 |  |
Modern Jerusalem is not yet "holy unto the Lord", but it is intensely interesting to see
the predictions of Jeremiah being anticipated before our eyes. The writer to whose book
we are indebted for much of this article says:
"Here is an Israelitish prophet daring to predict with the precision of a surveyor the
exact building development of a great city, thousands of years after his words were
penned."
The hill Gareb is outside the walls of old Jerusalem, and it was about 50 years ago that
building reached this spot. During the past few years the city has extended as far as
Goath, a point some distance west of the hill Gareb. The "place of ashes" was reached
some 40 years ago, and the line of building is now just touching the "valley of dead
bodies". The final measurement given by the prophet, to "all the fields unto the brook of
Kidron", is now reached. No limit, however, is imposed upon the development of the
city to the south, and it is towards Bethlehem that it is now extending.
The water supply of Jerusalem is mentioned in Scripture, in connection with Hezekiah
(II Chron. 32: 2-4) and later, Pontius Pilate. To-day, water is being brought from the
springs of Ras-el-Ain some 38 miles away. Six pumping stations are used to pump the
water along its course, each pump raising the water 600 feet. Tel-Aviv, which is near the
springs of Ras-el-Ain, is an entirely modern Jewish city, with more than 120,000
inhabitants. This city is only a few miles from Jaffa.
The Dead Sea, also, is being utilized. Two valuable chemicals are found in abundance
in its waters, Potash and Bromine; and a Palestine Company has already put down
extensive and up-to-date plant for retrieving this mineral wealth for the benefit of the
country. Major Tulloch, in a lecture given recently before the Royal Society of Arts,
stated that there is sufficient Potash in the Dead Sea to supply the world's needs for the
next 2,000 years. When the day of blessing dawns, the knowledge of the Lord shall
cover the earth, as the living waters that will flow down from Jerusalem shall cover the
Dead Sea. Meanwhile the present profitable use of this Sea, so long as a synonym for
death and dreariness, is suggestive.
So also is the approximation to prophecy of the use of Haifa as the Mediterranean
outlet for Mesopotamian oil. In Deuteronomy we read:
"Let Asher be blessed with children; let him be acceptable to his brethren, and let him
dip his foot in oil" (Deut. 33: 24).
Whatever the true fulfillment of this prophecy of Moses may prove to be, it is
significant that Asher's territory has been chosen for the delivery of over 2,000,000 tons
of Petroleum a year, which is brought for nearly 1,000 miles by "the greatest pipe line
ever carried through as a single enterprise".
None of the items enumerated above are fulfillments of O.T. prophecy, but they
approximate to them sufficiently to cause the most skeptical to pause, and the believer to
rejoice. The "fig tree" is about to bud. Israel are returning. They have yet to look upon