought to be
allowed a decisive influence in favor of their genuineness.

XII. MALACHI.

23. In Hebrew Malachi signifies _my messenger_, being the very word
employed in chap. 3:1. Hence some have supposed that this is not the
prophet's name, but a description of his office. Such a supposition,
however, is contrary to scriptural usage, which in every other case
prefixes to each of the prophetical books the author's proper name.
Malachi has not given the date of his prophecies, but it can be
determined with a good degree of certainty from their contents. The
people had been reinstated in the land, the temple rebuilt, and its
regular services reestablished. Yet they were in a depressed condition,
dispirited, and disposed to complain of the severity of God's dealings
towards them. Their ardently cherished expectation of seeing the
Theocracy restored to its former glory was not realized. Instead of
driving their enemies before them sword in hand, as in the days of
Joshua, or reigning triumphantly over them in peace, as in the days of
Solomon, they found themselves a handful of weak colonists under the
dominion of foreigners, and returning to the land of their fathers
solely by their permission. All this was extremely humiliating to their
worldly pride, and a bitter disappointment of their worldly hopes. Hence
they had fallen into a desponding and complaining state of mind. While
rendering to God a service that was not cheerful but grudging,
complaining of its wearisomeness, withholding the tithes required by the
law of Moses, and offering in sacrifice the lame and the blind, they yet
complained that he did not notice and requite these heartless services,
and talked as if he favored the proud and wicked. "Ye have said, It is
vain to serve God: and what profit is it that we have kept his
ordinance, and walked mournfully before him? And now we call the proud
happy; yea, they that work wickedness are set up; yea, they that tempt
God are even delivered" (3:14, 15). To these sins they had added that of
putting away their Hebrew wives, that they might marry foreign women
(2:10-16). All these circumstances point to the administration of
Nehemiah, probably the latter part of it; for after his visit to Babylon
in the thirty-second year of Artaxerxes (Neh. 13:6), he found upon his
return, and has described in the last chapter