Jemima

“ That's one o' the things I like aboot ye, Jemima."
"Weel, ye can stop likin' it," I answered gey sharp. "Surely I can ken chaps withoot bein' silly aboot them. An' dinna be thinkin' ye're the only man I ken in this place, for ye're no'!" ”

“ As for Miss Jemima, the parson left her with a pious thanksgiving that Riccabocca at least was a Christian, and not a Pagan, Mahometan, or Jew!
CHAPTER XXVIII.
There is that in a wedding which appeals to a universal sympathy. No other event in the lives of their superiors in rank creates an equal sensation amongst the humbler classes.
From the moment the news that Miss Jemima was to be married had spread throughout the village, all the old affection for the squire and his House burst forth the stronger for its temporary suspension. Who could think of the stocks in such a season? ”

“ He gi'ed a bit laugh.
"I've a guid mind to tell ye, jist to prove ye was wrang aboot him ha'ein' a better nature," I says.
And I told him. He was fair amused. "Keep on tryin', Jemima," he says. "Ye ha'ena proved onything except that roses ha'e thorns. Has he said onything to Mrs. Parkins? "
"Ay; he said he had got a pin in his pillow—the auld coward! She was upset, puir body."
"He wasna a coward in his day," says Frederick, "and maybe the falsehood has saved ye trouble, Jemima,"—and then we kept argufyin' till we cam' to "Seaview." ”

“ I says. "Ye ken I'm far ower young to be engaged to onybody."
He wagged his head.
"A girl cannot be ower young to be engaged to the right man, Jemima." And he got hold o' ma hand. "Let me press it," says he, wi' a groan.
"No' likely!" says I, strivin' to draw it frae him.
"Let me hold it then withoot pressin' it."
"Oh, gracious me!" I says. "Behave yoursel'! Ye're hurtin' ma fingers; ye've near dislocated ma pinkie, ye muckle elephant!"
And I won free.
"I'm no' an elephant," says he kin' o' angry. "I'm a human bein' wi' an honest heart which is bein' broke. But I'll tell ye something." ”

“ Mind, ye can aye depend on me. Noo, I must gang. See ye the morn, aboot 6:30. Guidnicht, Jemima," he says frae the door.
"Guidnicht," says I, "and thank ye."
When I gaed to ma room I couldna help wonderin' aboot him. It seemed queer for a chap like him to be daein' jobs aboot a hoose. But it was nane o' ma business, and I was ower sleepy to wonder long. "He has a kind heart onyway," was ma last thought, and as the poet says: "Kind hearts is mair nor cornets," whatever that means. ”

“ What is it?” asked every one, but there were more askers than answerers.
“Use your ears and listen!” continued the wild voice. “Use your eyes and see!”
“Whoever is he, Jemima?” I asked, finding myself near a reliable woman. Nancy stood some little way off leaning against a cart.
p. 162“Why, it’s old Enoch Lale,” said Jemima. “I know him well enough, he lives over there under Trehowel, by Carreg Gwastad, just where these blacks landed.”
Why Jemima always persisted in calling the French “blacks,” I know not; possibly because they were foreigners, possibly she meant blackguards. ”

“ He sat that close I had to tell him to leave me room to grow. He shifted aboot an inch awa', and groaned.
It wasna vera excitin', and, to tell ye the truth, I was wonderin' when I was gaun to see the colour o' his chocolates—no' that I'm greedy; only a promise is a promise, and I was gettin' hungry.
But there was nae word o' them or o' onything else. When he had groaned for aboot the tenth time, I says:—
"Is't your feet?"
"Oh, no!" says he. "It's no' ma feet, Jemima, though they're bad enough. Oh, dear!" ”

“ James, and the elders of the Church at Jerusalem, glorified God, upon hearing of the conversion of so many Gentiles by the teaching of St. Paul, and then they "said unto him, Thou seest, brother, how many thousands of Jews there are which believe; and they are all zealous of the law: and they are informed of thee, that thou teachest all the Jews which are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, saying that they ought not to circum [Pg 302] cise their children, neither to walk after the customs. What is it therefore? the multitude must needs come together: for they will hear that thou art come." ”

