The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1922-01-27
International
SundaySchooLLesson
BY WILLIAM n. ELLIS


BY WILLIAM q. ELLIS.
For January 90 is. Elijah in Naboths
Vineyard. ~ Kings 21:1-2s.
A Sulky King, an Evil Woman, a
Brave Prophet.
If newspaper correspondents at the
nliiiar with the Bible events, more
than one ofthem would long ago have
pointed out that China, is Naboth's
vineyard The old story comes along in
the course of International Lessons,
and its uneanny pertinency will be
pointed out in thousands of classes.
Because Naboth was weak and Queen
Jezebel was both strong and unscrupu-
lous, the poor man was -despoiled of
his patrimony which was his by every
law of God and man. just as China has
been despoiied for decades past.
Turnout the conference sessions, and
even among the delegates themselves,
there has persisted the ancient notion
that the weak have no rights which
the strong are bound to respect; and
that law does not run on the same
level for the mighty and for the fee
BILE. There still prevails something
like a divine right of power. Times
without number, in conference sessions
and elsewhere, China's weakness has
been thrown in her face as justifica-
ton for patiently unfair deals by the
powers. The title of the nations to
the peculiar privileges and possessions
which they have seized for themselves
in China is on all tours with Ahab's
right to Naboths vineyard. Strength
is its own excuse for its deed.
But / am running a bit ahead of the
Lesson story. The characters are the
same as we dealt with two weeks ago
king Ahab, of Israel; his heather
wife, Jezebel, whose name persists to-
day as a common term of reproach;
and Elijah, the prophet of Jehovah.
The only other principal parsonage in
the story is Naboth. the owner of a
vineyard which adjoined the kings
property. and which the king coveted.
Have the Weak Rights?
1t is the glorious claim of Chris
tian civilization that all men are
equal before the law; and that the
strongest In old Israel this law, given
by God, ran as the law of the land.
Even INSCRIPTIONS Ahab respected 1t,
when Naboth stood upon hi5 unques-
toned right-to refuse to part with his
inheritance. In both New York and
Washington there are great depart
nient stores, occupying a block each,
which have been unable to secure
ownership of a small corner lot apiece.
Whatever the reasons for the refusal OF
sciously administered a widaly-read
public lesson upon the rights of the
small landowner, as over against the
large.
We hear much talk about the rad
ical and Bolshevik tendencies of our
day, and the reasons therefor None
is more powerful than the belief,
widely entertained, that the poor do
not have the same rights before the
law as the rich; and that powerful in
terests are often able to bend legis-
lation and law-administratioh to their
own advantage. There is enough
truth in this complaint to make it
matter of concern to every thoughtful
citizen. If Justice does not hold her
scales even, then the condemnation of
God and man is likely to fall upon
the state. The best propaganda of
Bolshevism is the Unjust judge and the
yenal lawmaker.
King Ahab, with that sense of re-
sponsibility which usually goes with
power, apparently never thought of
going beyond the law. Naboth was
clearly within his rights in refusing to
angry and baffled, and he fell into a
fit of sulks that upset the entire
palace. Like an overgrowu baby,
crying because he cannot have what
he ought not to have, the king got
mad" and took his temper out upon
MS family.
A Queens Bloody Plot.
A husbands mood usually makes a
wife's weather. both in palace and cot
tage, and when the masterful JeZebel
found her husband sulking because
his land-Iust had been thwarted 1--WE
think of the countless family feuds
and neighborhood quarrels which
have arisen from this same sort of de-
sire to add more land to ample acres),
she quickly took CHARACTERISTIC way
out of the dilemma. In the case of
Jezebel. as of certain nations now
much in the public eye, we should re-
member that they do not profess any
but heather standards She had not
learned the law of jehovah; to her, it
seemed simple and natural that she
should get for the king anything he
desired, by fair means or foul.
Her plot was simplicity itself. and
of the fashion that was followed in
encompassing the death of Christ, and
the betrayal of countless good men
aid causes turnout the centuries She