The Pulpit Commentary — 1 Kings — Section 299

they would ask, what this messenger of the Most High, this miracle-worker, could have done between morning o.nd evening to bring this terrible judgment down upon his head. And this was a question which only the old prophet could rightly answer, and he had answered it o.lreacly. He had told his sons e.nd neighbours that afternoon, when first he hee.rd of this tragedy, that it was the punishment of disobedience (ver. 26). Not improbably he proclaimed it again to the crowd which awaited his retw·n. "He had been charged," he would say, as they stood gazing on the helpless corpse, "to lo.y our city under a bo.n; he had btien commanded to eat no bread, to drink no water here. And he came back, and he ate bread and he drank water in my house ; therefore it is that ' the lion hath torn him and slain him, according to the word of the Lord'" (ver. 26) . .And so the men of Bethel, and the strangers among them-and thousands of strangers would be present in Bethel at that time-would understand that this man, albeit a prophet, and a doer of wondrous works, had paid the penalty of his partial disobedience with his life. They would perceive that God had not spared His own elect messenger. They would see that the man who had been commissioned to protest against Jeroboam's will-worship, who had courageously faced the king in his might, and had stood like an Athanase against the world, had received judg- ment without mercy when he overstepped the commandment of his God. And they would assuredly be reminded, some of them at least, how sinful and how dangerous must be that departure from the law which they had that day seen instituted amongst themselves. And as one by one they dropped off, and, deeply awed and impressed, returned to their tents or booths, the one thought which above all others filled their minds would be this-how sure and swift and terrible wa.s the recompense of disobedience. But if these strangers, in their perplexity, proceeded to make fnrther inquh-ies, as they may well have done; if they asked what could have lc.l such a man as this to set at nought the plain commandment of God : if they discovered from the old prophet, or his sons, or others, the circumstances of his sin ; if they learned that this man of God had resisted the entreaties of the king, had obey~d his own instrucUons to the letter, and ho.d only come back and eaten bread on tlie solemn assurance of this old prophet himself that an angel from heaven had diB- tinctly reversed his commission; if they understood that it was because he had taken this man at his word and trusted to his good faith, as they themselves would have done in like circumstances, that he had been induced to return; anu that because of this, and nothing else, this ambassador of the Most Merciful had died by the stroke of a wild beast, we may imagine what their astonishment and horror would be like. "Who shall deliver us," they would cry, "out of t~e hand of this mighty God?" And it is probable that at first they would find it ~cult to see wherein his sin lay, and to disentangle the right and the wrong in his conduct. They would say, and rightly, that he was much more sinned ago.inst than sinning. It would seem to them that the really guilty party escaped ~npuni_shed, whilst his innocent victim paid to the uttermost farthing. And it 1s possible that some found, at least for a time, in this episode, as some in later days have done, a riddle which they could not read. But its meaning could not be lost upon them all; if it had been, the Divine purpose in this visitation would ~ave been defeated. It may be the old prophet himself expounded its lessons ; it may be th11t " such o.s set their heart to seek the Lord"-and we may be sure that Jer?boam's innovations had occasioned the gr1west misgivings and fears in many m1_nds-:--foun~ them out for themselves. But in o.ny case some would not be long m d1scovermg that these things were an allegory. "As hieroglyphics," says Lord Bacon, "preceded letters, so parables were more ancient than argu- ments." May we not add that acted parables were still more ancient than spoken ones. A Tarquin, striking off the heads of the tallest poppies, belongs to the beginnings of history. This was the age when men not only gave signs, but wer 6 such themselves (Isa. xx. 8; Ezek. xxiv. 24; Matt. xii. 89, 40). The death of the "man of God'' accordingly was a po.ro.ble; e.n object-lesson of the most impressive  THE FinST DOOK OF KINGS. [CH. XIII, 11-84,