Abraham and his times : two sermons preached in the First Congregational Church of Fall River, Mass., Feb. 17th and 24th, 1901

ABRAHA^r

AND HIS TIMES

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ABRAHAM

AND HIS TIMES.

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Preached in the First Congreg"ationaI Church of
Fall River, Mass., Feb. 17th and 24th, 1901

By WM. W. ADAMS, Pastor.

I'RINTED BY REIJUEST.

The sermons are the latest two. of a series still
unfinished. Authority for statements respecting the
city of Nippur is found in articles, written for the
Sunday School Times, by Prof. H. V. Hilprecht.
scientific director of the expedition. Other informa-
tion is derived from the latest and most trustworthy
sources.

SERMON.

Terali took Abram his son, and Lot the son of
Haran, his son's son, and Sarai his daughter in law,
his son Abram's wife ; and they went forth with
them from Ur of the Chaldees, to go into the land
of Canaan. Gen. 11:31.

That journey represented the beginning of a
new period of human history : the beginning of a
course of events still continuing, than which there
has never been anything more important in history.
It was a small beginning certainly, and for the most
part a very obscure one ; but in that respect it
corresponded with all most important beginnings,
especially in Divine processes. The beginnings of
life, even the immortal life of beings in the image
of God, are from microscopic germs ; and the first
processes are imperceptible. The beginnings of
great empires have commonly been insignificant ; the
mightiest and most important movements of history
have often had their rise in events which in them-
selves seemed very trivial, and became momentous
only because of their relations and their outcome.

As regards the journey of Terah and Abram,
and events connected with it, certain famous Chris-
tian scholars and literary critics, of the last half of
the nineteenth century, made man}^ sweeping and
most confident statements, which contradict the
common beliefs of previous centuries. The state-
ments are still repeated, though in later years more
often considerably modified, by the successors of

4 SERMON.

those scholars ; who also sometimes claim a prac-
tical monopoly of knowledge respecting the matters
treated. One statement, fundamental to all others,
has been that in the times in which Abram was
alleged to live, the world had no literature and no
written languages properly so called. Ancient mon-
uments there were, the precise age of which no one
knew ; and here and there a limited amount of
hieroglyphic inscription, the meaning of which was
at least obscure, the characters of which in any
case could not have been extensively used, while of
such language the alleged Abram of Mesopotamia
could have had no knowledge, still less could have
made any use.

The first and necessary inference from that
premiss was that whatever purported to be a his-
tory of times long preceding the early days of
Greece and Rome, coiild have no better authority
than oral tradition or folk-lore, repeated from gen-
eration to generation and from age to age, with
many additions and changes in transmission, made
from conjecture, from fancy, from ancestral and
national vanity. The word myth came into use,
to express the quality of some such alleged history.
In current and unlearned utterance it was prac-
tically a new word, and for a time many did not
clearly understand the meaning of it. Certainly
there had been unrecorded traditions in all ages,
and many of the religious stories of (yreeks and
Romans were known to be myths, some of them
possibly taking their origin from facts of nature or
from philosophic conjecture. It was known, too,
that many .stories of mediaeval times, concerning
alleged events in the history of Christianity, had

SERMON. 5

no better foundation than ignorance respecting pro-
cesses of nature, with superstition, imagination,
credulity. The times of early Scripture history
were times of still greater ignorance, superstition,
credulity, it was said; and the conditions of those
times the world only very slowly outgrew. Some
of the traditions and myths then current had great
vitalit}' because they were religious, and were plaus-
ibly presented as a history of events out of which
Judaism grew, and Christianity which is based on
Judaism.

But the temper of the nineteenth century was
by eminence scientific ; in respect to history as well
as in respect to nature. All previous beliefs must
be subjected to .scientific criticism. Early traditions
of what sort soever, which had passed from mouth
to mouth for ages, obviously could have no author-
ity; and presumably many of them were mythical.
The alleged early history of the Jewish Scriptures
could not possibly be history in the modern sense
of the word. A little of it may have had some
foundation in fact, as ancient folk-lore ; but of course
most of it must be fable, myth or story deliberately
invented for a purpose. That phrase "must be"
was very frequently used in an oracular manner,
even in stating a merely individual theory or assump-
tion ; and it is still characteristic of those who
remain under the influence of the prepossessions
already stated. The apparent close connection
between the fictitious events of the earl}- time and
the historic events of subsequent times suggests
that at least some of the stories had been invented
to give plausible foundation for subsequent events,
the primary causes and conditions of which are

6 SERMON.

unknown. Thus one famous scholar, but recently
deceased, held to the day of his death that the story
of Jacob and the twelve patriarchs was a pure
invention to give a reputable origin to the people
of Israel; while of course they "must" have had
their origin in the accidental drifting together of
feeble Bedouin tribes which, because they were
feeble, formed a union for mutual defence and
support.

Such, in general, was the state of mind prev-
alent among a number of scholars, who prided
themselves upon their learning, some of whom were
certainly men of great ability, and who have not a
few followers among the Christian scholars of today.
In that state of mind, on the assumption that early
Scripture history must be without authority, partly
because, at the best, it must have been made up of
traditions passing from mouth to mouth during long
aees when there was no literature and no written
language — in that state of mind the scholars referred
to began to subject the Scripture records to a literary
and historical criticism which was thoroughly scep-
tical and suspicious to begin with. Some of the
canons of criticism most frequently applied have
been, to say the least, of very questionable validity.
Such, for instance, as these; The narrator who does
not mention some well-known event of the times of
which he is writing "must have been" ignorant of
that event, and therefore could not have lived in
those times : as if any narrator of contemporaneous
events ever mentioned all even of the fairly impor-
tant events known by him. Certain important laws
"could not have been" in existence at a given time
because the practice of the time was at variance with

SERMON. 7

them : as if no important laws of our time were not
habitually disobeyed and disregarded. The outline
of historic events which is manifestly given for the
sake of calling attention to the moral lesson of the
events, cannot be received as truthful history, because
the writer had a moral purpose in view : as if such
a writer might not be most of all conscientious in
historic statement, because the moral lesson is pre-
cisely in the events themselves ; as if, also, many a
most truthful historian of todav did not have regard
to the moral lesson of events narrated. Contradic-
tions are continually manufactured by modes of
interpretation. Mere diversities of statement are
treated as contradictions : as if two different things
might not both be true, as if any historic narrative
must be considered all-comprehensive. Other diver-
sities are declared incompatible when a harmonizing
interpretation might be given which would be
entirely natural and rational. Because the alleged
history had for its materials only traditions' coming
from by-gone ages, it was a foregone conclusion that
the narrative could not be true history. Therefore
the work of criticism was merely to find evidence to
sustain the foregone conclusion.

