Christian herald., August 24, 1883, Page 5, Image 5

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Why Not ?
that if the avenger should overtake’ miests. ’ This interference with the
him before he reached the city they civil and criminal law by the
Hamlets sword, reaching the
might attempt to pacify him till Church of Rome was one of the heart of Polonius through the
legal investigation could take place. grounds of complaint which led to hangings of his mother’s chamber,
Before, however, the fugitive could the Reformation, and was one of transfixed that prudence which is
be secured from the avenger by the the immediate causes of the death only annil^r
i
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I shHter conceded try thedttWVhe of tM- -famtats Thomas a t^ckbi. ~ the prudence which distrusts princi­
The Cities of Refuge.1
was to undergo a solemn trial, and
The spirit of the Mosaic code ples and trusts to policies. It is
make it appear to the satisfaction now prevadcs all jurisprudence; only the true man who can bet
BY LTMAN ABBOTT.
of the magistrates of the place the punishment of crime “is no really brave^ only the righteous
“ Who have-fled forrefuge to lay hold upon
“Where the homicide was commRtecT longer leTt toTjieTrijured individualf man who can walk through the
the hope set before us.”—Hebrews 6: 18.
It was a common practice among that it was purely accidental the whole community is the city of darkness hnd face the mystery of
ancient nations that thè nearest of Should he be found to have been refuge, ami no man is to be put to life with a serene soul. Mean men,
kin sTiouTd avenge the death of a guilty of murder, he was delivered death until he has been tried by an unrighteous men, small men like
The city of Polonius see what is right and
murdered relative.
Among the into the hands of the avenger of impartial tribunal.
Bedouins and other Arab tribes blood, that he might die. When refuge is the Old Testament bud ; know that it ought to be done, but
compensation was allowed. Who­ once settled in the city of refuge avenge not yourselves, but rather are too cowardly to do it. They
ever killed the murderer after the the manslayer had a convenient give place unto wrath, is the New distrust the eternal power of truth
blood-money had been paid was habitation assigned him gratuitous­ Testament blossom. The Mosaic and of the God whose life it is;
liable to a grievous punishment. ly, and the citizens werb' to teach law is sometimes denounced as they hug the shore and are wrecked
The provision of the six cities of him some trade whereby he might harsh and cruel; but it was in fact on reefs and shoals where the bold
To render his marvelous in its provisions of man, strong in faith and resolute in
refuge required by Moses to be set support himself.
apart when the children of Israel confinement more easy, the mothers mercy. I know^iotliing cqwul, and purpose, sets his prow to the
should come into their promised of the high priests used to feed and scarcely anything analogous, to farthest horizon and, with God’s
land was the first step toward pro­ clothe -these unfortunate- fugitives- tliis law -of the cities of refuge at sea under keel and God’s heaven
viding a better way of punishing that they might not be impatient, that age of the world in any other overhead, leaves the perils and
murder : it took the right of trial and pray for the death of their nation, while parallel to the provis- dangers of the treacherous coast far
and the condemnation out of the sons, oh whose decease they were ion for the protection of the acci- lmhiml. If CohmihiiH had—liatened^-
-hands-of the-avongor of-Hood andr 'restored to their liberty ami their' -dental Tntmslayer^are other pròvis to the prudent counsels of the wise
put it into, the hands of a court of property. If the slayer died while ions of the Mosaic code equally re­ men of his generation, his sails-
impartial officers, who were tp de­ in the city of refuge, his bones markable. In England as late as would never have filled with the
termine whether there were murder were delivered to his relations after A. D. 1600 the death penalty was breezes of the new continent; he
or accidental homicide.2 Of these the death of the high priest, to be visited upon two hundred and dared greatly, and he wears worthi­
cities three were on the eastern buried in the sepulcher of his sixty-three crimes, while the Mosaic ly the splendid crown of fame
side of Jordan, three on the wes­ fathers. The privilege of asylum law provided capital punishment which the world has set upon his
tern ; they were so selected and ar­ was also extended by Moses to the for but twelve, and this, too, in an brow.
