ESCH
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ESCHAT0L06Y
Hethite, and Basemath the daughter of Elon of the
same place" (Gen., xxvi, 34). This selection of
Chanaanite wives, who " both offended the mind of
Isaac and Rebecca" (Gen., xxvi, 35), seemed to have
caused peculiar suffering to Rebecca, who, speaking
with her husband, declared, " I am weary of my life
because of the daughters of Heth: if Jacob take a wife
of the stock of this land. I choose not to live" (Gen.,
xxvii, 46). Old and with eyes so dim he could not
see, Isaac ordered Esau to take quiver and bow, so
that after having prepared a savoury dish with the
fruit of his hunting, he might receive the parting bless-
ing, belonging to the eldest son. Esau, yielding
ready obedience, went " into the field to fulfil his fath-
er's commandment". (Gen., xxvii, 1-5.) Mean-
while, clothed with the very good garments of his
older brother, with hands and neck so carefully cov-
ered under the tender hides of the kids as to resemble
the hairj' skin of Esau, Jacob, following in every de-
tail the advice of Rebecca, knelt before Isaac, olTered
the savoury dish, and begged and obtained the coveted
blessing. Great then was the astonishment, and
genuine the indignation, of the disappointed Esau,
who " roared out with a great cry", on hearing the de-
ceived Isaac declare, "thy brother came deceitfully
and got thy blessing". Though sj-mpathizing with
his grief-stricken son, Isaac, realizing more fully the
import of the oracle communicated to Rebecca, felt
impelled to add : " I have blessed him, and he shall be
blessed"; "I have appointed him thy lord, and have
made all his brethren his servants". (Gen., xxvii, 6-
37.) The restraining influence of the father's pres-
ence is admirably portrayed in the few words uttered
by Esau: "the days will come of the mourning of my
father, and I will kill my brother Jacob" (Gen., xxvii,
41). That this exclamation revealed a deep-seated
purpose, the evident anxiety of Rebecca, the hasty
flight of Jacob to Haran, and his long stay with his
uncle Laban, clearly demonstrated. (Gen., xxvii,
42-xxxi, 3S.) Indeed, even after a self-imposed exile
of twenty years, the carefully instructed messengers
sent to Esau in the land of ,Seir (Gen., xxxii, 3) and the
strategic division of his household and flocks into two
companies clearly indicate Jacob's abiding sense of
distrust (Gen., xxxii, 4-S).
After extending a cordial welcome to his returning brother, Esau parted from Jacob and "returned, that day, the way that he came, to Seir" (Gen., x.xxiii, 1-16), where he and his descendants became e.xceed- ingly rich (Gen., xxxvi, 1-8). The very name Edom- ite, given to the descendants of Esau (Edom), has served to perpetuate the remembrance of the circum- stances attending Esau's birth and the sale of his first birthright. From the noteworthy preference of Jacob to Esau (Gen., xxv, 22 sq.), St. Paul (Rom., ix, 4-16) shows that in the mystery of election and grace God is bound to no particular nation and is influenced by no prerogative of birth or antecedent merit. ^^ hen Isaac, old and full of days, had died, we find Esau with Jacob at Hebron, there to bury their father in the cave of Machpelah (Gen., xxxv, 28-29).
Palis in Vig., Did. de la Bible, s. v.; Cow.\n in Hastings. Did. of the Bible, s. v.; DoDS, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph (Lon- don, 1880).
D.^NiEL P. Duffy.
Esch (EscHius), NicoL.\r.s V.\n, a famous mystical theologian,b.inOisterwijknear Hertogenbosch (Bois- le-Duc), Holland, in 1507;d. lOJuly, 157S. After finish- ing his classical studies in the school of the Hierony- mites, he studied philo.sophy, theolog\-, and canon law at Louvain, but refused to take his doctor's degree. In 1530 he was ordained priest, and then settled in Cologne in order to de vot e himself to higher st udies and the prac- tice of Christian perfection. .\t the .same time he be- came the private tutor of a number of voung men. mainly imiversity students. Blessed PeterCanisius and Lawrence Surius are the most celebrated of his pupils.
In Cologne, too, he contracted a clo.se friendship with
several members of the Carthusian Order, among
whom Johann Landsberger, Gerhard Hamontanus, and
Theodorich and Bruno Loher are worthy of special men-
tion. Though his feeble health did not allow him to
become a member of the order, he lived in the monas-
tery, for a time at least, and followed its rule of life as
closely as possible. In 1538 Nicolaus was appointed
pastor of the Beguinage at Diest; after a year he sur-
rendered his charge for a time, but took it up again
with such success that after his death he was com-
monly spoken of as the saintly Father Eschius. He
was also instrumental in founding several diocesan
seminaries according to the rules laid down by the
Council of Trent. Among his literary works the fol
lowing are worthy of note: " Introductio in vitam in-
troversam", which is really an introduction to a new
edition of the "Templum animse" (Antwerp, 1563
etc.); "Exercitiatheologiiiemystica>, seuexercitiaquse-
dam pia, qua" compendio hominem ad vitam perfec-
tam instjtuendam juvare possunt " (Antwerp, 1563).
HuRTER, Nomenelator (Innsbruck, 1S92); Hermes in Kirch-
enlexikon (Freiburg, 1886), IV, 888.
A. J. M.iAS.
Eschatology, that branch of systematic theology which deals with the doctrines of the last things (t4 EtrxaTo). The Greek title is of comparatively recent introduction, but in luodern usage it has largely sup- planted its Latin equivalent Dc .Xovissiniis. As the numerous doctrinal subjects belonging to this section of theology will be treated ex professo under their sev- eral proper titles, it is proposed in this article merely to take such a view of the whole field as will serve to indicate the place of eschatologj' in the general frame- work of religion, explain its subject-matter and the outlines of its content in the various religions of man- kind, and illustrate by comparison the superiority of Christian eschatological teaching.
As a preliminary indication of the subject-matter, a distinction may be made between the eschatologj' of the individual and that of the race and the universe at large. The former, setting out from the doctrine of personal immortality, or at least of survival in some form after death, seeks to ascertain the fate or condi- tion, temporary or eternal, of individual souls, and how far the issues of the future depend on the present life. The latter deals with events like the resurrec- tion and the general judgment, in which, according to Christian Revelation, all men will participate, and with the signs and portents in the moral and physical order that are to precede and accompany those events. Both aspects — the individual and the universal — be- long to the adequate concept of eschatologj* : but it is only in Christian teaching that both receive due and proportionate recognition. Jewish eschatology only attained its completion in the teaching of Christ and the Apostles; while in ethnic religions eschatology seldom rose above the individual view, and even then was often so vague, and so little bound up with any adequate notion of Di\'ine justice and of moral retribu- tion, that it barely deserves to be ranked as religious teaching.
I. Ethnic Esch.\tologies. — (1) Even among the lower — sa\age and barbarian — races the universality of religious beliefs, including belief in some kind of ex- istence after death, is very generally admitted by modern anthropologists. Some exceptions, it is true, have been claimed to exist ; but on closer scrutiny the evidence for this claim has broken down in so many cases that we are justified in presuming against any exception. Among the lower races the truth and purity of eschatological beliefs vary, as a rule, with the purity of the idea of God and of the moral standards that prevail. Some savages seem to limit existence after death to the good (with extinction for the wicked), as the Nicaraguas, or to men of rank, as the