The critics found, or thought they found, liter-
ary evidence that the historic records of the Old
Testament were not composed at the dates hitherto
assigned, the dates claimed in some of the records
themselves ; but were composed centuries after those
times, when the world had written languages and
literatures. They found, or thought they found,
that the records as w^e have them, each appearing to
be the composition of some single author, were
really not so composed. From two to four or more

8 SERMON.

independent narratives of different dates, by differ-
ent authors who lived in different regions, had been
most curiously and intricately pieced together, by
combining long or short sections, by interweaving
paragraphs, verses and parts of verses, by th'e cull-
ing and due insertion of single words ; all the
minutest details of source and combination being
now for the first time discovered by the omniscient
and infallible critics of the nineteenth Christian
century. Yet even as thus put together, the record
as we now have it might nevertheless be truthful,
and perhaps one might even suppose it to be
inspired. But the critics go on to say that the
record thus prepared was edited and re-edited many
times ; each editor making such changes as he saw
fit, the better to accomplish the particular purpose
he himself had in view. The lynx-eyed critic is often
ready to specify the word which editor number one
inserted, the other word interpolated by number two,
and so on. While of course it is to be remembered
that even the original and component narratives
were all from a late time, and without exception
were made up of floating traditions and myths, some
of which may have had a certain amount of fact
underlying them, which we are to separate from the
fable as best we may. vSome narratives, however,
especially those which claim to present the words
of men of the early time, must be deliberate fictions
or frauds. Thus one writer, in a Bible Dictionary
now in counse of publication, expressly affirms of the
larger part of the book of Deuteronomy that "the
majority of critics believe this book of the law to
have been the result of a pious fraud promulgated
by Hilkiah and Shaphan'^' with the intention of

* In the seventh century B. C.

SKRMOX. 9

deceiving Josiah into the belief that the reforms
which they desired were the express command of
God revealed to Moses." Yet the book of Deu-
teronomy, more than any other book of the Old
Testament, is pervaded by an earnest and pleading
religious enthusiasm. It manifests the loftiest moral
temper, it presents most urgently the highest moral
standards, and it claims that some of its contents
are the direct revelations and injunctions of Jehovah.
No ordinary sinner could thus deliberately lie in the
name of God for the sake of carrying through a
genuine moral reform. No other man, deliberately
perpetrating a fraud, has been able to give to his
composition such tone of high spirituality, such
uplifting fervor of religious earnestness in present-
ing the purest ideals.

It is not to be denied that the searching exam-
ination of scholarship and ability, using methods
never so fully used before, has corrected errors of
the old time, and has put many things in a new
light. But the general outcome of this (in some
of its representatives) most pretentious work of
"scientific" criticism maybe stated as follows: The
foundation of Judaism was laid in falsities; the
religious training of Judaism was in part by frauds
and lies; yet the moral code of Judaism was the
highest known in the ancient world and its religion
was the truest, purest and most spiritual. Both
morals and religion were produced by these falsities
and frauds; Christ was the consummate flower of
Judaism and Christianity is developed from it. Such
causes do not produce such results. Christ himself
said Either make the tree good and its fruit good,
or make the tree corrupt and its fruit corrupt, for

10 SERMON.

the tree is known by its fruit. Of thorns men do
not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush gather they
grapes.

Historically, the scholars who, in any consider-
able number, first discredited the statements of the
Old Testament were the so-called Rationalists of the
first half of the nineteenth century. With them it
was a fundamental principle to reject whatever could
properly be called supernatural in Scripture story,
including all miracles. In the rapid progress of
knowledge much of traditional belief had been dis-
carded or modified. Physical science was demon-
strating the reign of law ; it was believed that
geologic changes had come to pass gradually under
the uniform action of slowly working forces ; and
evolution was supposed to take place by impercep-
tible modifications requiring long periods of time
and produced through the action of material forces
only. Mediaeval miracles, and miracles in non
Christian religions, were commonly discredited by
Protestants. Why should the supernatural be recog-
nized in Judaism and Christianity more than in
other faiths of the world ? One answer may be that
so long as Jesus Christ can not be considered a
mere product of his times, so long as it can be
shown that he is author of an ever progressing and
world-wide redemption, so long it will not be possi-
'ble to exclude from Christianity or from Judaism
that special and peculiar Divine agency which is
indicated by the words supernatural and miraculous.

As years passed on there came many changes
in scientific opinions, and in the statements of them.
Geology admitted cataclysms, leaps were found in
evolutionary processes, the acknowledged immanence

SERMON. 11

of God in nature led to the recognition of a constant
Divine agency in the world and in history. The
more recent scholars who have discredited Old Tes-
tament history commonly accept the supernatural in
Christianity and, to a less degree, in Judaism.
Their first premiss has been the existence of tradi-
tions merely in the olden times, and of conditions of
mind and life which were incompatible with the
clear discernment of fact and the careful transmis-
sion of knowledge. Therefore it is needful to
consider the correctness of that premiss. Certainly
if we are to have any clear understanding of that
marvellous movement in history which is alleged to
have begun with one called Abram, it is indispens-
ably needful to know as much as possible of the
times in which he is said to have lived, that we may
judge of the reasons for such a movement at that
time, and of the possibility of beginning it. Every
decade during the last half of the nineteenth century
furnished us with increasing knowledge of those
times, the certainty and accuracy of which can not
be questioned. The Scriptures give very little infor-
mation. They tell the story of Abram, but for the
ages preceding his time they give us only a chapter
of genealogies. It is just as if knowledge of those
ages was commonly possessed when the story of
Abram was written ; and as if later ages could obtain
the knowledge if they sought for it. Modern times
have been without that knowledge, and partly on
that account the historic truthfulness of the Scripture
story has been discredited. Because men did not
know of any records in those ages, or of any culture
that would care for records, they carelessly assumed
that neither existed. Then they made their ignor-

12 SERMON,

ance the basis of an argument against the truthful-
ness of the Scriptures. But it will not do to argue
from ignorance. That is not scientific; is not in
accordance with common sense. That I am ignorant
of a record does not prove that it does not exist,
unless, indeed, I happen to be omniscient.

