Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER VI. THE AKK AT ZION. From the day on which the ark thus became his neighbour and almost his vassal, David was essentially the chosen one of lahveh and of Israel. His royalty assumed a religious character, which that of Saul did not possess. David was the elect of lahveh; his function was that of a lieutenancy of lahveh. The idea of the royalty by divine right was thus founded. Everything was permissible to the king, who gave lahveh a settled dwelling-place at the door of his own residence. In return for this service, lahveh was about to accord him what was then the most highly appreciated and rarest privilege, that of seeing his posterity seated upon his throne, by a species of undisputed devolution. This it was which constituted the great consecration cf David, as it was also the consecration of the hill of Zion. Henceforth, the ark remained stationary. It wasaccepted that, among so many mountains which in appearance were much better designed for the purpose, it was the little hill of Zion which had been chosen by lahveh. And why ? Because it was little, and because lahveh, being very mighty and strong, loves the small and the weak, who do not da;e to display pride towards him. To have the ark close by, to be the neighbour of lahveh, and, in one sense, his guest, what higher favour could there be than this ? In the religious conceptions of nearly all the Semitic peoples, the vicinity of the temple or altar of a god was regarded as a mark of great favour. These ancient gods had only a limited sphere of power; so much so that it was often necessary to remind them of one’s existence. This was what was expressed in the word ger, joined to the name of the divinity in names like Gerel, Gero, Geresmun, Gerastoreth, etc.t By this title of ger, a man became the prote'g…