LIBRARY OF
WELLES LEY COLLEGE
PURCHASED FROM
Sweet Pond
Westminster Commentaries
Kptted by Walter Lock D.D.
IKELAND PROFESSOR OF THE EXEGESIS
OF BOIiS BOBIPTUfiiC
THE BOOK OF GENESIS
N,
i
THE BOOK OF GENESIS
WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES
BY
S. E. DRIVER, D.D.
BEOrCrS PR0PES80R of HEBREW AND OAK0!» OF CHRTPT CHTTRCH, OXFORD,
HON. D.LITT. CAMBRIDGE AST) IIUBLIN, HON. D.D. GLASGOW AND ABERDJiEN,
EXAMINIilO CHAPLAIN TO THE LATE BISHOP OF SOUTHWELL,
FELLOW OF THE BBITISH ACADKMY,
TENTH EDITION
METHUEN & CO. LTD.
36 ESSEX STREET W.O.
LONDON
First Published January IQ04
Second Edition March igo4
Third Edition October jgo4
Fourth Edition May iqos
Fifth Edition Sept. igo6
Sixth Edition March IQ07
Seventh Edition Augitst igog
Eighth and Revised Edition . . . January igii
Ninth Edition April igij
Tenth Edition January igi6
^loic'lO
PREFATORY NOTE BY THE GENERAL EDITOR.
THE primary object of these Commentaries is to be exe-
getical, to interpret the meaning of each book of the
Bible in the light of modern knowledge to English readers.
The Editors will not deal, except subordinately, with questions
of textual criticism or philology ; but taking the English text
in the Revised Version as their basis, they will aim at com-
bining a hearty acceptance of critical principles with loyalty to
the Catholic Faith.
The series will be less elementary than the Cambridge Bible
for Schools, less critical than the International Critical Com-
mentary, less didactic than the Expositor's Bible ; and it is
hoped that it may be of use both to theological students and to
the clergy, as well as to the growing number of educated laymen
and lay women who wish to read the Bible intelligently and
reverently.
Each commentary will therefore have
(i) An Introduction stating the bearing of modern criticism
and research upon the historical character of the book, and
drawing out the contribution which the book, as a whole, makes
to the body of religious truth.
(ii) A careful paraphrase of the text with notes on the
more difficult passages and, if need be, excursuses on any points
of special importance either for doctrine, or ecclesiastical or-
ganization, or spiritual life.
But the books of the Bible are so varied in character that
considerable latitude is needed, as to the proportion which the
VI yOTE
var!::is rrxrt= shr^i!^ h:M to each other. The General Editor
'c~lll ilrrcire 1.7 zZ.Lr\yoTiT to secure a general nniformity in
sc^-j^ iwi chjir\i.:er: l:ui the exact method adopted in each
oae and the final respoosilMlitT f(»r the statem^its made will
rest witii the indrndiial ooDtribotors.
By penmsskm of tibe Ddesates of the Oxford UniTersity
Press Bnd of the Syndics of the Csonbridge UniTersity Press
tbe Text used in this Soies of Commeotanes k the Kerised
Vasoo <rf the Holy Scriptures.
THIS Commentanr will be foond to differ in some respects
from the iHreTioas Tohmies <rf the series, but the drfereoces
are of a kind wfaidi arise neoeaaarily from the snbject-matter of
the btK^
Greater attentkn is paid to matters of arehs^ology, ancient
feistory, and modem sdcDe^ especially in estimating the histo-
rical and scientific ralne ai the earlier chapters of the book ;
and more notioe has been taken c^ literarv criticism and of
the analjss at the sonroes oat of whidb the book has been
oonqrased.
Both of these points hare been found necessary; for the
Book ci Genesis tooches scienc-e, archaeology, and history at
■MKe poiniB than anj other book of the Old Testament, and
it is iiuiiliil that in a Gommentary for edacated readers
these poinlB dioiild be fredy Hhistzated and discussed. Much
study has also been bestowed during recent years on the literary
analyas of the boc^ and manj ocMicfaiskMis hare been reached
which hare commended thems^es to a laige number of scholars,
mm! diese it woold be nnfur to withh<^ from the general
reader.
Thoe is too anodier reason why a fuller treatment of such
sobiectB has been foimd neoesnry in the present Tolume than, for
tiMrty»w-«»^ in the CSommentary on Job. That book also touches
mai^ pointB of scioice, bctt they are there presetted in a form
obvioasfy poetical ; here the Horm is a{^)arently that of sober
NOTE . vn
history, and the book has often been treated as though it were
a manual of scientific fact and of exact history. But, as such,
it must be submitted to the ordinary tests which apply to
scientific and historical knowledge. That must be the first
step in the interests of truth and in the reverent attempt to
define Inspiration, whatever considerations we may feel have
afterwards to be added to supplement it. The scientific student
is therefore fi-ee to say, or rather bound to say, at times, in the
light of modem knowledge, '* This is not science, its value must
be found elsewhere " ; and the historical student is free to say,
or rather is bound to say, "This is pre-historic; this has not
adequate contemporary support ; if I found it in another litera-
ture, I should not venture to build upon this as ascertained
fact ; the value of the book must be fotmd elsewhere." Such
a frank discussion will be found in this Conmaentary. There
will also be formd a very strong insistence on the evidence
which the moral and spiritual tone of the book offers of its
InspiratioiL
These are the two surest starting-points. There are other
points that lie beyond. Thus, while the editor of this Com-
mentary has urged various historical arguments ipp. xliiL ff".,
ML ) in support of the general trustworthiness of the patriarchal
narratives, many readers may feel that one or all of the
following considerations strengthen his position. i\) The extra-
ordinary truthfulness to human nature and to Oriental life
creates an impression in favour of such trustworthiness ; ( 2 1 the
consistency of this book with the subsequent history and re-
ligious thought of later Judaism helps to confirm this impression ;
(3) the fact of Inspiration, once admitted on the higher level of
moral and spiritual tone, may weU carry its influence over into
details of fact, and turn the balance, when otherwise uncertain,
on the side of trustwonhiness. For the truest historian is not
the accumulator of the largest number of ascertained facts,
but the best interpreter of the spirit of the age which he
describes, he who is best able to pick out the thread of purpose
in the tangle of details. In other words, the ultimate decision
on the value of the book has to be based on its context, and on
its connexion with the whole of Holy Scripture.
VIIT NOTE
These, however, are considerations which will appeal differ-
ently to different minds : the first steps necessary are a careful
test of the book by the ordinary canons of scientific and historical
investigation, and a tracing of the clear marks of a higher spirit
in its religious tendency. It is because both of these steps
are taken so steadily and securely here, that I feel that this
Commentary will meet a very real need of the present day.
WALTER LOCK.
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION.
THE present Commentary is an expansion of lectures which
I have given for some years past to students reading for
the School of Theology at Oxford. Its aim is firstly to explain
the text of Genesis, and secondly to acquaint readers with the
position which, in accordance with our present knowledge, the
Book holds, from both a historical and a religious point of view.
The most recent English Commentary upon Genesis, of any
considerable size, appeared in 1882 ; and since then many dis-
coveries have been made which have a bearing upon the Book,
much fresh light has been thrown upon it, and new points of
view have been gained, from which, if its contents and the place
taken by it in the history of revelation are to be rightly under-
stood, it must be judged. It has been my endeavour, while
eschewing theories and speculations, which, however brilliant,
seem to rest upon no sufficient foundation, to place the reader,
as far as was practicable, in possession of such facts as really
throw light upon Genesis, and in cases where, from the nature
of the question to be solved, certainty was unattainable, to
enable him to form an estimate of the probabilities for himself
In the explanation of the text, while I have not been able
entirely to avoid the use of Hebrew words, and of technical
expressions belonging to Hebrew grammar, I have endeavoured
so to express myself that the reader who is unacquainted with
Hebrew may nevertheless be able to follow the reasoning, and
to understand, for instance, why one rendering or reading is
}>reierable to another. The margins of the Revised Version —
X PREFACE
where they do not merely repeat the discarded renderings of the
Authorized Version — very frequently contain renderings (or
readings) superior to those adopted in the text: hence they
always deserve careful attention on the part of the reader ;
and though the instances in which this is the case are not so
numerous in Genesis as in some of the poetical and prophetical
books of the Old Testament, I have made a point, where they
occur, of indicating them in the notes. Hebraists are, moreover,
well aware that, superior as the Revised Version is to the
Authorized Version in both clearness and accuracy, it does not
always, either in the text or on the margin, express the sense of
the original as exactly as is desirable ; and I have naturally,
in such cases, given the more correct renderings in the notes.
The field of knowledge with which, at one point or another,
the Book of Genesis comes in contact is large ; archoeology,
ancient history and geography, modern travel and exploration,
for instance, all in their turn supply something more or less
substantial to its elucidation. Naturally, where the subjects
are so varied and wide, and the period concerned so remote
from that at which we at present live, points of interest or
difficulty occur, which I should have been glad to explain or
discuss more fully than my limits of space permitted me to do,
and on which therefore I have been obliged to content myself
with brief statements of fact or probability, as the case might
be^ ; I have, however, in such cases nearly always added references
to some standard work in which the reader will find further
information or discussion. I have found Hastings' Dictionary
of the Bible, and the Encyclopcedia Biblica particularly useful
for this purpose ; but naturally other works have often been
referred to as well. I have in some cases multiplied references
in the hope that readers who might not have access to one book
that was mentioned might be able, if they desired it, to refer to
another.
^ See, for instance, many of the notes on eh. x.
PREFACE XI
The critical and historical view of the Book of Genesis — which
extended to Scripture generally, appears to me to be the only
basis upon which the progressive revelation contained in the
Bible can be properly apprehended \ and the spiritual authority
of the Bible ultimately maintained — has been assumed through-
out : but a minute discussion of critical questions has not seemed
to me to be necessary ; and I have confined myself as a rule
to brief statements of the general or principal grounds upon
which the more important of the conclusions adopted rest.
There are of course some points, on which — the data them-
selves being ambiguous, or slight — divergent conclusions may
be, and have been, drawn : in such cases I can only say that
I have endeavoured to decide as well as my knowledge and
judgement permitted me.
The Commentaries in the present series are not intended to
be homiletic or devotional ; but I have always endeavoured, as
occasion offered, to point out the main religious lessons which
the Book of Genesis contains, and the position taken by it in the
history of revelation. There are parts of the Book in which,
judged by the canons of historical method, it must be evident
that we are treading upon uncertain ground : but that in no
degi-ee detracts from the spiritual value of its contents ; and
the presence in the writers of the fjurifying and illuminating
Spirit of God must be manifest throughout. In view of the
many problems which, to modern readers, the Book of Genesis
suggests, it will be a satisfaction to me if I may have succeeded
in making my volume a contribution, however slight, to that
adjustment of theology to the new knowledge of the past, which
has been called a * crying need ' of the times ^
Among the Commentaries upon Genesis which I have con-
sulted, I feel bound to record my special indebtedness to that
1 Compare the paper read by the Bishop of Winchester at the Bristol
Church Congress, 1903 {Guardian^ Oct. 21, 1903, p. 1590).
2 The Guardian, Dec. 19, 1900, p. 1784. „
XTI PREFACE
of August Dillmann, an admirable scholar, whose writings were
always distinguished by learning, ability, and judgement. It has
been translated into English; but it can hardly be said to be
well adapted to the ordinary English reader, as it contains much
technical matter, which, though interesting and valuable to
special students, is superfluous for the general reader, while,
on the other hand, it does not always contain the kind of
information which an English reader would expect to find in
a Commentary. I have only, in conclusion, to acknowledge my
obligations to the Warden of Keble College, the editor of the
series, who has taken much trouble in reading all the sheets,
and who has on many occasions given me the benefit of his
judgement, and offered suggestions to which I have very grate-
fully given effect.
S. R D.
Christ Church, Oxford,
October 6, 1903.
PREFACE TO THE SEVENTH EDITION.
The present edition does not differ in any substantial respect
from the preceding ones : I have only been obliged to make
some small alterations, due to the advance of knowledge, in
certain matters relating to chronology and archaeology. In
consequence of the discovery in 1907 of a cuneiform chronicle
shewing that the Second Babylonian dynasty was in part con-
temporary with the First (see the note in the Addenda on
p. 156), the date of the First dynasty, and with it that of its
sixth king, Hammurabi, have had to be lowered ; and I have
now, throughout the volume, altered the date of Hammurabi to
B.C. 2130 — 2088. For the reasons stated partly on p. xxix n.,
and partly in the note on this page in the Addenda, I am also
now persuaded that the astronomer Mahler's date for Ramses II,
B.C. 1348 — 1281, which has been adopted by Professor Sayce,
rests upon mistaken data, and that he must be placed
c. 1300 — 1234 B.C. : the probable date of the Exodus becomes thus
c, 1230 B.C. I have moreover revised the Chronological Table
(opposite p. i of the Introduction), in accordance with the latest
and best authorities ; and I have added two notes in the
Addenda (on p. xxxiii, and p. 156 respectively), which I hope
may help readers to understand the difficulties of early Egyptian
and Babylonian chronology, and explain to them the reasons for
the differences between the dates that have been proposed for
the early periods of Egyptian and Babylonian history. I have
also made some other additions to the Addenda. Apart from
the standing correction in the date of Hammurabi, the other
principal changes in the body of the work will be found on
pp. xxix, XXX, IL 5 — 9, xxxiii, xlviii last line, and xlix, 11. 1 — 3
and n. 2 (correction of the error in the supposed early occur-
rence of the name Ahe-ramu), 34 n. 2, 52 n. 5, 90, 128 (note
on x. 22), 137 with n. 3 (the site of iJ-sagil), 156, 229 (the
date of Ramses II), 347 (the date of Ramses II, and of
the Hyksos). Except in two or three strongly conservative
XIV PREFACE TO THE SEVENTH EDITION
quarters, in which the need of adjusting some of the current
views regarding the Old Testament to the enlarged knowledge
of modern times has not yet made itself felt, the Commentar}^
in the five and a half years that have elapsed since it first
appeared, has been most favourably received ; and the appre-
ciation elicited by it has been to me a gratifying indication that
the line taken in it is a sound one, and that my endeavour to
present the Book of Genesis as it ought to be read in modern
light has not been altogether in vain.
S. R. D.
June 24, 1909.
PREFACE TO THE TENTH EDITION.
The unexpected death of Dr Driver in 1914 has prevented
any further revision of this Commentary, as he has left no
materials available for the purpose. It is however worth
mentioning that since the ninth edition appeared Dr Driver
published a revised edition of his Introduction to the Lite-
rature of the Old Testament (9th Ed. 1913) and in the
Addenda to that volume (pp. xxvi — xxxiii) will be found a few
notes bearing on Genesis, and particularly his last and fullest
discussion of the controversy about the value of the Names of
God as a clue to the sources of the Pentateuch. He there
refers with approval to articles in the Expositor by Dr Skinner,
since republished in book form {^The Divine Names' in Genesis,
Hodder and Stoughton, 1914) : and also to the Appendix in
the Rev. D. C. Simpson's Pentateuchal C^'iticism (Hodder and
Stoughton, 1914), which was written at Dr Driver's suggestion
and had the benefit of his revision.
The ninth edition, of which this is a reprint, consequently
represents the final form of this Commentary. The progress of
Old Testament Criticism and of Oriental archaeological studies
will doubtless modify particular statements in it, but the wide
range of Dr Driver's knowledge, the accuracy of his scholarship
and the sanity of his judgment cannot fail to secure a permanent
value for all his work.
WALTER LOCK
November, 1916.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
Addenda ............ XVII
Principal abbreviations employed L
Note on the Chronology LIU
CHRONOLoaicAL Table LIV
Introduction
§ 1. Structure of the Book of Genesis, and Characteristics of
its component parts i
§ 2. The Chronology of Genesis xxv
§ 3. The Historical Value of the Book of Genesis :
a. The prehistoric period (chaps. L — xi.) . . . xxxi t-
b. The patriarchal period (chaps, xii. — l.) . . xliii
§ 4. The Religious Value of the Book of Genesis . . . Ixi <-
Text and Commentary 1—401
Additional Notes
The Cosmogony of Genesis 19
The Sabbath 34
On the narrative 11. 4'> — iil 24 ...... . 51t.^
The site of Paradise ......... 57
The Cherubim 60
On chap. iv. ... 7^
On Enoch 78
On the figures in chap, v 79
On the Names in chaps, iv. and v., and their possible Babylonian
origin 80
The Historical Character of the Deluge ..... 99
Noah's judgement on his three sons Ill
Nimrod and Labylon 122
The Tower of Babel 136
XVI CONTENTS
PA6K
Ur and the Hebrews 142
On Melchizedek 167
The Vale of Siddim and the Dead Sea. The probable site of
the Cities of the Kikkar 168
The Historical Character of the narrative contained in Gen. xiv. 171
The Angel of Jehovah 184
Circumcision 189
The destruction of the Cities of the Kikkar .... 202
Lot 205
The Sacrifice of Isaac 221
The Cave of Machpelah 228
The 'Hittites' in Hebron 228
The Ishmaelite Tribes 243
Stone-worship 267
Gilead and Laban 290
Jacob's struggle at Penuel 296
On the sites of Mizpab, Mahanaim, Penuel, and Succoth . 300
The narrative of Jacob's dealings at Shechem (chap, xxxiv.) . 306
Famines in Egypt. The date of Joseph 347
Land-tenure in Egypt 374
The Character of Joseph 400
Excursus I. The Names of God in Geuesis . . , .402
Excursus II. On Gen. xlix. 10 ('Until Shiloh come') . 4io
Index 4i6
ADDENDA.
p. xxviii. The attempt which is sometimes made to harmonize the Biblical
narrative with an earlier date for the first appearance of man than B.C. 4157,
by denying that the genealogy iu Gen. v. supplies any basis for a chronology,
does patent violence to the terms used. Had indeed the language of Gen. v,
been simply that A begat B, and B begat C, &c., it might have been conceiv-
able, as in Mt. i., that links were omitted : but when the age of each patriarch
at the birth of his first-horn is expressly stated, such a supposition is mani-
festly out of the question,
P. xxix n. The date c. 1300 — 1234 for Ramses II is supported by the fact
that, if Thothmes III is rightly assigned to B.C. 1501 — 1447, the known regnal
years of the intervening kings require an interval of at least 26 -l- 8 -f- 36 -i- 25 -F
34-1-2-1-21 = 152 years between them (Breasted, Hist, of Egypt, 1906, p. 599).
P. xxxiii. Egyptian chronology rests upon four principal bases: (1) the list
of 31 dynasties, with the numbers, and, in most cases, the names of the kings in
each, and the years which they reigned, drawn up by Manetho, a priest
of Sebennytus, c. 280 B.C. The Egyptian history of Manetho has perished:
but his list is quoted by Africanus, Eusebius, and (in part) by Josephus.
