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vagueness calls her, the Queen of the South (Matt. xii. 42). We know that the Emperor of Abyssinia is named Menelek—and a man of uncommon power he seems to be. Well, if we should meet an Abyssinian, and ask him who the first Menelek was, he would answer at once the son of the Queen of Sheba. For all the Abyssinians believe that the Queen of Sheba in our chapter was their queen, and that Solomon married her, and Menelek was their son. It is an old legend but a groundless one. No doubt the fame of Solomon had reached Ethiopia, as the fame of a greater than Solomon' was to do by and by (Acts viii. 27); but it had reached Arabia as well, and this queen was an Arabian lady. Wave after wave of almost incredible rumour had come lapping up to her secluded kingdom. And always there was some whisper of the Lord in it-it was the fame of Solomon concerning the name of the Lord (v. 1). Until at last, impelled by a curiosity that had some hunger for the divine in it, she set off to see things for herself. What a stir in the narrow and crowded streets of Jerusalem, when the long train of camels came through the gate! What gazing of children, and what a world of mystery in the strange dresses and the Arabian speech! There would be many a sleepless brain, and many a dream, in the little beds of Jerusalem that night. It must have been superb to be a boy when Solomon reigned.

Now

OW we are told what was the first object of the queen. She wished to prove Solomon with hard questions (v. 1). In other words, she wished to ask him riddles, for the hard questions were something of that kind. To us that seems a somewhat foolish objectmore fitted for the tea-table than for thrones. But we must remember that in the ancient world the folk took riddles very seriously. Plutarch tells us that Homer died of grief because he was unable to answer a certain riddle. And there was the Sphinx, too, with her hard

question, that was answered at last (and the answer was man) by Edipus. And then in the Old Testament there was the riddle of Samson (Judg. xiv.), and in the New Testament the number of the beast (Rev. xiii. 18)—all which had something of life and death in them. It was with 'hard questions,' then, that the Queen of Sheba began, and Solomon told her all her questions (v. 3); and though we are quite ignorant of what the particular questions were, some beautiful stories about them have drifted down the ages. Perhaps the most beautiful of all is this, that the queen held in her hand two bouquets, the one of real and the other of artificial flowers (and the latter a most perfect imitation), and she asked Solomon, without moving from his throne, to tell which were the real and which the false. What would you have done, think you, on the spur of the moment? The story says that Solomon bade open the lattice, and outside the lattice was a pleasant garden-and the bees came in and settled on the real flowers! Then after the hard questions came the communing (v. 2), and the survey of all the royal magnificence (v. 4). Until at last, with all the wonder of it, the Queen of Sheba was struck dumb (v. 5), and cried, in words that have been used a thousand times to hint at the glories of the new Jerusalem: 'The half hath never been told.'

NOW when we turn to the New Testament, we shall

find Jesus drawing two lessons from this incident, and the first is the lesson of lawful curiosity (Matt. xii. 42). There are times when it is sinful to be curious-can you give some Bible instances? There is the instance of Eve (Gen. iii.), and that of Lot's wife (Gen. xix.), and that of the men of Bethshemesh who looked into the ark (1 Sam. vi. 19-21). But there are other times when to be curious is not sinful; it is an instinct, that may become a duty, and may rise into a noble passion; and on that eager spirit, that is urgent to see and prove, our Lord has

set His seal of commendation. Are you indifferentthat is the point-to what is great and good? Can you go on, when you hear of it, in your old way without a single stirring of heart towards it? Then 'the queen of the south shall rise up in judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it.'

AND the second is the lesson of undetected glory

(Matt. vi. 29). It was in the visit of the Queen of Sheba that the glory of Solomon came to its crown. I dare say it seemed to the patriotic Jew that the world would never view the like again. Then Jesus came, and pointed to the lilies-to the scarlet anemone and golden amaryllis, and men learned that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Was not that a lesson in undetected glories? Does it not intimate that round our very feet (had we but eyes to see the wonder of it) are things more wonderful and rich and beautiful than ever dazzled these eyes from far Arabia? Lord, open our eyes that we may see! Then we shall never pluck a flower out of the grass, but we shall feel that a greater than Solomon is here.

