e;
_then_, the State still existing at his time, but internally deranged
by idolatry and apostacy. This apparent contradiction cannot be
reconciled in any other way than by assuming that Isaiah is the author.
As a rule, the punishment appears as already inflicted; city and
temple as destroyed; the country as devastated; the people as carried
away; compare _e.g._, chap. lxiv. 10, 11. But in a series of passages,
in which the Prophet steps back from the _ideal_, to the _real_
stand-point, _the punishment appears as still future_; _city and temple
as still existing_. In chap. xliii. [Pg 176] 22-28, the Prophet meets
the delusion, as if God had chosen Israel on account of their deserts.
Far from having brought about their deliverance by their own merits,
they, on the contrary, sinned thus against Him, that, to the inward
apostacy, they added the outward also. The greater part of Israel had
left off the worship of the Lord by sacrifices. It is the mercy alone
of the Lord which will deliver them from the misery into which they
have plunged themselves by their sins. But how can the Lord charge the
people in exile for the omission of a service which, according to His
own law, they could offer to Him in their native country only, in the
temple consecrated to Him, but then destroyed? The words specially:
"Put me in remembrance," in ver. 26, "of what I should have forgotten,"
imply that there existed a possibility of acquiring apparent merits,
and that, hence, the view of our opponents who, in vers. 22-24, think
of a compulsory, and hence, guiltless omission of the sacrificial
service during the exile, must be rejected. Vers. 27, 28 also, which
speak of the punishment which Israel deserves, just on account of the
omitted service of the Lord, and which it has found in the way of its
works, prove that this view must be rejected, and that vers. 22-24
contain a reproof. The passage can, hence, have been written only at
the time when the temple was still standing. Of this there can so much
the less be any doubt that, in vers. 27, 28, the exile is expressly
designated as future: "Thy first father (the high-priestly office) hath
sinned, and thy mediators have transgressed against me." (The
sacrificial service was by a disgraceful syncretism profaned even by
those whose office it was to attend to it). "Therefore I _will_ profane
the princes of the sanctuary, and _will_ give Jacob to the curse, and
Israel to reproaches." Even [Hebrew: vaHll