ISAIAH.

CHAP. I.

The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master's crib: but Israel doth not know.-Verse 3.

"An my children! my cows and my sheep know me well; but you cease to acknowledge me." "Alas! alas! my cattle know me better than my wife: I will go to live with them, for their love is sincere to me. I will not remain any longer in such a family; henceforth the affectionate cattle shall be my companions, they shall be my children."

And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood.-Verse 15.

The Heathen in praying always spread forth their hands, and have their eyes earnestly fixed on the place where the gods are kept, or on the heavens above. See Exod. ix. 29, 33; 1 Kings viii. 22, 54; 2 Chron. vi. 12, 13, 29; Isai. lxv. 2.

Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes.-Verse 16.

"The washings of the scriptures are ceremonial; (Heb. ix. 10;) or miraculous; (2 Kings v. 10, 13;) or moral; (Psalm xxvi. 6; lxxiii. 13;) or spiritual; (Psalm li. 2;) or superstitious; (Matt. xv. 2;) or sacramental."

People from England are astonished to see the numerous ablutions of the Orientals. The heat of the climate, and the copious perspirations, render it requisite as a matter of health and comfort; but the various causes of impurity with which men necessarily come in contact are the most binding reasons. Connected with all their temples, there is a tank, where the

devotees repeat their prayers, and "wash away their sins;" and no religious ceremony will be commenced by a strict Hindoo without having first performed his ablutions; because he fears some impurity of body or mind which might prevent the merit of his performance. The method is as follows: he takes off his upper and lower garments, and places them on the ground; he then goes into the water, and pours it on his head, and repeats his prayers, taking up also some in his hand three times, still repeating his prayers; he then swallows a little of the element, and afterwards sprinkles his garments. Water from the sacred Ganges is used in their more holy services; and few duties are considered to be more meritorious than to bring it on their shoulders, as is shown in the following engraving.

Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.-Verse 18. See the observations on Ezek. xxiii. 14.

This, by many, is believed to refer to the strength of the colour, and to the difficulty of discharging it: and though I do not presume to contradict that opinion, it may perhaps be suggested to have an additional meaning. Dr. Adam Clarke says, "Some copies have □ ke-shanim, like crimson garments.""

The iniquities of Israel had become very great. In verse 10, the rulers are addressed as if those of Sodom and Gomorrah. In verse 21, it is said the faithful city had become "a harlot;" and in the 29th, it is predicted: "They shall be ashamed of the oaks which ye have desired, and ye shall be confounded for the gardens that ye have chosen." Is it not certain that these references to Sodom, to a harlot, and to the gardens, are allusions to the wickedness, the idolatry, and the union which Israel had formed with the Heathen? For what purposes were the gardens or groves used, of which the

frequenters were to be ashamed? No doubt, for the same as those in the East at the present day. The courtesans of the temples receive those in the groves, who are ashamed to go to their houses. Those wretched females are called solikillikal, that is, "parrots of the grove." "That wicked youth is always gathering flowers in the grove." "Thou hideous wretch! no one will marry thee; thou art not fit for the grove." See the remarks on Isai. lxvi. 17.

Scarlet or crimson was the favourite colour of the ancient heathen prostitutes. "And when thou art spoiled, what wilt thou do? Though thou clothest thyself with crimson, though thou deckest thee with ornaments of gold, though thou rentest thy face with painting, in vain shalt thou make thyself fair; thy lovers will despise thee." (Jer. iv. 30.) This is an exact description of the dress, and other modes of allurement, used at this day by a female of the same low character. "The woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand, full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication: and upon her forehead was a name written, Mystery, Babylon the Great, The Mother of Harlots and Abominations of the Earth." (Rev. xvii. 4, 5.) In that most vivid description by Ezekiel of the idolatries of Samaria and Jerusalem, they are represented as two harlots, and there such disclosures are made as convey a most frightful picture of the depravity of the people. "She increased her whoredoms: for when she saw men portrayed upon the wall, the images of the Chaldeans portrayed with vermilion, she doted upon them."* Her paramours, also, were "exceeding in dyed attire upon their heads." (Ezek. xxiii. 14-16.)

The sacred prostitutes of the temples always have garments of scarlet, crimson, or vermilion. See the remarks on Prov. vii. 10.

