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neither temple nor tabernacle, and that vs. 72 speaks of the rebuilding of the house, there can scarcely be any doubt but that Jerusalem, as the central point of Israel’s worship, is intended to be understood. And thus, too, from a religious point of view the house was by no means as important as the tower, for God dwells in his temple. This interpretation proposed by Dillmann, p. 262, and accepted by Vernes, p. 89, is certainly correct. With this cf. Test. Levi. x. GTR. Table, i.e. offerings —51. The religious fall of the Israelites and the fate of the prophets.—52. The escape and translation of Elijah. That Enoch should especially note this is natural, since he and Elijah were the only persons who escaped death; cf. 93:8.—53, 54. The fruitless labors of the prophets to the time of the Exile. In each one of their herds, i.e. in each tribe of Israel. Till, etc. refers to the calling in of foreign heathen nations to their support, thereby hastening their own destruction. By allowing strange nations to influence the fate of Israel they virtually betrayed “his place.” Verses 55-58, evidently refer to unfortunate wars of the Israelites immediately before and at the Exile; but just what nations are symbolized by the animals here mentioned can scarcely be determined with any degree of confidence. Devoured, vs. 57; cf. Jer xii. 9; Ezek. xxxiv. 5, 8; Isa. Ivi. 9. Vs. 56 is almost literally quoted in Barnabae Epist. xvi. 5—59. Seventy shepherds, a first class crux interpretum. It almost seems as if the different interpreters vied with each other in misunderstanding the object and character of these shepherds. Accepting as self-evident that shepherds must mean men, and in this connection rulers, the commentators have sought high and low, in Israel and out of Israel, in Egypt, Chaldea, Babylonia, Greece, and other countries for seventy shepherds who superintended the oppression of the chosen people. Others, again, have thought of seventy periods of time or periods of government, and, based on their respective suggestions, have placed the origin of the book at all times from the period of Judas Maccabi to the revolution of Bar-chochbas. It is impossible to mention all the various theories circulating on these seventy shepherds, for that would require too much space; it is also unnecessary to do so and to refute them, for this has been done to the satisfaction of all candid seekers of truth by Gebhardt in Merx’s Archiv, II. 2, p. 163-246, who has made these seventy shepherds a special topic of inquiry, and has conclusively shown the utter impossibility of accepting any of the explanations that make them leaders or rulers of heathen nations. We therefore turn immediately to the only true, legitimate, and satisfactory explanation. This was first mentioned by Hofmann (Schriftbeweis, I. p. 422), accepted and strengthened by Schiirer, p. 531, and lately adopted by Drummond, p. 40. According to them these shepherds are not men, not rulers of heathen nations, but they are angels. There can be no doubt whatever of the truth of this interpretation, for the following reasons: 1. Throughout all this symbolism men are always represented as animals, and the heathen nations as wild beasts or birds of prey. That Noah and Moses are pictured as men in 89:1, 9, 36 finds its explanation in the peculiar object in which they are engaged. Besides, it is expressly stated that they became men; cf. notes. Now, in contradistinction from men symbolized by animals, angels are symbolized by men, as 87:2; 90:14 clearly demonstrate. Angels alone are dignified as men; and what possible reason could there be for calling the leaders of the wild beasts and of the birds men, and thus giving them a name even more dignified than the names given to the Israelites? 2. Before they go out to pasture they all appear contemporaneously before the Lord, 89:59, and how could that suit successive rulers? Schiirer ironically asks if these rulers were to be regarded as pre-existing? 3. In the last judgment they are associated with the fallen angels, 90:20 sqq. 4. The angel who keeps the record of the deeds of the shepherds is simply called another, 89:61, thus signifying their oneness of being with him. 5. The shepherds are appointed, according to 89:75, to protect the sheep from the wild animals, ie. from the heathen nations, Interpreting the shepherds as heathen rulers would give the senseless sentence that the heathen rulers were to protect the Israelites from themselves, i.e. from these rulers! The author’s idea is simple and plain. During the time that Israel, by the will of God, was to be oppressed and overcome by the nations around her, he had placed them in the hands of seventy shepherds, as guardians, who should watch that Israel should not suffer and endure more than was God’s will. This the shepherds neglect to do, and deliver to the wild beasts and birds of prey more than they should have done; hence these shepherds shall be punished, and be cast with the fallen angels, who had also proved faithless, into the fiery abyss. The idea that Israel suffered more than her sins deserved is not strange or unexpected. It is the author's exegesis of passages like Isa. xl. 2 (according to the