The ignorance of modern tiines respecting the
early world — aside from Scripture story — began to
be dissipated with the investigations respecting the
pyramid-building Egyptians. Those investigations,
however, threw little light upon the earlier portion
of Scripture story. The first resultful investigations
in Mesopotamia began in December 1842. The
French government sent Paul Emil Botta to Mosul
as vice consul. His curiosity had already been
excited in regard to the remarkable mounds in that
vicinity. He unearthed a marvellous palace with
inscriptions and bas reliefs ; but ere long he was
transferred to government service elsewhere. In
1846 the Englishman Layard began to excavate in
the same region. He discovered Nineveh, the
mighty city of Scripture story ; and proved that
the ruins were the ruins of Nineveh. The Scripture
.story had been often discredited. Some town called
Nineveh there might have been in ancient times
but b}^ no means such as the Scriptures represented
— so great, so wonderful. The Scripture statements
were confirmed, however, by the actual ruins. Records
were found, and deciphered, of the very kings and
campaigns described in the Old Testament.

From that time to the present, investigation has
been almost continuous — increasingly interesting,
increasingly marvellous in result, increasingly con-
firmatory of Scripture, and giving full information

SERMON. 13

of times long before Abram. The finest results, thus
far, have been reached by Americans. In 1884 the
American Oriental Society organized an expedition
and sent Dr. W. H. Ward, managing editor of the
Independent, on a rapid exploring tour through
Babylonia. The ultimate result was the organization
of a company for excavation, under the auspices of
the University of Pennsylvania. They began work
in 1889, and, with some inevitable pauses, still con-
tinue it on the same site where they began. They
have been digging up the capital city of Nippur, a
great city long before Rome or Greece was heard
of, before Nineveh or Babylon existed, before the
pyramids were built in Egypt. The ruins were in
a group of mounds eighty miles south east from
Bagdad, three hundred miles down the Tigris from
Nineveh, between the Tigris and Euphrates, but
connected with both by large canals. One of these
was the river Chebar, of Ezekiel : the old name has
been found in texts taken from the ruins. While
the Nippur of cuneiform records was probably the
Calneh of Scripture story.

The principal mound was some seventy feet in
height above the surrounding plain. Sections of it
have been excavated some distance below the level
of the plain of today, which is higher than in the
old time. Evidence has been found of the continued
existence of that city, in greater or less preserva-
tion, from probably about TOGO B. C. to 900 A. D.
Sixty thousand inscribed tablets have been recovered :
it is certain that many more are still under the soil.
None yet obtained have an earlier date than 5000
B. C. ; but from that time they are of all dates
throughout the history of the city. They deal with

14 SERMON.

all subjects. Some are historic, some we should call
scientific, many are religious. There are state doc-
uments and many business records, deeds of real
estate, shopkeepers' accounts and such like. They
are all in what is called linear writing: all in the
same general character; but on the oldest tablets
the characters are cruder in form, and evidently
modified from hieroglyphics, some of which can be
clearly made out. That linear writing, based upon
preceding hieroglyphics, points to a previous period
of considerable duration during which civilization
was developing.

One of the gates of Nippur was excavated.
According to evidence given, the foundation was laid
5000 B. C, made of bricks laid in bitumen, and so
well built that it had never needed repair, though
the upper courses were much worn by traffic. There
were three entrances ; a broad, central one for char-
iots, camels and other beasts of burden, and two side
entrances at a higher level for pedestrians. A
palace wall was unearthed, dating from 4000 B. C.
The palace was six hundred feet long, two stories
in height, with small windows near the ceiling.
The pavement was of brick ; within the precincts
were ancient tablets, a well with a large inscribed
vase near it, and leading from the well a drain. Of
about the same date were marble statues, stone
vases, bas reliefs of terra cotta, arrow heads and
spear heads of copper and mace heads of stone. On
the whole the most remarkable find, however, was
a temple, in another mound of the same group some
little distance away. It was dedicated to the god
Bel and contained a library. The books are clay
tablets in the cuneiform character, and thev were

SERMON. 15

arranged in long rows on shelves running through
a series of rooms. Only one twentieth part of the
library portion of the temple has been excavated as
yet, but twenty six thousand tablets have been taken
out. It is estimated that from one hundred thou-
sand to one hundred and fifty thousand more still
lie under the ground. It is known that the temple
was destroyed by a foreign enemy about 2300 B. C,
a little before the time of Abram. It is witness,
therefore, to the literary culture of Abram's time ;
as the city of Nippur, with which it was connected,
is witness to the condition of civilization during a
period from at least four thousand years before
Abram down to hundreds of years after Christ.

Terah and Abram went forth from Ur of the
Chaldees. It has been doubted if such a place
as the Ur of Scripture story ever existed. Until
recently no modern people knew the site of it, out-
side of the Scriptures no mention was made of it.
It was a fabulous town, therefore, invented to give
his first local habitation to the Abram of Jewish
mythology. But Ur has been dug up. Its Scrip-
ture name has been found upon thousands of
inscribed bricks ; its name among the Arabs is El
Mugheir, the place of bitumen ; for it has been the
place from which the Arabs have obtained bitumen
for generations. As its records show, it was once a
seaport on the Persian Gulf, but is now a hundred
and fifty miles from the sea. The great rivers
Tigris and Euphrates have long been filling up the
northern end of the gulf, and we know the present
rate of deposit. If the rate has been the same in
ages gone, it must have been 6000 or TOOO B. C.
when Ur was on the shore of the gulf. According

16 SERMON.

to its records it was an ancient city, for a time the
capital city of a great empire. According to the
inscription of one of the kings, whose date was
before 4000 B. C, he ruled from the Persian Gulf to
the Mediterranean. The inscription of another king,
a little later in time, may be read on a stone door-
socket now in the city of Philadelphia. Another
still, about 3800 B. C, made a military expedition
to the coast of Syria, crossed over to Cyprus, and
left in Cyprus an inscription which may now be
seen in the Metropolitan Museum of New York.
As its remains testify, Ur was a centre of manufac-
tures and also of commerce, trading with India.
Wealthy residents owned farms in the surrounding
country, and employed attorneys to lodk after their
tenants : we have record of their legal transactions.
One person had a costly emerald set in a ring,
and took a guarantee from the jeweler that the
stone would not fall out in twenty years: we have
the original guarantee to-day. Ur, also, had a famous
temple, dedicated to the moon-god whose name was
Sin. It is believed that there is a connection
between the names Sin and Sinai : the Scriptures
seem to indicate that Sinai was a sacred mountain
before Moses led his flock to the foot of it.

