Of course, in many cases the standard itself may be conceived as the judge, as when a man is condemned by his conscience, or by the popular customs, or by the principles of the covenant. Two passages in Job illustrate the flexibility of the usage in the higher sphere. Eliphaz, arguing against Job's complaints, says: "Shall mortal man be just (P) with God?" (iv. 17), i.e. be found in the right as to his life.1 To which Job replies: "Of course I know that it is so, How should man be just with God?" (ix. 2). Eliphaz means that, brought to God's bar, no man will be found righteous; Job means, no man can make his righteousness, though he have it, valid against God, or at God's bar, He being unwilling that he should; because His omnipotent power will hinder man from sustaining his cause. "I know that I have to be guilty," he elsewhere exclaims (ix. 15, 20). Thus it may be said in regard to this verb: (1) that it is not much in use in the older language; (2) that it is always used of persons; (3) that it means to be in the right, according to some standard, chiefly in a juridical sense; and (4) that this standard being sometimes the general law of conduct, the moral law, the word shows a tendency to be used of this conformity, or as we use righteous in an ethical sense, the juridical idea falling away. This tendency shows itself more and more in the language, i.e. the standard becomes more and more the great general principles of morals and religion.

Now the same things can be said in general of the adjective P righteous, in regard to which we need only remark: (1) that it is never used in the feminine; a curious fact, explained, perhaps, by the primary use being juridical, where the interests of men alone came into discussionand it is only used of persons, with perhaps one exception

1 On the interpretation of Job iv. 17 see the author's The Book of Job, with Notes, etc. ("Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges "), p. 33, where he briefly discusses the competing renderings, and decides on the whole for Can man be righteous before God? This, he thinks, is most in harmony with the time at which the charge comes in, the scope of the following verses, and the general aphorism in v. 6, 7.-ED.

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(Deut. iv. 8); and (2) the ethical notion begins to prevail over the juridical.

The use of the nouns PTY and Лy, which hardly differ in their general meaning, is of great interest, especially in Isaiah. The same general idea belongs to this word—that which has the quality of PTY, which is conformable to a norm or standard. This appears most plainly, first of all, when the word is predicated of things like measures and weights,

e.g.

,righteous weights אַבְנֵי צ',a righteous ephah אֵיפַת צ'

' a right balance. Our word right perhaps comes
nearest to the meaning, i.e. conformable to the idea of an
ephah, weights and balances. So Ps. iv. 5, ' !, right sacri-
's
fices, such sacrifices as are agreeable to the idea of sacrifice.
Perhaps even Day, right judgment, judgment such as it
should be. Here again the norm or standard may vary
indefinitely. That has the characteristic of 's in any sphere
which corresponds to the admitted norm in that sphere-
whatever is right according to an understood standard.

The transition from this to conduct or actions is easy.
The standard may be propriety, popular custom, what is
due socially, or what is required in morals or religion.
Naturally, in judging of actions, the last named standards
will be those that are chiefly thought of. But as the
standard deepens in its idea, righteousness will also acquire
more inwardness and condensation.
When said of men,
the use of the word is readily understood, and hardly needs
illustration.

But there can be little doubt that the same general idea appears when 's is predicated of God. The point of difficulty here is naturally to discover the standard by which the action of God is estimated. There appears in the mind of the prophets, when they speak even of God, the generel feeling that there is a moral standard which is not merely God's will. Probably a difference between this standard and God's will rarely occurred to them—the two coincided. But there appears the feeling of the existence of such a standard. Even Abraham says: "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" (, Gen. xviii. 25).

And in the Book of Job, the most modern of Hebrew books in its ways of thinking, Job openly charges God with injustice; and in one remarkable passage the patriarch proclaims his resolution to adhere to righteousness, though God and man alike should show themselves unjust (xxvii. 5, 6). But usually such a distinction probably was not drawn. God's will and action coincided with righteousness, and God's will was the norm of righteousness on that account practically, without its being the source of it absolutely, or to be identified with it. When God's actions, therefore, were estimated, they were naturally judged by the same standard as was applied when men's were judged. God acted righteously when He acted as a just man would have acted in the circumstances. This makes His righteousness often to be what is called retributive righteousness. And this is a common usage.

