i8 7 o] PROPHECY IN CRITICAL SCHOOLS 177 



least, of his general scheme did come to be tested in the 

 most crucial way during his own lifetime. 



The Assyrians came as he had foretold, overthrew the 

 enemies of Judah, but pressed their allies scarcely less 

 hardly. Meantime, the words of the prophet and his 

 compeers had not fallen dead upon the land. A vigorous 

 reaction was at hand, which should unite in one cause the 

 patriotism and the faith of the kingdom. Hezekiah, the 

 son of Ahaz, threw all his heart into the cause of the 

 prophets. A great religious reformation ensued, and, as 

 always was the case in Judah, there sprung up at the same 

 time a powerful revival of patriotic feeling. The king and 

 his nobles were eager to throw off the yoke of the Assyrian, 

 whose armies were no longer at their gates, and whose 

 superior force they hoped to counterbalance by an 

 Egyptian alliance. There was much in this plan that 

 might naturally attract the prophet, who, beyond doubt, 

 had entered with lively interest into the religious reforma 

 tion, and who was now an acknowledged power in the 

 nation. Yet Isaiah steadily set his face against the 

 Egyptian alliance. Deliverance must come from God 

 Himself. 



The Egyptians are men and not God, 



Their horses flesh and not spirit ; 



Jahveh stretches out His hand, 



And the helper stumbles and the holpen falls ; 



All of them perish together. 1 



It is very obvious that this policy of Isaiah was in fact 

 the prudent course. We can hardly doubt that, but for 

 the persistence with which he exposed and combated the 

 plans of the Egyptian party, Jerusalem would have shared 

 the fate of Samaria. But it is not in this light that the 

 prophet s course can be appreciated aright. He feared 

 Assyria as little as he trusted Egypt ; he knew only that 

 so long as Nineveh was executing God s judgment on the 

 nations, no alliance could contend against it, but that 

 Jahveh Himself would give deliverance from a power that 



1 Isa. xxxi. 3. 



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