Not long before Abram's time the Elamites of
the eastern (Persian) mountains made successful
insurrection against the empire of lower Mesopo-
tamia. The leader was Hammurabi, who captured
Ur, sacked and destroyed the temple of Nippur, and
for the first time made Babylon a capital city. In
the British Museum may be seen a hundred and
fifty of his letters. Some of them are political,
relating to the government of Babylonia; others

SERMON. 17

give direction respecting the felling of trees for
smelting purposes, respecting the clearing of an
old canal, respecting the claim of a subject to certain
lands, which claim the king thought justified by
ancient deeds; and such like. In a contract of
Hammurabi's time we find the name Abramu, the
very name of Scripture story, borne by a different
person. We have also the name Jacob-el.

Much contempt has been expressed for the
alleged historic character of the fourteenth chapter
of Genesis, and the military expedition of Chedor-
laomer narrated in it. No such expedition could
possibly have been made in that day, it has been
said ; and the claim of Chedorlaomer to sovereignty
in Palestine is still more absurd. But we have
already seen that long before the time of Abram
Mesopotamian kings ruled Syria and made frequent
expeditions. The expedition of Chedorlaomer was
to suppress an insurrection against a new dynasty.
In the records of Hammurabi we have all the names
which are mentioned in Genesis. He was himself
the Amraphel king of Shinar, or, as the Hebrew
should be pronounced, Shingar, the very Sungir of
the tablets in Babylonia. Chedorlaomer king of
Elam was Kudur Lagamar, a genuine Elamitish
name. Arioch king of Ellasar we read of on the
tablets as Eri Aku king of Larsa, and Tidal king of
Goiim is called king of Gutium on the tablets. The
latest critical objection to this chapter of Genesis is
that the story is an invention of the time of the
exile, in the sixth century before Christ; and that
the names were derived from Babylonian records
during the exile. That merely shows the violent
resorts which men will make when consciously
driven into a corner.

18 SERMON.

Hammurabi oppressed the people whom he con-
quered, especially in the old seats of empire. Many
of the people were vShemites, the very race to which
Abram belonged : Hammurabi was of a different
race. Therefore not a few of the Shemites of the
conquered capitals migrated to other regions of the
empire ; to northern Mesopotamia, some of them to
vSyria. It was at the very time of that migration
that Terah and Abram started on their journey,
stopping for a season in northern Mesopotamia.
The time was favorable for them personally, and
favorable for the beginning of a new movement in
history.

Thus in various ways the Mesopotamian tablets
confirm the statements of Scripture as statements of
historic fact. The general course of events, in the
lifetime of Abram and before his time, the historic
conditions, the troubles of the empire, the names,
the original seats of the Shemites, are all in harmony
with the narrative in Genesis. That narrative could
not be so precise and exact if it had been merely an
oral tradition repeated for ages by ignorant men.
The times were enlightened, writing was customary
among the common people. If Abram had any such
high and important mission as he is alleged to have
had, reaching to future ages in its results, he could
not fail to make record of it and of the course of his
life in fulfilling it.

Terah was a polytheistic idolater, one of the
prophets tells us. He may have gone northward
chiefly for political reasons, and in Haran he tarried
and died. But from the time when we first know him,
Abram was free from idolatry and was monotheist.
It was a true contention of the late Prof. Max

SERMON. 19

Miiller of Oxford that, historically, the world owes
monotheism to Abram. The Jews had a tradition,
recorded in the Talmud, that religious persecution
was one prominent reason for his migration from
Mesopotamia. Whatever other reasons there may
have been, and other subordinate and concurrent
reasons are quite probable, according to Scripture
story the chief reason why he went to Palestine and
thereafter led the peculiar life attributed to him,
was a special mission respecting the future as
founder of a new order of things.

We are not accustomed so to think of it, but'
our twentieth century civilization began with Abram.
It is founded in monotheism and the principles that
go with monotheism. The monotheism of Abram
was germ of Judaism, Christianity, Mohammedanism.
Mohammedanism is a perverted offshoot ; Judaism
and Christianity are related as the earlier and the
later stages of the same great movement. It was a
movement looking towards, and including, special
and positive provisions for human redemption.
There never had been such a movement before.
There had been comprehensive but vague promise
of redemption. There had been historic crises of
judgment and warning by which the progress of
evil in the world was arrested and hindered ; but
positive measures of redemption began with Abram.
From his day to ours those measures have been
carried out more and more fully, and in all human
history there never has been any other systematic,
efficient and '"^on-working measures of redemption
than those beginning with Abram. We are living
in the midst of movements which started from him.

Because movement of redemption it was move-

20 SERMON.

ment of a far-reaching- development of humanity
towards its true goal. " In thee shall all the families
of the earth be blessed." The peculiar kind of de-
velopment intended was slow for a long time, for it
had great difficulties to overcome, and meanwhile the
old processes of history went on as before, The forces
of humanity are self-active, a certain degree of devel-
opment is spontaneous ; but in degenerate life its
energy is not continuous. Civilization develops for
a time, perhaps with rich results; then is blighted,
and the bearers of it become prey of corruption.
Another race appropriates as many of the products
of previous civilization as it can, and then makes its
own developments, with an ultimate result of recur-
ring blight and corruption. Such was the process
for ages after Abram. In general, corruption came
sooner with each new development ; the moral power
of the race was failing, there was increasing need of
redemption. During all this period peculiar moral
and religious training was given in Judaism ; prepar-
ations for comprehensive redemption were going on.
A moral and religious foundation was laid for a
development which should be continuous. Then the
Christ came ; the preparations were put to use. The
old movement went on into processes more vigorous,
more numerous, more comprehensive ; into results
ever greater, more various, more precious. We are
living in the midst of them. The movements of
history are increasingly rapid, the achievements
are continually grander, the outlook is wonderful.
Demonstrably all this began with Abram ; in its
peculiarity our civilization had its origin in him, or
rather in God's calling and use of him. Other
aspects of his times will be considered hereafter.

