The prophet Malachi, whose opinion in this matter was soon brought to bear,[1] had announced with much energy a precursor of the Messiah, who was to prepare men for the final renovation, a messenger who should come to make straight the paths before the elected one of God.  This messenger was no other than the prophet Elias, who, according to a widely spread belief, was soon to descend from heaven, whither he had been carried, in order to prepare men by repentance for the great advent, and to reconcile God with his people.[2] Sometimes they associated with Elias, either the patriarch Enoch, to whom for one or two centuries they had attributed high sanctity;[3] or Jeremiah,[4] whom they considered as a sort of protecting genius of the people, constantly occupied in praying for them before the throne of God.[5] This idea, that two ancient prophets should rise again in order to serve as precursors to the Messiah, is discovered in so striking a form in the doctrine of the Parsees that we feel much inclined to believe that it comes from that source.[6] However this may be, it formed at the time of Jesus an integral portion of the Jewish theories about the Messiah.  It was admitted that the appearance of “two faithful witnesses,” clothed in garments of repentance, would be the preamble of the great drama about to be unfolded, to the astonishment of the universe.[7]

[Footnote 1:  Malachi iii. and iv.; Ecclesiasticus xlviii. 10.  See ante, Chap.  VI.]

[Footnote 2:  Matt. xi. 14, xvii. 10; Mark vi. 15, viii. 28, ix. 10, and following; Luke ix. 8, 19.]

[Footnote 3:  Ecclesiasticus xliv. 16.]

[Footnote 4:  Matt. xvi. 14.]

[Footnote 5:  2 Macc. v. 13, and following.]

[Footnote 6:  Texts cited by Anquetil-Duperron, Zend-Avesta, i. 2d part, p. 46, corrected by Spiegel, in the Zeitschrift der deutschen morgenlaendischen Gesellschaft, i. 261, and following; extracts from the Jamasp-Nameh, in the Avesta of Spiegel, i., p. 34.  None of the Parsee texts, which truly imply the idea of resuscitated prophets and of precursors, are ancient; but the ideas contained in them appear to be much anterior to the time of the compilation itself.]

[Footnote 7:  Rev. xi. 3, and following.]

It will be seen that, with these ideas, Jesus and his disciples could not hesitate about the mission of John the Baptist.  When the scribes raised the objection that the Messiah could not have come because Elias had not yet appeared,[1] they replied that Elias was come, that John was Elias raised from the dead.[2] By his manner of life, by his opposition to the established political authorities, John in fact recalled that strange figure in the ancient history of Israel.[3] Jesus was not silent on the merits and excellencies of his forerunner.  He said that none greater was born among the children of men.  He energetically blamed the Pharisees and the doctors for not having accepted his baptism, and for not being converted at his voice.[4]