But _good tidings_ and the _proclamation_ meant so much more than the mere political deliverance of Israel--meant the fact of their pardon, the tale of their God's love, of His provision for them, and of His wonderful passion and triumph of salvation on their behalf--that it is no wonder that these two words came to be ever afterwards the classical terms for all speech and prophecy from God to man. We actually owe the Greek words of the New Testament for _gospel_ and _preaching_ to this time of Israel's history. The Greek term, from which we have _evangel_, _evangelist_ and _evangelise_, originally meant good news, but was first employed in a religious sense in the Greek translation of our prophecy. And our word "preach" is the heir, though not the lineal descendant, through the Latin _prædicare_ and the Greek κηρυσσειν, of the word, which is translated in ch. lx. of our prophet to _proclaim_, but in ch. xl. to _call_ or _cry_. It is to the Exile that we trace the establishment among God's people of regular preaching side by side with sacramental and liturgical worship; for it was in the Exile that the Synagogue arose, whose pulpit was to become as much the centre of Israel's life as was the altar of the Temple. And it was from the pulpit of a synagogue centuries after, when the preaching had become dry exposition or hard lawgiving, that Jesus re-read our prophecy and affirmed again the _good news_ of God.
What is true of nations is true of individuals. We indeed support our life by principles; we develop it by argument;--we cannot lay too heavy stress upon philosophy and law. But there is something of far greater concern than either argument or the abstract principles from which it is developed; something that our reason cannot find of itself, that our conscience but increases our longing for. It is, whether certain things are facts or not; whether, for instance, the Supreme Power of the Universe is on the side of the individual combatant for righteousness; whether God is love; whether Sin has been forgiven; whether Sin and Death have ever been conquered; whether the summer has come in which humanity may put forth their shoots conscious that all the influence of heaven is on their side, or whether, there being no heavenly favours, man must train his virtue and coax his happiness to ripen behind shelters and in conservatories of his own construction. Now Christ comes to us with the good news of God that it is so. The supreme force in the Universe is on man's side, and for man has won victory and achieved freedom. God has proclaimed pardon. A Saviour has overcome sin and death. We are free to break from evil. The struggle after holiness is not the struggle of a weakly plant in an alien soil and beneath a wintry sky, counting only upon the precarious aids of human cultivation; but summer has come, the acceptable year of the Lord has begun, and all the favour of the Almighty is on His people's side. These are the _good tidings_ and _proclamation_ of God, and to every man who believes them they must make an incalculable difference in life.
As we have said, the prophet passes in the rest of this prophecy from the spiritual influences of his mission to its outward effects. The people's righteousness is described in the external fashion, which we have already studied in Chapter Fourteen; Zion's espousals to Jehovah are celebrated, but into that we have also gone thoroughly (pp. 398 ff.); the restoration of prophecy in Jerusalem is described (lxii. 6-9), as in ch. lii. 8; and another call is given to depart from Babylon and every foreign city and come to Zion. This call coming now, so long after the last, and when we might think that the prophet had wholly left Babylon behind, need not surprise us. For even though some Jews had actually arrived at Zion, which is not certain, others were hanging back in Babylon; and, indeed, such a call as this might fitly be renewed for the next century or two: so many of God's people continued to forget that their citizenship was in Zion.