Following the crowd?

Readers of this blog may be familiar with the work of Bible scholar Thomas L. Leishman. His thorough discourses on each and every book of the Bible for the pages of The Christian Science Journal are remarkable, and are now at our fingertips with the advent of that indispensable resource for the student of the Bible, JSH-online.com. 

Leishman's short article Zephaniah: The Dawn of Seventh-Century Prophecy (October 1969, The Christian Science Journal) is very helpful. (Most Christian Science Reading Rooms will be able to help you locate this and other articles for you.)

Here we discover that the people of Judah were being drawn away from worshipping God. What was influencing them? Leishman explains that with "the dawning of the seventh century B.C. the influence of the pagan empire of Assyria was becoming stronger in the affairs of the Hebrew people." 

Furthermore, their king, Manasseh, was not setting a good example. Leishman sets out Zephaniah's three-pronged argument:

"...the prophet outlines three main points, sometimes described as the Menace (Chap. 1), the Admonition (2:1 to 3:8), and the Promise (3:9–20)."

The Menace: "He envisions the approach of a terrible doom, in the course of which the Scythians will be invited to have part in the sacrifice of the chosen people (see 1:7). God, he assures them, "will cut off the remnant of Baal" (verse 4), all traces of the degrading worship so typical of Manasseh's day, and has no patience with the blank apathy and lazy inactivity of those who are inclined to ignore God completely (verses 12–14)."

Blank apathy | Lazy inactivity | Ouch!

Readers can find for themselves the Admonition and the Promise and will be glad to read about the "faithful and righteous remnant" who heeded the prophet's warning and resisted the local crowd-think.

Mary Baker Eddy might have been commenting on the role of the prophets when she wrote:

"As silent night foretells the dawn and din of morn; as the dulness of to-day prophesies renewed energy for to-morrow, -- so the pagan philosophies and tribal religions of yesterday but foreshadowed the spiritual dawn of the twentieth century -- religion parting with its materiality." (Message to The Mother Church for 1902, p. 4: 28). 

Julie Swannell