(2) Native lists, — all either partial, or, unhappily, mutilated, — the principal of
which are the Turin papyrus, the Tablets of Abydos, Sakkara, and Kamak,
and the Palermo Stone, first published in 1906^ (3) The highest years of
kings mentioned in the inscriptions. These notices are naturally not of a
character to yield a complete chronology: but they yield minimum, dates
for the reigns of many kings, and often supply us with the means of checking
or correcting other statements. (4) Astronomical occurrences assigned iu the
inscriptions to the reigns of particular kings, the dates of which can be
determined by astronomical calculation. The Egyptian calendar year con-
sisted of 365 days; and began on 1 Thoth (properly, our July 19), the day ou
which the dog- star, Sirius or Sothis, rose with the sun in the morning. But
the year thus annually marked by the rising of Sothis with the sun is virtually
^ See a synopsis of Manetho's list, as quoted by different ancient writers, and of
the first three of the native lists mentioned, in Sayce's Egypt of the Hebrews
(^1902), pp. 287 ff. The Palermo Stone dates from the 5th dynasty, and is of
importance as shewing how carefully, even at this early date, the annals of every
king had been kept, probably from the time of Menes. For an account, and trans-
lation, of the inscription, see Breasted's Ancient Becoi'd$ of Egypt (Chicago, 1906),
i. 51 ft.
XVIII ADDENDA
identical with the astronomical year of (approximately) 365| days : hence in
the Egyptian calendar year a quarter of a day was dropped every year ; every
four years, therefore, the calendar reached the end of the year, and began
the next year, one day too soon, so that the new year began a day before tlie
one on which Sirius rose with the sun; and as this process continued, the
calendar new year, and with it the calendar months of the Egyptian year, all
began earlier and earlier, till after 1460 years they had shifted back an entire
year, and all began a year too soon. The rising of Sothis with the sun co-
incided with 1 Thoth, the calendar New Year's Day, in b.o. 4241/0—4238/7,
2781/0—2778/7, 1321/0—1318/7: if, therefore, we found a statement that the
' heliacal ' rising of Sothis took place in a given year (say) 30 days later than
1 Thoth, we should know, in virtue of what has been said, that that year was
30 X 4 = 120 years after one of these dates b.o.
From the 18th dynasty onwards there is little diflFerence in the dates
arrived at by different modern Egyptologists, two fixed points, consistent
with each other, being capable of determination by astronomical calculation^.
(1) A papyrus states that in the 9th year of Amen-hotep I, the 2nd king of this
dynasty, Sothis rose with the sun on the 9th of Epiphi, i.e. 308 days after
1 Thoth: 4x308 — 1232; the 9th year of Amen-hotep I was thus 1232 years
after 2781/0 — 2778/7, or (taking the earliest of these alternatives) was 1549
B.O., and his first year was 1557 B.C. (2) In a document dating from tlie reign
of Thothmes III, the festival of the heliacal rising of Sirius is said to have
taken place on the 28th of Epiphi, i.e. 19 days later than in 1550/49 — 1547/6.
As 4 X 19 = 76, the year refezTed to will have been 76 years later than 1550/49 —
1547/6, or 1474/3—1471/0. One of the years 1474/3—1471/0 fell consequently
during the reign of Thothmes III, which by means of notices respecting the
appearance of the new moon is fixed more closely to B.C. 1501 — 1447. This
date for Thothmes III will make the 18th dynasty begin c. 1587 B.C.
Manetho's reporters give confused and discrepant accounts of the state-
ments respecting the five dynasties preceding the 18th: but according to
Josephus he stated that for 511 years before the 18th dynasty, Egypt was
ruled by the foreign invaders called the Hyksos: these (Petrie^) were partly
contemporary with native Egyptian dynasties, and they were preceded by the
453 years of the 13th dynasty: thus Petrie makes the 12th dynasty end
B.C. 2565, and (adding the 213 years assigned to it by the Turin papyrus)
begin B.c. 2778. But a document (one of the Kahun papyri) discovered in
1899 contains a statement that in the 7th year of Usertesen^ III of this
dynasty, the festival of the heliacal rising of Sothis fell on the 15th of Phar-
muthi, or 225 days after 1 Thoth: 4x225 = 900; the 7th year of Usertesen
was consequently 900 years after B.C. 2781/0 — 2778/7, or B.C. 1881; his first
year was thus 1887 B.C.; and the dynasty ruled (adding, before and after
Usertesen, the regnal years known) b.o. 2000 — 1788, It follows from this
^ Comp., with what follows on this subject, Breasted, Ancient Records of Egypt,
i. 25 — 48 (with a table of dynasties, and dates of reigns), 221 — 3.
» History of Egypt, i» (1903), p. 204 f.
8 Or, as the name is now read (Meyer, p. 245), Senwosrtt (the prototype of
' Sesostris ').
ADDENDA XIX
lower date for the 12tli dynasty, that, if it be correct, Manetho's 511 years
for the Hyksos must be far too great; accordingly those who accept it allow
for the whole of the loth to the 17th dynasties only about 200 years (b.c. 1788
—1580), and for the Hyksos only c. 1680—1580.
Such is the explanation of the great diveigence between Petrie on the one
hand, and Meyer and Breasted on the other, as regards the date of the
12th dynasty. The cogency of the astronomical argument is admitted by
Petrie: the correctness of the Sirius datum in the 12th dynasty is, he points
out, confirmed by two independent testimonies from monuments in Sinai
{Researches in Sinai, \QOQ, pp. 168 — 170): but Meyer and Breasted's reduction
of the length of the 13th to the 17th dynasties, he argues, does great violence
to the combined testimony of Manetho and the Turin papyrus, Manetho
assigning to this whole period 1590 years, and the Turin papyrus so far sup-
porting him that it gives the names of 100 or more kings belonging to the
13th and 14th dynasties (ibid. 171 — 6). Petrie accordingly now (p. 175) has
recourse to the other possible alternative of reckoning Usertesen's 7th year
as 900 years, not from the Sothic period which began 2781 B.C., but from the
previous Sothic period which began (see above) 4241 B.o. He thus gives now
{I.e.) as the date of the 12th dynasty b.c. 34.59 — 3246, and as the date of
Menes b.c. 5510. Against such a high date Meyer and Breasted argue that
Manetho's figures are not trustworthy. The sixty kings of the 13th dynasty
had only short reigns, the early Hyksos were partly contemporary even
with the 13th dynasty, and the sparsity of monuments belonging to the 13th
— 17th dynasties is unfavourable to the supposition that the period was such
along one (see Meyer, Aeg. Chron. 60 — 65, Nachtrdge, 31 — 39, Gesch. d. Alt?
I. il 276 — 286, 293). The future must shew which of these three divergent
chronologies will ultimately be found to accord best with the available data.
For the purposes of the present note, it is not necessary to pursue the
subject of Egyptian Chronology further: those who desire fuller information
may be referred to Petrie, Hist, of Egypt, i.^ (1903), 145—7, 200—5 (on the
Hyksos period), 248 — 254 (the date of Merenptah, p. 251, modified in iii. p. 2),
ii. 25 — 34 (for p. 32, comp. Meyer, Nachtrdge, p. 43f.; and on the other side,
Petrie, Sinai, pp. 177—181), iii. pp. vi— viii; Budge, Hist of Eg. (1902), i.
Ill — 161; Ed. Meyer's masterly treatise Aegyptische Chronologie in the
AhhandJimgen of the Berhn Academy, 1904, with the Nachtrdge, ibid., 1907 ;
Breasted's invaluable Ancient Records of Egypt, Historical Documents from
the earliest times to the Perdan conquest, collected, edited, and translated
icith Commentary (5 vols.; Chicago, 1906), i. 25—48, 221—3 ; Petrie, Re-
searches in Sinai (1906), pp. 163—181 ; Meyer, Gesch. des Altertums\ i. ii.
(1909), pp. 28—38, cf. 53—56, 95—102, 276—286, 293 ; more briefly. Breasted,
Hist, of Egypt (1906), pp. 13 f., 21—23, with Table of Dynasties, pp. 597 flF.
Pp. xlii n. 2, 24 «. 2 (second paragraph). I rejoice to see substantially
the same criticisms made independently by the Rev. G. S. Streatfeild on pp.
15 — 17 of his pamphlet cited below (p. Ixviii).
P. xlix. On the supposed occurrence of the name Yahweh in Babylonian,
see the recent discussions of Rogers in his Relig. of Bah. and Ass., especially
in its relations to Israel (New York, 1908), pp. 89 flf., and of Langdon in the
XX ADDENDA
Expositor, Aug. 1910, p. 137 f., both of whom agree that it does so occur.
Assyriologiats are not, however, agreed that it is read rightly in all the
passages that have been alleged : see further below, p. XL 1 1.
P. xlix n. 2. It is interesting to find, in the list of places in Palestine
taken by Shishak (c. B.C. 930), one (No. 71— 2), which is considered now by
Egyptologists to correspond to a Semitic D13N bpn, ' Field of Abram ' {hcUcal
being an Aramaic word, the one found in ' Akel-dzm^' = W2ri ^pn, and also
occurring eight times besides in the same list) : see Breasted, in Amer. Joum.
ofSem. Lang, xxi (1904), p. 36, Hist, of Eg., p. 530 ; and cf. Spiegelberg,
Aegypt. Randglogsen zum AT., 1904, p. 14, and Meyer, Die Israeliten und
ihre Nachharstamme, 1906, p. 266. If the critical view of the dates of the
Pentateuchal sources is correct, this will be the earliest occurrence of the
name Abram : the site of 'Abram's Field,' it maybe reasonably presumed, was
at or near Hebron (cf below, on xiii. IS).
Pp. xlix — liii. See further, on the true bearings of archaeology on the
O.T., the excellent and lucid article of Stanley A. Cook in the E.tpositor,
June, 1906, esp. pp. 529 ff., 534 ff., where it is shewn, among other things, that
the idea, still current in some quarters, that archaeology has overthrown many
of the conclusions of hterary and historical criticism, is based simply upon
a misconception of the facts. Similarly, Prof. A. S. Peake, in an instructive
and discriminating lecture on 'The Present Movement of Biblical Science'
(published in Inaugural Lectures hy Members of the Faculty of Theology of
Manchester University, 1905, edited by A. S. Peake), p. 31, after referring
to the many services rendered to Biblical science by archaeologj', says, 'But
while archaeology has done all this, it remains true that, so far as Old
Testament scholarship is concerned, it has not confirmed a single position
doubted by sober criticism.' To the same eflfect, also, with many pertinent
illustrations, Prof. W. H. Bennett, in an article on 'Archaeology and Criticism*
in the Contemporary Review for April, 1906, pp. 518 flf.
P. lii. Whether the Egyptian name quoted really contains the name
'Joseph,' experts appear to be more and more doubtful (Spiegelberg, Ra^id-
glossen, p. 13 n.; cf. Meyer, op. cit. p. 292): W. M. Miiller now adopts as its
Semitic equivalent Yashuh-el (see Juurn. of Bihl. Lit. 1909, p. 31 ; and c£
EncB. ii. 2582, n. 1 end).
P. Ivi, footnote. Readers of the Dean of Canterbury's TTie Bihle and
Modern Itivestigation, should be aware that Dillmanu's views are seriously
misrepresented in it. The Dean, namely, seeks to shew there (pp. 30 — 47) that
Dillmann, the man of ' strong sense and historical capacity ' (p. 33), arrived at
far more conservative conclusions with regard to the historical character of
the Pentateuch than Prof. G. A. Smith and myself had done. But the Dean
has misread Dillmann. So far as Genesis is concerned, Dillmann does not
'accept the historical truth' of the patriarchal nan-atives (p. 42), in the sense
in which any ordinary reader would understand the expression. It is true, he
argues against the opinion that these narratives rest upon no foundation in
fact; but the historical substratum which he finds in them is almost entirely
tribal, the Aciuid personal element which he recognizes in them is very small:
not only Lot and Ishmael, but aI»o Isaac and his descendants are the personi-
ADDENDA XXI
fications of tribes^: in Abraham there is an indeterminate personal element,
but most of the details about him are due either to popular 'Sage,' or to the
narrators. Thus the details, even of such a chapter as Gen. xxiii. (P), are
the 'free composition of the narrator' {Genesis, p. 296); J in particular con-
tains numerous examples of the free expansion or development of a traditional
nucleus; and the many conversations in his narratives ('e.g. Gen. xviii. — six.,
xxiv., xliii. — xliv., and elsewhere ') can be only regarded as peculiarly his own
work*. Dillmann's Theologie des AT.s, published posthumously, represents
probably to some extent an earlier stage of his conclusions on the subject; but
even here (p. 77) his view is that the traditions about the patriarchs, which
were 'first written down in the post- Mosaic and prophetic age,' have been
'greatly transformed and idealized under the influence of the Mosaic and pro-
phetic religion, that in particular tribal history has been largely recast into
family history, and that it is now for us very difficult, and in fact impossible,
to distinguish the actual facts from the ideal truth which has been put into
them.' None of the conclusions thus reached by Dilhnann can be said with
any truth to be more conservative than mine (pp. xliv — xlvii, Iv — lix) ; and
the opinion that any of the principal patriarchs represent tribes I have
expressly rejected (p. Ivii). See further a paper in the Expository Times,
March, 1906, pp. 282 fi"., where I have shewn further, by citation of Dillmann's
actual words, that his views with regard to the sources of J, E, and
Deuteronomy, the dates of J and E, and the historical character of the
representations of P, &c., so far from being, as alleged, more conservative
than mine, are, to all intents and purposes, the same.
P. 3, on i. 1, With a language as largely unknown in England as Hebrew
is, it is possible for an amateur or theorist to perform extraordinary feats.
Thus Mr Fenton, in a work called The Bible in Modern English, translates
the first verse of Genesis in this way, * By Periods God created that which
produced the Solar Systems; then that which produced the earth.' To say
nothing about the rest of this rendering, what, we may ask, would be thought
of a Latin scholar who, having before him the words In principio, gravely
informed his readers that principium was a plural word, and meant 'periods' ?
Yet this would be an exact parallel to what Mr Fenton has done. Other parts
of the Old Testament are translated in the same fashion : thus Dt. xxxiii. 20
* Let the horseman (!), Gad, be blest!' and Daniel becomes (Daniel iv. 9) 'Chief
of the Engineers ' (! ).
P. 24 n. 2 (cf. p. xlii n. 2). It is extraordinary how anyone can seriously
regard Mr Capron's book as containing a real solution of the problems raised
by a comparison of the Bible with science. In confirmation of the position
1 Commentary on Genesis, in the last ed. of 1892, p. 218 i. (cf. pp. 316, 403).
In the English translation, vol. ii. p. 3 bottom, the sentence beginning with ' As '
should read : ' As in the case of Lot, Ishmael, Esau, and their sons, it is sufficient
to regard them [i.e. Isaac, and Jacob, p. 3 bottom'] as ideal personal names, taken
from particular groups within the limits of the nation, or from the whole at
different stages of its development.'
^ Comm. on Ntnn., Dent., Jos. (in Dillmann's final discusBion of the oomposition
of the Hexateuch), p. 629.
XXII ADDENDA
taken in the two notes referred to, the Dean of Christ Church (Dr T, B.
Strong) permits me to print the following, as it appears to me, eminently
sound criticism : — ' It seems to me that there are serious and fundamental
objections not only to details in Mr Capron's book, but to the whole method
of it. In the first place, it is plain upon the surface that Mr Capron has put
upon the author of Genesis, whoever he was, a purpose which cannot have
been before him. He is trying to extract from the book a scientific intex'pre-
tation of the world in a modern sense. Now the scientific interpretation of
the world in a modern sense is a comparatively late product, and may be said
to have developed out of a condition in which the religious and scientific
aspects of the world were fused. The writer of Genesis ascribes the origin and
conduct of the world to God, and so far as that explains why the world came
into existence it may be said to have the germ of the scientific explanation
in it. But the scientific explanation strictly so called belongs to a later stage
of the history of the human mind than the author of Genesis.
'Secondly, Mr Capron hopes to find Genesis anticipating the form of philo-
sophy in which he himself appears to believe, namely the philosophy of Herbert
Spencer. Here he seems to me to be unconsciously doing the author of
Genesis a serious wrong. The philosoj^hy of Herbert Spencer is not in-
fallible, and is already sharply criticized. Precisely therefore in proportion
as Mr Capron has success in finding this philosophy in Genesis he involves
Genesis in all the risks of refutation and modification which beset the
Spencerian philosophy. If Genesis is shewn to speak in terms of Herbert
Spencer, and Herbert Spencer should then prove unsatisfactory, he involves
Genesis in his ovra collapse; and this is particularly unreasonable, as there is
no clear evidence that the author wished to set foi'th Spencerianism.
' Once more, the position can be maintained only by violent exegesis. No
one could seriously maintain that the words e.g. of the Creation-story natur-
ally have the meaning which Mr Capron puts upon them. In other words he
starts with the interpretation he wants to extract from them, and forces them
into harmony with it. This is a method which has been pursued before in
the history of interpretation, but which is now completely discredited. It is
in fact a modem form of the Alexandrine method of allegorical interpretation,
such as we find in Philo Judaeus. In Philo's day a prevalent philosophy, which
he himself tliought satisfactory, was a kind of syncretism, combining elements
of Stoicism and Platonism. This philosophy Philo felt bound to extract
somehow from the Pentateuch. He was applying to the Old Testament the
method which the Greeks were applying to Homer. But though his appli-
cation of his principle is highly ingenious, no one in the world supposes that
it was successful. The whole of it disappears when it is recognized, as it must
be, that the author did not mean that or anything like it. Mr Capron appears
to be doing a similar thing in the interest of the philosophy of Spencer with
a similar lack of success.'
P. 24 n. 3. Canon Bonney has reaffirmed recently, in greater detail, the
opinion here expressed by him respecting the irreconcilabiUty of Gen. i, with
science, in an article in the Church Family Neicapaper, Oct. 9, 1908, p. 862.
Prof. Hull, in the article which Canon Bonney here criticizes, only reconciles
ADDENDA XXIIl
them bv disrejrarding all tbe points in which they differ! Prof. Hull confines
himseli virtually to pointing out (what is, of course, perfectly true) that
Genesis affirms, and nature exhibits, the realization of a divine plan in the
development and structure of the physical universe ; but that is something
very different from proving that the order of events, as described in Genesis,
and as taught by science, is the same.