“ He reigned in Jerusalem; and his mother was Hamutal, of the city Libhah. He was an impious man, and impure in his course of life; but as the king of Egypt returned from the battle, he sent for Jehoahaz to come to him, to the city called Hamath 11 which belongs to Syria; and when he was come, he put him in bands, and delivered the kingdom to a brother of his, by the father's side, whose name was Eliakim, and changed his name to Jehoiakim and laid a tribute upon the land of a hundred talents of silver, and a talent of gold; and this sum of money Jehoiakim paid by way of tribute ”

“ There is a city called Jamnia; one of the most populous cities in all Judaea, which is inhabited by a promiscuous multitude, the greatest number of whom are Jews; but there are also some persons of other tribes from the neighbouring nations who have settled there to their own destruction, who are in a manner sojourners among the original native citizens, and who cause them a great deal of trouble, and who do them a great deal of injury, as they are continually violating some of the ancestral national customs of the Jews. ”

“ So much did the children of Ammon pay unto him, both the second year, and the third.
6 So Jotham became mighty, because he prepared his ways before the LORD his God.
7 Now the rest of the acts of Jotham, and all his wars, and his ways, lo, they are written in the book of the kings of Israel and Judah.
8 He was five and twenty years old when he began to reign, and reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem.
9 And Jotham slept with his fathers, and they buried him in the city of David: and Ahaz his son reigned in his stead. ”

“ The Jews of Palestine after the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans were once more scattered abroad, as their ancestors had been twice before, to mingle as “Jews” in various parts of the world. Doubtless, modern Jews are simply a blend of all the twelve tribes. At the time when James wrote, the Jews were very numerous in all the great commercial centers of the world, such as Alexandria, Antioch, Babylon, Ephesus, Miletus, Pergamum, Rome, Thessalonica. ”

“ During the captivity the Jews in Assyria and Babylonia were allowed great privileges. They were considered more in the light of colonists than of slaves, and from the histories, both sacred and secular, we learn that, as stated in the books of Nehemiah, Esther, and Daniel, they were occasionally employed in high positions in the state and at court. Nehemiah, though born at Babylon during the captivity, was a Jew of the tribe of Judah, but was cup-bearer to the Persian king, Artaxerxes Longimanus, at Susa. ”

“ The word that came to Jeremiah concerning all the Jews who dwelt in the land of Egypt, who dwelt at Migdol, Tahpanhes, Memphis, and in upper Egypt, saying, Thus saith Jehovah of hosts, the God of Israel, 'Ye have seen all the evil that I have brought upon Jerusalem and upon all the cities of Judah; and behold, they are this day a desolation, and no man dwelleth in them, because of their wickedness which they have committed to provoke me to anger in that they went to offer sacrifices to other gods, that they knew not, neither they nor ye, nor your fathers. ”

“ The difference between writer and readers lies in this, that he is in Palestine, and they not; that he appears to be in a position of authority, whereas they seem for the most part to be a humble and suffering folk. All which fits in admirably with the hypothesis that we have before us an Epistle written by the austere and Judaic-minded James the Just, written from Jerusalem, to comfort and warn those Jewish Christians who lay remote from his personal influence. ”

“ THERE was a good Jew named Nehemiah, whom the King of Persia had made his cup-bearer. One day one of the Jews came from Jerusalem, and told Nehemiah how sad all was at their home, the city that once had been so beautiful. There was a little bit of the Temple built up, but all the streets were heaps of ruins, and only a house or two here and there built up; and the robber tribes round were always breaking in and doing mischief. ”

“ It is expressly recorded about several Arabian tribes that they were converted to Judaism; such were the Benu-Kinanah, a warlike, quarrelsome clan, related to the most respected Koraishites of Mecca, and several other families of the tribes Aus and Chazraj in Yathrib.
62 Especially memorable, however, in the history of the Arabs is the conversion to Judaism of a powerful king of Yemen. The princes or kings of Yemen bore the name of Tobba, and at times ruled over the whole of Arabia; they traced their historical origin back to Himyar, their legendary origin to Kachtan. ”

“ Soon after Jehoiakim came to the throne, word came from Egypt that Jehoahaz had died. It was then that Jeremiah, who with Shaphan and Hilkiah had quietly aided the king in his policy of reform, but had retired to his home in Anathoth when these reforms began to bear fruit, heard again the call to go out and prophesy to the people of Judah. Danger was threatening from the throne and this danger brought Jeremiah out of his seclusion, to the fore again. ”

