Apion, i, 60-68, ii, 199-203).

But there is no need of such testimony. The Old Testament, the Apocrypha, and the

New Testament, leading us progressively from century to century, indicate the same

carefulness in the upbringing of children. One of the earliest narratives of Scripture

records how God said to Abraham, "I know him, that he will command his children, and

his household after him, a d they shall keep the way of Jehovah to do justice and

n

judgment" (Gen 18:19)--a statement which, we may note by the way, implies the

distinction between the seed of Abraham after the flesh and after the spirit. How

thoroughly the spirit of this Divine utterance was carried out under the law, appears

from a comparison of such passages as Exodus 12:26, 13:8, 14; Deuteronomy 4:9, 10, 6:7,

20, 11:19, 31:13; Psalm 78:5, 6. It is needless to pursue the subject farther, or to show

how even God's dealings with His people were regarded as the basis and model of the

parental relationship. But the book in the Old Testament which, if properly studied,

would give us the deepest insight into social and family life under the old

dispensation--we mean the book of Proverbs--is so full of admonitions about the

upbringing of children, that it is sufficient to refer the reader generally to it. He will find

there the value of such training, its object, in the acquisition of true wisdom in the fear

and service of Jehovah, and the opposite dangers most vividly portrayed--the practical

bearing of all being summed up in this aphorism, true to all times: "Train up a child in the

way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it" (Prov 22:6); of which we

have this New Testament application: "Bring up (your children) in the nurture and

admonition of the Lord" (Eph 6:4).

The book of Proverbs brings before us yet another phase of deepest interest. It contains

the fullest appreciation of woman in her true dignity, and of her position and influence in

the family-life. It is quite true, as we shall presently show, that the obligation to train the

child rested primarily upon the father, and that both by the law of God and by the

ordinances of the Rabbis. But even the patriarchal story will prepare an attentive reader

to find, especially in the early upbringing of children, that constant influence of woman,

which, indeed, the nature of the maternal relationship implies, provided the family -life be

framed on the model of the Word of Go d. Lovelier pictures of this than the mother of

Samuel and the pious Shunammite hostess of Elisha can scarcely be conceived. But the

book of Proverbs shows us, that even in the early times of the Jewish monarchy this

characteristic of Old Testament life also appeared outside the bounds of the Holy Land,

wherever pious Israelites had their settlements. The subject is so deeply interesting,

historically and religiously, and perhaps so new to some readers, that a slight digression

may be allowed us.

Beyond the limits of the Holy Land, close by Dumah, lay the land or district of Massa

(Gen 25:14), one of the original seats of the Ishmaelites (1 Chron 1:30). From Isaiah 21:11

we gather that it must have been situate beyond Seir--that is, to the south-east of

Palestine, in Northern Arabia. Whether the Ishmaelites of Massa had come to the

knowledge of Jehovah, the true God; whether Massa was occupied by a Jewish colony,

which there established the service of the Lord;34 or whether, through the influence of

Hebrew immigrants, such a religious change had been brought about, certain it is, that

the two last chapters of the book of Proverbs introduce the royal family of Massa as

deeply imbued with the spiritual religion of the Old Testament, and the queen- mother as

training the heir to the throne in the knowledge and fear of the Lord.35

Indeed, so much is this the case, that the instruction of the queen of Massa, and the

words of her two royal sons, are inserted in the book of Proverbs as part of the inspired

records of the Old Testament. According to the best criticism, Proverbs 30:1 should be

thus rendered: "The words of Agur, the son of her whom Massa obeys. Spake the man

to God-with-me--God with me, and I was strong."  36

Then Proverbs 31 embodies the words of Augur's royal brother, even "the words of

Lemuel, king of Massa, with which his mother taught him." If the very names of these