XI.II.1.  The tabernacle of David fell at last, and no king was born to set it up again.  The state suffered not a crisis, but destruction.  And the result was that such of the religious hopes of the people as they still held fast, were no longer limited to existing political conditions, but now took a freer flight, became tinged with enthusiasm, and cast off all restrictions.  In former times there was always an enemy threatening in the background, a danger really approaching, to give rise to the expectation of a great conflagration, the materials for which had long been collected in the nation itself:  but after the exile fancy dealt in general coalitions of God knows what peoples against the New Jerusalem, vaticinations for which there was no ground whatever in reality. 1

****************************************** 1 Ezekiel xxxviii. xxxix.; Isaiah lxvi. 18-24; Joel iv.; Zechariah xii. xiv.  In Isaiah v. 26, on the other hand, we must, of course, read GWY, for GWYM, the singular instead of the plural. *****************************************

In earlier times the national state as it had existed under David was the goal of all wishes.  Now a universal world empire was erected in imagination, which was to lift up its head at Jerusalem over the ruins of the heathen powers.  Prophecy was no longer tied to history, nor supported by it.

But the extravagant hopes now built on Jehovah were balanced on the other side by sober and realisable aims which the course of history presented.  Those who waited for the consolation of Israel were then confronted from the nature of their situation with practical tasks.  The old prophets were satisfied with expressing their ideas, with criticising existing evils; as to practical points they had nothing to say, the leadership of the people was in other hands.  But the old community being now gone and its heads having fallen with it, the godly both had the power and felt the obligation to place themselves at the head of the Israel now to be anew created, after which they had long been striving, and their faith in which was still unshaken.  In former times the nation had not been so seriously threatened as that its continued existence, notwithstanding the dangerous crises it might have to pass through, should ever cease to be regarded as natural, as a thing of course.  But now this was by no means a thing of course, the danger was a pressing one that the Jewish exiles, like the Samaritan exiles before them, would be absorbed by the heathens among whom they dwelt.  In that case the Messianic hopes also would have lost their point of application, for, however true it was that the realising of them was Jehovah’s concern, the men must still be there to whom they were to be fulfilled.  Thus everything depended on getting the sacred remnant safe across this danger, and giving it so solid an organisation that it might survive the storms and keep alive the expectation of the promise.