TWENTY-NINTH SUNDAY

Evening.

THE ANOINTING AT BETHANY

WE

Passage to be read: Matt. xxvi. 1-16.

E are now approaching the last days of the earthly life of Jesus, and our lesson opens with the clear declaration from our Saviour's lips that in two days He would be crucified. There is a

singular interest in Matthew's little preface to these words: he tells us that it was 'when Jesus had finished all these sayings' that He spoke plainly about His crucifixion. That means, I take it, that the mind of Christ was calm; that there was order and quiet progress in His teaching; that He moved forward through His many lessons with a deliberate and sure advance, till His hearers were able to bear the news of Calvary. How apt we are, when a great secret holds us, to blurt it out in an illconsidered way! How thoughtless and how unkind we often are, in the eager telling of unpleasant things! The narrative of Matthew deepens our impression of the noble self-restraint of Jesus. Matthew had felt in Christ that sweet reserve without which love is sure to prove a wastrel. Observe, too, that when Jesus foretells His death, He does not say He is going to be betrayed. He says, 'The Son of Man is betrayed to be crucified' (v. 2). That intimates that in the heart of Judas, Christ read the deed as if already done. In the thought of the traitor everything was planned, and Jesus is a discerner of men's thought. The secret imaginings of our to-day are the open sins and failures of our to-morrow. There is a deep philosophy of conduct in the advice of Paul, to bring every thought into captivity to Christ. I fancy that God sees, hidden in every acorn, the beauty and the gnarled strength of the oak-tree; so Jesus, in the dark and brooding heart of Judas, saw the arrest in the garden, and the cross. And one point more: The high-priest is called Caiaphas (v. 3). But it seems that Caiaphas was only his distinguishing name. His personal name was Joseph, but there were so many Josephs that men called him Joseph Caiaphas, perhaps Joseph the Oppressor. Can we recall a similar Bible instance where the name of Joseph has been almost forgotten? 'Joses, who by the apostles was surnamed Barnabas, which is, being interpreted, the Son of Consolation' (Acts iv. 36).

THEN

HEN follows the beautiful scene at Bethany, and we cannot too closely note the setting of it. It is immediately preceded by this black conspiracy (vs. 1-5); it is immediately followed by the traitor's bargain (vs. 14-16). On the one side, fear and jealousy and hatred; on the other side, treachery and bargain-driving. And in the centre (a rose between the thorns) a love that forgot everything and lavished all. Who Simon the leper was, we do not know. I like to think he was that leper we read of, who had cried, 'Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean' (Matt. viii. 2). Whoever he was, no doubt our Lord had cleansed him: and yet men called him Simon the leper still. You see how old names, like old reputations, stick. Men keep them alive with a kind of evil pleasure. There would be many who could never talk of Simon but they would add, 'Of course, you have heard he was a leper once?' Just as there are families who can never praise a neighbour but they close by asking, 'You know he was once a bankrupt?' And yet I think that Simon loved his name. It was a standing memorial of one glorious morning. He never could think how he had been a leper but it led him to think of how he had met the Lord; and now that that same Lord was at his table, he may have been saying, 'My cup is running over.' It was then that this woman, whom we know to have been Mary, performed this act that was to live for ever. She broke the alabaster box of very precious ointment, and poured it on Jesus' head as He reclined at And the disciples were indignant and thought it sheer extravagance; but Jesus crowned the act with immortality. Just note that in the ancient world rare ointments were commonly held in alabaster vases. Herodotus tells somewhere that among the presents sent by King Cambyses to the Ethiopians there was an alabaster vessel of nard like Mary's. Now, if this woman were indeed the sister of Lazarus, may not the ointment have been purchased to anoint his body, and so have been

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