1. The central point of Jewish theology and the key to an understanding of the nature of Judaism is the doctrine, “God chose Israel as His people.” The election of Israel as the chosen people of God, or, what amounts to the same, as the nation whose special task and historic mission it is to be the bearer of the most lofty truths of religion among mankind, forms the basis and the chief condition of revelation. Before God proclaimed the Ten Words of the Covenant on Sinai, He addressed the people through His chosen messenger, Moses, saying: “Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto Myself. Now therefore, if ye will hearken unto My voice, indeed, and keep My covenant, then ye shall be Mine own treasure from among all peoples, for all the earth is Mine; and ye shall be unto Me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation.”1021
2. The fact of Israel's election by God as His peculiar nation is repeated in Deuteronomy, with the special declaration that God had found delight in them as the smallest of the peoples, on account of the love and the faith He had sworn to the Patriarchs.1022 It is accentuated in the Synagogal liturgy, [pg 324] especially in the prayer for holy days which begins with the words: “Thou hast chosen us from all peoples; Thou hast loved us and found pleasure in us and hast exalted us above all tongues; Thou hast sanctified us by Thy commandments and brought us near unto Thy service, O King, and hast called us by Thy great and holy name.”1023 Inasmuch as the election of Israel is connected with the deliverance of the people from Egypt, the whole relation of the Jewish nation to its God assumes from the outset an essentially different character from that of other nations to their deities. The God of Israel is not inseparably connected with His people by mere natural bonds, as is the case with every other ancient divinity. He is not a national God in the ordinary sense. He has chosen Israel freely of His own accord. “When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and out of Egypt I called My son,” says God through Hosea,1024 and thus prefers to call Himself “thy God from the land of Egypt.” This election from love is echoed also in Jeremiah, who said, “Israel is the Lord's hallowed portion, His first-fruits of the increase.”1025 The moral relation between God and Israel is most clearly characterized, however, by Amos, in the words: “You only have I known of all the families of the earth; therefore I will visit upon you all your iniquities.”1026 Here is stated in explicit terms that the God of history selected Israel as an instrument for His plan of salvation, in the expectation that he would remain faithful to His will.
3. The real purpose of the election and mission of Israel was announced by the great prophet of the Exile when he called Israel the “servant of the Lord,” who has been formed from his mother's bosom and delivered from every other bondage, in order that he may declare the praise of God among the peoples, and be a harbinger of light and a bond of [pg 325] union among the nations, the witness of God, the proclaimer of His truth and righteousness throughout the world.1027 The entire history of Israel as far back as the Patriarchs was reconstructed in this light, and we find the election of Abraham also similarly described in the Psalms1028 and in the liturgy. Indeed, in every morning prayer for the past two thousand years the Jewish people have offered thanks to God for the divine teaching that has been intrusted to their care, and praised Him “who has chosen Israel in love.”1029
4. The belief in the election of Israel rests on the conviction that the Jewish people has a certain superiority over other peoples in being especially qualified to be the messenger and champion of religious truth. In one sense this prerogative takes into account every people which has contributed something unique to any department of human power or knowledge, and therein has served others as pattern and guide. From the broader standpoint, all great historic peoples appear as though appointed by divine providence for their special cultural tasks, in which others can at most emulate them without achieving their greatness. Yet we cannot speak in quite the same way of the election of the Greeks or Romans or of the nations of remote antiquity for mastery in art and science, or for skill in jurisprudence and statecraft. The fact is that these nations were never fully conscious that they had a historic or providential destiny to influence mankind in this special direction. Israel alone was self-conscious, realizing its task as harbinger and defender of its religious truth as soon as it had entered into its possession. Its election, therefore, does not imply presumption, but rather a grave duty and responsibility. As the great seer of the Captivity had already declared, to be the servant of the Lord is to undergo [pg 326] the destiny of suffering, to be “the man of sorrow,” from whose bruises comes healing unto all mankind.1030
5. Accordingly the election of Israel cannot be regarded as a single divine act, concluded at one moment of revelation, or even during the Biblical period. It must instead be considered a divine call persisting through all ages and encompassing all lands, a continuous activity of the spirit which has ever summoned for itself new heralds and heroes to testify to truth, justice, and sublime faith, with an unparalleled scorn for death, and to work for their dissemination by words and deeds and by their whole life. Judaism differs from all other religions in that it is neither the creation of one great moral teacher and preacher of truth, nor seeks to typify the moral and spiritual sublimity which it aims to develop in a single person, who is then lifted up into the realm of the superhuman. Judaism counts its prophets, its sages, and its martyrs by generations; it is still demonstrating its power to reshape and regenerate religion as a vital force. Moreover, Judaism does not separate religion from life, so as to regard only a segment of the common life and the national existence as holy. The entire people, the entire life, must bear the stamp of holiness and be filled with priestly consecration. Whether this lofty aim can ever be completely attained is a question not to be decided by short-sighted humanity, but only by God, the Ruler of history. It is sufficient that the life of the individual as well as that of the people should aspire toward this ideal.
