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The Jewish Religion
garded as coming directly from God Himself to reveal His divine nature and His will and purpose with it and with the
whole human race. In all the events of its history, as interpreted by its spiritual leaders, Israel ever saw God's hand working, and through the interpretation of its history aright and life of it learned to know God and His true worship the chief been ever has history Israel's service for all men. source of
its
knowledge of God. Revelation
But
in a certain
pressed
in
the
sense there
one
is
still
word, Revelation.
a third source,
term
This
ex-
implies
knowledge of God is the result not only of individual and communal religious conexpanding his own but also, and perhaps even more, of thought, sciousness and revelation of Himself to Israel purposed God's actual and inspired men, whom we call and through divinely chosen that the Jew's
Certainly the prophets so conceived of themselves, They spoke and labored, not their message, and their work. as mere human beings, but as impersonal agents through prophets.
whom God
Himself was
irresistibly
working.
Volumes have
been written to explain prophetic inspiration and revelation
by natural law, and from a rationalistic and somewhat mechanical standpoint, and much light has been shed upon this very
difficult
that only the
Yet we are constantly made
problem.
human
side of the prophet's nature
to realize
and work
can be thus analyzed and explained; the divine element, the manner of God's willing and working, remains ever above
and beyond human analysis and comprehension. During a long period the prophets were the leaders in this wonderful through them unfolding of Israel's knowledge of God eternal truths were revealed, which were indispensable for
human knowledge and
spiritual
believe that these prophets
growth.
We
can scarcely
discovered these truths entirely