P. 26. Dr McCosh, in his Religious Aspect of Evolution, pp. 93 ff., who
has been recently brought forward as an 'authority' for the harmony ot
Genesis i. with geology, simply, as he himself expressly avows (p. 93), follows
Guyot, Dana, and Dawson, especially Guyot, whose attempted reconciliations
have been sufficiently dealt with on pp. 22 — ?5 of the present volume. The
correspondence exhibited by liis table, pp. 96 — 98, is as illusory as that
exhibited by Sir J. W. Dawson's Tables (below, p. 23 note), and contains the
misstatements which in one form or another are inseparable from all such
'harmonies.' Thus science does not teach that 'there must have been light
nourishing plants before the sun was condensed' (see, on the contrary, the
quotation from Prof, Pritchard, below, p. 25 note), or that the moon was
' thrown off' from the earth after the appearance of vegetation upon it (on
the contrary, when the moon was thrown off, the earth, or at least the outer
envelope of it, must have been molten, * twenty-seven miles in depth going to
its [the moon's] formation': see Prof. Sollas, The Age of the Earth, p. 8); and
Gen. i. 16, 17 speaks not of the sun, moon, and stars as 'becoming visible' on
the Fourth Day, but, as plainly as language can do, of their being ' made ' and
'set' in the heavens on that day (below, p. 25). And Romanes' remark, quoted
on p. 99 from a review {Nature, Aug. 11, 1881, p. 334), that the order in which
the flora and fauna are represented as appearing in Genesis agi*ees with the
evidence of science, must have been made in forgetfniness of the facts ; for it
is contradicted by what is taught in every geological manual (Dana, Dawson,
Geikie, &c. : see below, p. 22, &c., and the quotation from Prof. Bonney,
p. 24, note 3). Professors Dana and Dawson, it should be remembered, are
the only men of scientific eminence who have even attempted, during recent
years, to harmonize Gen. i. with the teachings of science ; and it is disin-
genuous to quote them as authorities for their agreement without at the same
time acquainting the reader, — who certainly would not otherwise suspect what
they were, — with the methods by which, respectively, the supposed 'reconcilia-
tion' was accomplished by them. The 'accuracy' which, in a passage that has
been recently quoted. Sir J. W. Dawson extols in Genesis, is in reality non-
existent; it is obtained, partly by ignoring or obscuring the facts which
conflict with it, and partly by forcing upon the words of Genesis senses which
they do not bear. Thus, in addition to what has been pointed out below
(pp. 23, 25), Sir John Dawson understands the ' deep ' of ». 2 not, as probably
every other reader has always understood it, of an abyss of water, but
non-natui-ally of a 'vaporous or aeriform mass' enveloping the earth, which
ultimately became the atmosphere ; and v. 3 is interpreted by him not of the
first beginning of light, but ot the intensification oi previously existing light
by the concentratiou of the luminous matter which emitted it, to form the
XXIV ADDENDA
sun {Origin of the World, &c. pp. 105, 113, 120 f.). Surely, if Gen. i. wei'e
really accurate, it would bear its accuracy upon its face : it would not have to
be wrung from it by means of exegetical tours deforce, such as are unheard of
in the interpretation of any other literature (cf. below, p. 24 (4), with nn?-' \
and p. 25). Enlightened Roman Catholic scholars admit the truth candidly:
see Pere Lagrange, Revue Bibl. 1896, p. 381 ffi (on Gen. i.), esp. p. 388 f ;
Minocchi, La Genesi, 1908, p. 22 fil
Nor, it may be worth adding, is it correct to say, at least without material
qualifications, that Gen. i. agrees with science in placing the creation of light
before the formation of the sun. For according to Gen. i. light was created
(». 3) after water already existed upon the earth {v. 2) : according to science,
however, light was already given out by the luminous gaseous nebula, — if not,
also, by many other nebulae as well, — which ultimately, after untold ages had
passed, was condensed into the bodies forming the solar system. If, therefore,
it is stated that Genesis agrees with science in placing the creation of light
before the formation of the sun, truthfulness demands that it should be stated
at the same time that it also dis&grees with science in placing its creation
after the formation of the earth, with water upon it ; whereas in fact, according
to science, light existed unnumbered ages before the primitive nebula could
have condensed to form either the earth or water.
It will be understood that, as is pointed out at greater length below
(pp. 26 ff.), this and other disagreements with science, though their existence
ought not to be denied, in no way detract from the religious value of the
cosmogony of Genesis, or obscure the clearness with which it gives expression
to such general truths as those of an ordered sequence in the process of
creation, and of stages moving upwards towards man.
A word may perhaps be permitted on the subject of ' Evolution.' Evolu-
tion may be true or false, or partially true and partially false : but in either
case it is not taught in the first chapter of Genesis : the language used in this
chapter does not suggest, whether directly or indirectly, either a transition
from vegetable to animal life, or a transition from one species, whether
vegetable or animal, to another. For a statement of what appears to him to
be the right attitude for the theologian to adopt towards this principle of
science, the writer may be permitted, perhaps, to refer to the first of his
Sermons on the OT. (1892), on 'Evolution compatible with Faith.'
P. 34 n. 2. Out of 356 tablets belonging to the period of the first Bab.
dynasty, examined bv Mr Johns, 5 are dated on the 7th day of the month,
6 on the 14th, 8 each on the 21st and the 28th, and only 2 on the 19th. As
the average, after deducting 39 for the first day of the month, would be about
11, there seems thus to have been at this period in Babylonia a marked
abstention from secular work on these five days, especially on the 19th. In
the 8th and 7th centuries, on the contrary, out of 356 dated documents, 40
are dated on the first of the month, 12 on the 7th, 11 on the 14th, 16 on the
21st, 11 on the 28th, and only 2 on the 19th: in this period, the only day
marked by such abstention was the 19th (Johns, Exp. Times, Sept. 1906,
p. 567; cf. Dec. p. 141). In the neo-Babylouian period contracts appear to
ADDENDA XXV
have been signed as frequently on the 19th day of the month as on the other
days (Schiaparelli, Astronomy in the OT. 1905, pp. 176 — 8, with statistics
respecting 2764 tablets dating from b.c. 604 — 449). Out of 2554 tablets
examined by R. D. Wilson {Princeton Theol. Rev. Apr. 1903, p. 246), and for
which therefore the average would be 85, 54 are dated on the 7th of the
month, 88 on the 14th, 180 on the "21st, 67 on the 28th, and only 8 on the
19th: but it is not stated to what period or periods these tablets belong.
P. 34 n. 3. In a recently discovered lexical tablet, the word slmpattu,
'sabbath,' is used in explanation of the Sumerian Ud-huia-kam (the '15th
day,' i.e. the day of the full moon): see Zimmern, ZDMG. 1904, pp. 199 flf. See
a translation of the tablet in Pinches, OT. in the light of the hist, records
and legends of Ass. and Bab.^ (1908), p. 527: it explains different expressions
in which the word Ud ('day ') occurs.
Both Zimmern (p. 201) and Pinches (p. 27 f.) are of opinion that though
one of the characters is mutilated, shapattu occurs also in the fifth of the
Creation-tablets. Line 14, viz., as given below (p. 29), is followed by five lines,
of wliich the last four are addressed to the moon ; and the fourth of these is
read by Zimmern and Pinches as here rendered (the rest in Unguad's trans-
lation, in Gressmann's Texte u. Bilder zum AT. 1909, i. 20): —
' He exalted him monthly, without fail, in a tiara :
"At the beginning of the month shalt thou rise over the land,
With horns shalt thou shine, to determine six days :
On the seventh day, [shew thou] a half-tiara,
On the [sa]bbath thou shalt be equal [in both] halves,"'
'Sabbath' will here denote the 14th (or I5th) day of the month.
P. 51 ff. See further, on Gen. iii., the very full discussion in Tennant, 77ie
Sources of the Doctrines of the Fall and Original Sin, 1903 (including the
history of these doctrines in later Jewish and Chiistian hands).
P. 52 n. 4. Bat see R. C. Thompson, as cited in the Exp. Times, Nov.
1903, p. 50 f., who contends that no sacred garden is here referred to at all.
P. 72. With the views respecting Cain here referred to, conip. Foakcs-
Jackson, The Biblical History of the Hebrews (1903), pp. 7, 363 f
P. 106. The fact that the Babylonian narrative of the Flood exhibits
agreements with both J and P has been used lately as an argument for
impugning the critical conclusion that the Biblical narrative is composite. It
is difficult to take this argument seriously. The critical view is (p. 107) that
the story, — with of course such Babylonian features as were included in it, —
was current in Palestine, that it was committed to writing in two sliglitly
different forms, and that excerpts from the two texts thus produced were
combined to form the existing Biblical narrative. If the Biblical narrative
arose in this way, the marvel surely would be if hoth its component parts, —
derived, as ex hyp. tliey both are, from a story containing Babylonian features,
— did not exhibit resemblances with the Babylonian narrative.
P. Iu7 f. Siiss's discussion of the Babylonian story of the Flood is
accessible now to English readers in the English translation of his Face of
the Earth (1904), i. 20—40 (esp. pp. 30 ff.), 57, 63—65, 69, 71 f. See, however,
D. 6
XXVI ADDENDA
also the criticism of Sollas, 77te Age of the Earth, p. 316, who points out that
in view of the now known elevation of the point at which the Zab enters the
Assyrian plain above the sea, — some 600 ft., — no recorded combination even of
a cyclone with an earthquake could have driven a storm-wave even remotely
as far ; it would not have driven it up the Tigris even as far as Bagdad
(154 ft. above the sea). If, therefore, this is the true explanation of the
Babylonian Flood-story, there must, in so far as 5asisadra's ship is repre-
sented as grounding on JJisir, be considerable exaggeration of the facts.
P. 125. Interesting additions to our knowledge of the Hittites have been
made lately by the excavations of Prof. Winckler in 1906 — 7 at Boghaz-keui,
the old capital of the Hittites, in the modem province of Angora, the ancient
Cappadocia. Here, in what seem to have been the archives of the ancient
Hittite kings, an extensive collection of cuneiform inscriptions, expressed in
partly the language of Babylonia, partly the native language of the country,
has been discovered, giving much information about the history and political
condition of the Hittites and neighbouring peoples, and also testifying to the
brisk political correspondence carried on at this distant period between the
Hittite kings and other nations, including even Egypt, in Babylonian. It is
striking evidence of the wide-reaching influence of Babylonia in the ancient
world, to find Cappadocia and Egypt corresponding in its language and
script Among other notable discoveries made at Boghaz-keui were portions
of the Babylonian version of the famous treaty, concluded by Ramses II
with the Hittites in his 21st year, c. 1280 — 1270 B.C., of which previously only
the Egyptian text had been known. See the Mitteilungen der Deutschen
Orient-Gesellscha/t, No. 35 (Berlin, Dec. 1907).
P. 131, note on x. 29, 1. 8. This identification, which was originally Lassen's,
is suggested by the fact that 'algum,' and the Heb. words for ivory, apes, and
peacocks, are apparently Indian : see Max Miiller, Lectures on the Science of
Language, first series, ed. 1864, pp. 208 ff. (who accepts it). It is objected
(Keane, The Gold of Ophir, 46 f.) that Ahhira is not the name of a people, but
means simjily a region where the Ahhirs, a widespread caste of 'cowherds,'
were settled. Still Ptolemy mentions a district Aberia in precisely the same
locality: and Josephus {Ant. viii. 6. 4) identified 2(o(f)€ipa [lxx. for 'Ophir' has
in 1 K. ix. 28 Sw^^pa] with Chryse (i.e. Malacca), 'which belongs to India.'
P. 131 n. 4, on x. 29, Ophir. It should have been stated that Prof. Keane,
though he identifies Ophir with Dhofar on the S. coast of Arabia, considers
that the 'gold of Ophir' was found in Mashonalaud, and only brought to
'Ophir' as an emporium. Dr Carl Peters discusses the question of Ophir
at great length in his Eldorado of the Ancients (1902), pp. 289 — 369. Peters,
however, distinguishes between the Ophir of Gen. x. 29 and the Ophir of
Solomon, whence the gold came : for the Ophir of Gen. x. 29 he follows
(p. 293) the view adopted by Glaser (below, p. 131 n. 4), npun grounds developed
with much learning, but not cogent, that it was on the Arabian coast of the
Persian Gulf; the Ophir of Solomon he finds (p. 341 f.) in Ma.<<honaland between
the Zambe.si and tne Sabi. There certainly were anciently v.rv extensive
g'ld-workmgs in Maslionaland, as Bent {2'he Ruined Cities of Maslionaland,
ADDENDA XXVII
1892), ftwd especially Hall and Neal {The Ancient Buina cf Rhodesia, 1902),
have abundantly shewn. It is contended by Peters that the ruins of the
great Zimbabwe ( = ' House of Stone') and other places in Rhodesia are of a
character shewing that they were constructed by Phoenicians and Sabaeans
(pp. 353 flf., 364; cf. Keane, The Gold of Ophir, pp. 160 ff. [but see below,
p. XLII]). Keane places even the Havilah of Gen. ii. 11 in Rhodesia, the
Pishon being, seemingly, the Zambesi (p. 192); and supposes Tarshish to have
been the seaport Sofiila (20° S.). The grounds on wliich these positions
rest require to be carefully tested: but as it is not affirmed by either
of these writers that the Ophir of Genesis was in Mashonaland, a con-
sideration of their arguments lies beyond the scope of the present com-
mentary. The hypothesis of two Ophirs should clearly be only a last resort.
In view of the connexion in which Ophir stands in Gen. x., ' the burden of
proof,' as Mr Twisleton said long ago (Ophir, in Smith, DB. ii. 1S63, p. 640),
'lies on anyone who denies Ophir to have been in Arabia': at the same time
difficulties undoubtedly arise, partly from the apparently Indian origin of the
Heb. words referred to above, partly from the fact that Arabia does not seem
to have been a country capable of producing gold in such quantities as
Solomon (even allowing for some hj^jerbole) appears to have obtained from
it (1 K. ix. 28; cf. x. 14 ffi). Hence the view that Ophir, though in Arabia,
was an emporium for gold brought to it from elsewhere; though even so, as
Palestine was a comparatively poor country, it is difficult to think what com-
modities Solomon would have had to offer in exchange for the gold obtained
by him, and the inference has accordingly been drawn that the Israelites
must have mined the gold themselves (Keane, p. 57 f.)- This inference, it
correct, would seem to imply that it was procured from some country other
than Arabia. See further EncB. s.v. ; Budge, Hist, of Egypt, ii. 132 — 4;
Glaser, Zwei Publikationen [those of Keane and Peters] iiher Ophir (1902).
P. 138. It is conjectured by Prof. Sayce {Exp. T. Feb. 1907, p. 232 f)
that ^Eher is from ibira, a 'commercial traveller' (from eheru, to cross over),
and denoted originally the trader who * crossed ' the Euphrates from its W.
to its B. bank. The conjecture rests upon a slender basis: for ihira is
apparently an extremely rare word, occurring only on two lexical tablets as
a Sumerian gloss on the Ass. damkaru, 'merchant.' Deut. xxvi. 5 lends no
support to the conjecture: for 'wandering' (RVm.) does not, as Prof. Sayce
seems strangely to suppose, mean 'travelling' like an itinerant commercial
agent, but * wandering ' like one who has lost his way, and is on the point
of perishing (see 1 S. ix. 3, Ps. cxix. 116, Jer. 1. 6, where the same word,
lit. perishing, is used of a ' lost ' animal).
P. 156 n. 4. Babylonian chronology for all the earlier period of the
history is founded upon the tablet published first by Mr Pinches in 1884,
containing a list (A), unfortunately mutilated in parts, of the kings from the
First dynasty to the 7th cent. B.C. : by the side of each king's name is given
the number of years of his reign, and at the end of each dynasty tlie sum of
the years of reign of all the kings of that dynasty. The kings of the First
dynasty are all missing from this tablet ; but they could happily be supplied
62
XXVIII ADDENDA
from another (B), which had been published by Mr Pinches, four years pre-
viously, in 1880, and which contained a list of the kings of the First and
Second dynasties ^ These lists may be read most conveniently in Records
of the Past, second series, vol. i. pp. 13 — 19; in E'B. ii. 286 — 9; and, cor-
rected and supplemented from other sources, in Gressmann, Altorientalische
Texte und Bilder zum AT. (1909), i. 103—5; or Meyer's Gesch. d. Alter-
tum^, I, ii. (1909), on the chart opposite p. 334. The data contained even
in list A do not enable us to determine directly the dates B.o. of the earlier
Babylonian dynasties : but help is afforded in doing this by statements made
by several of the later Bab. and Ass. kings of the intervals which had elapsed
between certain of the earlier kings and themselves. Unfortunately, however,
these statements are not all consistent with each other, and do not con-
sequently lead to the same results. (See a synopsis of the statements, and
a discussion of the problems to which they give rise, in Rogers' Hist, of Bab.
and Ass. 1900, i. 312 — 348.) There is however a general agreement among
Assyi-iologists that the Third, or Kasshite dynasty (see on Gen, x. 8), which
is said in the list to have remained in power for 576 years, began about
B.C. 1760 (Rogers, 1782). The First dynasty is said in the list to have
lasted 304 years, and the Second 368 years; upon the assumption, therefore,
which seemed to follow naturally from the manner in which the list was
arranged, that these dynasties were consecutive, the First dynasty was
generally supposed to have begun c. 2440 B.C. (Rogers, 2454). In 1907, how-
ever, Mr L. W. King2 published, from the tablets stored in the British
Museum, a chronicle shewing that the Second dynasty did not fdlotc the
First, but was partly contemporary with both the First and the Third,
Ilima-ilu, the first king of the Second dynasty, being a contemporary of
Samsu-iluna and Abi-eshuh, the 7th and 8th kings of the First dynasty,
and Ea-gamil, the last king of the Second dynasty, being contemporary with
Bitiliash, — or, as the name is now read, Kashtiliash, — to all api)carance the
3rd king of the Third dynasty. The discovery of this chronicle of course
modified the dates which had commonly been assumed previously for the
First dynasty, and with it the date of its 6th king, ijammurabi.
Here is a list of the kings of the first three Babylonian dynasties, with
the dates assigned to them by Ungnad^, the scholar who, with Thureau-
Dangin*, has been the latest to discuss them. The principal chronological
statements made by various later kings are appended in footnotes: it will be
seen that they do not all lead to consistent results : —
1 The names, and lengths of reign, of the kings of the First dynasty are also
now known independently from chronicles that have been discovered siuce.
2 Chronicles of Early 'Bah. Kuu/s, 1907, ii. 1 fl. See pp. 22—24.
3 Orieiitalistische LiW-ratur-Zeitung, 1908, p. 13 f. (cf. 1907, p. 638) ; and in
Gressraann's Texte u. Bilder (1909), quoted above, i. 103 f. Thureau-Dangin diSers
from Ungnad only iu giving for the Third dynasty b.o. 1761 — 1186 (so also Meyer)
instead of e.g. 1757—1182.
* Journal des Savants, 1908, pp. 190 S. (with Table, p. 199J ; and in Z.fUr Ass.
1908, pp. 176 S. (with Table, p. 1«0).
ADDENDA
XXIX
First Dynasty.
1. Sumu-abu (14 1), b.c. 2232—22199.
2. Sumu-la-el (36), 2218—2183.
3. Zabum (14), 2182—2169.
4. Abil-Sin (18), 2168—2151.
5. Sin-muballit (20), 2150—2131.
6. Hammurabi (43), 2130-20883.
7. Samsu-iluna (38), 2087—2050.
8. Abi-eshu' (28), 2049—2022.
9. Ammi-ditaaa (37), 2021—1985.
10. Ammi-zaduga (21), 1984—1964.
11. Samsu-ditana (31), 1963—1933.
11 Kings. [300] years.
Third Dynasty
(The Kasshites).
1. Gandash (16^), b.c. 1757—1742.
2. Agum I (22), 1741—1720.
3. Kashtiliash (22), 1719—1698.
4. Ushshi (8), 1097—1690.
Second Dynasty
(of the Country of tbe Sea, i.e. Lower
Babylonia).
1. Ilima-ilu (60^), b.c. 2085—20266.
2. Itti-ili-nibi (55), 2025—1971.
3. Damki-ilishu (36), 1970—1935.
4. Ishkibal (15), 1934—1920.
5. Shushshi (27), 1919—1893.
6. Gulkishar (55), 1892— 1838'.
7. Peshgal-daramash (50), 1837—
1788.