“ One of the best, though not one of the wisest, kings of Judah, he did his best to eradicate every trace of idolatry; but the hearts of the people responded faintly to his efforts. Reform was only outward and superficial,--an illustration of the inability even of an absolute monarch to remove evils to which the people cling in their hearts. To the eyes of Jeremiah, there was no hope while the hearts of the people were unchanged. "Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots?" he mournfully exclaims. "Much less can those who are accustomed to do evil learn to do well." ”

“ Jeroboam adopted a plan which while safeguarding the interests of his treasury, prevented his becoming unpopular with his own subjects; as he was unable to have a temple for himself alone, he chose two out of the most venerated ancient sanctuaries, that of Dan for the northern tribes, and that of Bethel, on the Judæan frontier, for the tribes of the east and centre. He made two calves of gold, one for each place, and said to the people, “It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem; behold thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.” ”

“ In the provinces, likewise, the Jews became very turbulent; particularly in Alexandria, and different other parts of Egypt, of Syria, and other places, where they made war against the heathens, killing many, and being massacred in their turn. They were led to these outrages by the opinion that they were bound by their law to extirpate idolatry, and to kill all those who would not become proselytes to Judaism. These are probably the wars and fightings to which St. James alludes; and which they undertook rather from a principle of covetousness than from any sincere desire to convert the heathen. ”

“ Even after the work of Nehemiah had been accomplished, the Jewish State in Palestine was still no more than an insignificant upland community, a drop in the ocean of pagan races enclosing it; a tract some fifteen miles in length and breadth with Jerusalem as its only city. Doubtless the Jews were encouraged by the prosperity of their kinsfolk in the great cities of Babylonia, Syria and Egypt. ”

“ Chapter 10
1 And Rehoboam went to Shechem: for to Shechem were all Israel come to make him king.
2 And it came to pass, when Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who was in Egypt, whither he had fled from the presence of Solomon the king, heard it, that Jeroboam returned out of Egypt.
3 And they sent and called him. So Jeroboam and all Israel came and spake to Rehoboam, saying,
4 Thy father made our yoke grievous: now therefore ease thou somewhat the grievous servitude of thy father, and his heavy yoke that he put upon us, and we will serve thee. ”

“ So when the Israelites came to him to ask him not to be hard upon them, and make them bring him so much corn and so many sheep, the old men told him to answer them kindly and gently, but the young men said he had better be fierce and sharp. So he followed the young men's advice, and made a very unkind answer.
This made them all so angry that they said they would not have him for their king any longer; but they took Jeroboam, a brave strong man of the tribe of Ephraim, and made him their king. Only two tribes still held steady to Rehoboam. These were the tribes of Judah and Benjamin. ”

“ God pitied the deplorable overthrow of His chosen people: He saw that there was neither slave nor freeman—"neither any shut up, nor any left at large, nor any helper for Israel"; and in Jeroboam He gave them the saviour who had been granted to the penitence of Jehoahaz. [306] It was, so to speak, a last pledge to them of the love and mercy of Jehovah, which gave them a respite, and would fain have saved them altogether, if they had turned with their whole heart to Him. And, personally, Jeroboam II. seems to have been one of the better kings. Not a single crime is laid to his charge ”

“ Amos prophesied in the Reign of Jeroboam the Son of Joash King of Israel, soon after Jeroboam had subdued the Kingdoms of Damascus and Hamath, that is, about ten or twenty years before the Reign of Pul: and he [345] thus reproves Israel for being lifted up by those conquests; Ye which rejoyce in a thing of nought, which say, have we not taken to us horns by our strength? But behold I will raise up against you a nation, O house of Israel, saith the Lord the God of Hosts, and they shall afflict you from the entring in of Hamath unto the river of the wilderness. ”

“ There was a common language in Western Asia, Aramean, the lingua franca of traders from Nineveh to Memphis; and Jew, Assyrian and Egyptian conversed in it. But the tongue of these raiders from over the Caucasus was unintelligible. Yet how they would set their teeth into the land! Mixed with the verses which thus describe them are others which suit not them but the Chaldeans and must have been added by the Prophet in 604. A people so new to the Jews might hardly have been called by Jeremiah an ancient nation, from of old a nation, and in fact these phrases are wanting in the Greek version. ”