Obed

“ For other references to Obed-edom as one of the doorkeepers, see xv. 18, 24, xvi. 38. On the other hand he is classed as a singer in xv. 21, xvi. 5, passages which are probably additions to the original text of Chronicles, or at any rate represent later or divergent tradition.
7The sons of Shemaiah; Othni, and Rephael, and Obed, Elzabad, whose brethren were valiant men, Elihu, and Semachiah. 8All these were of the sons of Obed-edom: they and their sons and their brethren, able men in strength for the service; threescore and two of Obed-edom. ”

“ Heh, heh, heh—then just tell me, young feller, why Cap'n Obed an' twenty odd other folks used to row aout to Devil Reef in the dead o' night an' chant things so laoud ye cud hear 'em all over taown when the wind was right? Tell me that, hey? An' tell me why Obed was allus droppin' heavy things daown into the deep water t'other side o' the reef whar the bottom shoots daown like a cliff lower'n ye kin saound? ”

“ One fasted severely; another did not possess the smallest thing; this one glowed with the most fervent charity; while that one had lived in the practice of obedience for twenty years. When the Abbot had heard these things, one after the other, he said: "The virtue of this last is greatest of all, for the rest followed their own will, but he has made himself the servant of another's will."
4. A little drop of simple obedience is worth a million times more than a whole vase full of the choicest contemplations. ”

“ And the matter may well be counted worth a more careful analysis than it often gets. How does a father distinguish between what he calls an obedient and a disobedient child? Both are faulty. How in any fair sense may one be called obedient? ”

“ So much for the phenomena to which the ascetic impulse will in certain persons give rise. In the ecclesiastically consecrated character three minor branches of self-mortification have been recognized as indispensable pathways to perfection. I refer to the chastity, obedience, and poverty which the monk vows to observe; and upon the heads of obedience and poverty I will make a few remarks.
First, of Obedience. The secular life of our twentieth century opens with this virtue held in no high esteem. ”

“ Thus it was that in obedience to the law laid down by his mother, and in obedience to the law of that unknown and nameless thing, fear, he kept away from the mouth of the cave. ”

“ It took Obed to git the truth aout o' them heathens. I dun't know haow he done it, but he begun by tradin' fer the gold-like things they wore. Ast 'em whar they come from, an' ef they cud git more, an' finally wormed the story aout o' the old chief—Walakea, they called him. Nobody but Obed ud ever a believed the old yeller devil, but the Cap'n cud read folks like they was books. Heh, heh! Nobody never believes me naow when I tell 'em, an I dun't s'pose you will, young feller—though come to look at ye, ye hev kind o' got them sharp-readin' eyes like Obed had. ”

“ But there were other forces at work in the cub, the greatest of which was growth. Instinct and law demanded of him obedience. But growth demanded disobedience. ”

“ for God's work is its own wages, and there is a present reward of obedience in obedience. ”

“ Every cradle asks us "Whence?" and every coffin "Whither?" The poor barbarian, weeping above his dead, can answer these questions just as well as the robed priest of the most authentic creed. ”

“ that you indulge the body only so far as is needful for good health. The body should be treated more rigorously, that it may not be disobedient to the mind. ”

“ "Man has upon him his flesh, which is at once his burden and his temptation. He drags it with him and yields to it. He must watch it, cheek it, repress it, and obey it only at the last extremity. There may be some fault even in this obedience; but the fault thus committed is venial; it is a fall, but a fall on the knees which may terminate in prayer. ”

“ Truly the wise man said well, that a command of gall cannot be obeyed like one of sugar. A man must require just and reasonable things, if he would see the scales of obedience properly trimmed. From orders which are improper springs resistance which is not easily overcome; ”

“ The Goddess thus addressed them, as they forbade her: ‘Why do you deny me water? The use of water is common 231 VI. 350-376 to all. Nature has made neither sun, nor air, nor the running stream, the property of any one. To her public bounty have I come, which yet I humbly beg of you to grant me. I was not intending to bathe my limbs here, and my wearied joints, but to relieve my thirst. ”

