Page:History of Art in Sardinia, Judæa, Syria and Asia Minor Vol 1.djvu/217

Enumeration of Documents Consulted. 199 into Aramaic. When, at the return from the exile, all the ancient institutions were restored, it was found that the people who had followed Ezra — an illiterate rabble of no ancestry — -could no longer understand the Scriptures in their own vernacular. Aided by men of learning and eminence, he founded that important religious and political body called the Great Synagogue, or Men of the Great Assembly, and entrusted them with the translation and expounding of the Bible. To Ezekiel, however, we shall turn for our main evidence ; him we shall follow step by step, even as he followed the angel ; like him, we shall note the minutest indications, as if to us the interpellation, "thou son of man" [Esek. xliii. 10, 11), were addressed. We are bound to confess that the programme laid down by the prophet is incomplete. His silence upon hieratic furniture may, perchance, be explained by the not improbable fact that the finely wrought bronzes, etc., in the first temple had been in great measure broken or melted down, to satisfy the demands of Egypt, Damascus, Assyria, and Chaldaea in turn. 1 His plans, as we have seen, are ground plans. Allusions to portions above ground are confined to the merest accessories — • such as tables, sacrificial altar, and the railing around the sanc- tuary. His only important contribution is the pylon at the Eastern Gate (Ezek. xl. 14). Kings and Chronicles are not agreed upon the respective height of this pylon, and that of the sanctuary. 2 Nor does any reference, however faint, suggest the arrangement, proportion, or size of the façades. We look in vain for a feeble ray to light up with its glimmer the profound gloom that sur- rounds the contour of the columns, the distance separating them, the special outline of the mouldings, and the value of projections forming plinths and entablatures against the plain wall. Such are some of the difficulties that beset our path, questions that cannot be resolved in a haphazard fashion. The first temple was built for a king of Israel by Phoenician craftsmen, who carried out the programme traced by the king with regard to detail and ornament, allowing for the special require- 1 Loc. cit. 2 Is this discrepancy between the two versions due to the fact that, when the Chronicles were written, the upper storey of the temple, which was of wood, had fallen in ? — Editor.