ranged that the manslayer could “ horns of the altar,”1 where a man age when prisqns were unknown
Half the anxieties and perplexi­
never be more than six miles from might remain unharmed until, if and imprisonment impossible. Its ties of life would disappear if we
the nearest. To any of these cities proved innocent, he could be con punishments were swift, sure, cer­ only believed enough in God to
a person who had unintentionally ducted to a city of refuge. And tain ;. but they were not severe, take him at his word and trust him
slain one might flee, and if he from very early times, both among certainly not unusual, except in be­ with our earthly hopes and for­
reached it before he was overtaken the chosen people and the nations ing tempered with a mercy abso­ tunes. If we cast prudence to the
by the avengor of blood he was of the world, there has prevailed lutely unknown in any other land winds wherever principle was in­
safe within its shelter, provided he the custom of fleeing to the altar at that epoch in the world’s history, Volveil, and held to the thing that
all ages of the Christian was right in the face of all manner
did not remove mqre than a thous­ in case of-personal danger. Twice
and yards from its circuit, nor quit in the history of Judah notorious church the city of refuge has been of possible calamities, we should
the refuge till the decease of the criminals sought for impunity by regarded by Christian scholars as a find ourselves involved in no mesh
high priest under whom the homi­ “catching hold of the horns of the fitting type, of that God who is of compromise, weakened and
manifested in Christ as the refuge paralyzed by no consciousness of
cide had taken place. If, however, altar.”
he transgressed these provisions,
The right of asylum thus provid­ of his people—a refuge alike from unfaithfulness to great trusts and
the avenger might lawfully put ed in the Old Testament statutes to sorrow and from sin. Every man high opportunities. The bold way
him to death. In order to give the protect the innocent from the un­ is pursued by a Nemesis which is almost always the safe way. At
fugitive all possible advantage in righteous vengeance of the next dogs his footsteps whithersoever the battle of the Nile, when Nelson
his flight, it was according to the kin was adopted, modified, and ex­ he goes, and sooner or later comes ran his fleet between the French
the Rabbins, the business of the tended in the Christian Church upon him with the wrath of an squadron and the shore, his ap­
Sanhedrim to make the roads that during the Middle Ages by the avenging conscience. Before every parent rashness was a grand intui­
led to the cities of refuge conven­ papal authorities to the monasteries man Christ is set as a city upon a tion of leadership; it is the great
ient, by enlarging them and remov­ and the Christian Churches, which, hill which cannot be iiid, easy of soul which looks over the whole
ing every obstruction that might especially the chancel, were regard­ access, where he may find, not field of conflict and divines by in­
hurt the fugitive's foot or hinder ed as sacred spots within which the indeed a relief from his transgres- stinct the daring movement which
his speed. No hillock was left, no fugitive was safe not only from sions, but peace w ith God and with snatches victory at the point of
river was allowed over which there private vengeance but from civil his own conscience; where, even greatest „peril. Abraham was a
was not’a bridge, and the road at authorities. Once in this refuge, though he be guilty, he may find rash ami imprudent man when he
* forsook the pleasant land where his
least two-and-thirty cubits broad. the Church took him under its re.st to his soul.2
At every turning there were posts care, investigating the cast; and de
flocks had multiplied and his goods
Two of Arabi Bey’s children are
erected bearing the word “ Refuge,” termining the guilt or innocence;
increased^ to trust, through long
in the American Mission School at
to guide the unhappy man in his in very many cases it dismissed Cairo,
and Arabi himself took with and homeless 'i- wanderings, the
flight, and two students in the law him w ith no other penalty than a him, an assortment of Christian guidance of ail unseen Power;
were appointed to accompany him, fine which he paid to the monks or books to Ceylon.
Moses sacrificed a fortune and the
l into a crown, every burden becomes
a blessing, every sacrifice becomes
sacred ’and sublime, the moment
that our’Lord and Redeemer writes
on it “ For my sake” JT. y. Inde-
pendent.