Saint Joel

Be that as it may, this Prophet does not speak of the ten tribes: his entire prophecy concerns those of Judah and Benjamin. At the same time that he announces to these tribes what was to happen to them, he predicts the coming of the Messiah, whom he calls the teacher of righteousness, the establishment of His Church, the descent of the Holy Spirit upon all flesh, and the virtue of the name of Jesus Christ, which he says will be so great that whoever calls upon this holy name shall be saved. The style of Joel, in the first two chapters, is simple and perfectly suited to the subject matter he treats therein; but, subsequently, it rises and becomes more pompous and figurative, which makes the end of his prophecies much more obscure than the beginning.

He is seen represented: 1° between two lions tearing him apart; this characteristic seems quite strange, especially since it seems to imply a martyrdom that the Prophet never endured; it can only be an allusion to the words he addresses to the Jews when he predicts the devastation of their country: "A nation has come up upon my land, strong and without number; its teeth are like the teeth of a lion, and its jaw like that of a lioness"; 2° standing, holding the cartouche or phylactery on which the main texts of his prophecy can be read; 3° standing, seeing the sun and the moon in a vision: we do not fully grasp the meaning of this characteristic. Perhaps it was intended to mean that the Prophet receives the hidden oracles of Jehovah, represented by the moon, which is the star of the night, and that he spreads them upon the earth with words of dazzling clarity, symbolized by the sun, the star of the day; but then this characteristic would be general and would apply indiscriminately to all the Prophets.

Ezra, Esdras Jewish scribe and priest, a central figure in the return from the Babylonian exile. son of Seraiah, the high priest, whom Nebuchadnezzar put to death at Riblah after the capture of Jerusalem, was of the priestly race of Aaron through the branch of Eleazar. Taken to Babylon while very young, he was raised there in the obscurity and tribulations of captivity. But he applied himself seriously to the study of the holy books, and Scripture says of him that he "was a scribe and very skilled in the law of Moses"; that is to say, a man very learned in matters of governance and religion, following the laws of Moses and the customs of the Jewish nation.

The seventy years of captivity predicted by Jeremiah had almost elapsed when Cyrus, King of the Persians, having taken Babylon and become master of the empire of the Medes, the Assyrians, and the Chaldeans, published an edict granting the Jews permission to return to their country, with orders to rebuild t he temple Jérusalem Holy city where the Cross was lost and subsequently recovered. of Jerusalem. They departed in the number of nearly fifty thousand people, under the leadership of Zerubbabel, a prince of the royal family of David and grandson of Jeconiah. Among the names of the priests who followed Zerubbabel, one finds that of Ezra. But he subsequently returned to Babylon to solicit permission to continue the restoration of the temple. He was in that city in the seventh year of the reign of Artaxerxes, surn Artaxerxès, surnommé Longue-Main King of Persia who authorized the return of Ezra. amed Longimanus. That same year, he obtained from this prince letters of return for himself and for all those who wished to follow him to Jerusalem. These were letters of recommendation, in the form of an edict, to the governors of the provinces contained within the extent of Artaxerxes' kingdom, to oblige them to assist Ezra and all those of his nation in everything that depended on them, for the purpose of favoring their restoration. The king also ordered his treasurers to provide Ezra with everything he might ask of them, whether in silver, wheat, wine, oil, or salt. He further granted immunity from tribute and all public charges to the priests, the Levites, the singers, and other ministers of the temple of the Lord. Finally, he gave full power to Ezra to establish magistrates to judge the people, with the power to condemn and punish with fines, and even with corporal punishment and death, leaving him, moreover, the master to teach the law to those who needed to be instructed in it.

Ezra, provided with these letters from the king and "supported by the hand of the Lord," assembled a fairly large number of Israelites and set out on the road to return to Jerusalem. Having arrived at the bank of the river Ahava, and having noticed that there were neither priests nor Levites among the people, he sent to ask for some from Iddo, the leader of those who dwelt at Casiphia; the latter sent him thirty-eight Levites and two hundred Nethinim, who were the servants of the temple. After having proclaimed a fast and implored the help of God through prayer, Ezra departed from the bank of the river Ahava on the twelfth day of the first month of the year of the world 3537, followed by one thousand seven hundred and seventy-five men, and arrived safely in Jerusalem in the fifth month of the same year.

On the fourth day after his arrival, he offered burnt offerings to the Lord, to thank Him and to draw His blessings upon the people. At the same time, he delivered to the treasury of the temple the vessels, furniture, and offerings with which he was entrusted. He also gave the king's edicts to the satraps of his court and to the governors of the country beyond the Euphrates, and these officers began to favor the people and the house of God. But Ezra, having learned that many Israelites, both from the number of priests and Levites and from that of the magistrates and the common people, had allied themselves with foreign women, felt a deep sorrow for this detestable abuse; he tore his garments, pulled out his hair, and, utterly dejected with sadness, he sat on the ground in the temple, abandoning himself, to appease the Lord, to tears, fasting, and prayer. At this sight, the people shed an abundance of tears, and wishing to expiate the abomination into which they had fallen, resolved to do penance and to send away the foreign women with the children who had been born of them. Ezra, seeing the people thus disposed and ready to renew the covenant with the Lord, stood up and obliged the princes of the priests and the Levites and all Israel to promise him with an oath that they would do what they had just said. They swore it to him, and, after a general assembly in which the resolution that had been taken was made known to all Israel, commissioners were appointed to go into the cities and execute what had been agreed upon regarding the expulsion of the foreign women. Thus did Ezra succeed in abolishing these profane marriages.