II.

The Lord said unto Abrani, Get thee out of
thy coiintr}', and from thy kindred, and from thy
father's house, unto the hand that I will show thee :
and I will make of thee a great nation, and I will
bless thee, and make thy name great; and be thou
a blessing- ; and I will bless them that bless thee, and
him that curseth thee will I curse : and in thee shall
all families of the earth be blessed. — Gen. 12 : i-j.

The time was about i^OOO B. C. — perhaps a cen-
tury or two earlier or later. The scripture data for
chronology are imperfect, and the data given by
Babylonian records have not been sufficiently exam-
ined to warrant a confident conclusion. It was,
however, a time of highly developed civilization
in the Mesopotamian valley. There were a number
of cities which had been in existence for four
thousand years or more, and which were filled with
comfortable residences, chiefly of brick, with mag-
nificent palaces and grand temples. A portion at
least of the city population was wealthy, carrying on
manufactures and commerce in the cities, owning
farms and having tenants upon them in the surround-
ing country. In the palaces and temples, and
presumably in some of the residences, were works
of art — mural paintings, beautifully decorated vases,
and o-raceful statuary, which command the admiration
of men of to-day; and which, in the technical skill
displayed, greatly surpassed the art of some centuries
later. Outside of the cities lower Mesopotamia was

22 SERMON.

the garden of the world. It was the native home of
wheat and barley, which commonly yielded two
hundred fold, and of which two crops were harvested
every year. It was also the native home of the date
palm, groves of which were numerous. Other fruit
trees were the apple, fig and apricot, with nut trees
and vines, while the acacia furnished lumber. Many
of the vegetables used by us were common in
Babylonia. Birds were numerous and of many
kinds ; among domesticated animals were the camel,
the ox, the ass, goats and sheep.

The Tigris and Euphrates annually overflowed
much of the land, leaving behind a fertilizing deposit
brought from the far north. For the dry season
irrigating canals were numerous, some of them large
enough to'^be used for commercial purposes. Domestic
and foreign commerce was extensive. Vessels went
to India and elsewhere, boats were on the great rivers
and the canals. Over long used and famous high-
ways the inland commerce was carried on by car-
avans, which went to Persia and beyond on the east,
to Asia Minor on the north, to the Mediterranean coast
on the west ; while there was certainly intercourse,
we know not how much, with the empire in the
valley of the Nile. The civil and social condition
was well developed. Every man's home was declared
by law to be a sanctuary : severe penalties were
inflicted upon parents who repudiated their children,
and upon children who were dislo3^al to their parents.
Slavery existed, but in the mildest possible form.
The slave was member of the family as really as the
child : law forbade the taking of his 'life, great
treasures and sometimes the management of great
enterprises were entrusted to him. Business life

SERMON. 23

wa.s of course complex, and business interests were
carefully guarded by law. Detailed accounts were
kept in permanent records, notes were given for
loans, deeds were witnessed and sealed, oaths were
administered in important transactions, courts of law
were held in the temples under religious sanction.
What fairly corresponded to our common school
education of to-day was practically universal, at least
in the cities. There was no small amount of what
may be called untechnical science. Architecture,
boat building, road making and commerce implied
practical science. Astrology was diligently cultivated ;
in the discharge of their religious duties the priests
mapped out the heavens and made a beginning in
astronomy. They knew the pole star, the constel-
lation of Orion, the Great Bear, the planets and many
of the stars. In that clear atmosphere the phases of
Venus, from its crescent form to the full orb, were
recognized by the naked eye of the strong sighted.
]\Iercury was the blue star ; the color of its light,
clearly apparent, had religious significance ; and in
similar way Mars was the red star. In divisions of
time they had a twelve hour day and a twelve hour
night; and the week of seven days, with the seventh
day observed as a "day of rest for the heart" ages
before the time of Abram. The month was a lunar
month, but the year a solar year as with us. The
great libraries containing many thousand tablets
included royal and civil records, dictionaries, works
on grammar, historical, medical and scientific trea-
tises, religious records, cosmologies, liturgies, hymns
and works on magic. In polytheistic and grossly
mythological form, documents found in the libraries
so precisely correspond to the stories in Genesis of

24 SERMON.

the creation, the fall in Eden, and the flood, that
no student of the facts has ever doubted that the two
sets of records had a common origin.

Omitting, for the present, matters of religion,
such in brief was the civilization in lower Mesopo-
tamia, so far as we are now acquainted with it, when
Abram was a lad in Ur. The family of which he
was a member was certainly in good social position,
and pecuniarily in very comfortable circumstances.
Apparently the boy had been born in Ur : we have
no intimation that the family were new comers ; the
conditions implied indicate long residence. We may
be very certain that the boy was well trained in
the knowledge and affairs of his time ; that as he
grew to maturity he profited by the many advantages,
privileges and opportunities of his position. His
after life proves him to have been a man of excep-
tional ability in administration, a man of discernment
and insight, with mental grasp and far ranging
thought; .self poised, independent and resolute;
peculiarly high minded and magnanimous, peculiarly
spiritual and devout. Certain faults come prominently
out in the story which is impartially and unflinch-
ingly told of him in Genesis. They were faults
characteristic of his time and, as could be easily
shown, were the faults of one who had wide knowl-
edge of men and the habit of dealing with large
affairs; the faults of a man of the world at that time,
who in his virtues far transcended the times in which
he lived. He was a vShemite by race : in his day the
population of lower Mesopotamia was made up of two
very different races. The original race is now called
Sumerian : it belonged to the Turanian division of
the human family, akin to the Chinese and the Turk.

