יקבצנו מזרה ישראל "He that scattered Israel will gather him."-JER. xxxi. 10. THE SCATTERED NATION; PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE. EDITED BY C. SCHWARTZ, D.D., MINISTER OF TRINITY CHAPEL, JOHN STREET, EDGWARE ROAD. VOLUME I. 1866. LONDON: MORGAN AND CHASE, 38, LUDGATE HILL. "ALL your success depends on a striking title!" some say. And when they have uttered these weighty words, they look at you with the greatest satisfaction, not doubting that you fully sympathize with them, and are greatly indebted to them for this piece of good advice. It may be that your countenance betrays some symptoms of a differe opinion, and no sooner have they perceived it, than they repeat their grand maxim, though somewhat modified, and with a less degree of self-complacency: "A great deal of your success depends on a striking title!" Does this mean to say that many are more attracted by sounds than by sense, by words rather than by weighty truths? Are we to cater for a crowd that reads hastily and forgets speedily? We frankly confess that we cherish higher expectations of our readers, and strive after a nobler aim. It is the desire of our soul to describe, as our title promises, the scattered nation, in its past, present, and future; to relate the history of the people; to delineate the state of the land; to magnify the glory of the King of Israel. The Scattered Nation! A nation such as no other people ever was, and yet scattered; and then again, scattered to such a degree as no other nation ever was, and yet a nation! There is but one nation with which God has entered into a special covenant, for whose deliverance He has stretched out his mighty arm, for whose formation He descended from heaven, for whose guidance He moved in a fiery cloud. He distinguished that nation as his peculiar people. He gave it the Word, did for it what He has done for no other; and, when they rejected Him, in whom they had been chosen, and for whose sake they were preserved, when they rejected the Messiah-Israel's Corner and Head-Stonethey were scattered! You meet the Jew everywhere. The coldest region has not killed, the hottest clime has not burned him; flatteries and threatenings, barbarism and civilization, he has outlived them all; and though dispersed over all countries and among all the nations of the earth, the Jew is easily recognized. He is a stranger in the land of his birth, whilst a Jew in Europe is nationally united with the Jews in the most distant parts of New Zealand; for, though they are scattered, they are a nation. One of their enemies testified: "There is one people scattered abroad and dispersed among the people in all the provinces of thy kingdom" (Esth. iii. 8); and another, called to curse and compelled to bless, exclaimed: The people shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations." (Num. xxiii. 9.) You feel for the refugees driven from their native soil; you sympathize with the exile who has had to leave the ground where his cradle once stood; your VOL. I.NO. 1. 1 |