[Footnote 2: So _Gesenius_ also in the _Thesaurus_: "The whole earth shall be holy and shall more beautifully bloom and be adorned with plenty of fruits and corn for the benefit of those who have escaped from those calamities." _Gesenius'_ wavering clearly shows how little satisfaction the non-Messianic explanation affords to its own abettors. Besides the explanations of צמח יהוה by "the new growth of the people," and "the rich produce of the country," he advances still a third one, viz., "a divinely favoured ruler,"--an explanation which has even the grammar against it, as we are at liberty to translate only: "The Sprout of the Lord;" and likewise the analogy of פרי הארץ, according to which the Genitive can have a reference to the _origin_ only.]
A crisis of the most important nature in the history of Israel is formed by the Syrico-Ephraemitic war, by the expedition of the allied kings, Rezin of Damascus, and Pekah of Samaria, which had been already prepared under the reign of Jotham, and which broke out in the first years of Ahaz. It was in consequence of this war that Asshur came into the land. The inroad of the Assyrian King, Pul, under Menahem of Israel, had been transitory only, comp. Vol. 1. p. 165. It was only with the invasion under Ahaz that the tendency of Asshur began of making lasting conquests on the other side of the Euphrates, which could not fail to bring about a collision with the Egyptian power. The succeeding powers in Asia and Europe followed Asshur's steps. "Hitherto,"--so says _Caspari_, in his pamphlet on the Syrico-Ephraemitic war, S. 17 ff.--"hitherto Israel had to do with the small neighbouring nations only,--now, in punishment of their sins, oppressed by them; then, in reward of their obedience, oppressing and ruling over them. And the Syrico-Ephraemitic war itself had been a link only in the chain of these attacks--its last link. Israel, having arrived at the point of being hardened, and having entered upon a path in accordance with this tendency, required another more severe corrective--its being crushed by the mighty world's power. The appearance of these mighty powers, just at the period when Israel entered upon their hardening, is most providential.--The beginning of the end of the kingdom of the ten tribes had come, and the breaking up of its independent political existence had commenced. As enmity to Judah had given its origin to the kingdom of the ten tribes, so also did it bring about its destruction; born out of it, it died of it. It owed its existence to the incipient enmity; when the latter was accomplished (Isa. vii. 6,) it caused its death.--The Assyrians came to the help of Judah, but charged a high price for their help, viz., Judah's submission and fealty. Thirty heavy years of servitude, and, to a great part, of [Pg 27] fears of the worst, 2 Kings xvi. 18; Is. xxxiii. 18 (?); xxxvii. 3, followed for this kingdom also; and when, at the close of this period, it freed itself from them after the fashion of the kingdom of Israel, it shared nearly the same fate, 2 Kings xviii. 31 ff. It was only to the mercy of the Lord, who looked graciously upon the feeble beginnings of conversion, that it owed its deliverance. The Assyrian power, which had put an end to the kingdoms of Damascus and Israel, and which was the first power that appeared on the stage of history and came into conflict with the people of God, became a significant sign of the final fate of the world's power in its attacks upon the Kingdom of God. But, as a prelude to the long series of visitations which it had to endure from the world's power in its different phases, Judah was even now led to the very brink of destruction; there came a period, the 14th year of Hezekiah, when almost nothing more of it was to be seen by the outward eye than its metropolis exposed to the utmost danger."