SERMON. 25

Tliey came from the north : their civilization is the
earliest of which we have existing remains. They
invented the cuneiform character, but the language
for which that character is chiefly used is made up
of diverse elements — Turanian and Semitic com-
bined. Thousands of years before Abram, his
Semitic ancestors had come into Mesopotamia in
considerable numbers, apparently from Arabia. At
first they were subject to the Sumerians. They
adopted Sumerian civilization and developed it : in
time they became more numerous and attained the
civil supremacy. Tw(^ thousand years before Abram
a Semitic dynasty was on the throne and ruled over
all the westland to the coast of the Mediterranean.
Eastward their caravans climbed the highlands of
Persia ; northward they followed the Euphrates to
Armenia. At Haran, six hundred miles from Ur,
the north and south highway was crossed by another
great road running east to Persia and west to the
Mediterranean, Asia Minor and Egypt. The crossing
of these great highways made Haran an important
town commercially : and a rich country lay about
it in every direction.

In lower Mesopotamia was the Scriptural site of
Eden. Uncertainly as yet, but presumptively, our
modern historical sciences make the region about
the Caspian Sea to have been the centre of dispersion
for existing man ; and that entirely agrees with the
Scripture story of times following the flood. Quite
certainly Chinaman, Sumerian, pyramid-building
Egyptian, Shemite and apparently Aryan (our division
of the human family) were once together in a region
not far from the Caspian. From the northland the
Chinese vStock first of all wandered off toward their

26 SERMON.

present vseats, on the way dismissing colonies, some
of which entered India from the north east and
became the so-called aborigines — now the hill tribes
— of India. The people since called Sumerian,
Egyptian, and Shemite went southward. In later
time they mingled together in lower Mesopotamia.
Through Siberia and Asia Minor the Aryan went
into Europe: down the Indus he went into India
and became the modern Hindoo. Of mingled Tura-
nian and Semitic stock the pyramid-building Egyptian
migrated from lower ISIesopotamia, taking much of
his civilization with him. But another people were
in Egypt before him, apparently few in numbers,
and of a different race. Of those aborigines we have
learned for the first time within recent years, and
as yet know little about them. In the time of Abram
the ancient Egyptian empire was already gone ; the
Hyksos or shepherd kings were then on the throne.
They came as conquerors, perhaps from Arabia;
like Abram they were of vShemite stock and therefore
received him and his descendants with favor. The
Pelasgians and the Greeks of the Mycenaean period
were in Europe and on the eastern islands of the
Mediterranean. The Chinese were occupying their
present territory, the Aryans were in the valley of
the Indus, while, with exception of Asia Minor,
western Asia from Persia to the Mediterranean con-
stituted the empire which had its capital in Lower
Mesopotamia.

Turning now to religious conditions, the great
temple in Ur was dedicated to the moon-god whose
name was Sin. It was in existence at least twelve
hundred years before Abram, and we know not how
much earlier. In three great stages it towered far

SERMON. 27

above the city, and on its summit the priests kept
their astronomical and religious night-watches. In
the worship there were animal sacrifices, and occasion-
ally a human sacrifice. There were fasts and festi-
vals, processions, music, hymns and prayers. The
sense of sin was clearly expressed, but magical
incantations were chiefly relied on as mode of deliver-
ance from its curse. Many of the incantations and
many hymns are preserved upon the tablets found
in the temple library. Some hymns give clear
indication of ideas and convictions far above much
of the worship ; as if the religion had once been
purer, but had greatly degenerated. Thus, in one
of the earliest hymns, God is addressed as "All-
producing, life-unfolding, whose power benign
extends over all the heaven and earth. In thy
godhead, far and wide as sky and sea, thou spreadest
thine awe." Those words naturally indicate mono-
theism ; but from the earliest time of which we have
record, polytheism had been prevalent. The type
of it was peculiar. Each town had its chief divinity,
which at first perhaps was sole divinity. Certainly
in worship that divinity was often addressed as if
.supreme and alone. Some one of the heavenly
bodies was taken as symbol and in some sort rep-
resentative of deity, because impressively suggesting
the divine. Sin was the moon-god, Bel the sun-god;
yet by whatever name called or b)' whatever symbol
represented, in the earliest times the underlying
conceptions of deity were similar. It was- as if,
under different names, symbols and forms, the same
being was nevertheless in mind : as we call God
Father, Lord, the Almighty, the universe-King,
and such like. More and more, however, especially

28 SERMON.

in different communities and under different influ-
ences, conceptions came to be different. The gods
of different cities were thought of as different beings
with different attributes. Political or commercial
rivalries of the cities were transferred to the gods
as rival deities. In case of war the conquering city
made its god supreme, and all other gods subordi-
nate; and thus the case went on from bad to worse.
With moral degeneration of the people came degen-
eration in their thoughts of God. Righteousness
was le.ss prominent, superstitions and incantations
increased, human passions and human vices were
attributed to the gods ; and the more as it came to
be supposed that the impulse of passion and the
tendency to vice were implanted by the gods.

But from our earliest knowledge of him Abram
was a reverent monotheist. The fact is surprising
and suggestive. Can it be that he was alone in
his religious faith ? One would naturally suppose
that there must have been at least some other
monotheists in Ur, and elsewhere in the empire.
In Palestine, certainly, Melchisedek was monotheist,
according to Scripture story ^ king and priest at
once, as frequently in those days the subordinate
kings were priests, while in somewhat later times
the supreme king was considered to be personal
representative of deity. Melchisedek is called priest
of the most high God, possessor of heaven and
earth : that is one of the strongest statements of
monotheistic faith.

How came this contradiction of beliefs ? What
did it mean ? What was the occasion and the
purpose of calling Abram to leave his people and
his native land, and become a wanderer for life ?