8. Adara-kalama (28), 1787—1760.
9. Ekur-ulanna (20), 1759—1734.
10. Melamma-kurknra (7) , 1733—1727.
11. Ea-gamil (9), 1726—17188.
11 Kings. 368 years.
1 The regnal j'ears of the kings of this dynasty (as far as Ammi-ditana) are
supplied not from List P> (the figures in which are inexact), but from a recently
discovered Chronicle of the First dynasty, based upon two contemporary documents
dating from the reign of Ammi-zaduga (see King, Letters and Inscriptions of
Hammurabi, iii. (190u), pp. 213 ff., where the Chronicle is printed at length).
2 Contemporary, according to Chronicle K (King, Chronicles, i. 14; Gressmann,
i. 107), with ' Ilu-shumma, kiiig of Assyria.' Now, Irishum, * priest of Asshur,' and
'son of Ilu-shumma,' according to Shalmaneser I (c. 1300 c.c), restored a temple
159 years before Shamshi-Adad, who did so again 580 years before Shalmaneser
himself: according to Esarhaddon (b.c. 680 — 668), Irishum restored the temple
126 years before Shamshi-Adad, who did so again 404 years before Shalmaneser I
(King, i. 121 f.). If, then, this Ilu-shumma — who is also elsewhere called 'patesi
(priest-khig) of Asshur' (Mittnl. d. Orient-Gesellschaft, Nos. 20, p. 28, 26, p. 54) —
is the same as 'Ilu-shumma, king of Assyria,' the contemporary of Sumu-abu, the
date of Sumu-abu will be, according to Shalmaneser I, c. 2100 b.c, and according
to Esarhaddon, c. 1900 b.c.
* Lived, according to Nabu-na'id (b.c. 559 — 539), 700 years before Buruaburlash
(1399—1365 B.C. : see below, No. 19), i.e. c. 2100 b.c. See Rogers, i. 317.
* The regnal years in this dynasty, as given in List A. The names and regnal
years enclosed in square brackets are not preserved on the tablet, but are supplied
from other sources (cf. Meyer, op. cit., chart opposite to p. 334). See, for some
differences in the dates and arrangement of Nos. 19 — 28, Langdon, Exp. Times,
July, 1909, p. 456 f.
^ The regnal years in this dynasty, as given in List A.
* Waged war with Samsu-iluna and Abi-eshu'. See the words of the Chronicle
shewing this in King, ii. 20 f., or Gressmann, i. 107.
■^ Reigned, according to a boundary-stone dated the 4th year of Bel-nadin-apli
(c. 1125 B.C.), 696 years before Nebuchadnezzar I (c. 1100 b.c), i.e. c. 1850 b.c.
See Rogers, i. 316.
8 An older contemporary of Kashtiliash, the Kasshite. The words of the
Chronicle are (King, ii. 22 f. ; Texte u. Bilder, i. 107), 'Ea-gamil, king of the
Country of the Sea, [marched] against Elam. After him (i.e. after his death,
Thureau-Dangin), the Kasshite, Ulam-Buriash, brother of Kashtiliash, assembled
his army, and conquered the Country of the Sea.'
XXX ADDENDA
6. Abi-rattash (-), 1689 [—1670].
6. Tazzigurmash (-), [1669—1650].
7. Agum n (-) [1649—1620].
8-15. [The names of 8 kings missing :
c. 1619—1430.]
16. [Karaindash, 1429— 1415?]
17. [Kadashman-harbe, 1414— 1405 V]
18. [Kurigalzu I, 1404—1400.]
19. [Burnaburiash, 1399-1365*.]
20. [Karahardash, 1364.]
213. [Nazibugash, 1363.]
22. [Kurigalzu II] (32?), 1362—1331.
23. [Nazimaruttash] (26), 1330—1305.
24. [Kadashman-Turgu] (17), 1304—
1288.
25. Kadash[man-harbe] (6?), 1287—
1282.
26. Kutur-Eim (8?), 1281—1274.
27. Shagarakti-shuriash (13), 1273—
1261*.
28. Kashtiliash (8), 1260—1258.
29. Ellil-nadin-shumi (6mo.), 1252.
30. Eadashman-hai'be (6 mo.), 1251—
1250.
31. Eamman-shum-iddina (6), 1249 —
1244.
32. Eamman-shum-UBur (30), 1243—
1214.
33. Meli-shipak (15), 1213—1199.
34. Marduk-ablu-iddina (13), 1198—
1186.
85. Zamama-shum-iddina (1), 1185^.
36. Bel-nadin[-abi] (3), 1184—1182.
36 Kings. 576 years, 9 mo.
The Second dynasty, it is supposed, reigned in Babylon itself during
the 176 years that intervened between the First and Third dynasties.
Poebel {Z. fur Ass. 1908, pp. 162 fif.: see the Table, p. 175) agrees with
^ In the Tel el-Amarna letters corresponds with AmenhStep III (b.c. 1414 — 1383).
Called Eallimasin by Petrie, aud Winckler {KB. v. 1 — 13) ; Knudzton (Die el-
AiiKirna-Tafeln, 1907, pp. 60 ff.) reads the name as it is given here.
^ In the Tel el-Amarna letters corresponds with Amenh6tep IV (b.c. 1383 — 1365,
Petrie).
" Contract-tablets dated in the reigns of Nos. 21 — 28 exist (Meyer, I.e.).
* Said by Nabu-na'id to have lived 800 years before himself, i.e. c. b.c. 1350
(Rogers, i. 318). This date is not consistent with the one given in the next note:
"Ungnad is guided by that date, Poebel by this (so also Radau and Langdon).
e Waged war with Ashur-dan, king of Assyria. Ashur-dan reigned 60 years
before Tiglath-Pileser I (Rogers, i. 326), who, Sennacherib says (Rogers, i. 320),
reigned 4i8 years before himself h.o. 705 — 681), i.e. c. 1110 B.C., so that Ashur-
ilan's date would be c. 1170 B.o.
ADDENDA XXXI
Thureau-Dangin and Ungnad in the place which he assigns to the Second
dynasty, relatively to the First and Third dynasties, i.e. he supposes the
First and Third dynasties to be separated by the same interval ; but, as he
takes Nabu-na'id's 800 years for the interval between Shagarakti-shuriash and
himself as exact, he places that king, and with him the whole Kasshite
dj'nasty, 80 years earlier than Thureau-Dangin and Ungnad do, making it
begin 1841 B.C., and assigning correspondingly higher dates to the First
dynasty (b.c. 2300—2000), and to Hammurabi (b.c. 2198—2155).
King (i. 101—113) and Meyer {Gesch. d. Altertums\ i. ii. (1909), pp. 339,
340 — 1 ; cf. the Table, p. 585), urging the facts that the kings of the Second
dynasty are called not kings of Babylon, but kings of the 'Country of the Sea'
(i.e. Lower Babylonia), and also that no inscriptions of the Second dynasty
have been found in or near Babylon, eliminate the Second dynasty altogether
from the succession of Babylonian dynasties, and make the Third dynasty
follow immediately after the First. The date for the First dynasty, according
to these scholars, is thus b.c. 2060 — 1761, and for Hammurabi, b.c. 1958 — 1916.
This date, it is pointed out, agrees with that which would follow for Sumu-abu
(c, 2100) from the statements of Shalmaneser I (p. XXIX n.). As llima-ilu, the
first king of the Second dynasty, synchronizes with Samsu-iluna, the Second
dynasty will now begin c. 1910 B.C., and end (King) 368 years afterwards,
i.e. c. 1542 B.O. : Kashtiliash, the contemporary of Ea-gamil, is thus, according
to King, not — as it seems natural to suppose — the third Kasshite king of
that name, but an at present otherwise unknown king, who lived after the
7th Kasshite king, Agum 1 1. Meyer, on the contrary, arguing that 368 years
is an improbably long period for a dynasty of 11 kings, reduces it to 200
years: beginning c. 1910 B.C., it thus ends c. 1710 B.C. ; and Kashtiliash, the
contemporary of Ea-gamil, is the third Kasshite king of that name. In
making the Third dynasty continuous with the First, King thus abandons
the synchronism of Ea-gamil with Kashtiliash ; Meyer retains this syn
chronism, but reduces all the reigns of the kings of the Second dynasty.
We must await future discoveries ; but meanwhile the view of Thureau-Dangin
and Ungnad seems to do better justice to the data we at present possess.
[Meyer now (1913), upon fresh astronomical data, agi-ees with it.]
P. 156 n. 5. It is considered now that Kudur-mabuk had two sons ; and
that Arioch is to be identified not with Rim-sin, but with his brother Arad-sin,
'Arioch' corresponding to Eri-agu, the Sumerian equivalent of Arad-sin.
I quote from a letter received from Dr Stephen Langdon, Reader of Assyrio-
logy in the University of Oxford: — 'The fact that Kudur-mabuk had two
sons, Eri-'^agu, and Rim-^agu^ or Rlm-^^^Sin, was discovered by Bezold
some years ago, and established by Thureau-Dangin in his Die Sumerischen
u. Akkadischen Inschriften (1907), p. 210, note*. Arad-^^^'Sin is Semitic for
the Sumerian Eri-^agu. Arad-^^^Sin in Semitic means "Servant of Sin"
(the Moon-God) : and in Sumerian Eri-^agu means " Man of the Crown "
^ ^agu stands for ^^^siragu, the Sumerian for ' God of the Crown ' (agu meaning
'crown,' and being the Sumerian name of the Moon-God, and dinoir being the
determinative of 'God') : it is thus the Sumerian equivalent of the Semitic »'"*Sin,
the 'Moon-God.' 'Eim-Siu' means the 'Wild-ox (DiO) of the Moon-God.'
XXXII ADDENDA
(i.e. of the Moon-God); the two names are thus equivalent in meaning to each
other ; and Eri-^agu is just the Sumerian name of Arad-'*"Sin, the elder son
of Kudur-mabuk. The Elamite mahuk seems to replace lagomar in the
equation Kudur-mabuk = Kudur-lagomar. It appears to me that Kudur-
mabuk of the Larsa inscriptions (mostly Sumerian) is identical with the Biblical
Kudur-lagomar (" Chedorla'omer").'
The inscriptions which were formerly all regarded as relating to Rim-sin
are now referred partly to Arad-sin, and partly to Rim-sin. See Thureau-
Dangin, op. cit. pp. 211 — 221 (where six inscriptions of Arad-sin are translated,
and six of Rim-sin i); and, for the history, Ed. Meyer, Gesch. des AUertums\
I. ii. (1909), pp. 650—556.
Here are two of the inscriptions, as translated by Thureau-Dangin : —
(Brick A, from Mukayyar=Ur.) 'To Nannar, his king, Kudur-mabuk,
adda of the land of Martu, son of Simti-shilhak, when Nannar had received
his prayer, built the...?... of Nannar, for his own life, and for the life of
Arad-sin, his son, king of Larsa.'
(Brick B, also from Mukayyar.) * Arad-sin, the mighty man, whom as a
righteous shepherd (king) En-lil (Bel) has appointed, who cares for Ur, king of
Larsa, king of Shumer and Akkad — son of Kudur-mabuk, the adda of
Yamutbal, am I. That I might enlarge Ur, and have an exalted name, have
I humbly prayed ; Nannar, my king, has heard me : a great wall, which, like
a lofty mountain, cannot be undermined, which shines like the glow of terror,
have I built him. May his city be firmly established ! This wall, " Nannar
makes sure the soil of the land " is its name.'
In a third inscription Arad-sin speaks of himself as onewho fulfils the decisions
of Eiidu, restores Lagash and Girsu^, and renovates the city and the land; and
says that when the God of the new moon had let him behold his favourable
sign, and commanded him to rebuild and restore his temple, he had built the
temple in which the god delighted, for his own life, and for the life of Kudur-
mabuk, his father and begetter.
It seems that Kudur-mabuk appointed first his son Arad-sin king in Larsa,
and after Arad-sin's death his other son Rim-sin 3. Both speak of the various
temples which they had built. Arad-sin states that he has enlarged Ur, and
surrounded it with a strong wall, and restored Lagash, and boasts that he has
been appointed a ' righteous shepherd' of the god EUil of Nippur, and that he
executes the decisions of Eridu (i.e. of the god Ea, whose temple was in
Eridu: below, p. 52). Rim-sin seems to have extended the kuigdom of
Arad-sin. He not only calls himself 'shepherd of the whole land of Nippur,'
and boasts of his care for Eridu, Ur, Larsa, and Lagash, but also says that
Anu, EUil, Ea, and all the great gods have given Uruk (Erech) into his
^ These translations supersede the more tentative and incomplete translations
of seven of these inscriptions given in 1892 by Winckler in KB. iii. 1, pp. 93—99.
2 The Tiixevos of the Temple of Lagash (Meyer, p. 653).
8 'Arad-sin in all his inscriptions mentions his father Kudur-mabuk as still
alive. Rim-sin names him twice only : in his other inscriptions, in which he does
not mention him, his own name has the divine determinative ; probably, therefore,
Arad-sin died before his father; Rim-sin succeeded him, and after his father's death
assumed divine honours' (Thureau-Dangin, p. 210 a.^).
ADDENDA XXXIIl
hands, and tliat he has built a temple there. He also mentions other
successes.
It will be interesting if Dr Langdon's identification of Chedorla'omer
with Kudur-niabuk should be confirmed. It is remarked by Mr Ball {Exp.
Times, Oct. 1907, p. 41) that the name of the deity LagamcU (no doubt, the
same as Lagamar) occurs in a number of proper names on some tablets of the
First dynasty, recently acquired by St John's College, Oxford.
P. 157 n. 3. The uncertainty of the reading arises from the * polyphony' of
the cuneiform script, i.e. from the remarkable, but well-established fact that
the same character may denote diflFerent sounds^. In the three inscriptions
referred t(?, the name which has been supposed to correspond to Chedorla'omer
is written iu characters which, read phonetically, would give
(1) KU-KU-KU-MAL
(2) KU-KU-KU-MAL
(3) KU-KU-KU-KU-
The last character in (3) is obliterated. Mr King, having stated these
facts, continues, 'The three names are said to be identical, and to be a
fanciful way of writing Chedorla'omer. Assuming that (3) is to be restored
from (2), which is by no means certain, we get two forms of the name, one
beginning with KU written three times, the other with it written four times.
As the character has also the value dur, and Kudur is a well-known com-
ponent of Elamite names, the second occurrence in each name is probably to
be transliterated dur, so that the names can be reduced to Kudiir-ku-mal, and
Ku-dur-ku-ku-mal. In order to get the names more like that of Chedor-
la'omer, it was suggested by Mr Pinches that the character in question had on
its third occurrence the value lah or la^, and the names were transliterated
by him as Ku-ditr-lay-mal and Ku-dur-la^-gu-mal, the former being de-
scribed by him as " defectively wi'itten." But there is little justification for
assigning the new value lah or lag to the character used ; and, though Ku-
dur-ku-ku-mal is styled a king of Blara, there is no reason for supposing him
a contemporary of Hammurabi. He might have occupied the throne at any
period before the 4th century B.C. Although however Chedorla'omer's name
has not yet been identified in any Babylonian inscription, there is no reason at
all why it should not be found in one.' Mr King then proceeds to point out
(cf. below, p. 157 f.) 'that Chedorla'omer is in form a purely Elamite name,
Kudur-Lagamar, and that a joint expedition, such as that described in
Gen. xiv., might have taken place, consistently with what we know of the
politics of the age, in the early part of Hammurabi's reign. Thus it would
not be surprising if the name Chedorla'omer should be found as that of a
king of Elam in an inscription of the Old Babylonian period. Up to the
present time, however, no such discovery has been made.' Corap. Johns in
the Expositor, Oct. 1903, pp. 282 — 7, who after a discussion of the names of
all the four kings from the East concludes (p. 286), ' The cuneiform originals
suggested for the names in Gen. xiv. are therefore only ingenious conjectures.
They may all be right, but as yet not one is proved.'
^ See Evett's New Light on the Bible (1892), pp. 119 ff., 462—4.
XXXIV ADDENDA
P. 172f. Prof. Sayce has reverted to the subject of Gen. xiv. in the Exp.
Times for Aug. 1 906, pp. 498 fif. ; but his article contains nothing which renders
it necessary for me to modify anything that I have written upon it. The
names of Chedorhi'omer's allies being, no doubt, Babylonian, they would
naturally be derived through some channel or other from a Babylonian
source ; but no evidence has at present been adduced sufficient to shew that
they were derived directly from a cuneiform document of Hammurabi's age,
still less that the Heb. text of Gen. xiv. is a translation, or paraphrase, of a
cuneiform original. Prof. Sayce's conclusions simply do not follow from the
premises, or data, which he uses.
P. 173. It is stated by Prof Sayce expressly, and by Dr Orr^ and Prof.
A. T. Clay2, ^^y implication, that Noideke's arguments against the historical
character of the narrative of Gen. xiv. have been refuted by archaeology. The
statement supplies such an object-lesson of the methods on which the opponents
of criticism not unfrequently rely, that it may be worth while to explain here
the grounds upon which it rests. Here are Prof. Sayce's words {Monumental
Facts, 1904, p. 54; cf, though without Noldeke'sname, iJ/owwrneni*, p. 161 f.): —
'In 1869 the great Semitic scholar, Professor Noldeke, published a treatise on
the "Unhistorical character of Gen. xiv." He declared that "criticism" had for
ever disproved its claim to be historical. The political situation presupposed
by it was incredible and impossible ; at so distant a date Babylonian armies
could not have marched to Canaan, much less could Canaan have been a
subject province of Babylonia. The whole story, in fact, was a fiction based
upon the Assyrian conquest of Palestine in later days. The names of the
princes commemorated in it were etymological inventions : eminent Semitic
scholars had already explained those of Chedorlaomer and his allies from
Sanskrit, and those of the Canaanitish princes were derived from the events
in which they were supposed to have borne a part.' And then he goes
on to declare trium^^hantly (p. 55) how the progress of archaeology has refuted
all these statements.
It will probably surprise the reader to be told that, of the series of
arguments thus attributed to Prof. Noldeke, while the one about the names
is attributed to him with partial correctness (though in so far as it is stated
correctly, it has not been refuted by archaeology), the other arguments were
never itsed by him at all\ Prof. Noldeke, in the articles referred to, does not
say a single word about the political situation presupposed in Gen. xiv. being
incredible and impossible, or about the impossibility of Babylonian armies at
such a distant date marching to Canaan, or of Canaan being subject to
Babylonia. On the contrary, what he does say is this^: 'Cliedorlaomer, king
of Elam, appears clearly in vv. 5, 9, 17, as the over-lord of the others (the
"Oberkonig"). The fact that we know nothing about such a widely-extended
hegemony of the people of Elam* is no reason whatever for rejecting this
^ Problem of the Old Testament, p. 411.
2 Light on the OT. from Babel (Philadelphia, 1907), pp. 125—7.
3 TJntersuchungen zur Kritik des AT.s (1869), p. 159 f.
* Prof. Sayce writes 'Babylonia': but this is quite beside the mark; the
narrative itself gives Elam, not Babyluuia, the politioal supremacy.
ADDENDA XXXV
statement; we know far too little of the ancient history of Western Asia to do
that.' So far from denying the wide dominion of the Eastern power, Prof.
Noldeke thus expressly declares that there are no reasons for questioning it!