6. Of course, the election of Israel presupposes an inner calling, a special capacity of soul and tendency of intellect which fit it for the divine task. The people which has given mankind its greatest prophets and psalmists, its boldest thinkers and its noblest martyrs, which has brought to fruition the three great world-religions, the Church, the Mosque, and—mother of them both—the Synagogue, must be the [pg 327] religious people par excellence. It must have within itself enough of the heavenly spark of truth and of the impetus of the religious genius as to be able and eager, whenever and wherever the opportunity is favorable, to direct the spiritual flight of humanity toward the highest and holiest. In fact, the soul of the Jewish people reveals a peculiar mingling of characteristics, a union of contrasts, which makes it especially fit for its providential mission in history. Together with the marked individuality of each person we find a common spirit highly sensitive to every encroachment. Here there is a tenacious adherence to what is old and traditional, and there an eager assimilation of what is new and strange. On the one hand, a materialistic self-interest; on the other, an idealism soaring to the stars.1031 The sages of the Tannaitic period already remarked that Israel has been intrusted with the law which it is to defend and to disseminate, just because it is the boldest and most obstinate of nations.1032 On the other hand, the three special characteristics of the Jewish people according to the Talmud are its chastity and purity of life, its benevolence and its active love for humanity.1033 A heathen scoffer calls Israel “a people of generous impulses which promised at Sinai to do what God would command, even before it had hearkened to the commandments.”1034 “Gentle and shy as a dove, it is also willing like the dove to stretch out its neck for the sacrifice, for love of its heavenly Father,” says the Haggadist.1035 And yet R. Johanan remarks that Israel, called to be the bearer of light to the world, must be pressed like the olive before it will yield its precious oil.1036 Every individual in Israel possesses the requisite qualities for a holy priest-people, according to a Midrash of the Tannaitic period, and hence we read in Deuteronomy, “The Lord [pg 328] hath chosen thee to be His own treasure out of all peoples that are upon the face of the earth.”1037
7. All these and similar sayings disprove completely the idea that the election of Israel was an arbitrary act of God. It is due rather to hereditary virtues and to tendencies of mind and spirit which equip Israel for his calling. To this must be added the important fact that God educated the people for its task through the Law, which was to make it conscious of its priestly sanctity and keep it ever active in mind and heart. The election of Israel is emphasized in Deuteronomy especially in connection with the prohibition of marriage with idolaters and with the prohibition of unclean animals, which also originated in the priestly laws.1038 The underlying idea is that the mission of Israel to battle for the Most High imperatively demands separation from the heathen peoples, and on the other hand, that its priestly calling necessitates an especial abstinence. And as has the law in its development and realization for thousands of years, so has also God's wise guidance trained Israel in the course of history so as to render him at times the unyielding preserver and defender and at other times the bold champion and protagonist of the highest truth and justice, according as the outlook and the mental horizon of the period were narrow or broad.