“ Whence comes it that men have so great a hankering for forbidden food? Do you presume to feed on flesh, O race of mortals? Do it not, I beseech you; and give attention to my exhortations. And when you shall be presenting the limbs of slaughtered oxen to your palates, know and consider that you are devouring your tillers of the ground. And since a God impels me to speak, I will duly obey the God that so prompts me to speak; and I will pronounce my own Delphic warnings, and disclose the heavens themselves ”

“ If, therefore, she that had an issue of blood might commendably touch the garment of our Lord, why may not she, who has her courses, lawfully enter into the church of God? But you may say, Her infirmity compelled her, whereas these we speak of are bound by custom. Consider, then, most dear brother, that all we suffer in this mortal flesh, through the infirmity of our nature, is ordained by the just judgement of God after the fall; for to hunger, to thirst, to be hot, to be cold, to be weary, is from the [pg 058] infirmity of our nature ”

“ When we were in the flesh, that is, in a carnal state, under the reigning power of sin and corruption—in the flesh as in our element—then the motions of sins which were by the law did work in our members, we were carried down the stream of sin, and the law was but as an imperfect dam, which made the stream to swell the higher, and rage the more. ”

“ So when she felt in her soul the prophetic madness, and was warmed by the divine fire prisoned in her breast, she looked upon the child and cried: "O child, health-bringer to the whole world, speed thy growth. Often shall mortal bodies owe their lives to thee, and to thee shall it be counted right to restore the spirits of the departed. But having dared his once in scorn of the gods, from power to give life a second time thou shalt be stayed by thy grandsire's lightning. So, from a god shalt thou become but a lifeless corpse ”

“ All Ages, all Degrees unsluice their Eyes;
And Heav'n, and Earth resound with Murmurs, Groans, and Cries.
Matrons and Maidens beat their Breasts, and tear
Their Habits, and root up their scatter'd Hair:
The wretched Father, Father now no more,
With Sorrow sunk, lies prostrate on the Floor,
Deforms his hoary Locks with Dust obscene,
And curses Age, and loaths a Life prolong'd with Pain. ”

“ Thus I prevent the Loss of Life and Blood,
And, in Effect, the Action must be good.
Vain Resolution! for, at ev'ry Gate
The trusty Centinels, successive, wait:
The Keys my Father keeps; ah! there's my Grief;
'Tis he obstructs all Hopes of my Relief.
Gods! that this hated Light I'd never seen!
Or, all my Life, without a Father been!
But Gods we all may be; for those that dare,
Are Gods, and Fortune's chiefest Favours share. ”

“ It, indeed, came out, afterwards, that this crime was also effected by the abominable belief in Obeah: the woman, who mixed the draught, had no idea of its being poison; but she had received the deleterious ingredients from an Obeah man, as “a charm to make her massa good to her;” by which the negroes mean, the compelling a person to give another every thing for which that other may ask him. ”

“ If ye offer lambs to be slain in oblation, ye shall not bring them female but male, as was the oblation of Abraham and Isaac who sacrificed to their Lord, and the Lord will forgive our sins and the sins of our dead. ”

“ A victim free from a blemish, and most beauteous in form (for ’tis being sightly that 522 xv. 131-162. brings destruction) , adorned with garlands and gold, is placed upon the altars, and, in its ignorance, it hears one praying, and sees the corn, which it has helped to produce, placed on its forehead between its horns; and, felled, it stains with its blood the knives perhaps before seen by it in the limpid water. Immediately, they examine the entrails snatched from its throbbing breast, and in them they seek out the intentions of the Deities. ”

“ Having battered around this wicked world for twenty years I thought I was prepared for all the shocks that human flesh is heir to, and that no matter what happened there was a special rule of etiquette to fit it, but there was nothing in all my experience, nor in the Ten Commandments, nor Hoyle, nor Avogadro’s Hypothesis, nor Grimm’s Law, that prepared me for what happened next. ”

“ Nor is it an easy thing for thee to control the steeds, hot with those strong fires which they have within their breasts, which they breathe out from mouth and nostrils. Scarce do they suffer my control, when their fierce spirits have become heated, and their necks rebel against the reins. But do thou, O son, beware lest I be the giver of a fatal gift to thee, and while still there is time amend thy prayer. ”

