Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1893-02-09
All IIil1 TABERNACLE.
THE lCHTHYoLoCY AND OTHER NAT.
URAL HISTORY OF THE BIBLE.

tluces Many Lessons From the Mention
of Fish In the Bible.
BROOKLYN, Feb 5.--Rev. T. Dewitt Tai.
mage this morning preached to a great all-
dicnce in the Tabernacle remarkably in.
teresting and eloquent sermon on THE Ich.
THEOLOGY OF the Bible; or, God Among the
Fishes" being continuation of his series
of discourses on God everywhere. The
text chosen was Genesis j. 90, And God
said, Let the waters bring forth abundautly
the moving creatures that hath life"
What a new book the Bible isl After
&c years preaching from it and discussing
over 5000 different subjects founded on the
word OF God the book is as fresh to me as
when learned, with stretch of infantile
memory, the shortest verse in the Bible,
Jesus wept." and / opened a few weeks
ago a new realm of Biblical interest that
neither my pulpit nor any one else's had
ever explored, and having spoken to you in
this course of sermons on God everywhere
concerning the Astronomy of the Bible;
or, God Among the Stars" the "Chronol-
ogy of the Bible; or, God Among the Cen
turies;" the "Ornithology of the Bible; or,
God Among the Birds' tho "Mineralogy
of the Bible; or, God Among the Anne
thysts," this morning, as l may be divincly
helped, will speak to you about the Itch
THEOLOGY of the Bible; or, God Among the
Fishes"
THE SEA OF MANY NAMES.
Our horses were lathered and tired out
and their fetlocks were red with the blood
cut out by the rocks, and l could hardly
get my feet out of the stirrups as on Satur-
day night we dismounted on the beach of
Lake Galilee. The rather liberal supply of
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salem was we'll nigh exhausted and the
articles of diet remaining had, by oft repe-
tition three times a day for three weeks,
ceased to appetite. never want to see
fig again, and dates with me are all out of
date
For several days the Arab caterer, who
could speak but, half a dozen English
words would answer our requests for some
of the styles of food with which we had
been delectatcd the first few days by cry
ing out, FINISHED" The most piquant APP
petizer is abstinence, and the demand of all
the party was, Let us breakfast on Sum
day morning on fresh fish from Lake Cen
nesareth," for you must know that that
lake has four names, and it is worth pro-
fusion of nomenclature, and it is in the
Bible called Chinnereth, Tiberias Gennesa-
reth and Galilee.
To our extemporized table on Sabbath
morning came broiled perch, only a few
hours before lifted out of the sacred waters
1t was natural that our minds should re-
vert to the only breakfast that Christ ever
prepared, and it was on those very shores
where we breakfasted. Christ had in those
oldcn times struck two flints together and
set on fire some shavings or light brush
wood and then put on larger wood, and
pile of glowing bright Goals was the con-
sequence.
Meanwhile the disciples fishing on the
lake had awfully poor luck, >" and every
time they drew up the net it hung dripping
without t1uttering fin or squirmng scale
But Christ from the shore shouted to them
and told them where to drop the net, and
1873 big fish rewarded them. Simon and
Nathaniel, having cleaned some of those
large fish, brought them to the Goals which
Christ had kindled, and the group who had
been out all night and were chill and wet
and hungry sat down and began mastica-
ton. All that scene came back to us when
on Sabbath morning, December, 1899, just
outside the ruins of ancient Liberals and
within sound of the ripping Galilee, we
breakfasted.
FISHING GREAT BIBLE TOPIC.
Now, is it not strange that the Bible i'm
agery is so inwrought from the fisheries
when the Holy Land is, for the most part,
an inland region? Only three lakes, two
besides the one already mentioned-namely,
the Dead sea- where fish cannot live at all
and as soon as they touch it they die, and
the birds swoop on their tiny carcasses, and
the third, the Pools of Heshbon, which are
alternately full and dry. Only three rivers
of the Holy Land, Jabbok, Kishon and Jor-
dan. About all the fish now in the waters
of the Holy Land are the perch, the carp
the Dream. the miunpW tlp hlanpu bn
barbel $50 called because of the barb at its
mouth), the club, the dogish, none of
them worth Il Delaware shad or an Adirou-
dack trout.
Well, the world geography has changed
and the worlds bill of fare has changed
Lake Galilee was larger and deeper and
better stocked than now, and no doubt the
rivers were deeper and the fisheries were
of far more importance then than now
Besides that there was the Mediterranean
sea only 80 miles away and fish were salt
ed or dried ans brought inland, and so
much of that article of food was sold in
Jerusalem that a fish market gave the
name to one of the gates of Jerusalem near
by, and il was called the fish gate.
The cities had great reservoirs in which
the fish were kept alive and bred Tho
Pool of Gideon was tishpool. Isaiah and
Solomon refer to fishpools. Large fish were
kept alive and tied fast by ropes to stake
in these reservoirs, "a ring having been run
through their gills, and that is the mean
ing of the Scripture passage which says,
! "Canst thou put hook into his nose or
bore his jaw through with thorn?'
So important was the fish that the god
Dagon, worshiped by the Philistines was
made half fish and half man, and that is the
meaning of the Lords Indignation when in
Samuel we read that this Dagon, the fish
god, stood beside the ark of the Lord, and
Dagon was by invisible hands dashed to
pieces because the Philistines had dared to
make the fish Il god. That explains the
scripture passage, The head of Dagon and
both the palms of his hands were cut Off
upon the threshold; only the stump Of Da-
Eon was left to him." Now, the stump of
Dagon was the fish part. The top part,
which was the figure of man, was dashed
TO pieces, and the Lord, by demolishing ev-
orythng but the stump or fish part of the
DOL practically said, You may keep your
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