8. It is true that the thought of Israel's calling and mission in world-history first became clear when its prophets and sages attained a view of great world-movements from the lofty watch-tower of the centuries, so that they could take cognizance of the varying relations of Judaism to the civilized peoples around. The summons of the Jewish people to be heralds of truth and workers for peace is first mentioned in Isaiah and Micah,1039 while only in the great movement of nations [pg 329] under Cyrus did the seer of the Exile recognize the peculiar mission of Israel in the history of the world. If in gloomy periods the outlook became dark, still the hope for the fulfillment of this mission was never entirely lost. In fact, the contact of the Jewish people with Greek culture after Alexander the Great gave new power and fresh impetus to the conception of Israel's mission,1040 as the rich Hellenistic literature and the vision of Daniel in chapter VII testify. In fact, Abraham, the ancestor of the Jewish people, became for the earliest Haggadists a wandering missionary and a great preacher of the unity of God, and his picture was the pattern for both Paul and Mohammed.1041 The election of Israel is clearly and unequivocally expressed by Rabbi Eleazar ben Pedath in the words, “God sent Israel among the heathen nations that they may win a rich harvest of proselytes, for, as God said through Hosea, ‘I will sow her unto Me in the land,’ so He wishes from this seed to reap a bountiful and world-wide harvest.”1042
9. In the Middle Ages, when the historical viewpoint and the idea of human progress were both lacking, the belief in the mission of Israel was confined to the Messianic hope. Both Jehuda ha Levi and Maimonides, however, regard Christianity and Islam as preparatory steps for the Messiah, who is to unify the world through the knowledge of God.1043 “The work of the Messiah is the fruit, of which Israel will be universally acknowledged as the root,” says the Jewish sage in the Cuzari. Therefore he rightly accepts the election of Israel as a fundamental doctrine of belief. Modern times, however, with their awakened historical sense and their idea of progress, have again placed in the foreground the belief [pg 330] in the election and mission of Israel. The founders of reform Judaism have cast this ancient doctrine in a new form. On the one hand, they have reinterpreted the Messianic hope in the prophetic spirit, as the realization of the highest ideals of a united humanity. On the other, they have rejected the entire theory that Israel was exiled from his ancient land because of his sins, and that he is eventually to return there and to restore the sacrificial cult in the Temple at Jerusalem. Therefore the whole view concerning Israel's future had to undergo a transformation.1044 The historic mission of Israel as priest of humanity and champion of truth assumed a higher meaning, and his peculiar position in history and in the Law necessarily received a different interpretation from that of Talmudic Judaism or that of the Church. As individuals, indeed, many Jews have taken part in the achievements and efforts of all civilized peoples; the Jewish people as such has accomplished great things in only one field, the field of religion. The following chapters will consider more closely how Judaism has taken up and carried out this sacred mission.
1. The hope of Judaism for the future is comprised in the phrase, “the kingdom of God,”—malkuth shaddai or malkuth Shamayim,—which means the sovereign rule of God. From ancient times the liturgy of the Synagogue concludes regularly with the solemn Alenu, in which God is addressed as the “King of kings of kings”—king of kings being the Persian title for the ruler of the whole Empire—and directly after this the hope is expressed that “we may speedily behold the glory of Thy might, when Thou wilt remove the abominations from the earth, and the idols will be utterly cut off; when the world will be perfected under the kingdom of the Almighty, and all the children of flesh will call upon Thy name; when Thou wilt turn unto Thyself all the wicked of the earth. Let all the inhabitants of the earth perceive and know that unto Thee every knee must bend, and every tongue give homage. Let them all accept the yoke of Thy kingdom, and do Thou reign over them speedily, and forever and ever.”1045 At the close of the Torah lesson in the house of learning the assembly regularly recited the blessing, “Praised be Thy name! May Thy kingdom soon come!”—afterwards known as the Kaddish,1046 and reëchoed in the so-called “Lord's Prayer” of the Church. The words of the prophet, “The Lord shall be King over all the earth; in that day shall the Lord be One, and His name One,”1047 voiced for all ages this ideal of the future, and thus gave a goal and a purpose to the history of the world [pg 332] and at the same time centered it in Israel, the chosen people of God.