“ Lord ; the fat that covereth the inwards, and all the fat that is upon the inwards, 15 And the two kidneys, and the fat that is upon them, which
is by the flanks, and the caul above the liver, with the kidneys, it shall he take away. 16 And the priest shall burn them upon the altar: it is the food of the offering made by fire for a sweet savour: all the fat is the Lord 's. 17 It shall be a perpetual statute for your generations throughout all your dwellings, that ye eat neither fat nor blood. ”

“ These 'mediums' are called 'Obeah-men' and their functions are not confined, by any means, to the merciful interference between the demon and his victim to which I have just alluded. These idle dreamers are not unfrequently employed by revengeful negroes to 'bewitch' some enemy; and, such is the superstitious dread of, and belief in, the communicated power of the Obeah priest, that the person bewitched wastes away and dies, as I have often seen, sometimes from credulous fear, and sometimes from secret poisoning. ”

“ In such words as these did her father Jove address her: “Dost thou, my daughter, unaided, attempt to change the insuperable decrees of Fate? Thou, thyself, mayst enter the abode of the three sisters, and there thou wilt behold the register of future events, wrought with vast labour, of brass and of solid iron; these, safe and destined for eternity, fear neither the thundering shock of the heavens, nor the rage of the lightnings, nor any source of destruction. There wilt thou find the destinies of thy descendants engraved in everlasting adamant. ”

“ Equally as pale as the youth does the Divinity himself turn; and he bears up thy sinking limbs; and at one moment he cherishes thee, at another, he stanches thy sad wound; and now he stops the fleeting life by the application of herbs. His skill is of no avail. The wound is incurable. As if, in a well-watered garden, any one should break down violets, or poppies, and lilies, as they adhere to their yellow stalks ”

“ And now behold, this is the commandment which I give unto you, that ye shall not suffer any one knowingly to partake of my flesh and blood unworthily, when ye shall minister it, for whoso eateth and drinketh my flesh and blood unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to his soul; therefore if ye know that a man is unworthy to eat and drink of my flesh and blood, ye shall forbid him. ”

“ Down fell the wounded Nymph, and sadly groan'd,
And pull'd his Arrow reeking from the Wound;
And weltering in her Blood, thus faintly cry'd,
"Ah cruel God! tho' I have justly dy'd,
"What has, alas! my unborn Infant done,
"That He should fall, and Two expire in One?
This said, in Agonies she fetch'd her Breath.
⁠The God dissolves in Pity at her Death;
He hates the Bird that made her Falshood known,
And hates himself for what himself had done ”

“ I'm fully satisfy'd!
"This Boy shall stand a living Mark, to prove
"My Husband's Baseness and the Strumpet's Love:
"But Vengeance shall awake: those guilty Charms
"That drew the Thunderer from Juno's Arms,
"No longer shall their wonted Force retain,
"Nor please the God, nor make the Mortal vain. ”

“ The use of baths shall be offered to the sick as often as it is necessary: to the healthy, and especially to youths, it shall not be so readily conceded. But also the eating of flesh shall be allowed to the sick, and alto- gether to the feeble, for their rehabilitation. But when they have grown better, they shall all, in the usual manner, abstain from flesh. The abbot, moreover, shall take the greatest care lest the sick are neglected by the cellarer or by the servitors: for whatever fault is committed by the disciples rebounds upon him. ”

“ Famine executes the orders of Ceres (although she is ever opposing her operations) , and is borne by the winds through the air to the assigned abode, and immediately enters the bedchamber of the sacrilegious wretch, and embraces him, sunk in a deep sleep (for it is night-time) , with her two wings. She breathes herself into the man, and blows upon his jaws, and his breast, and his face; and she scatters hunger through his empty veins. ”

“ If any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.”
Well might those who listened to such extraordinary teachings as these say, “Never man spake like this man.” “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”
Jesus replied in still more extraordinary and apparently inexplicable declarations: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life ”