The New Jerusalem.

Manawatu Herald, 15 August 1893, Page 3

The New Jerusalem.

It appears that among Oriental Jews there is a general belief that the opening of the railway from Joppa to Jerusalem is a sure precursor of the corniug of the Messiah. The foundation for the opinion appears to be the last chapter of the prophecies of Isaiah, in an eloquent prediction of the return of th? Hebrew exiles, where we read : — " They shall b .ing all your brethren ouf of all the nations, for an offering unto ilie Lord, upon horses, and in chariots, and in litters, and upon mules, and upon swift beasts to my holy mountain, Jerusalem, saith the Lord." The Hebrew word which is translated " swift beasts " in the English version is kirkaroth, and occurs only this ouce in all the Bible. The roots of the word are found in II Samuel, vi., 14, where it is applied to the swaying dance of David, and in the common Hebrew word for furnace. Hence the derived meaning, " a swaying furnace." For the English rendering there is no justification whatever in the sense of the Hebrew word in the text. Some propose to translate it 11 dromedaries ;" but the same prophet only a few chapters before (lx., 6), uses a totally different word, the accepted equivalent of which is " dromedary." It is certainly neither camels nor asses, for there are well known Hebrew words regularly used for them. When the English translation was made in King James" time there was no word to express the Hebiew in thi3 passage ; but what more accurate epithet could be applied to a railway locomotive than to call it a swaying furnace ? And what more accurate term could the prophet use to describe what he had seen in his vision of the return of the Hebrews by all kinds of conveyances, among them one which he had never beheld in all his experience, but which " swayed 1 , and carried fire ? What a picturesque word to describe a train or locomotive in rapid motion !