2. The establishment of the kingdom of the One and Only God throughput the entire world constitutes the divine plan of salvation toward which, according to Jewish teaching, the efforts of all the ages are tending. This “Kingdom of God” is not, however, a kingdom of heaven in the world to come, which men are to enter only after death, and then only if redeemed from sin by accepting the belief in a supernatural Savior as their Messiah, as is taught by the Church. Judaism points to God's Kingdom on earth as the goal and hope of mankind, to a world in which all men and nations shall turn away from idolatry and wickedness, falsehood and violence, and become united in their recognition of the sovereignty of God, the Holy One, as proclaimed by Israel, His servant and herald, the Messiah of the nations. It is not the hope of bliss in a future life (which is the leading motive of Christianity), but the building up of the divine kingdom of truth, justice, and peace among men by Israel's teaching and practice.1048 In this sense God speaks through the mouth of the prophet, “I will also give thee for a light of the nations, that My salvation may be unto the end of the earth.”1049 “All the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.”1050 “The remnant of Jacob shall be in the midst of many peoples, as dew from the Lord, as showers upon the grass.”1051
3. Clearly, the idea of a world-kingdom of God arose only as the result of the gradual development of the Jewish God-consciousness. It was necessary at first that the prophetic idea of God's kingship, the theocracy in Israel, should triumph over the monarchical view and absorb it. The patriarchal life of the shepherd was certainly not favorable to a monarchical rule. “I will not rule over you, neither shall my son rule [pg 333] over you, the Lord shall rule over you,” said Gideon in refusing the title of king which the people had offered him.1052 According to one tradition Samuel blamed the people for desiring a king and thereby rejecting the divine kingship.1053 “I give thee a king in Mine anger,” says God through Hosea.1054 The more the monarchy, with its exclusively worldly and materialistic aims, came into conflict with the demands of the prophets and their religious truth, the higher rose the prophetic hope for the dawning of a day when God alone would rule in absolute sovereignty over the entire world. Now, in the kingdom of the Ten Tribes, with its frequently changing dynasties, the old patriarchal conception was dominant, while in the kingdom of Judah, which remained loyal to the house of David, the monarchical idea developed. Isaiah, living in Jerusalem and favorably disposed towards the monarchy, prophesied that a shoot from the house of David, endowed with marvelous spiritual powers, should come forth, occupying the throne in the place of God, and through his victories would plant righteousness and the knowledge of God everywhere upon earth, and establish throughout the world a wonderful reign of peace.1055 Upon this royal “shoot” of David1056 rested the Messianic hope during the Exile, and amidst the disappointments of the time this vision became all the more idealized. In contrast to this the great prophet of the Exile announced the establishment of the absolute dominion of God as the true “King of Israel”1057 over all the earth by the nucleus of Israel, “the servant of God,” who would become conscious of his great historic mission in the world and be willing to offer his very life in its cause. In all this the prophet makes no reference to the royal house of David, but makes [pg 334] bold to confer the title of the “anointed of God”—that is, Messiah—upon Cyrus, the king of Persia, as the one who was to usher in the new era.1058 Subsequently these two divergent hopes for the future run parallel in the Psalms and the liturgy as well as in the apocryphal and rabbinic literature.
4. While the Messianic aspirations as such bore rather a political and national character in Judaism (as will be explained in Chapter LIII), yet the religious hope for a universal kingdom of God took root even more deeply in the heart of the Jewish people. It created the conception of Israel's mission and also the literature and activity of the Hellenistic propaganda, and it gave a new impetus to the making of proselytes among the heathen, to which both Christianity and Islam owe their existence. The words of Isaiah, repeated later by Habakkuk, “The earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea,”1059 became now an article of faith. While in earlier times the rule of Israel's God, JHVH, was attached to Zion, from whose holy mount He ruled as invisible King,1060 later on we find Zechariah proclaiming Him who was enthroned in heaven as having dominion over the entire earth,1061 and the Psalter summons all nations to acknowledge, adore, and extol Him as King of the world.1062 Nay, at the very time when Judah lay humbled to the ground, the prophet exclaimed, “Who would not fear Thee, O King of the nations? for it befitteth Thee; forasmuch as among all the wise men of the nations, and in all their royalty there is none like unto Thee.”1063 Israel's great hope for the future is expressed most completely and in most sublime language in the New Year liturgy: “O Lord our God, impose Thine [pg 335] awe upon all Thy works, and let Thy dread be upon all that Thou hast created, that they may all form one single band to do Thy will with a perfect heart.... Our God and God of our fathers, reveal Thyself in Thy splendor as King over all the inhabitants of the world, that every handiwork of Thine may know that Thou hast made it, and every creature may acknowledge that Thou hast created it, and whatsoever hath breath in its nostrils may say: the Lord God of Israel is King, and His dominion ruleth over all.”1064
5. In the earlier period, then, the rule of JHVH seems to have been confined to Israel as the people of His covenant. During the Second Temple Jerusalem was called the “city of the great King”1065 and the constitution was considered by Josephus to have been a theocracy, that is, a government by God.1066 Indeed, the entire Mosaic code has as its main purpose to make Israel a “kingdom of priests,” over which JHVH, the God of the covenant, was alone to rule as King. The chief object of the strict nationalists, in opposition to the cosmopolitanism of the Hellenists, was that this government of God, in its intimate association with the Holy Land and the Holy People, should be maintained unchanged for all the future. Thus the book of Daniel predicts the speedy downfall of the fourth world-kingdom and the establishment of the kingdom of God through Israel, “the people of the saints of the Most High; their kingdom is an everlasting kingdom.”1067 Naturally, such a purely nationalistic conception of the rulership of God does not admit the thought of a mission or its corollary, the conversion of the heathen.1068 These appear among the liberal school of Hillel in their opposition to the more rigorous Shammaites and the party of the Zealots.1069 It is, therefore, quite consistent that the modern nationalists should again dispute the mission of Israel.