After having reformed the abuses that had crept in among the people, Ezra applied himself to instructing them in their duties, and this was his main occupation for the rest of his life. In the seventh month of the year of the world 3551, the children of Israel, assembled at the gate of the temple for the celebration of the Feast of Tabernacles, begged him to read to them the law of Moses and to explain it to them. Ezra, having therefore placed himself in the middle of the square on a wooden platform, read the law from morning until noon. The people were so touched by it that they melted into tears. Ezra, seeing the Israelites penetrated with sorrow, consoled them, telling them that they should not weep on the day of such a solemn feast, but rather rejoice in the Lord. All this people, consoled by these words, went to take food, and thus the Feast of Tabernacles was celebrated with joy. The next day, the heads of families, the priests, and the Levites came to find Ezra to beg him to continue to explain to them the words of the law. They came upon the place where it is written that the Lord had ordered through the ministry of Moses that the children of Israel should dwell in tents during the solemn feast of the seventh month. The people, having heard these words, went to look for tree branches on all sides, and, having brought them, everyone made themselves booths in the form of tents, on the tops of houses, in the squares, in the streets, and even in the courtyard of the temple. Ezra continued to read the book of the law, each day of the feast, from the first to the last, explaining to the people the parts that needed clarification.

On the twenty-fourth of the same month, the day on which a great fast had been indicated, the children of Israel gathered covered in sackcloth and ashes, with the intention of making a public satisfaction to the Lord for the violation of the law which they had ignored or despised until their return from captivity. After they had confessed their sins and offered long prayers to obtain forgiveness, the covenant with the Lord was renewed, and an authentic act was drawn up, which was signed by Nehemi Néhémie Contemporary of Ezra, governor of Judea. ah, by the priests, the Levites, the heads of families, and the rest of the people. The names of the high priest Eliashib and of Ezra are not found in the enumeration of those who signed this act: apparently they are forgotten, or they are there under other names, for Ezra was still living. He was present later at the dedication of the walls of Jerusalem in 3550. He is given more than one hundred and twenty years of life, but the exact time of his death is not known. Josephus says of this great man that he died full of glory and years, and that he was given magnificent funeral rites in the city of Jerusalem. Scripture itself makes his eulogy in few words when it says "that Ezra had prepared his heart to penetrate the understanding of the law of God and to have its precepts taught in Israel."

## CULT AND RELICS. — WRITINGS.

Joel is honored among the Greeks, who celebrate his feast on October 19, as well as by the Russians and Muscovites who follow their Usnard Medieval hagiographer, author of a martyrology. rite. Usnard is the first to have fixed it for him on the third day of July, and he has been followed by the modern Roman. As for Ezra, the Greeks do not appear to have accorded him a particular cult: the Latins began to insert his name into their martyrologies in the 12th century, as seen in the old Roman and in those of Ado and Usnard, followed by the modern Roman.

The prophecy of Joel contains three chapters, with this unique title: On the destruction of Jerusalem. As for Ezra, we have four books under his name. The first two, which, according to the remark of Saint Jerome, were counted as only one among the Hebrews, are canonical and received unanimously in all Churches, both Greek and Latin. The last two are apocryphal and have no authority in the Latin Church; but the Greeks place the third among the divine books.

The sequence of history contained in the first book is eighty-two years, from the first year of the reign of Cyrus in Babylon, the year of the world 3468, until the nineteenth year of the reign of Artaxerxes Longimanus who sent Nehemiah back to Jerusalem in the year of the world 3550.

The Latins, by dividing the first book of Ezra into two, did not change the title, and they usually give the second the same name as the first; however, it seems quite certain that they are by two different hands.

Ezra, in the first of the books that bear his name, speaks almost always in the first person and as the principal author and leader of the enterprise he recounts. On the contrary, in the second of these books, he is spoken of only in the third person, and even quite rarely... Nehemiah appears in all the chapters of the book; it is he who speaks, who acts, who presides everywhere, so that one can say that this book contains no less the history of this prince than that of the Jews. From the beginning of the book he declares himself its author. It contains the history of about thirty-one years, that is to say from the twentieth year of the reign of Artaxerxes, which is 3350 of the world, until the reign of Darius Nothus, his son, who began to reign in the year of the world 3551.

One finds in the old editions of the Vulgate a book IV under the name of Ezra. Some ancient Greek and Latin Fathers cited it in their writings, and reported several passages from it, which we still read today in this book. But this work must not have come down to us in its entirety, since Clement of Alexandria reports a passage from it that we no longer find there. Saint Ambrose speaks often of this book and always with praise. The author of this book is, according to the most convincing opinion, a person posterior to Jesus Christ. The work received from a Christian hand some additions that are only found in the Latin version.

Dom Ceillier: Histoire des auteurs sacrés et ecclésiastiques. — Cf. Bulliet: Vies des Saints de l'Ancien Testament; Rubricahier, Darras: Histoires de l'Église.