[163] How far Assyria assisted the development of prophecy we have already seen. But we have been made aware, at the same time, that Assyria's service to Israel in this respect presupposed the possession by the prophets of certain beliefs in the character and will of their God, Jehovah. The prophets' faith could never have risen to the magnitude of the new problems set to it by Assyria if there had not been already inherent in it that belief in the sovereignty of a Righteousness of which all things material were but the instruments. [164] Compare, for instance, Hosea's condemnation of Jehu's murder of Joram, with Elisha's command to do it; also 2 Kings iii. 19, 25, with Deut. xx. 19. [165] See above, p. 10. [166] Isa. xxviii. [167] Amos ii. [168] _Ante_, p. 74. [169] i. 2. [170] Therefore we see at a glance how utterly inadequate is Renan's brilliant comparison of Amos to a modern revolutionary journalist (_Histoire du Peuple Israel_, II.). Journalist indeed! How all this would-be cosmopolitan and impartial critic's judgments smack of the boulevards! [171] Exod. xx.; incorporated in the JE book of history, and, according to nearly all critics, complete by 750; the contents must have been familiar in Israel long before that. There is no trace in Amos of any influence peculiar to either the Deuteronomic or the Levitical legislation. [172] See especially Schultz, _O. T. Theol._, Eng. Trans. by Paterson, I. 214. [173] ii. 9-11. On this passage see further p. 137. [174] If iv. 13, v. 8 and ix. 6 be genuine, this remark equally applies to belief in Jehovah as Creator. [175] Kayser, _Old Testament Theology_. [176] v. 6, 14. [177] See above, p. 18. [178] iii. 2. [179] v. 21 ff. [180] Jer. vii. 22 f. [181] See above, p. 23. [182] v. 21-23. [183] vi. 8. [184] ix. 8 [185] viii. 7. [186] Chap. V., p. 71. [187] vii. 11. [188] On the ministry of eighth-century prophets to the people see the author's _Isaiah_, I., p. 119. [189] So LXX., followed by Hitzig and Wellhausen, by reading יֵצֶר for יֹוצֵר. [190] Cf. _Hist. Geography of the Holy Land_, pp. 64 ff. The word translated _spring crop_ above is לקש, and from the same root as the name of the latter rain, מַלְקֹושׁ, which falls in the end of March or beginning of April. Cf. _Zeitschrift des deutschen Palästina-Vereins_, IV. 83; VIII. 62. [191] Cf. 1 Kings xviii. 5 with 1 Sam. vii. 15, 17; 1 Kings iv. 7 ff. See Robertson Smith, _Religion of the Semites_, 228. [192] LXX.: _Who shall raise up Jacob again?_ [193] So Professor A. B. Davidson. But the grammar might equally well afford the rendering _one calling that the Lord will punish with the fire_, the ל of לריב marking the introduction of indirect speech (cf. Ewald, § 338_a_). But Hitzig for קרא reads קרה (Deut. xxv. 18), to occur, happen. So similarly Wellhausen, _es nahte sich zu strafen mit Feuer der Herr Jahve_. All these renderings yield practically the same meaning. [194] A. B. Davidson, _Syntax_, § 57, Rem. 1.