[pg 336]6. As soon as Jewish monotheism had once been conceived by the Jewish mind as the universal truth, the idea of the mission of Israel as a bearer of light and a witness of God for the nations, as enunciated by Deutero-Isaiah, became ever more firmly established. Many Psalms exhort the people to make known the wondrous doings of God among the nations, so that the heathen world might at last acknowledge the One and Only God.1070 Nay, Israel is even called God's anointed and prophet,1071 and in one Psalm we find Zion, the city of God, elevated to be the religious metropolis of the world.1072 The book of Jonah is simply a refutation of the narrow nationalistic conception of Judaism; it holds forth the hope of the conversion of the heathen to the true knowledge of God. In the same spirit Ruth the Moabitess became the type of the heathen who are eager to “take refuge under the wings of God's majesty.”1073 The author of the book of Job no longer knows of a national God; to him God is the highest ideal of morality as it lives and grows in the human heart. The wisdom literature also teaches a God of humanity. Under His wings Shem and Japheth, the teaching of the Jew and the wisdom of the Greek, can join hands; the religious truth of the one and the philosophic truth of the other may harmoniously blend.
7. Thus a new impulse was given to Jewish proselytism in Alexandria, and the earlier history of Israel, especially the pre-Israelite epoch with its simple human types, was read in a new light. Enoch1074 and Noah1075 became preachers of penitence, heralds of the pure monotheism from which the heathen world had departed. Abraham especially, the progenitor of Israel, was looked upon as a prototype of the wandering [pg 337] missionary people, converting the heathen.1076 Wherever he journeyed, his teaching and his example of true benevolence won souls for the Lord proclaimed by him as the “God of the heaven and the earth.”1077 In this sense of missionary activity were now interpreted the words, “Be thou a blessing ... and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.”1078 This was no longer understood in the original sense, that Abraham by his prosperity should be an example of a blessed man, to be pointed out in blessing others; the words were given the higher meaning that Abraham with his descendants should become a source of blessing for mankind through his teachings and his conduct, so that all the families of men should attain blessing and salvation by following his doctrine and example. Thus the idea of the Jewish mission was connected with Abraham, the “father of a multitude of nations,”1079 and this was later on adopted by Paul and Mohammed in establishing the Church and the Mosque.
