The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1919-01-03
INTERNATIONAL
SUNDAY SCHOOL
LESSON
pY WILLIAM T. ELLIS.

For January 5, is Pharaoh op-1
presses Israei."-Exodus 1:1-14;
2:1-25.
Finishing the Pharaoh Fashion.
This is more than a new year: it is
a new era. Our grandchildren will
understand more clearly than we the
vast meanings of the present months.
To us it has been given to see the
passing of an old order of life. We
have lived thru the Great Enianeipa-
ton. Some things as old as history
have come to an end before our eyes.
AS twenty million members of the
Sunday school, and other millions Of
newspaper readers besides. bsgin an
other year of lessons they find them
selves called upon to con the pro-
found significance of time that is
only partially paralleled in the past.
Nowadays we have to read the
newspapers in the light of the Bible.
if we would catch the meaning of
both. No alert person. for instance.
would think of studying the present
lesson upon the oppression of the
Jews in Egypt without interpreting it
from the standpoint of the latest It'd
ings from the Near East and the
VOL Id. Pharaohism, in fact and in
symbol, is as dead as the mummies
that adorn the Cairo Museum.
There is the tug Of Turkey upon
our interest as well as the pull of
Pharaoh. Events are moving apace
in the lands where the Bible stories
were enacted. A new epoch has
dawned for these old regions of ro-
nance. There are living questions
clamoring for the worlds attention in
Egypt and Palestine and all about the
Mediterranean; yet most of the popu-
lar knowledge of these lands reflects
of the Bible. No figure exists within
the confines of what was until lately
the Ottoman Empire who fills the eye
like Joseph and Moses. As a matter
or spiritual reality, they are still play
ing part in present events.
Farewell Pharaoh:
The pharaoh fashion is finished.
That is lesson number one Of the war.
Whatever from the conclusions of the
peace conference take, this decision
is sure: for it was the animating pur-
pose of the men who fought and OF
the nations which sustained them.
For long and bitter centuries and
millenniums, humanity endured the
evils of absolutisrn and autocracy.
the irresponsible rule of the king we
behold countless multitudes of men,
women and children writhing under
the lash or struggling with the load,
screaming and grooming or submitting
in dumb agony. What millions have
cursed God and died, all over the
world, under the blight IF tyranny!
Old beyond reckoning is themo-
notonous tale. Atrocities in Belgium
and Armenia are no new fashion. In
the latest issue of THE Journal Of the
American Oriental Society" I find a
long article by Professor Olmstead
upon THE Calculated FrightfuIness of
Ashur Nasir Apal," king OF Assyria
and prototype of the kaiser Of Ger
many. His "kultur" in cluded syste-
matte 1ooting and burning; and the
enemies he did not capture he ex-
terminated. One of his favorite de-
vices was to flay leading men. alive,
and spread their skins on the walls
of their towns Or he would build
memorial pillars, With enemies en-
tombed alive Inside, and the skins of
others covering the outside. He also
liked to impale his foes on stakes,
outside the city gates.
That is but one of the vagaries of
the old king fashion. The autocrat
could do as he pleased. The common
people had no rights but those which
he saw fit to bestow. But that fashion
has passed away with the kaiser, and
his company of scurrying kings. The
first great division Of this present
lesson upon Pharaoh's oppression of
the Israelites should be thanksgiv-
ing that this sort of thing is now, in the
past tense. The world is thru with
phara ohism. political, commercial, in
this: but the law of Moses and the
Spirit Of Christ have doomed them.
A new, high and resolute purpose in
the heart Of humanity has toppIea
injustice.
Forgetters of the Past.
Short memories are said to be
characteristic of rulers. Pharaoh was
good forgotten. He took no thought
OF the men of former days, the de-
liverers of his people, the friends of
his fathers. He was OF that large
Nl1C Nxyht r1, IT,
| scribes as blind. seeing only that
| which is near" Children and unedu-
Gated persons take into account only
| what they can see and hear: the pres-
ent thing and the present moment
| dominate them. Only the wise have
historical sense, seeking ever to hold
| all of life In proportion and in reia-
! tionship.
| Not always. tho. IL the cynical
| apothegam concerning the short mem
cries OF the people warranted by the
facts. Because America has not for
| gotten France and Lafayette and
Rochambeau of a. hundred and forty
| years ago, the German hordes have
been beaten back from the land of
the lily. and their power broken and
their plans utterly COMPOUNDED.
Whatever men do. God remembers
His cycles swing sure, tho slowly.
Consider what indications Of the past
there have been within a twelve
| month--3ohemia freed and honorcd
| Of all men; Finland given her oppor-
| tunity; Armenia emancipated; the
Jews afforded an open door in the
Land OF Promise; AIsace-Lorraine re-
stored; the horribly oppressed blacks
| in equatorial Africa saved from the
i German lash This is year of jubilee
upon which the world is entering;
and 1t has need to recall the days that
are gone. and gone forever. God for
| bid that we should be among those
who. Pharaoh fashion. forget their
friends and deliverers and allies.
| An Old Pharaoh Crime.
In Egypt, the Jews had grown to
be host. They throve and multi