is taken out of the sphere of the purely mysterious, and brought into the sphere of cause and effect: sin is the cause, disaster the effect. At the same time they taught that Jehovah was loving and merciful, and desirous of saving His people from disaster, by saving them from sin which is the cause of disaster Of course they did not rationalize away the ‘numinous’ sense of the Wrath of God, but they brought into relief the persona relation of love and mercy in which God stands towards His people,