132 QUAKER ASPECTS OF TRUTH 



The history begins with the story of Abraham, 

 travelling from Ur of the Chaldees to Palestine* He 

 would travel along this great military road, leading 

 northwards up the Euphrates valley, then westwards 

 by Damascus, and then southwards to Palestine. That 

 is to say he travelled along exactly the same road that our 

 own troops traversed under General Allenby* There 

 is no other possible road. 



I do not suppose that any scholar of repute would 

 regard the story of Abraham as strictly historical, but 

 probably there is this much historical truth in it ; that 

 at least one of the tribes which eventually united to form 

 ** the Children of Israel ** migrated from Chaldea, in 

 the near neighbourhood of Babylon, along this great 

 trade route to Palestine, eventually becoming enslaved 

 in Egypt. 



Then comes the first of the great deliverances : the 

 deliverance wrought by Moses, the national hero of the 

 Jews. And after him, one naturally thinks of such 

 heroic names as Joshua, Gideon, and many others ; 

 and later still Saul and David, in whose reigns the country 

 was finally conquered, and the Children of Israel settled 

 in the promised land. But it was a very unsettled 

 settlement. On the North was the great Empire of 

 Assyria, notable as being the most brutal military power 

 the world has ever known. It was the type of militarism 

 — devoid of art, devoid of culture, devoid of pity — but 

 with a perfect genius for organised devilry. 



Over and over again Assyrian armies made their 

 way southward along this great military road to attack 

 Egypt. In the reign of Tiglath Pileser Damascus fell. 

 In the reign of Sargon Samaria fell, and the whole 

 population of the northern Kingdom of Israel was carried 

 away into a captivity from which they never returned. 

 And, later still, Jerusalem too, was invaded by Sennac- 

 herib, and was only saved from the same appalling fate 



