be wiser to betake ourselves to the altar and sit suppliant there than
to make defences for ourselves. The ruined Jerusalem was better
guarded by that altar than if its fallen walls had been rebuilt.

The whole ritual was restored, as the narrative tells with obvious
satisfaction in the enumeration. To us this punctilious attention to
the minutiae of sacrificial worship sounds trivial. But we equally err
if we try to bring such externalities into the worship of the
Christian Church, and if we are blind to their worth at an earlier
stage.

There cannot be a temple without an altar, but there may be an altar
without a temple. God meets men at the place of sacrifice, even though
there be no house for His name. The order of events here teaches us
what is essential for communion with God. It is the altar. Sacrifice
laid there is accepted, whether it stand on a bare hill-top, or have
round it the courts of the Lord's house.

The second part of the passage narrates the laying of the foundations
of the Temple. There had been contracts entered into with masons and
carpenters, and arrangements made with the Phoenicians for timber, as
soon as the exiles had returned; but of course some time elapsed
before the stone and timber were sufficient to make a beginning with.
Note in verse 7 the reference to Cyrus' grant as enabling the people
to get these stores together. Whether the whole preparations, or only
the transport of cedar wood, is intended to be traced to the influence
of that decree, there seems to be a tacit contrast, in the writer's
mind, with the glorious days when no heathen king had to be consulted,
and Hiram and Solomon worked together like brothers. Now, so fallen
are we, that Tyre and Sidon will not look at us unless we bring Cyrus'