After commenting on the perverseness of following Josephus in substituting
'Assyrians' for the 'too obscure Elamites,' he goes on to say, 'What Ellasar
was we do not know; but naturally our ignorance of the kingdom can form no
argument against the correctness of the narrative.' And in a footnote he
expressly rejects the explanation of Amraphel from Sanskrit (he mentions
no such explanation of any of the other names), on the ground that Indian
names are not likely to have been current in Babylonia. The idea that the
narrative is a fiction based upon Sennacherib's expedition against Judah is
mentioned by him (p. 172); but, in spite of Prof Sayce's statement to the
contrary, only to be rejected ! The one grain of truth in Prof Sayce's long
indictment is that of the names of the five Canaanite kings, which are given,
Bera' and Birsha' (suggesting the idea of 'evil' and 'wickedness'), and perhaps
Shin'ab and Shem'eber as well, are formed artificially; but this (N.B.) is not
asserted of the name of any of the four kings from the East.
The fact is, Noldeke's arguments on Gen. xiv. have not been refuted, or
even touched, by archaeology. In all that he said about the four kings from
the East, the hegemony of Elam, the historical possibility of a kingdom of
Ellasar, &c., he expressed himself, though writing forty years ago, with such
sound historical insight that, while he left room for all the then unexpected
discoveries which have since thrown such a flood of light upon the further
East, not one of these discoveries has afitected the truth of what he said.
The historicity of some at least of the four kings from the East has been made
probable by archaeology : but that Noldeke did not deny. The wide-extended
nile and influence of Babylonia in ancient times has been proved by archaeology ;
but that also Noldeke did not deny. He did question the historicity of the
five kings of Canaan; but this has not been proved by archaeology. Prof
Sayce has simply not mentioned Noldeke's real arguments at all. Nor are
they mentioned by Dr Orr or Prolessor Clay. Noldeke's real arguments^ are
all based, not upon the impossibility of Babylonia at such a time ruling or
sending expeditions as far as Canaan, or upon the other premises imaginatively
ascribed to him by his critics, but upon the internal improbabilities of the
route, and certain other details, of the expedition itself (of the kind indicated
below, p. 17 If). These arguments are forcible, and difficult to meet except
by the concession that the details criticized are not reported with literal
exactness; certainly archaeology has as yet done nothing to meet them.
Archaeology has met the arguments which Noldeke did not use : it has not
met the arguments which he did use. Noldeke never questioned, as Prof.
Sayce declares that he did, the general possibility at this time of an
expedition being sent from the far East into Palestine: his argument con-
sisted in pointing out various historical improbabilities attaching to the details
of a particular expedition ; and archaeology can overthrow this argument
only by px'oduciug evidence that this expedition, tcith the details as stated m
» Ibid, pp, 160—173.
XXXVI ADDENDA
Gen. xir., actually took place. And this up to the present time (Mar. 1913)
archaeology has not done. [See further pp. XLVIII, XLIX.]
Dr Orr (pp. 411 — 413, 531 f.) expresses himself very confidently that the
narrative of Gen. xiv. is not a 'Midrash.' The present writer has not main-
tained that it is. But in spite of the archaeological facts which Dr Orr has
amassed in support of his position, a historian as conversant with antiquity as
Ed. Meyer, writing in 1909, has no hesitation in giving it that character
(Gesch. d. Alt.-, i. ii. 551 f.). It may be inferred that the argument founded
by Dr Orr upon the facts is not as cogent as he would desire it to be.
P. 180. It has been argued lately that the patriarchs 'lived under the law
of Hammurabi^,' and moreover that the laws implied in the narratives of
Genesis are those actually current in the patriarchal age, and such as no post-
Mosaic writer could have imagined or invented. Supposing this conclusion to
be sound, it would not be inconsistent with the position taken in the present
volume, in which it is maintained that the patriarchal narratives contain a
genuine historical nucleus (pp. Ivii, Iviii, 143). The conclusion is, however, a
very doubtful one. The resemblances appealed to are not sufficiently distinc-
tite to prove what is alleged. Most of the parallels that have been adduced
are too slight to merit any attention (e.g. Hammurabi's code, § 108 and Gen.
xlvii. 16, § 117 and xlvii. 19, § 185 and xv. 3 : the law, also, of § 8, prescribing
death as the penalty for theft from a temple or palace, is surely not needed to
explain the words either of Laban in xxxL 32, or of Joseph's brethren in xliv. 9).
"What at first sight appears to be a stronger case is supplied by § 146, which
prescribes that if a man's wife^ has given him a concubine, and the concubine
afterwards bears children, and makes herself equal with her mistress, because
she has borne children her mistress may not sell her, she may reduce her to
bondage (lit. put fetters upon her), and count her among her women-slaves:
she may only be sold (§ 147) if she has not borne children. Comp. Gen. xvi.
2, 6, where Sarah gives Abraham a concubine, Hagar, who, when she finds that
she has conceived, is arrogant towards her mistress, who then 'deals hardly'
with her (also xxx. 3, where Rachel gives Laban a concubine). The action of
Rachel, and even that of Sarah, can, however, be quite naturally explained
without calling in Hammurabi's law. The custom of having concubine-slaves,
— to say nothing of other countries, — was, and stiU is, common in the Semitic
East; it is implied for Israel in the law of Ex. xxi. 7 — 9; and it prevails
among the Arabs to the present day. A custom so widely diffused as this),
and attested for Israel itself by Ex. xxi., obviously does not require the code of
Hammurabi to explain it. Even moreover though it were true that Sarah
could not sell Hagar, the operation of Hammurabi's law would not be neces-
* See, on Hammurabi, p. 156 n. 4, with the references.
' 'If a man has married a wife,' ice. So Peiser, Harper, and others. Mr Johns,
however, in §§ 144 — 7 renders '& votary' for ' a uije,' and adheres to that rendering :
the sign used, he tells me, never has the value of aiiatu, "a wife,' and can only be
80 read upon the assumption of an error on the part of the engraver. In its actual
wording, therefore, Hammurabi's law will apply not to wives in general, but only
to married "votaries' ; though it is possible, as Mr Johns suggests, that its intention
is to extend to married votaries a provision already in force for other married
women.
ADDENDA XXXVIl
sarily presupposei In Mohammedan countries, a concubine-slave who has
borne children to her master is entitled to her freedom, if not immediately,
yet at her master's death: if he has not already the four wives allowed by
Mohammedan law, he generally marries her; if he does not do this, though he
may continue to employ her as a slave, he cannot sell her; at least, if he does
so, it is accounted a disgrace to him^ The feeling against selling a concubine-
slave who has given her master a child is thus not peculiar to Hammurabi's
code; and the argument that would prove the patriarchs to have lived under
Hamnmrabi's law would prove Mohammedans to live under it likewise.
Probably indeed both Hammurabi and Moliammed merely codified an already
existing Semitic custom. There is nothing however in Gen. xvi which im-
plies that Sarah could not sell Hagar. Saiah naturally resented her slave-
girl's behaviour, and took measures of her own to reduce her to submission,
so that she fled : there is nothing to suggest that she desired to sell her, so
that we are not entitled to say that she acted as she did, because the law did
not allow her to sell her: in fact, the words (x'vi. 6) 'do to her that which is
good in thine eyes,' imply that she was at liberty even, if she pleased, to sell
her. In no case, therefore, is the hypothesis that the patriarchs lived under
the law of Hammiirabi required for an explanation of the facts.
P 180 n. 1. On the supposed N. Arabian 'land of Musri,' of which
Winckler and others have recently made so much, see now also the criticism
of Ed. Meyer, Die Israeliten und Hire Nachbarsldmme (1906), pp._ 455 fiF.
P. 225. Prof. Sayce {Exp. T. June, 1907, p. 419) says that Wrh^ N*C'3 is a
literal translation of the Babylonian ishshak ildni, 'viceroy of the deified king,'
patesi or ishshak being a title borne by the governors of Babylonian provinces
and subject cities down to the end of the Hammurabi dynasty. It would
be Interesting, if true, to find that Abraham held an ofBcial position under
Hammurabi, as governor of a province or city: at the time of Sarah's death
he had, according to the chronology of Genesis (see p. xxvi), lived in or near
Palestine for 52 years ; and it would be still more interesting if we could dis-
cover in what part of the country his official residence was. But it must not
be forgotten that UThn X"'tJ*J is also perfectly good Hebrew for 'prince of
God': so Prof. Sayce's explanation is in no case necessary.
With regai'd to the rest of this article, it must be remembered that the
various words, or expressions, occurring in Gen. xxiii., stated in it to be similar
to, or borrowed from, those current in Babylonia, are also one and all perfectly
good Hebrew ; and hence their occurrence in this chapter is no evidence that
it was based {ib. p. 421 f-) upon early Babylonian documents. This is shewn
1 Cf. Burckhardt, Arabia, i. 341, 312 (in Mecca) ; Snouek-Hurgronje, Mekka, ii.
134 f.; Hughes, Diet, of Islam, -p-p. 59, 597; Kohler, Rechtsvergleichende Studien,
p. 15 f. (cited by S. A. Cook, The Laws of Moses and the Code of Hammurabi, p. 168).
See also the quotation from Lane in the note on Gen. xvi. 1 (where, like Sarah,
the wife herself gives the husband his concubine).
The contract-tablet from the 12th year of Hammurabi, translated by Pinches
(OT. in the light, dx. p. 185), though not bearing directly upon Gen. xvi., is of
interest, as illustrating at least what might happen in Babylonia : a husband and
wife jointly buy a daughter from her father, to be the wife's slave, and the husband's
concubine ; if she disowns her mistress, she may be sold.
XXXVIII ADDENDA
below (p. 230) with regard to several of the expressions used ; and it could bo
shewn with equal readiness of the others. Thus keseph mdle\ 'fiiii price
Qxi. full silcer).^ may correspond to the Bab. kaspu gamirtu, 'full price'; but
1 Ch. xxi. 22, 24 are evidence that the expression is likewise good Hebrew,
and also that it could be used in Hebrew as late as the time of the
Chronicler, c. 300 B.C. The endeavour to shew that the Heb. text oivv. 17, 18
is a translation of a Babylonian sale of land in the form in which it was drawn
up in the age of Hammurabi is anything but convincing: no parallel at all
resembling it is quoted; and Pinches (071 in the light, &c. p. 238), after
quoting two examples of contracts for the sale of land belonging to that age,
which he says are 'types of hundreds of others known to Assyriologists,'
remarks that they shew 'noteworthy differences' from the transaction re-
corded in Gen. xxiii.
P. 239 n. 2. Dr Orr (p. 107 n. 5) says that Wellliausen conjectures 'quite
arbitrarily ' father for mother in xxiv. 67. But if there are grounds for a
conjecture, even though they may be insufficient to make it a certainty, the
conjecture cannot justly be stigmatized as 'arbitrary.' Or does Dr Orr think
that the syntax of 10S mt^ n^nxn in v. 67 is so ordinary and normal as to
arouse no suspicion that 'of Sarah his mother' is a gloss % And how comes it
that, whereas throughout the chapter down to v. 56 the servant's 'master' has
been Abraham, in v. 65 it suddenly becomes Isaac? The conjecture that a
notice of Abraham's death once stood after v. 62 would at once explain this
change in the person denoted by ' master ' ; and if, as the syntax strongly
suggests, 'of Sarah his mother' should disappear from ». 67, then his father
(V2N) would naturally be read for his mother (I^N) in v. 67.
P. 262. Dr Orr (pp. 105 n., 493 f.) makes very light of the chronological
difficulty discussed in the note on this page: the objection, he says, 'is an old
one, and has frequently been replied to.' No doubt it has been : but it is
necessary sometimes to consider the value of a 'reply.' Dr Orr implies that
if Isaac, at the blessing of Jacob and Esau (Gen. xx\ ii.) were, as ' ordinarily
assumed and as the remaining data combine to shew, 139 years old,' the
difficulty would disappear. Let us grant, provisionally, this premise, and see
how it works. Esau, we are told (xxvi. 34 f , P), was 40 years old when he
married his two Hittite wives, who were a 'grief of mind' to his father and
mother : as Isaac was 60 at the birth of Esau and Jacob (xxv. 26 f., P), he
would, at the time of Esau's marriage, be 100. Is it, now, credible, or in
accordance with human nature, that a parent, apprehensive (xxvii. 46, cf. xxvi.
35) lest his son, aged 40, should imitate his brother in making an undesirable
match, would wait thirty-nine years, till he was 79, before taking steps to
prevent it (see xxviii. 1, 2, 6, P)? That is what Dr Orr's explanation credits
Isaac and Rebekah with having done.
P. 325. Dr Orr (p. 237 n.) finds nothing but ' misplaced ingenuity ' in the
supposition that two discrepant narratives are woven together in chap, xxxvii.
Not to repeat what is said in the note about • Midianites' (not ' the Midiau-
ites') on xxxvii. 28, it is strange that he sees nothing surprising in its being said
by {ex hyp.) one and the same writer that Joseph was sold to Potiphar by
'Midianites' in xxxvii. 36, and bought by Potiphar from 'Ishmaelites' in
ADDENDA XXXIX
xxxix. 1 ! It 18 also remarkable that in the text of the same page he seems to
think it quite possible that the ' narrator of the life of Joseph ' may have found
the merchants to whom Joseph was sold described ' in one of his sources as
Ishmaehtes and in another as MidianitesM But how does this supposition
differ in principle from the ' critical ' theory which he thinks so baseless ? It
is simply the same theory in other words.
P. 344, on 'Abrek/ Spiegelberg {Aegypt. Randglossen zum AT., 1904,
pp. 15 ff.) objects to the explanation of Brugsch and Renouf that 'thy command
is our desire ' is neither an Egyptian expression, nor suitable in the mouth of
a herald ; and explains ' Abrek ' as an Egyptian word meaning ' Give heed ! '
'Attention!'
P. 365 n. Dr Orr (p. 366 f.) again tries to persuade his readers that the
chronological discrepancy pointed out in the note is imaginary, and that there
is really no diflBculty in the chapter whatever. The ditBculty caused by the
inclusion of Hezron and Hamul disappears, he thinks, entirely upon the
' ordinary solution ' that they are introduced as the ' legal representatives and
substitutes of Er and Onan, who are said to have died in the land of Canaan.'
But in the first place this supposition is artificial and arbitrary in the ex-
treme : Perez represented Er alone, not Er and Onan (notice the terms of
xxxviii. 8); and secondly, even allowing, for the sake of argument, that Hezron
and Hamul did represent Er and Onan, nothing is gained : the list, as it stands,
— and Dr Orr will have nothing to do with it in any other form, — expressly
purports to be, not a list of Jacob's descendants as such, but {vv. 8, 26) a list
of Jacob's descendants who came into Egypt : Hezron and Hamul, therefore,
even though they appear as the representatives of Er and Onan, can only be
included in it because they came into Egypt. The chronological difficulty
(explained in the footnote on p. 365) thus remains exactly as before.
It is impossible to discuss the whole question again ; but the principal in-
consistencies may be briefly placed again before the reader. (1) The list
purports to be one of the 'children of Jacob' (v. 8), or of the 'souls belonging
to Jacob that came out of his loins ' {v. 26), who ' came into Egypt ' : Jacob,
therefore, ought to be eo-cluded : but in v. 8 his name is indnded. (2) The
'sons and daughters' of Leah are said in v. 15 to be 33 : if the actual names
in vv. 8 — 15 are counted, there will be found to be 34, or, — excluding Er and
Onan, who are said to have died in Canaan, and who consequently cannot have
come into Egypt, — 32. (3) In rv. 19 — 22 Manasseh and Ephraim are mcluded
among the 14 sons of Rachel, who, with the 33 of v. 15, the 16 of v. 18, and
the 7 of V. 25, make up the 70, who (Ex. i. 5, as well as v. 27 end here) came
down with Jacob into Egypt ; in v. 27* they are plainly excluded. (4) In
V. 26, after the whole number of Jacob's descendants who came into Egypt
is said to have been 33 + 16+14 + 7 (i.e. 70), it is suddenly said that they
were 66; this figure being raised to 70 (p. 27) by the addition of Manasseh
and Ephraim, and seemingly Joseph (who have all been mentioned before),
and Jacob (inconsistently with v. 26*). There are thus a sei-ies of distinct
and separate inconsistencies in the list. Clearly, therefore, it presents some
'problem' which claims solution. Can a list containing so many inconsistencies
be throughout the work of one hand? Must not corrections have been in-
XL ADDENDA
troduced into it, which brought with them these inconsistencies? I have
offered one solution. I do not say that it is the right one ; and shall be only
too happy to accept a better one, if it should be produced. But Dr Orr
renders no help. He says that the omissions which I suggest 'create difficulties
and remove none.' But they do remove some diflSculties, as will be seen, if
the list is read carefully with the omissions suggested. And they do not
'create' diflBculties, though they leave some which are in the list already: for,
in the list itself, the sum 33 in v. 15 can be harmonized with vv. 8 — 15 only
at the cost of one of two inconsistencies: either Er and Onan must be
included (though they were never in Egypt), and Dinah omitted as a later
insertion (see on v. 15^); or (Dr Orr's alternative) Er and Onan must be
ea;cluded, and Jacob and Dinah iwcluded, which implies that the writer of
the list reckoned Jacob as one of his own sons (see v. 15*")! With what
justice am I blamed by Dr Orr for accepting one of these inconsistencies,
when he himself accepts the other? According to Dr Orr, the table 'is
evidently one of heads of families, and includes in its enumeration, not only
Jacob himself and his daughter Dinah, but Er and Onan, who died in Canaan
(represented by Hezron and Hamul), and Joseph's two sons, who, though ex-
pressly mentioned as born in Egypt (v. 20), are embraced in "the souls that
came with Jacob into Egypt,"' But this view not only misreads the table, but
removes no difficulty. The table is not a mere list of heads of families ; it is
a list of heads of families who came into Egypt (vv. 8, 26). I have indeed
suggested myself that, in its original form, it was perhaps a list of Jacob's
descendants, as such, 'drawn up without reference to the migi'ation into Egypt,
and afterwards not quite consistently adjusted to its present place ' ; but Dr
Orr is not entitled so to understand the list, unless he excludes the clauses in
vv. 8, 26, whicii speak of the migration into Egypt, as later additions (which he
does not do). And the difficulties about Jacob being reckoned as one of his
own sons, and Hezron and Hamul being (according to the chronology of JE)
not even born at this time, remain as before, unremoved by his hypothesis.
P. 383, 1. 16 f. Kur, to dig, is, however, an uncertain root (Lex. 468^); and
it would form not m^kherdh, but m'khordh. M^kherdh must come from
karar, prob. to turn round-, hence Dillm. suggests a curved knife, or sahre.