Parkhurst says, "ww Sisir occurs not as a verb, and the ideal meaning is uncertain, but as a noun, vermilion, a very beautiful red colour. So the Seventy, μrw. Pliny informs us that this, which the Greeks call paros, was found in silver mines in the form of reddish sand, and was much used by the Romans in his time, as a paint, and formerly applied to sacred

• On the walls of the heathen temples, the most offensive figures are portrayed in the same way. In the vestibule of one I once entered, there were men and women portrayed in every possible position.

purposes." Calmet remarks: "Verrius, quoted in Pliny, tells us, that on high festival days there was a ceremony, and a kind of prodigality in painting the face of Jupiter with vermilion!" The "ideal meaning," says Parkhurst, “is uncertain;" and yet the colour was greatly used by the ancient idolaters, and is equally so by those of the present day; and I think it more than probable, that the ideal meaning of it now is the same as was that of antiquity. "Quicksilver and sulphur unite in certain proportions, and form the paint called vermilion." Siva the Supreme claims quicksilver as his property; and in the medical books it is called Siva's σepμa. Sulphur is the property of the goddess Parvati, the consort of Siva; and it is called her Teppa. These two, joined together, form the sathelingam, that is, "vermilion." The ideal meaning, therefore, is not doubtful.

Looking, then, at this favourite colour of ancient and modern idolaters, at the individuals by whom garments of that colour were worn, at the meaning attached to it, and the ideas which are excited;-considering, also, the abominable union which Israel formed with the Heathen, and the term whoring as applied in the scriptures to the Israelites for following strange gods;—we probably gain an additional idea, which is worthy of being retained, of those Jewish sins which were as scarlet, but which, if repented of, were to be "white as snow."

Ye shall be as a garden that hath no water.-Verse 30.

No man in the East will, if he can help it, be without a garden: to be destitute of such an appendage, would make him feel like a bird in a cage. In every garden, it is absolutely necessary to have a well; because, the rains being only periodical, vegetation would be soon parched up in such a climate without water. The transgressors therefore were to be "as a garden that hath no water."

CHAP. II.

Thou hast forsaken thy people the house of Jacob, because they be replenished from the East, and are soothsayers like the Philistines. -Verse 6.

The marginal reading, for from the East, is "more than the East." But Dr. Boothroyd's rendering is: "Because they

are filled with diviners from the East." What! were the descendants of Jacob replenished in their heathenish pursuits from the idolatrous East? So says the prophet!

In an "Essay on the sacred Isles of the West," by Captain Wilford, he says, "This passage I conceive to allude to Hindoos, from the very forcible expression of, from the East, from beyond the East, or from the remotest parts of the East. The prophet did not mean the Chaldeans, who were well known to him, as he repeatedly takes notice of them." From what part could they be so well replenished as from these parts of the East? Is it not in our nature to consider any article to be the most genuine, which is imported in a direct way from the place where it is produced? The distant East still continues to send her diviners and jugglers to all the contiguous isles and nations.

Lieutenant Burnes tells us : "The natives of Bokhara are also firm believers in magic; but they refer to India as the seat of that science." (Vol. i. p. 321.)

Their land also is full of idols.-Verse 8.

This is a true and literal description of India; the traveller cannot proceed a mile, through an inhabited country, without seeing idols and vestiges of idolatry in every direction. See their vessels, their implements of husbandry, their houses, their furniture, their ornaments, their sacred trees, their domestic and public temples; and they all declare that the land is full of idols.

In that day a man shall cast his idols of silver, and his idols of gold, which they made each one for himself to worship, to the moles and to the bats; to go into the clefts of the rocks, and into the tops of the ragged rocks.-Verses 20, 21.

This, no doubt, refers to the total destruction of idolatry. "To the bats," vavāls, those of the smaller species; as the larger are eaten by the Hindoos, and were also used as an article of food by the Assyrians. The East may be termed "the country of bats," as they hang by hundreds and thousands in caves, ruins, and under the roofs of large buildings. To enter such places, especially after rain, is most offensive. I have lived in rooms where it was sickening to remain, on account of the unpleasant smell produced by those creatures, and whence it was almost impossible to expel them. The