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A67563
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The case of Joram a sermon preached before the House of Peers in the Abby-church at Westminster, January 30, 1673/4 / by Seth, Lord Bishop of Sarum.
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Ward, Seth, 1617-1689.
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1674
(1674)
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Wing W817; ESTC R19529
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17,156
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39
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The Case of Joram A SERMON Preached before the House of Peers IN THE Abby-Church at WESTMINSTER January 30. 1673 4. BY SETH Lord Bishop of SARUM LONDON Printed by Andrew Clark for James Collins at the King's Arms in Ludgate-street MDCLXXIV Die Jovis 5 o. Februarii 1673. Ordered by the Lords Spiritual and Temporal in Parliament that the Thanks of this House be and is hereby given to the Lord Bishop of Salisbury for his pains in Preaching before the Lords in the Abby Church at Westminster on Friday the thirtieth day of January last and that he be desired to Print and Publish his Sermon then Preached John Browne Cler. Parliam The CASE of JORAM 2 KINGS VI. and last Verse And he said This evil is of the Lord Wherefore should I wait upon the Lord any longer THE cause of this Solemn and most Honourable Assembly at this time is to humble our selves in consideration of a most grievous and horrible Calamity which was some years since as upon this day brought upon these Kingdoms by the Sacrilegious and Bloody Martyrdom of our late most Excellent Sovereign to afflict our souls in Contemplation of our sins which brought upon us that heavy Judgment with humble penitent broken and contrite Hearts to wait upon the Lord to implore his Mercy in removing from us the guilt of that innocent blood in pardoning our Offences and taking away his Plagues and Judgments from us To work our selves to such a frame or temper of spirit there are two ways or methods either by shewing the Necessity and Utility the Beauty and the Comeliness of such a temper and the Happiness which will follow thereupon by convincing us how much it is our Duty and our Interest and Concernment or else by having before our eyes the indecency and absurdity the folly and madness wickedness and misery how much it is against our Duty and against our Interest to be found in a contrary temper and disposition Of these two Methods we find that Solomon in his Book of the Preacher made choice of the later That to bring men to fear God and keep his Commandments he thought it best to convince the world of the vanity of all other courses That giving his mind to understand the reason of things he applied himself to know the folly of wickedness and the wickedness of folly and madness And to bring men to wisdom and virtue he thought it the best expedient to represent to them the absurdity and ugliness of folly and wickedness Something like to this I have proposed to my self at this time and to that end I have chosen to submit to your consideration this strange and extravagant instance in the Text. Where that I may the sooner arrive at what I aim at I shall not spend time in disputing the Author of the words but with the best Interpreters as I conceive suppose them to have been the words of Joram King of Israel and in some measure to collect and raise a true idea or character of him I must draw you a little back into the Story Our Author I say was Joram he was the Son of Ahab and Jezabel and King of the ten Tribes of Israel his capital City was Samaria his adjacent neighbour on the North was Benhadad King of Syria who now made War against him Joram not able to keep the Field was driven up into Samaria and there was obstinately besieged The City was a fenced or fortified City and Benhadad would not storm it but resolved to take it by Famine And the Famine here prevailed to a degree almost incredible the prices of commodities so great the diet to which they were reduced so vile an Asses head was sold for 80 pieces of silver a cab of Pigeons dung for 5. So vile nay so exceedingly monstrous and unnatural Can a woman saith the Prophet Isaiab forget her child Here two women conspire together and against the laws of God and nature enter into an engagement to act that which you will abhor to hear to devour their tender little ones and resume into their bodies that fruit whereof they had lately been delivered And because one of them repents of her engagement the other makes her appeal to Joram she spies him walking the rounds to view the Works and out of a complicated passion of hunger and sorrow envy and indignation in the agony and bitterness of her soul she cries out Help O King And now begin to take a character of this Joram He supposed she had cried for Victuals and he presently falls upon cursing the woman 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So Josephus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So the Septuagint Let not God help thee how should I help thee Well! this was indeed part of the womans grief but this was not all she had killed her child and her companion according to agreement had eaten part of him and now had withdrawn her own her spleen would now be satisfied as well as her stomach she therefore states her case and cries for Justice Indeed the case was lamentable enough to move the heart of any man and it put Joram's into motion but it was not into compassion but fury It had been reason that he should have rent his Heart and not his Garments but he rends his cloaths and falls into cursing and raving and into a wild extravagant resolution God do so to me and more also if the head of Elisha the Son of Shaphat shall stand on him this day What is the coherence or where is the Logick of this cursing and damning resolution How was Elisha concerned in what had happened Before he cursed the woman now he curses himself with a grievous curse God do so to me that is take away my life and more also that is in the language of our times God damn me if the head of Elisha But why must Elisha suffer what had he done had he devoured the child that was dead or hid the living child or brougt the Famine upon Samaria As if rage did submit to reason or from the wrath of man we were to expect the righteousness of God! that he should swear and curse there was no reason nevertheless for his Oaths sake he sends his Messenger to Elisha's house and presently follows to see the Execution Where to make up the hiatus betwixt his coming and uttering the words of the text we may conceive that Joram has there blustered out the Story of the woman That he hath raved at Elisha and blasphemed against the Lord himself and that in reply the Prophet and endeavoured to allay the passion and calm the storm of rage that was upon him That he had put him in mind of looking up to God the sender of all Publique Calamities exhorted him to humble himself under his mighty hand to wait upon him for deliverance to pray to him for succour and the like To all which he ungratiously rejoyns according to the tenor of the text You tell me of the Lord