But in such passages as those in the second half of Isaiah manifestly this sense will not suit. God's righteousness there is a course of action conformable to a rule; but the rule is not that of the general law of morals. The word belongs to another sphere, namely, the redemptive sphere. The standard is not the moral law in God's mind as sovereign ruler; but some other standard in His mind as God of salvation. When He acts according to this standard, the attribute of 's belongs to Him or to His actions. Now this standard, of course, might be a general purpose in His mind in regard to Israel, in which case the standard would be the covenant relation. He acts' when He acts as it becomes God in covenant with Israel. As the covenant was a redemptive one, this comes to much the same thing as to say that He acts as the God of salvation. The interesting point, however, is whether the idea of the prophet has not gone so far as to rise to this as the true conception of God. The purpose of salvation is not a purpose which He has formed, but is the expression of His very Being. It is His characteristic as God. When the prophet says of Cyrus: "I have raised him up in 's," that might very well be simply "in the region of a redemptive

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purpose" (Isa. xlv. 13). And so when 's calls one to follow it, or when God calls him in 's to follow Him, as He elsewhere speaks of going before him.

So when He says to Israel, "I have chosen thee; I strengthen thee; I uphold thee with the right hand of My righteousness" (Isa. xli. 10), this might mean that He acts to Israel on the lines of His relation to Israel and of His purpose. And with this agree the many passages where ' is parallel to salvation: "My salvation is near to come, and My righteousness to be manifested" (lvi. 1).

But there are other passages which seem to go further, and to show that Jehovah's actions, which are ', were some of them anterior to His relation to Israel, and that His forming this relation illustrated His 'y-in other words, they rise to the elevation of making the salvation of Israel, and through Israel that of the world, to be the thing which is conformable to the Being of Jehovah, and expresses it. For instance, Jehovah says to Israel: "I have called thee in righteousness"-the entering into covenant with Israel was in 's (xlii. 6). And in a remarkable passage, xlv. 18: "Thus saith the Lord that created the heavens; He is God, that formed the earth; He made it to be inhabited. I have sworn by Myself that to Me every knee shall bow; look unto Me, and be saved, all the ends of the earth." Here the salvation of the world and the original creation are brought together, and the first seems anterior in idea to the second.

5. Righteousness in the People.

The Old Testament runs out its idea of the final state and perfection of the kingdom of God and its universality, more on the external side, in events and in the relations of the nationalities of the world to one another and to the Church. The various prophets differ according to their circumstances in their idea how the relations of Israel and the nations were to be adjusted. In all, however, the heathen are brought into a relation

of submission and subordination to Israel; the Church at last overcomes and absorbs the heathen world.

In the same way the relations of the various classes within Israel are finally adjusted, as at the day of the Lord. All evil is judged and destroyed-the people are all righteous. And with the perfection of the Church comes in also the perfect state of creation. The earth yields her increase; there is abundance of corn even on the tops of the mountains; it shakes like Lebanon-the desert blossoms like the rose, and God's blessing is upon the people (Ps. lxxii. 16; Isa. xxxv. 1).

Israel seemed no And this state of

Of course, all Old Testament prophecies are written from the point of view of things as they then were, when Israel alone was the Church, and the nations were outside the covenant. And one of the most interesting and also most difficult tasks of the interpreter of prophecy is to decide how much of the prophetic form may have to be stripped off when applying the prophecies to our own dispensation. In the days of the Apostle Paul a state of things had entered that seemed almost the reverse of the state of things which formed the point of view from which the Old Testament was written. more the Church, but outside of it. things raised the question to him in one way as it does to us in general, how the prophecies in regard to Israel were to be fulfilled. He fell back on the covenant; the gifts and calling of God are without repentance. The covenant formed with Israel secured their presence in the Church. The Church was indeed founded in Israel, which was the stock into which Gentiles were only grafted in. The natural branches broken off should be grafted in again, and all Israel should be saved (Rom. xi.). On the spiritual side alone is it that the apostle's reasoning is carried on. This leaves us without any guide so far as restoration to the land is concerned. We are thrown upon general considerations suggested by the ways of God upon the whole.

But how does the Old Testament run out its idea of