To  this  appeal  the  only  answer  was  a  drawn


THE  SIN   OF   EDOM.  95

sword.  The  Edomites  massed  their  forces  on  their
western  frontier,  and  the  Israelites  were  compelled
to  choose  another  way.  The  enmity  did  not  end
there.  Edom  watched  his  opportunity,  and,  spring-
ing from  his  mountain  lair,  again  and  again  drank
blood.  When  Israel  was  weak  and  oppressed,  it
could  always  reckon  that  in  him  it  had  one  foe
more.  "He  did  pursue  his  brother  with  the  sword,
and  did  cast  of?  all  pity,  and  his  anger  did  tear  per-
petually, and  he  kept  his  wrath  for  ever"  (Amos  i.
n).  In  that  last  sore  distress  Judah  had  no  more
bitter  and  insulting  foe  than  Edom.  The  Psalmist
cries,  "Remember,  O  Lord,  against  the  children  of
Edom,  the  day  of  Jerusalem ;  who  said,  Rase  it,
rase  it,  even  to  the  foundation  thereof"  (Ps.  cxxxvii*
7).  For  the  man  who  is  deaf  to  the  pleadings  of
brotherhood  and  of  pity  the  Scripture  has  its  threat-
enings.  It  has  also  its  judgments  for  nations.  "Thus
saith  the  Lord  God:  Behold,  I  am  against  thee,  O
mount  Seir.  .  .  .  because  thou  hast  had  a  per-
petual enmity,  and  hast  given  over  the  children  of
Israel  to  the  power  of  the  sword  in  the  time  of  their
calamity,  in  the  time  of  the  iniquity  of  the  end:
therefore  as  I  live,  saith  the  Lord  God,  I  will  pre-
pare thee  unto  blood,  and  blood  shall  pursue  thee.
.  .  Thus  will  I*  make  mount  Seir  an  astonishment
and  a  desolation ;  and  I  will  cut  off  from  it  him  that
passeth  through  and  him  that  returneth"  (Ezek.
xxxv.  3-7).
