Verse 36. Why glidest thou ever away.
Changing thy beat ?
Thou shalt be ashamed of Egypt also.
As thou wert of Asshur.
Verse 37. Thou shalt go forth from them also,
Hands on thy head.
For Jahveh hath rejected whom thou trustest ;
And thou shalt not prosper with them.
The severity of a Judge mingles with the wounded
pride of a lover, as he pronounces sentence on them.
Israel shall experience at the hands of others what she
has herself inflicted on Jahveh.
Right through this chapter, there runs a broad and
simple contrast, physical in its basis but capable of
easy transference to the spiritual sphere — a contrast
between "the wilderness" and Karmel (verse 7).
From the Red Sea, northward to the roots of Lebanon,
there runs a deep depression. In its upper reaches,
known as the Ghor, it forms the channel of the Jordan ;
midway, as the Arabah, it forms the bed of the Salt
Sea ; while toward the south, as the wilderness of



48 LOQUITUR JAHVEH

Zin, it opens out to a breadth of from five to ten
miles, "its surface littered with gravel and blown sand,
often piled up in great dunes." ^ The prophet's youth
was spent on the verge of the Arabah, and with a few
rapid strokes he conveys to us here the impression it
had burned in on his soul. It is a land of deep drifts
and narrow gorges, with few springs or permanent
streams ; where the atmospheric effects, due to the
pure air, are pecuHarly strong. Such shade does not
so much rest the eye, as oppress the heart, suggesting
the evil that lurks within (" a land of mirk darkness ").
