Page:The message of the hour - four sermons delivered on the new years' day, and the day of atonement, 5651-1890 (IA messageofhourfou00moseiala).pdf/37

 not effect a radical change in our opinions, nor leave a lasting impression upon our hearts. Some of us would even raise serious objections to his ministraton.

To a great many, the lean, long, haggard figure of the mountaineer, the dark, piercing look, the coarse, unfashionable habilament, the plain, unpolished speech, would seem decidedly out of date and place in a modern Jewish congregation; badly fitting into the frame of our services and gatherings. The man to conduct our divine worship, and to speak to us the word of God, is not expected to be of the Elijah type; but rather a portly, polite gentleman, not careless even of the smaller duties of dress and gesture, unobtrusive in mien and look, careful and measured in speech as well as in action, knowing his position to be, not a leader of public opinion, not a pathfinder of new ways and methods, but simply a trained orator and skillful expounder of opinions and customs held by those who placed him there, and whose word of wisdom and might generally the latter may displace him from his honorable post. No! Elijah would not do at all in a modern Jewish congregation. A man who has the audacity to frown at the king, and to lay the charge of corruption and murder upon his very crown; who, in face of an overwhelming majority of prophets and priests, eating at the king's table and fawning at his majesty, declares that he Elijah alone is right; that the word of God in his mouth is truth, and that those who obey the king's behest and minister at the new altars of Baal and Astarte are traitors to their God and their people; a man who could speak so disrespectfully of those who differed from him in their religious opinions, and who, in a fit of rage, could slaughter four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal such a man, and be he the greatest of God's prophets, the most earnest and convincing defender of Israel's faith, could not be elected to the pulpit of the smallest or the most ignorant of our congregations. He could not get so much as a hearing.

In synagogues and churches the name of Elijah is uttered with great reverence, and is associated with many living hopes of the two religious systems. Whether in the literal or spiritual interpretation of the great Messiah's idea, Elijah holds the title of