SERMON. 29

To answer these questions we must go back and
inquire respecting the origin and meaning of religion.
Religion implies a spirit of loyalty and devotion to
God : how first of all does man come to learn of
God ? Not from special and peculiar revelations :
for. such revelation purports to come from God, as
from a being already known. As in the first verse
of the Bible we read In the beginning God created.
In some sort the reader is supposed already to
to know who God is ; though in subsequent por-
tions he finds the record of many special revela-
tions, and many teachings respecting the character
of God and of his relation to us. Students of the
philosoph}^ of religion are agreed that in primitive
man, and in every young child of to-day, the
capacity of recognizing God is given in the endow-
ment of reason ; and the revelations in which he
is first of all recognized are the revelations in
nature. There could be no teaching respecting
God if there were not already some rudimental
idea or sense of him. Looking out upon the
world, primitive man and the child of yesterdaj^
saw the manifestation of mighty power, of
manifold life ; saw processes going on in what we
call nature which had evident purpose and meaning
in them, and recognized them as the manifestations
of a being invisible but real. Of course the first
sense of God is feeble and vague, but with experi-
ence it becomes increasingly clear. There is mystery
in it which is increasingly the mystery of the
unsearchable and the infinite on whom all thinofs
depend ; the mystery of a being whose presence
is manifested in his operations, and the recognition
of whom is accompanied with sense of awe, with

30 SERMON.

thrill of adoration, with impulse to worship. All
these .are commonly slight and vague at first ; the
mind may easily be diverted from them ; but they
are also susceptible of great development. Given
the spontaneous and natural recognition of God to
begin with, then there may be teaching to an}^
extent ; there may be special revelation for special
needs.

Primeval man was not mere animal ; and there
never was a being above the animal who had not
yet become truly human. That theory is no longer
tenable ; the crudity of knowledge which gave rise
to it, has been outgrown. Still less was primeval
man ever in the condition of the degenerate and
brutal savage of to-day. Some of the rude arts
of the savage may be relics of primeval time, but
the stupor of blight and the degeneracy of degra-
dation were not primeval. However he came into
being the first man was fully human in constitution
to begin with, but he was mere child in condition.
In its beginnings humanity has always been a
germ. Every new life, and every new t3'pe of
life, is first of all a germ developing after its kind.
Child life develops rapidlv as we know. It is
sensitive to its surroundings, inquisitive, inventive,
incessantly active. It soon comes to have quick
and keen discernment.

The primitive form of religion was what is
called animism. All nature seemed animated with
life. It seems so to the childhood of to-day: to
our maturest and most discerning thought it seems
.so no less : our latest science affirms an indwelling
life. It was the Divine life perpetually revealed
in manifestations endlessly varied. There is a

SERMON. 31

something unique and peculiar in all truly Divine
manifestations : a something practically identical in
them all, because of which they are recognized as
Divine. That unique and identical somewhat is
the fundamental element of natural monotheism.
Because of it, and by means of it, the religious
belief of early man might have matured into mon-
otheism clearly held. But it is also true that in
form and in superficial characteristics the Divine
revelations in the world arc very diverse. Objects
which manifest the indwelling life in some impres-
sive manner are very numerous, and very different
one from another. The aspects and phases of
nature are very different. There is one glory of
the day and another glory of the night. The
grand mountain reveals its maker ; the mighty
river reveals him in another mode. The tempest
has its awfulness; the smiling, peaceful landscape,
covered with verdant life, has its charm. If the
element of difference be emphasized, if in any
way that becomes controlling in thought, it makes
possible an ultimate belief in many gods, in poly-
theism. It is also to be said that the dull or
unspiritual mind may easily confound the outward
object revealing the Divine with the spiritual life
which is revealed ; may confound the symbol with
that which is symbolized, and in religious feeling
practically identify the two. That would be a
long stride towards idolatry ; in the end would
involve both idolatry and polytheism.

Now what was the outcome with early man?
Scientific investigators of to-day give different
answers. Doubtless they should not ; but at present
the answer is under discussion. On the one hand

32 SERMON.

it is claimed that the earliest religion was practi-
cally polytheistic. Revelations in nature are very
diverse, it is said ; and that diversity is very
obtrusive. Then, far back as we may search in
history, outside of the Scriptures, we find poly-
theism as the religion of the world. In the earliest
period to which research has penetrated, in Nippur
<)000 or TOOOB. C, polytheism held sway. On the
other hand it is claimed that the sense of the Divine
is always essentially the sense of one identical
reality ; while in all earliest hymns and religious
utterances a monotheistic feeling is unmistakable ;
as in the vSumerian hymn from which I quoted.
Demonstrably, Nature is monotheistic: all physical
science proves that. The universe is one. There
is one system of laws everywhere controlling forces
which are the same. Demonstrably, human reason
in its normal workings, its deepest constitution,
its truest utterances, may be called monotheistic:
psychology, philosophy and hi.story prove that. In
rational conception there can be but one infinite;
there must be an ultimate cause and there can be
but one. In all men reason is essentially one, and
it is at one with the reason revealed in the universe.
Truth is one, the right is one, the good is one
in its principle. Why then should early man be
polytheistic in religion — false to Nature in his
most fundamental conceptions, false to reason in
his most fateful conclusions ? Only through spiritual
degeneration; only by perversion. Certainly in the
constitution of man there has come moral and
religious degeneration. Far back as we may search,
the condition in which we find him is abnormal,
a condition of internal conflict and chaos; out of

SERMON. 33

harmony with himself in the relation and action
of his powers ; out of harmony with the world
in his relation to its forces and processes. Come
into existence however he may, he could not
come from the hands of his ^Nlaker an abnormal
being, perverted and degenerate as we find him.
His condition has sometimes been said to be the
result of evolution from the animal — the spiritual
in him being overborne by animal forces not yet
brought into subjection. Three answers are obvious.
First, the evolution of man as man is an already
accomplished fact. His development has but just
begun, btit the evokition of humanity is completed.
Nevertheless, after twelve thousand, fifteen thou-
sand, twenty thousand years of history, the dom-=
ination of the animal over the spiritual is still
the common fact. It is to be remembered, still
further, that our ablest teachers in science no
longer conceive of evolution as transition only by
imperceptilDle modifications going on through in-
calculable time. Leaps are recognized. In the
lower type imperceptible modifications go on for
a peiiod, but they are preparations for a transition
as abrupt and complete as that from the chrysalis
to the butterfly. According to one master in science
the transition from the protean genus takes place
wholly during the growth of a single embr^'o.
Secondly, in no other case of evolution in all the
geologic ages has the life evolved been, in all its
representatives, abnormal after its kind. Such a
fact in nature would be impossible we mav well
believe ; such a theory is irrational. But, thirdly,
the abnormal condition of man does not consist
wholly or chiefly in a preponderance of animal

34 SERMON.

over spirit. In and by itself the spiritual life is
in condition of functional conflict and chaos. It
could easily dominate the animal if itself were
normal. It is impossible, I think, fairly to escape
the conclusion that something has gone wrong in
human history, that perversion has come since
history began ; that, as vScripture allegory affirms,
and as the Scriptures everywhere imply, there came
a moral and religious perversion in the early stages
of human development, affecting heredity and in-
troducing serious derangement in human life.