8. In contradistinction, then, to the political concept of the kingdom of God, which Ezekiel still hoped to see established by the exercise of external power,1080 the idea assumed now a purely spiritual meaning. This kingdom of God is accepted by the pious Jew every morning through his confession of the divine Unity in the Shema. Abraham had anticipated this, say the rabbis, when he swore by the God of heaven and earth, and so also had Israel in accepting the Torah at Sinai and at the Red Sea.1081 In fact, the kingdom of God began, we are told, with the first man, since, when he adored God freely as King of the world, every living creature acknowledged Him also. But only when Israel as a people proclaimed God's dominion at the Red Sea, was the throne [pg 338] of God and His kingdom on earth established for eternity.1082 And when Ezekiel says: “With a mighty hand will I be King over you,” they explain this to mean that the people chosen as the servant of God will be continually constrained anew by the prophets to recognize His kingdom.1083 Yea, the closing words of the Song at the Red Sea, “The Lord shall reign for ever and ever” were taken to imply that all the nations would in the end recognize only Israel's One God as King of the world.1084 As a matter of fact, the rabbinical view is that every proselyte, in “taking upon himself the yoke of the sovereignty of God,” enters that divine Kingdom which at the end of time will embrace all men and nations.1085 In the book of Tobit and the Sibylline Oracles also we find this universalistic conception of the Messianic age expressed.1086
9. Accordingly, proselytism found open and solemn recognition both before and after the time of the Maccabees, as we see in the Psalms,—especially those which speak of proselytes in the term, “they that fear the Lord,”1087 and also in the ancient synagogal liturgy, where the “proselytes of righteousness” are especially mentioned.1088 The school of Hillel followed precisely this course. Matters changed, however, under the Roman dominion, which was contrasted to the dominion of God especially from the time of Herod, when the belief became current that “only when the one is destroyed, will the other arise.”1089 Particularly after the Christian Church had become identified with Rome, all missionary endeavors by the Jews were considered dangerous and were therefore discouraged as much as possible. In their [pg 339] place arose the hope for a miraculous intervention of God. In Hellenistic circles the Messiah was believed to be the future founder of the kingdom of God,1090 which assumed more and more of an other-worldly nature, such as the Church developed for it later on.
10. The more the harsh oppression of the times forced the Jew to isolate himself and to spend his life in studying and practicing the law,—which was tantamount to “placing himself under the kingdom of God,”1091 the more he lost sight of his sublime mission for the world at large. Only individual thinkers, such as Jehuda ha Levi and Maimonides, kept a vision of the world-mission of Israel, when they called Jesus and Mohammed, as founders of Christianity and Islam, messengers of God to the idolatrous nations, divinely appointed to bring them nearer to Israel's truth,1092 or when they pointed forward to the time when all peoples will recognize in the truth their common mother and in God the Father of all mankind.1093 A most instructive Midrash on Zechariah IX, 9 gives the keynote of this belief. “At that time God as the King of Zion will speak to the righteous of all times, and say to them, ‘Dear as the words of My teaching are to Me, yet have ye erred in that ye have followed only My Torah, and have not waited for My world-kingdom. I swear to you that I shall remember for good him who has waited for My kingdom, as it is said, Wait ye for Me until the day that I rise up as a witness.’ ”1094
On the other hand, it was owing to the sad consequences of the missionary endeavors of the Church that the idea of the mission of Judaism was given a different direction. Not conversion, but conviction by teaching and example, is the [pg 340] historic task of Judaism, whose maxim is expressed in the verse of Zechariah, “Not by might, nor by power, but by My spirit, saith the Lord of hosts.”1095 It is not the creed, but the deed, which tells. Not the confession, but conduct, with the moral principles which govern it, counts. Such a view is implied in the well-known teaching of Joshua ben Hananiah, “The righteous of all nations will have a share in the world of eternal bliss.”1096 Judaism does not deny salvation to those professing other religions, which would tend to undermine the foundation of their spiritual life. Standing upon the high watchtower of time, it rather strives ever to clarify and strengthen the universal longing for truth and righteousness which lies at the heart of all religion, and is thus to become a bond of union, an all-illuminating light for the world. To quote the beautiful words of Leopold Stein in his Schrift des Lebens:1097 “Judaism, while recognizing the historic justification of all systems of thought and faith, does not cherish the ambition to become the Church Universal in the usual sense of the term, but aims rather to be the focus, or mirror, of religious unity for all the rest. ‘The people from of old,’ as the prophet called them, are to accompany mankind in its progress through the ages and the continents, until it reaches the goal of the kingdom of God on earth, the ‘new heaven and new earth’ of the prophetic vision.”1098 The thought of the Jewish mission is most adequately expressed in the Neilah service of the Union Prayer Book, based upon the Einhorn Prayerbook, which reads as follows:1099 “Endow us, our Guardian, with strength and patience for our holy mission. Grant that all the children of Thy people may recognize the goal of our changeful career, so that they may exemplify by their zeal and love for mankind the truth of Israel's watchword: One humanity on earth, even as there is but One God [pg 341] in heaven. Enlighten all that call themselves by Thy name with the knowledge that the sanctuary of wood and stone, which erst crowned Zion's hill, was but a gate through which Israel should step out into the world, to reconcile all mankind unto Thee!”