P. 392, on xlix. 24^. In view of the names by which it has been supported
the interpretation of this difficult clause obtained by vocalizing nj/~l for nUT
ought not perhaps to have been left unmeutioued. Adopting this vocalization,
Ewald(^/sf.i. 409), Tuch, and Dilhnann render the clause, 'From there (where
is) the Shepherd of the Stone of Israel,' i.e. from heaven, whence the Shepherd-
God [' Shepherd's God' in Ewald, I. c. n. 2, is a mistranslation] (Gen. xlviii. 15,
Ps. xxiii. 1, Ixxx. 1), revered at the sacred stone of Bethel (ch. xxviii. 21),
stretches out His hands to support Joseph in the battle. The 'Shepherd of
the Stone of Israel,' if this reading of the passage is correct, will thus be
virtually a synonym of the ' God of Bethel ' (xxxi. 13). Gunkel, combining this
reading with that of the Peshitta, mentioned on p. 392, renders 'By tfie
name of the Shepherd of Israel's Stone,' understanding the expression to
mean the Divine Shepherd, who was regarded (cf. below, pp. 267, 268) as
dwelling in the sacred stone of Bethel But Gunkel allows that the correct-
ADDENDA XLI
ness of the text h open to suspicion; and the 'shcph'^rrl' of a 'stone'
certainly implies a strange combination of figures. Prof. G. F. Moore {EncB.
iii. 2977, n. 14) proposes, 'By the arm {or arms) of the Stone of Israel'
(yiTp or ^yitp for T\])'\ DB'O): this would form a good parallel to 'hands' in
clause c; but would hardly be possible, unless the ' Stone of Israel' had come
to be a mere title of Yahweh, the figure of the ' stone ' being forgotten.
Various arguments and positions adopted in the present volume, in
addition to those referred to above, are adversely criticised in Dr Orr's
The Problem of the Old Testament (1906): but I find no occasion to alter
substantially anything that I have written in consequence. On particular
points, as I have more than once remarked before, there is scope for difference
of opinion, on account of the insufficiency or ambiguity of the data: but Dr
Orr does not appear to me to have shaken any of the main conclusions reached
by critics; and in liis attempt to explain the facts of the OT. in accordance
with what is virtually the traditional view, he has not shewn himself more
successful than his predecessors. There is nothing substantially new in his
volume : critics are quite familiar with the objections which he has marshalled
against them ; the present writer, at any rate, — and he cannot believe that he
stands alone in this respect, — has examined and considered them again and
again, and has always found himself brought to the same conclusion regarding
them : they are not cogent, and they are far outweighed by the numerous and
insuperable difficulties and inconsistencies attaching to the traditional view.
Dr Orr does his best to explain away these difficulties and inconsistencies,
and produces probably upon many readers the impression that he has done
so ^ but those who have learnt not to rely upon confidently expressed asser-
tions, but to examine passages and arguments for themselves, will, it is
believed, soon discover how imperfect his explanations are. It is also to be
remembered that divergence of opinion among critics does not necessarily
shew, as Dr Orr seems often tacitly to argue, that there is no problem to
solve, and that the traditional view may therefore be reinstated : it may
equally be an indication that the problem is complicated, or the criteria am-
biguous, and that more solutions of it than one are, with our present know-
ledge, possible or tenable. Except in the exact sciences, there is no branch
of investigation in which, from the causes indicated, divergences of opinion
among experts are not met with.
With regard to one point, the fault that Dr Orr finds with me (pp. 221,
238) for suggesting what is contrary to the fact in saying (below, p. xi) that
the term Jehovah is 'uniformly' employed in Gen. xii. 10 — 20, whereas in
fact it occurs there only once, I may say that my intention was to group
together ch. xviii. — xix. (mentioned in the same sentence) and xii. 10 — 20, and
to say that in both together (except in the verse, xix. 29, specified as excluded)
the term was 'uniformly' employed (which is correct). In so far as the words
'in the similar narrative' before ' xii. 10 — 20' seem to suggest (what in writing
the sentence I did not notice) that the two narratives were treated by me
separately, I have not the least objection to omit them. The correction is
a verbal one, and the general accuracy of the statement made is not afifected
by it.
D. e
ADDENDA 11.
(Nov. 1910.)
For fuller information on various questions discussed in the present
volume, the reader may now consult Dr Skinner's Genesis (1910), in the
* International Critical Commentaries.'
On p. XXVII, above, 1. 5 — 6. According to Randall-Maciver, however
{Mediaeval Rhodesia, 1906, pp. vii— viii, 59 flf., 85 f., 92 f., 99, 102), the
Zimbabwe and other similar buildings in Rhodesia are not the work of
ancient peoples from the East, but are of native African workmanship, and
are not earlier than c. 14 — 1500 a.d.
P. iii flf. On the composite structure of Genesis, comp. Prof. A. A. Sevan's
essay on 'The Historical Methods of the OT.' in Cambridge Biblical Essays
(1909), pp. 1 — 19 (including parallels from Arabic authors).
The composition of Genesis according to Eerdmans. Prof. B. D.
Eerdmans, Kuenen's successor at Leiden, has propounded lately a theory of
the composition of Genesis, which, as it is now sometimes referred to, may be
briefly described here. Critical problems, Eerdmans considers \ have in recent
yeai's atti-acted so much attention that the exegesis of Genesis has been
neglected. Hence conclusions have been reached which are inconsistent with
a sound exegesis. It is the great fault of Wellhausen and his followers that
they have not recognized the polytheism of Genesis. Already in 1893 Eerdmans
saw that Elohim in the 'Book of the Covenant' (Ex. xxi. 6, 13, xxvii. 8, 9),
must mean, not ' God,' but ' the gods ' : afterwards he became more and more
convinced that a sound exegesis shewed that beliind our text of Genesis there
lay a background of polytheistic traditions, the existence of which had become
obscured by the monotheistic sense imposed upon them afterwards through
the influence of Deuteronomy. The analysis of Genesis into J, E, and P
starts with the assumption that Genesis is, and substantially always was,
monotheistic : this assumption does not do justice to the original sense of the
narratives in it, and leads consequently to false results : hence the analysis
which depends upon it must be rejected. Genesis is composite: but the clue
to the analysis is to be found not in the criteria usually followed by critics, but
in exegesis. Eerdmans himself however starts with a literary clue. He
divides the Joseph-narratives into two recensions, one an Z9>"a^/-recension, in
which Joseph's father is called ' Israel,' the other a e/acoJ-recension, in which
he is called 'Jacob' (cf. below, on xxxv. 21, xliii. 6 ; and LOT. p. 19)''.
1 Die Komposition der Genesis (1908), pp. 1 — 2, and Preface.
' P. 70 f. It is unnecessary to give here the passages referred to each recension :
they will be found in Skinner, p. 439.
ADDENDA II XLIII
With each of these narratives is connected a series of passages fi'om the
earlier parts of Genesis (pp. 87 — 9). The Jacob-recension, with the narratives
belonging to it, is the longer, and forms the fundamental narrative of the book,
the compiler having collected various legends, and combined them iuto a
history; the Israel-recension, with the other narratives belonging to it, was
worked in aftenvards. In the course of the combination of these two
narratives into our Genesis, numerous successive expansions and redactional
adjustments were introduced. The most characteristic feature of Eerdmans'
theory is, however, the polytheism, which except in a few late, post-
Deuteronomic additions, — such as ch. i. (in its present form) ; xv. 1 — 6 ; xvii.
(4 cent. B.C.), xxi., xxxv. 9 — 15, — he considers as having dominated originally
all the narratives of which the book is composed. In some passages, as i. 26,
XX. 13, the original polytheism is still apparent; other passages consist of
legends which merely recognize Yahweh as one among other gods, as ch. iv.,
ix. 18 — 27, xxii., xxvii., xxviii. 11 — 22, xxix. — xxxi., xxxix.; in other cases
poljiiheistic legends have been transferred to the one God, Yahweh, a;8
chs. ii. — iii., vi. 1 — 8, xi. 1 — 9, xvi., xviii.— xix., xxiv., xxvi. In all the pre-
Deuteronomic passages in which ElMra occurs, it was meant originally in
a polytheistic sense ('gods'); by the later redactors, it was understood in
a monotheistic sense ('God'), the text being altered, where necessary, to
express this sense: thus (p. 75) xiii. 10 'garden of Yahweh' was originally
'garden of the gods' (LXX 6(6^), and (p. 71) xix. 24 read originally 'And the
gods caused fire and brimstone to rain down from Yahweh ' : Amos himself in
iv. 11 meant Elohim in the same sense. The theory, it will be apparent, is a
bouleversetnent, alike of the current critical, and of the traditional, view of
Genesis. But it is, in details, — to say nothing of the polytheism which it
postulates in Genesis, — much too complicated and arbitrary to be probable ;
and though Dr Orr ^ welcomes warmly its rejection of the Divine names as a
guide to the analysis, it may be doubted whether even this position can be
ultimately maintained apart from the other elements of the theory with
which it is so intimately connected. For criticisms of the theory, the reader
may consult Volz, Theol. Lit.-zeit. 1908, col. 667 — 9; Skinner, Genesis,
pp. xliif, 439; Holzinger, ZATW. 1910, p. 245 flf.; cf. A. R. Gordon,
Expositor, Sept. 1910, p. 244 f.
Pp. iv, xi, xii. As we have just seen, Eerdmans rejects the Divine names
in Genesis as a criterion of authorship ; and the question has also been raised
recently in other quarters what their value is for analytical purposes. As the
subject is one on which some misconception is prevalent, and language is
sometimes used implying that the varying use of the Divine names is the sole,
or at least- the 'chief,' ground on which the analysis of even the entire (!)
Pentateuch rests, it may be worth while to say here a few words about it
In considering the question two cases must be distinguished. (1) In the
separation of P from JE in Genesis, it must be remembered, Elohim is but one
1 The Life of Faith, Sept. 29, 1909, p. 1097 ; cf. The Faith of a Modern Christian,
p. 23 (both with several misstatements and exaggerations of fact).
2 Cf. Di Orr, in the passages referred to in the last note.
XLIV . ADDENDA II
out of more than 30 phraseological criteria alone (below, pp. viii — xi ; comp.,
for the whole Hex., LOT. p. 131 flF.) — to say nothing here of other criteria
(below, pp. vi — vii, xxii — xxv), which point to the conclusion that the
passages in which they occur are by a different writer from the rest of the
book. And if we take into account the entire Hexateuch, the criterion ceases
with Ex. vi. 2 (p. xi, n. 1), Yahweh being henceforth employed in the sections
assigned to P in place of EloJiim. Thus, in regard to the separation of P from
the rest of the narrative of Genesis it is not Elohim alone, but the totality of
distinctive features, characteristic of a certain group of passages, which leads
critics to assign them to a separate source, viz. the one now usually called ' P '
(comp. p. xi, with n. 1). If P had used Yahweh in Genesis, as he does after
Ex. vi. 2, the grounds fo** the separation of P from JE would have been sub-
stantially not less strong than they are now. But ' Elohim ' alone is not an
absolute criterion of P : for passages in which it is not accompanied by any of
the other features just referred to, are not assigned by critics to P (see p. xi f ).
(2) In the analysis of JE, the case is different. In 'JB' — i.e. in the
narrative which remains in Gen. — Nu. after the separation of P — the constancy
with which in certain passages Elohim is used, while Yahweh is used in
other, often contiguous passages (see below, p. xi) certainly suggests somewhat
strongly diversity of authorship ; and the suspicion thus arising is confirmed,
when it is found that there are other indications, which suggest independently
that the passages of JE in which Elohim is used are by a different writer from
those in which Yahweh is used. But here also the use of the Divine names is
not an absolute criterion of authorship: there are passages, especially in the
books after Genesis, in which Yahweh is used, which have been assigned by
critics, upon grounds other than the use of the name Elohim^ to E : and what
is said below (p. xii) is, not that Elohim, is a uniform criterion of E, but that it
is 'preferred' by E, though 'not exclusively' (p. xiii). And a 'preference,' if
sufficiently marked, may be an indication of authorship (cf. LOT. p. 132 «.).
In view of the smaller number of criteria distinguishing J and E, the varying
use of the Divine names is of relatively greater importance for the analysis of
JE than it is for the separation of JE from P ; but there are many cases in
which it is not the only criterion on which critics rely for the purpose.
It has, in addition, been maintained recently that the uncertainty of the
Heb. text of Genesis makes the use of the Divine names an insecure criterion
for the analysis. In Gen. i. 1 — Ex. iii. 12, according to Schlogl {E.vp. Times,
XX. 563), the name Yahweh (alone) occurs 148 times, Elohim (alone) 179
times, and Yahweh Elohim 20 times (Gen. ii. — iii.). It is true, now, that,
according to Redpath {Amer. Journ. of Theol. 1904, pp. 295 — 8) and Eerdmans
(p. 34 i.) the Sept. has in some 50^ of these passages a different Divine name
(e.g. o ^eo'f, or Kv'pioj 6 ^€09, for Yahweh) : Mr Wiener {Essays on Pentateuchal
Criticism, 1909, pp. 14 — 40) has also pointed out that in many other places in
Gen. one or more MSS of the LXX have a different Divine name from the Heb
text, and that in 16 passages (pp. 14 f., 36 f.) one or two Heb. MSS (also once
^ Neither B^dpath'a nor Eerdmang' list is exact.
ADDENDA 11 XLV
four, and one* fire MSS) agree with the Greek variant*; and aceording to
Schlogl {I.e.) ' other texts ' — he does not specify either the passages in which
the yariants occur, or the ' texts ' ; but by the latter he presumably means the
LXX, and MSS of the LXX, perhaps also other versions and MSS of versions —
have, for 118 of the 148 occurrences of Yahweh in Gen. i. — Ex. iii. 12, either
o 6eoi or Kvpioi 6 Beus., for 59 of the 179 occurrences of Elohim., o Ki'ptos
or Kv'pio? o ^ec5y, and for 19 of the 20 occurrences of Yahxoeh Elohim., either
o ^eof or o KJptof. Mr Wiener, now, argues that in all these cases the Greek
variant depends upon a various reading in the Heb. MS used by the translators,
and that the existence of these variants in Heb. MSS renders the Massoretic
text so uncertain that no presumption as to authorship can be built upon the
varying use of the Divine names in it. Schlogl even goes further, and would
correct in Gen. 1. 1 — Ex. iii. 12 not only the (118 + 19 = ) 137 passages of
the Mass. text in which his 'other texts' have Gnd for Yahweh or Yahtceh
Elohim, but even the 31 other occurrences of Yah'ceh, for which no variant
is attested, thus eliminating Yahtceh from Gen. i. — Ex. iii. 12 a together !
Schlogl's violent and arbitrary treatment of the text condemns itself^; and
more need not be said about it. With regard to Mr Wiener's conclusion, it
will be evident, after what has been said above, that, even if it were granted,
it would leave untouched what is after all the most important element in the
critical analysis, viz. the separation of P from JE. But in fact it is impossible
to gi*ant it If every variant — or even a majority of variants — from the
Massoretic text to be found in the LXX, or in particular ]\ISS of the LXX,
were to be regarded as casting doubt upon the reading of the Hebrew, the
number of doubtful passages in the OT. would indeed be extensive. The
Massoretic text has a claim to be preferred till good cause has been shewn
against it. For though the Hebrew variants presupposed by the LXX or
other version are unquestionably often superior to the readings of the
Massoretic text, in the great majority of cases they are as unquestionably
inferior. Hence before a variant in the LXX or other version can be regarded
as casting doubt on the Massoretic text, it must be shewn that it really comes
into competition with it : in particular, it must be shewn, or at least rendered
probable, (1) that the variant is not due to a paraphrase or loose rendering on
the part of the translator, but really depends upon a various reading in the
Heb. MS used by him; and (2) that this variant reading in the Heb. has
substantial claims to be preferred to the Massoretic text, as being the
original reading of the Hebrew. The principal grounds upon which a variant
reading presupposed by a version has a claim to be preferred to the Massoretic
* Sam. agrees with the Greek variant thrice (twice with Heb. support).
* It seems however to be approved by Dr Orr. At least, Dr Orr quotes with
approval {The 'Life of Faith, Sept. 29, 1909, p. 1097) Schlogl's concluding words,
* It is consequently quite unscientific to determine the analysis of a source by the
names of God.' But the word 'consequently' shews that this conclusion is a
deduction from the conclusion, expressed in the preceding sentence, that (on the
grounds mentioned above) ' the name Yahweh did not [originally] occur in Gen. i. 1 —
Ex. iii. 12': any one, therefore, who does not accept Schlogl's premises is not
entitled to quote his authority for a concluisioa based upon them.
XLVI ADDENDA II
test are its yielding a better sense, and its being preferable for philological
or grammatical reasons i. it is impossible to think that, with at most two or
three exceptions, in the instances adduced by Mr Wiener these conditions are
satisfied, or that there is any reason for supposing that the variants contained
in them cast doubt upon the readings of the Massoretic text. A variation in
a Divine name makes, as a rule, no appreciable diflFerence in the sense : there
may be an isolated instance, here and there, where the LXX or other version
has a name wliich may be held to agree better with the context than the one
in the Massoretic text, and may thus be regarded as the more original reading:
but in the great majointy of cases in which there is a divergence between the
Massoretic text and a version in the Divine name used, there is no sufficient
reason for supposing it to point to a dififerent reading in the Hebrew 2.
P. xUx. Other occurrences of a name which to all appearance corresponds
to the Heb. Yahweh have recently come to hght in Babylonian. Thus,
neglecting some^, the reading of which, for one reason or another, has been
questioned by some Assyi-iologists, we have, from the Hammurabi period,
Ya-u-um-ilu (already cited on p. xlix), meaning ' Ya-u (Yahweh) is God,' and
Ya-ma-e-ra-ah*, ' Yama — or, as m and w readily interchange in Babylonian,
Yawa — is the moon'; from c. 15—1400 B.C. (in the Kasshite period), upon
tablets found at Nippur, Frt-t*-ia-ni (' Ya-u is creator '), Fa- u-a [ = ' Jehu,' on
the Black Obelisk of Shalmaueser, B.C. 842], Yaai-u, Ya-a-u, and Yar<i-u-tum
(with the caiitative ending -tum^) ; and from Taanach, in Canaan itself^
c. 1350 B.C., Ahi-yami, i.e. to all appearance 'Yah is a brother (or, my brother),'
corresponding to the Heb. Ahijah (Abiyahu). There is however no evidence
^ On the precautions which have to be observed in deciding whether a rendering
found in a version may be regarded as a safe guide for the correction of the
Massoretic text, see more fully Swete, OT. in Greek, pp. 444, 445; or the present
writer's Notes on the Heb. Text of Samuel (1S90), pp. xxxix — xl : and cf. bis Book of
Jeremiah (1906), p. xxv. For examples of the emendation of the Mp-soretic text
with the help of the ancient versions, see also the two last-mentioned works, passim.
2 In view of the large number of Heb. MSS known, the Hebrew corroboration of
the LXX variants, referred to above, is very slight. On the other hand, the
agreement of the Samaritan text with the Hebrew on this point in all but (according
to Dr Skinner) eight or nine cases, counts strongly in favour of the general
correctness of the Hebrew. See farther on the subject Skinner. Genesis, p. xxxvf.,
and on Dahse's Textkritische Materialien zur Hexateiichfrage (1912 1. see Dr Skinner's
cogent criticisms, novc appearing in the Expositor (from April 1913).
3 Including Ya-'-ve-ilu and Ya-ve-ilu (cited below, p. xlix) : see Zimmem, KAT.'
(1903), p. 468 n.; Savce, Expos. Times, Oct. 1910, p. 41»; Langdon, Expositor,
Aug. 1910, p. 137. See also the Exp. Times, Dec. 1910, p. 139 (on the lexical
tablet quoted as containing the name). Yawum, adiueed formerly by Dr Johns,
is now doubted by him (see a forthcoming art. in the PSBA. 1911). Prof. Sayce's
principal recent statements on the subject will be found in the Exp. Times, xviii.