Scripture story clearly shows how the perver-
sion of polytheism came in. Like the child of
to-day, the primitive human children needed care,
and as their faculties developed needed some special
teaching and training. They had no human ances-
tors to give it to them, and no animal ancestor
could give it. Man was made for communion
with his Maker. It is in accordance with common
sense, in accordance with what we know of the
Fatherhood of God, when we read that God did
make special revelation to his human children, in
mode corresponding to their capacity and in con-
tents corresponding to their condition and need.
That revelation would of course be revelation of
the One who alone is God. Need of revelation
would be greater after sin had come. It would
involve limitation and training. But sinful temper
revolted from Divine training, love's training though
it was. Training was refused ; the temper of self-
will and recklessness was indulged. Essentially
that was renunciation of God, practical atheism.
Now it is very significant indeed that in all
Scripture story of antediluvian times, the conflict

SERMON. '>»

is between God-fearing and godlessness, between
monotheistic piety and practical atheism. The
flood came; that event we considered in detail
some time ago.* Some of our ablest geologists
have held and still hold that the break-up of the
ice age, with its destruction of palaeolithic man
and contemporaneous animals, constituted the flood
of which, so far as the Mesopotamian valley was
concerned, we have account in Genesis. Partly
because foretold by revelation, the flood produced
peculiar and tremendous impression on those who
survived it. The traditions of all races show how
deep and permanent that impression was. It
greatly developed the sense of God in Nature:
the temper of atheism could not assert itself
among the new population of the world.

Nevertheless sin continued, and sin involves
spiritual degeneracy, weakening of spiritual dis-
cernment, perversion of spiritual process in spon-
taneous as well as in voluntary action. The
characteristic form of sin now became a turning
away from the God of history and of special
revelation. What then? There are many and
very diverse Divine manifestations in nature. Men
may turn to what seem to be other and various
deities who do not lay unwelcome requirement
upon them. Discarding special revelation, and
that which it involved, they may make their own
interpretations of God, and may regard as symbols
of deity the objects in nature which peculiarly
awaken within them the sense of the Divine. If
practical atheism is impossible, polytheism may come,
and idolatry at the same time. In fact, however,

* In a previous sermon of the series.

80 SERMON.

that grows to be a worship and service of the
creature more than the creator. Thus precisely,
for substance, Paul explains the origin of poly-
theistic idolatry in the first chapter of his epistle
to the Romans. It is a rational explanation, entirely
in accordance with what we know of the facts.
Properly interpreted, as we have seen in time
past, the Babel story of Genesis gives account of
the formal and imposing inauguration of polythe-
istic idolatry by the resolute co-operation of a
very considerable number of the human family.
Once established among men who were religiously
degenerating, polytheistic idolatry would surely
spread and be powerful. Something of the purer
belief of an earlier time might long continue, even
among the polytheists. A diminishing number
might remain monotheists : if aggressive in their
monotheism persecution might easily follow. It is
to be remembered that people who degenerate in
religion do not at once seriously degenerate in
general civilization. The conception of God and
of human relation to him is certainly of central
and vital importance in history. It has to do
with all highest ideals and with all endeavors to
realize them. Essential misapprehension of God
means corresponding misapprehension of the world
which he made, and of the laws of life which he
has ordained. The universe works out his pur-
poses ; to go wrong in respect to him is in the
end to go wrong utterly. All this is apparent
from the very nature of the case, and history proves
it in every age. But for a season the leaven of
corruption works in secret, all the more surely
preparing calamity for the future. Meanwhile

SERMON. 3Y

within certain limits there may be development,
many sided, apparently vigorous, outwardly mag-
nificent. Just that did come in the old world,
over and over. Changing from one race to another
there came repeated developments, which were
local and comparatively brief, and which succes-
sively ended in wreck. While the greater part
of mankind either went into permanent stagnation
or into a degradation in which little was left of
humanity but the possibility of redemption.

In such a condition a considerable part of the
world still remains. The processes which led to
it were going on for many centuries. In the
midst of them, when in the more favored regions
calamitous results were beginning to appear, the
call came to Abram. What did it mean ? It
meant a peculiar and blessed crisis in history brought
on by the God of love, the Father of men. It
meant the rescue of monotheism before it had
wholly disappeared from the world. It meant
maintenance in men of a sense of the Divine
spirituality without which there can be no per-
manent development of spirituality in themselves.
And maintenance of a .sense of God's holiness
without which there can be no adequate human
aspiration towards perfectness. It meant the in-
auguration of the first processes of redemption
while world-redemption was still possible — the
taking of one true and great man, still loyal to
the God of history, to be the founder of a new
order of things : isolating him in the mid.st of a
degenerating world, separating him from his rela-
tions to his kindred and to society, and from
civil entanglements ; subjecting him and his descen-

38 SERMON.

dants to a peculiar training that they might ac-
complish a peculiar mission. It meant the beginning
of positive preparation for Christ and the great
redemptive forces which he set into action. In
outcome it meant a Christendom increasingly puri-
fied and ever enlarging, a redemptive missionary
work carried on the world over. It meant rev-
olutions in history, increasingly radical and exten-
sive ; in manifestation at once of an on-working
redemption and of human progress, with ever
fuller and intenser life, ever greater diversity of
continually finer attainments and achievements.
It meant the kingdom of Christ, developing to its
earthly completeness that it may become kingdom
of glory and ultimately of heaven.

In the historic order of events, except for
that crisis inaugurated by the calling of Abram,
we had not been here to-day.

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