A SERIES OF WORKS FROM THE SACRED SCRIPTURES PRESENTED EZEKIEL EDITED, WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY RICHARD G. MOULTON, M.A. (CAMB.), PH.D. (PENN.) UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO New York THE MACMILLAN COMPANY LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., LTD. 1898 All rights reserved 5183 1895 v.ll COPYRIGHT, 1897, BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. Set up and electrotyped May, 1897. Reprinted November, Norwood Press J. 8 Cushing & Co. - Berwick & Smith INTRODUCTION EZEKIEL, in all respects one of the Greater Prophets, has a very special place in the history of literary form. What in his predecessors has been occasional and subordinate becomes in his prophecy a dominant form of utterance. And again, the reflection in written record of the prophetic life and ministry takes shape in Ezekiel as an elaborately arranged literary work. The form of discourse so characteristic of Ezekiel may be termed Emblem Prophecy. Its simplest illustration is when, for example, the prophet appears before his audience holding in his hands two sticks, with the name of Judah written upon the one and Israel upon the other. In the eyes of the people he solemnly joins these sticks together, and from this emblematic text proceeds to enlarge upon the healing of the national schism, and the glory of a united people under a Davidic rule. Of course, such objective emblems have been seen in other prophets : in Isaiah, walking barefoot as a captive; in Jeremiah, holding up his stained girdle; in Samuel, rending his mantle before Saul. The use of dumb show as a starting-point for other modes of presentation has characterised literatures widely separated from one another. In the early tragedy of the Re |