(1906—7), 26 f., xix. 424, 425, xxii. (Oct. 1910), 40 f.
* Johns, Exp. Times, xv. (1903 — 4). 560'': cf. Ranke, Early Bab. Personal Names
of the Hammurabi Dynasty (in Series D, vol. iii., of the Bab. Exped. of the Univ. of
Pennsylvania), 1905, p. 113 ; Burnev, Joum. of Theol. Studies, 1908, p. 343.
5 So Daiches, Z.f. Ass. xxii. (1908), p. 134 (against Sayce's view that -tum ia a
fern, term.), and Lang Ion (verbally) : for examples of such names, see Ranke, p. 14 f,
' See the writer's Schweich Lectures, p. 83.
ADDENDA II XLVII
that the * Ya-u,' mentioned in these texts, belono'ed to the Babylonian pantheon :
and Assyriologists are agreed that the Babylonian names, in which 'Yau'
appears, are not those of native Babylonians, but names borne by West- Semitic,
or ' Amorite,' settlers. The occurrences are at present isolated : but they
seem sufficient to shew that there was a West-Semitic deity, Ya-u, known as
early as c. 2100 B.C. Nothing, however, is at present known about the character
and attributes associated with Ya-u. And even though future discoveries
should shew clearly that the Heb. name ' Yahweh ' was derived from * Ya-u,'
it must be remembered (cf. below, p. 409) that the source from which either
this or any other divine name is ultimately derived matters little or nothing :
the question of importance is, What does the name come to mean to those
who use it ? What are the character and attributes of the Being whom it
actually denotes in the mouths of those who use it? Whatever may have
been the ultimate historical origin of the name Yahweh, all that concerns the
reader of the Old Testament is to know the nature and the character and the
attributes of the Being whom it denotes there. And these he must, and can,
discover from the OT. itself \
P. 106. Prof. Hilprecht has discovered recently a fragment of yet another
Babylonian version of the Deluge story, which, in his translation, runs thus
[Expos. Times, May 1910, p. 366):—
1 thee
2 1 will loosen ;
3 it shall sweep away all men together:
4 life before the deluge cometh forth;
5. ...as many as there are, I will bring overthrow, destruction, annihilation.
6 build a great ship, and
7 total height shall be its structure.
8 it shall be a houseboat carrying what is saved of life.
9 with a strong deck cover (it).
10 which thou shalt make,
11 the beast of the field, the bird of the heavens,
12 instead of a number.
13 and the family
The tablet has been assigned to c. 2200 b.o. The inferences which have
been drawn from the frngnient are far in excess of what the data warrant. In
particular, the resemblances with Geu vi. 20 (P), which have been found in it,
depend partly upon a very doubtful explanation of kumminu in L 12, rendered
" instead of a number,' and supposed in its second part to correspond to the
Heb. m,in (which, however, means not ' number,' but kind), and partly upon a
passage not in the Babylonian text at all, but inserted conjecturally by Prof.
Hilprecht himself in the first part of 1. 12, viz. [and the creeping things, two
of everything]. See the criticisms in the Expos. Times, Aug. 1910, p. 504,
Amer. Journ. of Sem. Lang. July 1910, pp. 303, 307 f., Journ. of the Amer.
Oriental *Soc. Dec. 1910, p. 30 ff., and by Marti, ZATfV. 1910, p. 29SS.
1 Ct Rogers, op. cit. p. 97.
XLVIII ADDENDA II
P. 172 f. In the Churchman for Sept. 1910, pp. 654—662, Prof. Sayce has
an article on ' Abraham in the Cuneiform Inscriptions,' in which, on the basis
of the inscriptions, he draws a picture of Babylonia and Western Asia in the
period of Hammurabi, working into it some of the Biblical notices respecting
Abraham. No doubt from inadvertence, he does not always sufiBciently
distinguish between statements based upon the monuments, and those derived
fi'om the Bible, so that an unguarded reader might easily carry away the
impression that a good deal more was mentioned in the inscriptions than is
actually the case. In spite, therefore, of the title, 'Abraham in the Cuneiform
Inscriptions,' it may not be superfluous to remind the reader that no mention
of Abraham has hitherto been found in the inscriptions ; nor does Prof. Sayce's
article bring any fresh arguments for the historical character of the expedition
of Chedorlaomer and his allies, mentioned in Gen. xiv. It may also be pointed
out that the explanation (p. 661) of ' prince of God' in Gen. xxiii. 6 as meaning
'Viceroy of the deified [Babylonian] king' (cf. above, p. XXXVII), and the
translation of Ex. xxii. 28 [Heb. 27], 'Thou shalt not revile the elohim (or
Babylonian king), nor cui-se his viceroy among thy people,' are both extremely
problematical.
On p. 662 flf. Prof. Sayce complains that in my criticism (above, pp. XXXIV
— XXXVI) I have done him an injustice in not quoting Noldeke's other article
{Z.fiir wiss. Theol. 1870, p. 213 flF.), which he had referred to in his note. I
had read this article before writing the criticism in question ; and only did
not refer to it, because it did not appear to me to express a view materially
different from that expressed in the article which I did quote. In the extract
from the second article given by Prof. Sayce, Noldeke appears to me to concede
and deny exactly what he had conceded and denied, respectively, in his first
article (cf. the extract above, p. XXXIV— V). Here, put briefly, are the
points : —
(1) The names of Chedorlaomer, Amraphel, and Arioch have been shewn
by archaeology, with great probability, to be historical. Their historical
character was not denied by Noldeke^.
(2) The names of the five Canaanite kings were regarded by Noldeke as
fictitious. The historical character of these kings has not been established by
archaeology.
(3) That a king of Elam might rule over the land of the Jordan and make
a military expedition to it, has been shewn by archaeology to be possible. The
possibility of this was not denied by Noldeke in either article.
(4) The historical character of the expedition narrated in Gen. xii\ was
denied by Noldeke — not upon archaeological grounds, but — on account of the
internal improbabilities which he considered it to exhibit. Its historical
character has not been proved by archaeology.
1 ' One or two,' at the top of p. 664, is not to be taken literally : the German
expression, ' ein Paar,' is used idiomatically to denote a small number, but not a
number limited necessarily to two. It would have been better rendered by Dr Orr,
'a few.' In the passage enumerating the names which Noldeke considered unhis-
torical (omitted in the translation, but indicated by the asterisks in line 2 of the
excerpt, p. 663), the names of the four kings from the East are not included.
ADDENDA II XLIX
Prof. Sayce appears not to have sufficiently noticed the words ' as narrated '
in his extract from Noldeke's second article (' The expedition of the kings
cannot have taken place as narrated' [italics mine]). The entire dispute
hinges on .these words. Noldeke nowhere denied the possibility of an expe-
dition into Canaan having been made by a king of Elam : what he denied was
the historical character of this particular expedition, with all the details as
described in Gen. xie. His arguments on this point may, or may not, in Prof.
Sayce's opinion, be sufficient : but (what is the point at issue) they have not
been refuted by archaeology.
Prof. Sayce also finds fault with me for implying that he had attributed
falsely to Noldeke the derivation of the names of Chedorlaomer and his
allies from the Sanskrit. But if the reader will refer back to p. XXXIV
(where the entire paragraph is quoted verbatim), I think he will agree with
nie that the words (' eminent Semitic scholars had,' &c.) imply of necessity
(notice 'had,' in oblique narration) that it was Noldeke's own view which he
was stating. The footnote mentions Renau's name ; but in terms which do
not in the least suggest that his opinion was not endorsed by Noldeke.
See further on Gen. xiv. Dr G. B. Gray's discussion iu the Expositor, May
1898, pp. 342 — 6 ; the brief but exact summary given by W. H. Bennett,
Genesis (in the Century Bible), 1904, p. 185 f.; S. A. Cook in Cambr. Bibl.
Essays (1909), p. 79 (where it is remarked that 'the discovery of historical
personages, and the probability of an invasion of Palestine from the east, do
not remove the internal difficulties ' of the narrative), and in the Expositor,
June 1906, p. 538; Barton, 'Abraham and Archaeology' in the Journ. of
Bibl. Lit. 1909, p. 152 flf.; and the fresh and independent treatment of the
question by Skinner, Genesis (1910), pp. 271 — 6. To prevent misconception
I may add that what I deny is, not the historical character of Abraham, but
the fact that his historical character has been proved by the monuments ;
and while I have great difficulty in thinking that the expedition can have
taken place, with the details as stated in Genesis xiv., I have never denied
(cf. below, p. 172) that an expedition without such of these details as are
improbable, though not at present in any way attested by the monuments,
may have taken place at the time in question. Nor do I deny that Abraham,
as a historical character, may have come into some conflict with this expe-
dition : 1 only maintain that at present our sole authority for supposing this
is the narrative of Gen. xiv. itself.
Pp. 215, 224. In Babylonian ' (the god) Four,' and ' (the god) Seven' were
names of the moon-god, suggested of course by the four quarters of seven days
each, of which the lunar month consists : hence Winckler's explanation {Gesch.
Isr. ii. 39 n., 44) of ' Kiriath-arba' as meaning properly 'City of (the god) Four,'
if not also of ' Beer-sheba,' as meaning ' Well of (the god) Seven ' (see on this
Bab. deity, Jastrow, Rel. Bab. u. Ass. 1905, i. 173 £), is not improbably to be
preferred to those here adopted. See Buruey, Journ. of Theol. Studies,
Oct. 1910, p. 118 t
LIST OF PRINCIPAL ABBREVIATIONS EMPLOYED.
ART. Fritz Hommel, Ancient Hebrew Tradition (1897).
BR. {or Rob.). Edw. Robinson, Biblical Researches in Palestine and the
adjacent regions: a Journal of Travels in the years 1838 and 1852
(ed. 2, 1856).
CIS. Corpus Inscriptionum Semiticarum (Parisiis 1881 flF.).
DB. (except when preceded by 'Smith'). A Dictionary of the Bible, edited
by J. Hastings, D.D. (4 vols., 1898—1902; a fifth, supplementary volume
appeared in 1904).
Del Franz Delitzsch, Neuer Commentar iJber die Genesis^ 1887 (EngL tr., in
2 vols., Edinb., 1888-9).
Dillm. {or DL). Aug. Dillmann, Die Genesis erkldrt, ed. 3, 1892 (Engl, tr., in
2 vols., Edinb., 1897). Ed. 1 (1875) appeared as the third edition, for
the most part rewritten, of Knobel's Commentary (see below).
E. See p. xii.
EHH. A. H. Sayce, The Early History of the Hebrews (1897).
EncB. EncyclopoBdia Biblica, ed by the Rev. T. K. Cheyne, M.A., D.D., and
J. Sutherland Black, M.A., LL.D. (4 vols., 1899—1903).
EW. English Versions (used in cases where A.V. and R.V. agree).
Exp. Times. Expository Times (a monthly periodical on Biblical and
Theological subjects, ed. by J. Hastings, D.D.; T. and T. Clark, Edinb.).
G.-K. Geseniics' Hebrew Grammar, as edited and enlarged by E. Kautzsch,
Professor qf Theology in tlie University of Halle. Translated from the
26th German edition by the Rev. G. W. Collins, M.A., and A. E. Cowley,
M.A. (Oxford, 1898).
Gunk. Hermann Gunkel, Genesis icbersetzt und erkldrt (1901).
HG. G. A. Smith, Historical Geography of the Holy Land (ed. 4, 1896^.
Holz. H. Holzinger, Genesis erkldrt (1898).
J. See p. xii.
KAT^ Die Keilinschriflen und das Alte Testament. Von Bb. Schrader
(ed. 2, 1883). Translated under the title The Cuneiform Inscriptions
and the O.T. by Owen C. Whitehouse, 1885, 1888. The references are to
the pages of the original, which are given on the margin of the English
translation.
KA 71* Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testatnetit. Neu bearbeitet von
Dr H. Zimmem und Dr H. Winckler (1903). Not a revised edition of
KAT.\ but a completely new work. Contains a very large amount of
fresh material, but does not entirely supersede KA T^
KB. Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek (transliterations and translations of Baby-
lonian and Assyrian inscriptions, by various scholars, under the editorship
of Eb. Schrader). Six volumes have at present [1909] appeared, vols, i — iij
LIST OF PRINCIPAL ABBREVIATIONS LI
(1889 — 92) containing inscriptions of Babylonian and Assyrian kings, vol. iv.
(189(5) contract-tablets, &c., vol. v. (1896) the Tel el- Amarna correspondence,
and vol. vi., Part i. (1900-1) niythological p(jem3 (including the Creation-
and Deluge-epics). Extremely valuable.
Knob, {or Kn.). Aug. Knobel, Die Genesis erkldrt (ed. 2, 1860).
L. (& B. The Land and the Book ; or Biblical illustrations drawn from the
manners and customs, the scenes and scenery of the Holy Land. By
W. M. Thomson, D.D., forty-five years a missionary in Syria and Palestine.
Three large volumes, Southern Palestine and Jerusalem, (1881), being
referred to as L. & B. i.; Central Palestine and Phoenicia (18S3) as
L. & B. n.; and Lebawm, Damascus, and Beyond Jordan (1886) aa
L. & B. rn. There is also an edition in 1 vol. (718 pp. small 8vo., 1898,
1901, &c.), the title-page of which differs from that of the larger edition
only in having 'thirty years' instead of 'forty-five years.' This is
apparently a reprint of the original edition (in 2 vols.) published in
1859 at New York. Much — perhaps most — of the matter contained in
it is incorporated in the 3 vol edition.
Lex. A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament based on the
Lexicon of William Gesenius. By Francis Brown, D.D., with the
co-operation of S. R. Driver, D.D., and C. A. Briggs, D.D. (Clarendon
Press, Oxford, 1906.)
LOT. S. R. Driver, Introduction to the Literature qf the Old Testament,
1891, ed. 8, 1909.
Masp. I. G. Maspero, The Dawn of Civilization. Egypt and Chaldasa (1894,
ed. 4, 1901).
Masp. IL G. Maspero, The Struggle of the Nations (1896).
Masp. III. G. Maspero, The Passing of the Empires 850 B.a to 330B.O. (1900).
These three large and brilliantly-written volumes are at present the
standard authority on the ancient history of Egypt, Babylonia, Assyria, and
neighbouring countries.
Mon. A. H. Sayce, The 'Higher Criticism' and the Verdict of the Monu-
ments (1894).
NHB. H. B. Tristram, The Natural History of the Bible, ed. 2, 186a
Onom. Onomastica Sacra, ed. by P. de Lagarde, 1870, ed. 2, 1887. Contains
Eusebius' Glossary of the names of places mentioned in Scripture, with
descriptions of their sites (p. 207 ff.), together with Jerome's translation^
(p. 82 ff.). The references are to the pages of ed. 1, which are repeated
on the margin of ed. 2.
P. See p. iv.
Parad. Friedrich Delitzsch, Wo lag das Paradies? (1881). Important, not
on account of the theory of the site of Paradise advocated in it (which has
not been generally accepted by scholars), but on account of the abundant
* See the Dictionary of Christian Biography, ii. 336.
LII LIST OF PRINCIPAL ABBREVIATIONS
information on the geography of Babylonia and adjacent countries collected
in it from the Inscriptions.
Pesh. Peshitta (the Syriac Version of the O.T.).
PEFM. Palestine Exploration Fund. Memoirs of the Survey (l — ni.
Western Palestine; iv. Eastern Palestine).
PEFQS. Palestine Exploration Fund. Quarterly Statement$.
PSBA. Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archoeology.
R. Redactor (or compiler). See p. xvi £
Rel. Sent. W. Robertson Smith, Religion of the Semites, 1889, ed. 2, 1894.
RVm. Margin of the Revised Version.
S. & P. Sinai and Palestine in connexion with their history. By A. P.
Stanley, D.D., F.R.S. (ed. 1864).
Tuch. Fr. Tuch, Gommentar iiber die Genesis, ed. 2, 1871.
TW. Tent Work in Palestine. By C. R. Conder, R.E. (ed. 1887, in 1 voL).
ZA TW. Zeitschrift fur die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft (from 1881).
ZDP V. Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palaestina- Vereins.
A small * superior ' figure, attached to the title of a book (as KA T.\ or
author's name, indicates the edition of the work referred to.
In citations, the letters » and ^ (or a and h) denote respectively the first and
second parts of the verse cited. Where the verses consist of three or four
clauses (or lines) the letters "»*>><='* (or a, 6, c, d) are employed sometimes to
denote them similarly.
A dagger (t), appended to a list of references, indicates that it includes all
instances of the word or phrase referred to, occurring in the Old Testament.
It has been found difficult to preserve entire consistency in the translitera-
tion of foreign names ; but it is hoped that the reader will not be seriously
misled in consequence. It has seemed sometimes worth while to distinguish
the Hebrew letters which are commonly confused in English (as h and h,
t and /) ; but even this has not been done uniformly, and in the case of some
very familiar proper names, not at all. Where distinctions have been made,
» = jj; ^=^, c; gh — ^', A = n, f-', ch (in Arabic words) = «;.; dh = i; ^ = p;
f or f=>t; f=l3.
NOTE ON THE CHRONOLOGY.
The ClivoTio^srical Table on tlie next page is added for the convenience of
readers. Alternative dates are in some cases given, in order that the reader may
be aware of the amount of agreement and diflFerence between different authori-
ties. References to the principal authorities on which the Table is based,
together with some explanation of the grounds for the differences, will be
found in the notes in the Addenda; those for Egyptian chronology in the note
on p. xxxiii. ; and those for Babylonian chronology in the note on p. 156, n. 4
(add to those here mentioned Hilprecht, The Babylonian Expedition of the
University of Pennsylvania, i. ii. (1896), pp. 24, 43). For the dates included
iu the Table, authorities earlier than those mentioned are mostly antiquated.
The First Dynasty of Babylon'.
LIST OP KINGS.
CHBONICLB.
B.«3.»
Sumu-abu
15 years
14 years
2232—2219
Sumu-la-el
35'
n
36 „
2218—2183
Zabum
14
»
14 „
2182—2169
Abil-Sin
18
»
18 „
2168—2151
Sin-muballit
30
)>
20 „
2150—2131
Hammurabi
55
>»
43 „
2130—2088
Samsu-iluna
35
n
38 „
2087—2050
Abi-eshu'
25
»
[?2]8 „
2049-2022
Ammi-ditana
25
>»
37 „
2021-1985
Ammi-zaduga
21
)»
10 [uuSuished]
1984—1964
Samsu-ditaua
31
11
1963—1933
304 years 300 years
Assyria does not come into prominence during the period covered bj the
Table ; the following dates may however be mentioned : —
B.O.
Ushpia, priest of Asshur, builder of temple in the * city
of Asshur' (see on Gen. iL 14) c 2300
Ilu-shumma, the first king^ of Assyria at present
(1909) known c-. 2225
Shalmaneser I, the builder of Calah (Gen. x. 10) ... c. 1300
The names of many early Assyrian patesis (priest-kings) and kings have
been recovered recently in the course of the excavations by the Germans of
KaVat Sherkat, the site of the 'city of Asshur.'