is that King Ahab He sold himself to work wickedness he exalted himself against God and man and went on triumphantly in a course of sinning He killed also took possession yet when Elijah a poor overgrown neglected hairy man girt with a girdle of leather about his loins charges him that it was he that troubled Israel and denounces the Judgments which should befall him He rent his cloaths and put sackcloth upon his flesh he fasted and lay in sackcloth and went softly Of all the wicked persons mentioned in the New Testament there is none who by the History of Josephus and by Tacitus and other Roman Authors is represented to have been more impudent and scandalous more outragiously debaucht then Felix the Roman Governour of Judea under Claudius and Nero yet when Paul his Prisoner a little wearish aged man whose bodily presence was weak and his speech contemptible reasoned before him concerning righteousness and temperance and the Judgment to come Felix trembled Whether the conviction of Joram did proceed from one or more or all or any of these causes it is not needful to enquire Thus much appears in fact that though he was extracted from that King Ahab and from that Queen Jezabel though his life and manners were answerable to his extraction and education though he was under a complicated distemper of mind a paroxysm of madness yet in the midst of all his indisposedness he is forced to acknowledge the hand of God in that Calamity which was upon him He even Joram said This evil is from the Lord. Even wicked and distempered men are forced sometimes to acknowledge the hand of God in the dispensations of his judgments Hitherto I have endeavoured to represent and prove before you the truth and evidence of this concession or supposition the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 laid down by Joram and how agreeable that is to Reason Scripture and Experience And now what consequence would any one expect from such an antecedent If the words had been barely without proof or enlargement delivered by the Prophet had it not been reasonable for him to assent to the truth of them and natural for him to have fallen upon this conclusion This evil is from the Lord therefore upon him will I wait to him will I address my self for our deliverance and forthwith to have put himself upon all necessary and congruous ways of application But being delivered by himself as an extorted acknowledgment of his awaken'd conscience Who would not expect that although before his conviction he went on resolutely in his course Yet being now rowsed and awakened he should proceed according to his Conviction That the same causes which had forced him to see and acknowledge the hand of God in the Judgment should have prevailed with him to apply himself to him for the removal of it Who would not expect that the words should run thus This evil is from the Lord wherefore upon him will I wait for succour and not give over until he have mercy on us But behold he said This evil is from the Lord wherefore should I wait on the Lord any longer And now the absurdity of this Inference is that which remains to be laid open before you I call it an Inference because in effect this deliberative question carries the force of a strong negation Wherefore should I wait i. e. I am resolved I will wait no longer To take the full meaning of that word which is here rendred by waiting I must entreat you to observe that the question is in the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Quid expectabo Chaldee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cur patienter me geram Septuagint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Quid deprecabor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Scripture signifies Prayer and Supplication and that with earnestness strong crying and tears and is usually joyned with fasting and other acts of mortification and humiliation So that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is of a large extensive signification and comprehends all these notions in it It seems the Prophet finding him in a distemper had exhorted him to give over huffing and ranting cursing and swearing and to betake himself to fasting and mourning to prayers and earnest Supplication to give over his sturdy and insolent behaviour and to compose himself to meekness and a deep humiliation To leave off his frowardness and impatience and with patience and due submission to tarry the Lord's leisure to expect and wait upon him for deliverance To all which he replies in these words Mah Ochil ladonai Wherefore should I fast and pray or betake my self to weeping and mourning Why should I submit and humble my self under the hand of God to what purpose should I expect and wait upon him any longer for deliverance intimating a peremptory resolution to the contrary You see now the Question betwixt Joram and the Prophet and I am to make your selves the Judges which of them had reason on his side In order whereunto it is necessary that I premise three things 1. In every deliberation the end or scope is presupposed and the question is of the best and likeliest means for the attainment of that end 2. When any one is fallen into calamity it is to be presumed that the end which he will propose to himself will be the removal of the calamity 3. Joram having acknowledged his calamity to have come from God it was supposed on both sides that to remove or continue this calamity was entirely and absolutely in the hand and power of God So that the only question is this which is the likeliest way to prevail with God to remove his Judgments and take away his heavy hand the way of Elisha or the way of Joram Now although it seems very easie to determine this question upon principles of common reason and by reflexion upon the ways of men yet seeing it is to be supposed that every one knows best what way it is that will move and prevail upon himself And seeing God hath declared himself in this matter and his declarations were then extant in the writings of Moses and the Prophets to which a King of Israel ought to be no stranger I should think it most congruous that the deliberation ought to proceed upon those measures and the enquiry accordingly to be what was like to be the issue of Elisha's way and what on the other side if Joram's way should be taken in this case of publick Calamity 1. Then how hath God declared himself as to Prayer and Fasting on one hand and to Cursing and Swearing on the other and so of the rest of the particulars in Question 1. In general Call upon me saith the Lord in the time of trouble and I will hear thee and help I cried unto the Lord in my trouble saith David and he delivered me out of my distress Again as to Fasting and Mourning in a day of darkness i. e. a case of Publick Calamity the way