Fisherman & farmer. [volume] (Edenton, N.C.) 1887-19??, 1893-02-24
1Ll. DIR. TALMAGE.
THE BROOKLYN DIVINES SUN.
DAY SERMON
Subject: GOD Among the Fishes"


bring forth nbunianttu the nouing crea-
lures that hath tife."-Genesis j.. 20.
What pew book the Bible is? After
thirty-six years preaching from it and dis
cussing over 300 different subjects founded
on the word Of God, the book is as fresh to
me as when | learned, with a stretch Of in
fantile 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 ona else's
had ever explored, and having spoken to
you in this course OF sarmons on God every
where concerning the Astronomy OF the
Bible; or, God Among thu Stars" the
chronology of the Bible; or, God Among
the Centuries" the ''Ornithology of the
Bible; or, God Among the Birds" the
''Mineralogy of the Bible; or, God Among
the Amethysts" this morning, as [ may b.
divinely helped, will speak to you about
che "Ichthyology of the Bible; or, God
Among the Fishes"
Our horses were lathered and tirei out,
and their fetlocks were red with the blood
cut out by the rocks, and I could hardly get
my feet out Of the stirrups as on Saturday
night we dismounted on the beach of Lake
Galilee. The rather liberal supply of food
with which we had started from Jerusalem
was we'll mig 81 exhausted, and the articles Of
diet remaining had by oft repetition three
times day for three weeks ceased to app9-
TIE. L never want to see a 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dates with me are all out Of date.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 delec-
tated the first few days by crying out Gin
lshed. The most piQuant appetizer is ab-
stinance, and the demand Of all the party
was, LET us breakfast on Sunday morning
on fresh fish from Lake Gennesareth," for
you must know that that lake has four
names, and it is worth profusion Of nomen-
clature, and it Is in the Bible called Chin
nereth. Tiberias, Gennesareth and Galilee.
10 our extemporized table on Sabbath
morning came broiled perch, only few
hours before lifted out of the sacred waters.
1t was natural that our minds should revert
TO the only breakfast that Christ ever pre-
pared, and 1t was on those very shores where
we breakfasted. Christ had in those olden
times struck two fints together and set on
dire some shavings or light brushwood and
then put on larger wood, and pile of glow
ing bright Goals was the consequence.
Meanwhile the disciples fishing on the lake
had awfully poor luck" and every time
they drew up the net it hung dripping with.
out hutter1ng fin or squirming scale. But
Christ from the shore shouted to them and
told them where to drop the net, and 153 big
fish rewarded them. Simon and Nathaniel,
having cleaned some of those large fish,
brought them to the Goals which Christ had
k1ndled, and the group who had been out all
night and were chill and wet and hungry,
sat down and began masticatlon. All that
scene came back to Us when on Sabbath
morning, December, 1889, just outside the
ruins OF ancient Tiberias and within sound
or the ripping Galilee, we breakfasted.
NOW. 1t is not strange that the Bible i'm
agery is so inwrought from the fisheries
when the Holy Land is, for toe most part.
sn inland region? Only three lakeS-two be-
sides the one already mentioned-namely
the Dead Sea, where fish cannot live at all
ana as soon as they touch it they die, and
the birds swoOp on their tiny carcasses, and
the third, the Pools of Heshbon, which arc
full and dry. Only three rivers
OF the Holy Land-Jabbok, Kishon and Jor-
Ian.
About all the fish now in the waters Of the
Holy Land are the perch, the carp, the
Dream, the minnow, the blenny, the barbeI
$50 called because of the barb at its mouth),
the club, the dogfsh, none Of them worth
Delaware shad or an Adirondack trout.
Well, the worlds geography has changed,
and the worlds bill Of fare has changed.
Lake Galllee was larger and deeper and bet
ter 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
Tea only thirty-five miles away, and fish
were salted or dried and 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 it was called the fish gate. The
cities had great reservoirs in which fish
were kept alive and bred. The pool of Gideon
was fish pool. Isaiah and Solomon refer
to fish pools. 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 meaning of the
Scripture passage which says, "Canst thou
put a hook into his nose or bore his jaw
with a thorn"
So important was the fish that the god
Dagop, worshlped by the Philistines was
made half fish and half man, and that is the
of the Lords Indignation when in
I 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 q god. That explains the
Scripture passage, The head of Dagon and
both the palms Of his hands vera cut off up.
on the threshold; only the stump OF Dagon
was left to him." Now, the stump of Dagon
was the fish part. The top part, which was
the figure of a man, was dashe1 to pieces,
and the Lord, by demolishing every thing
but the stump or fish part of the idol. prac-
tically said, You may keep your fish, but
know from the way l have demolished the
rest of the idol that it is nothing divine"
Layard and Wilkinson found the fish an
object Of idolatry all through Assyria and
Egypt. The Nile was full of fish, and that
explains the horrors of the plague that
the funny tribe all up and down
that river, which has been and is now the
main artery of Egypts life. In Job you
hear the plunge of the spear into the hip
popotamus as the great dramatic poet cries
out, ''Canst thou fill his skin with barbed
irons or his head with fish spears% Yea,
the fish began to swim in the very first book
of Genesis, where my text records, "And
God said, Let the waters bring forth abund-
antIy the moving creature that hath life"
Do you realize that the first living
thing that God created was the fish? 1t
preceded the bird, the Quadrupei, the