1 From King's Letters and Inscriptions of Hammurabi, iii. (1900), p. lxx f. The
first column gives the regnal j'ears of the several kings aceoidiug to the List 01
Ein^s (B) published by Mr Pinches in 1880 (above, p. XXVIII) ; the second gives
their regnal years according to the recently discovered Chronicle of the First
Dynasty, which is based upon two contemporary documents dating from the reign
of Ammi-zaduga (above, p XXIX, n. 1).
* According to Thureau-Dangin and UngnaJ.
s L. W, King, Chronicles coiicerniufj Early Bab. Kings (1907), i. lib, ii. 14.
Elsswheie he is styled pa^Mi (cf. p. XXIX, n. 2).
CaBffiO^kOLOGICAL TART.K.
i«tetf«
Cta*ii««M*i«I
I SnMfei«KC]
m.e.; *c. i
DrrRODucnoy.
I 1. Tie Strurturt of tie Book <f Gmetu, 4
it» eompomemi pmrU.
The Boc^of Geaeds is ao aDeil from die title gire&tt) it in the
Lxx. Yet^fOHL, derived from the Gie^ renden^ of iL ^ 9mr^ 9 fitfii^m
yereVews oipaioS al y^ It fixms the filSt bcx^ IB tihe ffilllrflli, —
as the titaaiyirfifde foraied by tiie PentBteodi aad the Book
is nov freqiiently termed^ — the genenl okgect of vUdi is to
in their CH^xn the fandunentiJ instxtataane c^ the laaefitxih theooacy
(Le. Ihe aril and the oaemonial lav), and to txaee fi<a^ the
paft theeooraeaf eresnts vhidt iasoed nbiiBatefy in the
of Ifiad in Omaan. ^le Book oi Geneas eonpnses die intndaciaiy
period of this histoy, embcacing the fires of die anoestocs of the
Hebrevs, and ending with the deadi of Josqih in ^^gjpt. Hie am
d the boc^ is, hoTeTcr, more dun merdj to reeoont the ■wiiiiij
<£ Isnelitadf: its aim is, at the same dme^ to describe hov the earth
itsdf mas onginaDj prepared to became the habitatioB of man, to give
an oodine of die earir history of ■'mtind npon it^ and to Atem hov
Israel mas rdated to odier natims, and hovitemoged gEadaaDyinto
s^iarate and distinct existenoe beside diCB. AoeoidEii^dienansdve
opms vith an account of de creation of die moid ; the fine of IsncTs
ancesixHS is traced back beyond Abraham to the fiist appeaonoe of
man upon d«e eaidi: and the idatka in vhich the natioBS Act-jjuA^
from the second fiitha (^ humanity, Xoah, were supposed to stand.
both towazds one another and toward laadl, b infieatod by a feunja-
logical scheme (ch. x.). Ilie enthe bo(^ may dms be dirided into
rsro puts, of which tie nrst, chs. i. — xL, presents a genezal riew of
1 The Book of Jc dnee
the litetmzT afSnhk^
ii INTRODUCTION [§ 1
the Ea/rhf History of Mankind, as pictured by the Hebrews, including
the Creation (ch. i.), the origin of evil (ch. iii.), the beginnings of
civilization (ch. iv.), the Flood (chs. vi. — ix.), the rise of separate
nations (ch. x.), and the place taken by the Semites, and particularly by
the Hebrews, among them (xi. 10 — 26); while the second, chs. xii. — 1.,
beginning with the migration of the Terahites, comprehends in par-
ticular the History of Israel's immediate ancestors, the Patriarchs,
viz. Abraham (xii. 1 — xxv. 18), Isaac (xxv. 19 — xxxvi.), and Jacob
(xxxvii. — 1.).
The narrative of Genesis is cast into a framework, or scheme,
marked by the recurring formula, These are the generations (lit. be-
gettings) of\... This phrase is one which belongs properly to a
genealogical system: it implies that the person to whose name it is
prefixed is of sufficient importance to mark a break in the genealogical
series, and that he and his descendants will form the subject of the
section which follows, until another name is reached prominent enough
to form the commencement of a new section.
The formula appears ten times in the Book of Genesis : viz. ii 4' (the
generations of heaven and earth), v. 1 (of Adam), vi. 9 (of Noah), x. 1 (of the
sons of Noah), xi. 10 (of Shem), xi. 27 (of Teral^), xxv. 12 (of Ishmael), xxv. 19
(of Isaac), xxxvi. 1, of. 9 (of Esau), xxxvii. 2 (of Jacob). In ii. 4* it is applied
metaphorically; and as it clearly relates to the contents of ch. i., it is very
possible that it stood originally before i. 1 (see p. 19). In the other cases, it
introduces each time a longer or shorter genealogical account of the person
named and of his descendants, and is followed usually by a more detailed
narrative about them.
With which of the component parts of Genesis the scheme thus
indicated was originally connected will appear subsequently. The
entire narrative, as we now possess it, is accommodated to it. The
attention of the reader is fixed upon Israel, which is gradually dis-
engaged from the nations and tribes related to it : at each stage in the
history, a brief general account of the collateral branches having been
given, they are dismissed, and the narrative is limited more and more
to the immediate line of Israel's ancestors. Thus after ch. x. (the
ethnographical Table) all the descendants of Noah disappear, except
the line of Shem, xi. 10 if.; after xxv. 12 — 18 Ishmael disappears, and
Isaac alone remains; after ch. xxxvi. Esau and his descendants dis-
appear, and only Jacob and his sons are left. The same method
is adopted in the intermediate parts : thus in xix. 30 — 38 the relation
1 Once (v. 1), 'I'his is the book of the generations of....
§ 1] COMPOSITE STRUCTURE OF GENESIS iii
to Israel of the cognate peoples of Moab and Animon is explained ; in
xxii. 20 — 24 (sons of Abraham's brother, Nahor), and xxv. 1 — 4 (sons
of Abraham's concubine, Keturah) the relation to Israel of certain
Aramaean tribes is explained.
The unity of plan thus established for the Book of Genesis, and
traceable in many other details, has long been recognized by critics.
It is not, however, incompatible with the use by the compiler of
pre-existing materials in the composition of his work. And as soon
as the book is studied with sufficient attention, phaenomena disclose
themselves, which shew that it is composed of distinct documents
or sources, which have been welded together by a later compiler
(or ' redactor ') into a continuous whole. These phaenomena are very
numerous ; but they may be reduced in the main to the two follo^ving
heads: (1) the same event is doubly recorded; (2) the language, and
frequently the representation as well, varies in different sections.
Thus i. 1 — ii. 4' and ii. 4** — 25 contain a double narrative of the origin
of man upon earth. No doubt, in the abstract, it might be argued
that ii. 4** ff. is intended simply as a more detailed account of what
is described summarily in i. 26 — 30; but upon closer examination
differences reveal themselves which preclude the supposition that both
sections are the work of the same hand: the ord&t of creation is
different, the phraseology and literary style are different, and the
representation, especially the representation of Deity, is different^
In the narrative of the Deluge, vi. 9 — 13 (the wickedness of the earth)
is a duplicate of vi. 5 — 8 ; vii. 1 — 5 is a duplicate of vi. 18 — 22, — with
the difference, however, that whereas in vi. 19 (cf. vii. 15) two animals
of every kind, without distinction, are to be taken into the ark, in vii. 2
the number prescribed is two of every unclean animal, but seven of
every clean animal: there are also several other duplicates, all being
marked by accompan)dng differences of representation and phraseology,
one group of sections being akin to i. 1 — ii. 4% and displaying through-
out the same phraseology, the other exhibiting a different phraseology,
and being conceived in the spirit of ii. 4'' — iii. 24*. In xvii. 16 — 19
and xviii. 9 — 15 the promise of a son for Sarah is t^vice described, —
the terms used in xviii. 9 — 15 clearly shewing that the writer did not
picture any previous promise of the same kind as having been given to
Abraham, — with an accompanying double explanation of the origin of
the name Isaac. The section xxvii. 46 — xxviii. 9 differs appreciably
in style from xxvii. 1 — 45, and at the same time represents Rebekah
* See particulars on p. 35 f. ^ ^^g jjjg notes, p. 86 ff.
D. d
iT rSTRODUCnON [§ 1
as influenced by a different motive fix)m that mentioned in xrvii,
42 — 45 in suggesting Jacob's departure from Canaan'. Further, in
xxviiL 19 and xxxv. 15 we find two explanations of the origin of
the name Bethel: in xxxii. 28 and xxxv. 10, two of Israel; in xxxii. 3
and xxxiii. 16 Esau is described as already resident in Edom, whereas
in xxxvi. 6 £ his migration thither is attributed to causes which could
not have come into operation until after Jacob's return to Canaan.
In short, the Book of Genesis presents two groups of sections,
distinguished from each other by differences of phraseology and style,
and often also by accompanying differences of representation, so marked,
so numerous, and so recurrent, that they can only be accounted for by
the supposition that the groups ia which they occur are not both the
work of iiie same hand-
The sections homogeneous in style and character with L 1 — ii 4'
recur at intervals, not in Genesis only, but in the following books to
Joshua inclusive ; and if read consecutively, apart from the rest of the
narrative, wiU be found to form a nearly complete whole, containing
a systematic account of the onjines of Israel, treating with particular
fulness the various ceremonial institutions of the Hebrews (Sabbath,
Circumcision, Passover, Tabernacle, Sacrifices, Feasts, &c.), and dis-
playing a consistent regard for chronological and other statistical data,
which entitles it to be considered as the framework of our present
HexateucL The source, or document, thus constituted, has received
different names, suggested by one or otner of the various characteristics
attaching to it From its preference, till Ex. vi 3, for the absolute use
of the name God ('Elohim ') rather than Jehovah ('Yahweh'), it has
been termed the Elohisfic narrative, and its author has been called the
EU'hist; but these names are not now so much used as they were
formerly; by more recent writers, on account of the predominance in
it of priestly interests, and of the priestly point of view, it is commonly
called the priestly narrative, and denoted, for brevity, by the letter P
(which is also used to denote its author).
The following are the parts of Genesis which belong to P : —
L 1 — ^iL 4» (creation of bearen and earth, and God's subsequent rest upon
the sabbath); v. 1 — 2S, 30—32 the line of Adam's descendants through Seth
to Xoah>; ri 9—22, viL 6, 11, LS— 16% 17», 1^—21, 24, viiL 1—2% S*"— 5, 13»,
14—19, ii. 1—17, 28—29 (the story of the Flood,; i. 1—7, 20, 22—23, 31—32
(list of nations descended from Japhet. Ham, and Shem) ; xi 10 — 26 line of
Shem's descendants t<? Terati;; li 27, 31 — 32 (Abrabim's family); lii. 4*" — 5,
1 See p. 262.
§ 1] THE PRIESTLY NARRATIVE (P) v
xiii. 6, ll** — 12* (his migration into Canaan, and separation from Lot); xvi. i*
3, 15 — 16 (birth of I.-hmael); xvii. (institution of circumcision); xix. 29
(destruction of the cities of the Kikkdr); xxi. l**, 2'' — 5 ^birth of Isaac);
xxiii. (purchase of the family burial-place in Machpelah); xxv. 7 — 11' (death
and burial of Abraham); xxv. 12 — 17 (list of 12 tribes desceiided from
Ishmael) ; xxv. 19 — "20, 26'' (Isaac's man-ia?e with Rebekah) ; xxvi. 34 — 35
(Esau's Hittite wives) ; xxviL 46 — xxviii. 9 (Jacob's journey to Paddan-aram) ;
xxix. 24, 2S\ 29, xxx. 22' (perhaps), xxxi IS**, xxxiii. 18' (Jacob's marriage
with Rachel, and return to Canaan); xxxiv. 1—2% 4, 6, 8 — 10, 13—18, 20 — 24,
25 (partly), 27 — 29 (refusal of his sons to sanction intermarriage with the
Shechemites) ; xxxv. 9 — 13, 15 (change of name to Israel at Bethel); xxxv
22^—29 (death and burial of Isaac); xxxvi in the main (Esau's migration into
Edom ; the tribes and tribal chiefs of Eiiom and Seir ; xxxvii. 1 — 2', xli. 46
(Joseph's elevation in Egypt); xlvi. 6 — 27, xlvii. 5 — 6% 7 — 11, 27'', 28 (migration
of Jacob and his family to EgyjH, and their settlement in the 'land of
Rameses'); xlviii. 3 — 6, 7 (Jacob's adoption of Ephraim aitd Manasseh);
xlix. 1', 28'' — 33, L 12 — 13 (Jacob's final instructions to his sons, and his burial
by them in the cave of Mi%chpelah).
For convenience of reference, and also in order to enable the reader
to judge of the character of the source as a whole, a synopsis of the
parts of Ex. — Josh, belonging to it is here added : —
Exodus L 1—5, 7, 13—14. ii. 23''— 25. vi. 2— vil la vii. 19— 20*, 21''— 22.
viii. 5 — 7, IS**— 19. ix. 8—12. xl 9—10. xiL 1—20, 28, S7», 40—41,4.3 — 51.
xiii. 1—2, 20. xiv. 1—4, 8—9, 16—18, 21', 21=— 23, 26—27', 2S«, 29.
xvl 1—3, 6—24, 31—36. xviL 1*. xix. 1—2*. xxiv. 15—18'. xxv. 1—
xxxi. 1S». xxxiv. 29 — 35. xxxv. — xL
Leviticus L — xvi. xvii. — xxvi. (these ten chapters embodying considerable
excerpts from an older source, now generally called, from its leading principle,
the ' Law of HoHnessy. xxvii.
Numbers L 1— x. 28. xiii. 1—17', 21, 25—26' (to Paran), 32». xiv. 1— 2-,
5—7, 10, 26—30. 34—382. xv. xvi 1», 2='— 7', ^7''— 11)', (16— 17)^ 18—24, 27',
32^ 35, (36—40)3, 41—50. xvii. xviii xix. xx. 1' (to month), 2, 3'' — 4,
6—13, 22—29. xxi. 4' (to Hor\ 10—11. xxiL 1. xxv. 6—18. xxvi— xxxi.
xxxii. 18—19, 28— 32^ xxxiii xxxiv.— xxxvi.
Deuteronomy i 3. xxxii. 48 — 52. xxxiv. P', o^, 7 — 9.
Joshua iv. 13, 19. v. 10—12. vii 1. ix. 15^ 17—21. xiii. 15—32. xiv.
1—5. XV. 1—13, 20-44, (45—47)', 48—62. xvi. 4—8. xvii. P, 3—4, 7, 9«,
9"=- 10«. xviii. 1, 11—28. xix. 1—46, 48, 51. xx. 1—3 (except '[andj
unawares'), 6' (to j«irf^«7?^«i;), 7—9 ^ xxi 1 — 12. (xxii 9— 34)».
The groundwork of P's narrative in Genesis is ' a series of inter-
1 See the writer's Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testahient, p. 43 r'
(ed. 6 or 7. p. 47 ff.).
^ In the main.
* The parentheses indicate lat^r additions to P (there are probably others as
well; but it is not necessary to indicate them in the presen; svnopsis).
* With traces in xxxii. 1—17, 20—27. * See LOT. 105 (112).
d2
vi INTRODUCTION [§ 1
connected genealogiea — viz. Ad&m (v. 1 — 28, 30 — 32), Noah (vi. 9 — 10),
Noah's sons (x. 1—7, 20, 22—23, 31—32), Shem (xi. 10—26), Terah
(xi. 27, 31—32), Ishmael (xxv. 12—17), Isaac (xxv. 19—20, 26"),
Esau (xxxvi.), Jacob (xxxv. 22'' — 26, xxxvii. 2). These are constructed
upon a uniform plan : each bears the title, "This is the genealogy of...";
each often begins with a brief recapitulation connecting it with the
preceding table (see on vi. 10) ; the method is the same thronghont.
The genealogies are made the basis of a systematic chronology; and
short historical notices are appended to them, as in the case of Abraham
and Lot, xii. 4''— 5, xiii. 6, 11''— 12*, xvi V, 3, 15—16, xix. 29' (Moore,
EncB. n. 1670 f.). The narrative is rarely more detailed, except in
the case of important occurrences, a^ the Creation, the Deluge, the
Covenants with Noah (ix, 1 — 17) and Abraham (ch. xvii.), or the
purchase of the family sepulchre at Hebron (ch. xxiii.). Nevertheless,
meagre as it is, it contains an outline of the antecedents and patriarchal
history of Israel, sufficient as an introduction to the systematic view
of the theocratic institutions which is to follow in Ex. — Nu., and which
it is the main object of the author of this source to exhibit. In the
earlier part of the book the narrative appears to be tolerably complete ;
but elsewhere there are evidently omissions (e.g. of the birth of Esau
and Jacob, and of the events of Jacob's life in Paddan-aram, pre-
supposed by xxxi. 18). But these may be naturally attributed to the
compiler who combined P with the other narrative used by him, and
who in so doing not unfrequently gave a preference to the fuller and
more picturesque descriptions contained in the latter. If the parts
assigned to P be read attentively, even in a translation, and compared
with the rest of the narrative, the peculiarities of its style will be
apparent. Its language is that of a jurist, accustomed to legal particu-
larity, rather than that of a historian, writing with variety and freedom ;
it is circumstantial, formal, and precise. The narrative, both as a
whole and in its several parts, is articulated systemarically'; a formal
superscription and subscription regularly mark the beginning and close
of an enumeration'. Particular words and expressions recur with
great frequency. Sentences are also cast with great regularity into the
same mould: as Mr Carpenter has remarked, 'when once the proper
form of words has been selected, it is unfailingly reproduced on the
1 E.g. i. S», 8\ 13, 19, 23, SI"; v. 6—8, 9—11, 12—14 Ac; xi. 10—11,
12—13 i-c.
* 'These are the generations of...' (above, p. iL); i. 5^ S*", 13 <fec. ; x. 5 [see
the note], 20, 31, 32, ssv. 13», 16, xixri. 29», 30", 40*, 43" &c. (see Wow, p. x.,
No. 26) : cf . also ri. 22 (see p. ix., No. 12), comp. with Ex. vii. 6 *c.
§ 1] LITERARY STYLE OF P vii
next occasion*.' In descriptions, emphasis* and completeness* are
studied; hence a statement, or command, is often developed at some
length, and in part even repeated in slightly different words \ There is
a tendency to describe an object in full each time that it is mentioned*;
a direction is followed, as a rule, by an account of its execution, usually
in nearly the same words". It will now, moreover, be apparent that
the scheme into which (p. ii.) the Book of Genesis is cast, is the work
of the same author, — the formula by ^, which its salient divisions are
marked constituting an essential feature in the sections assigned to P.
Here is a select list of words and expressions characteristic of P, —
most, it will be observed, occurring nowhere else in the entire OT.,
though a few are met with in Ezekiel, the priestly prophet (who has
moreover other affinities with P), and a few occur also in other late
OT. writings. Only words and expressions occurring in Genesis are
cited; the list would be considerably extended, if those characteristic
of the parts of Ex. — Josh, belonging to P were included as well'.
The dagger (+), both here and elsewhere, indicates that all passages of the Old
Testament, in which the word or phrase quoted occurs, are cited or referred to ;
and the asterisk (*) indicates that all passages of the Hexateuch, in which the
word or phrase quoted occurs, are cited or referred to.
1. God, not Jehovah, Gen. i. 1, and uniformly, except xvii. 1, xxi. l**, until
Ex. vi 2, 3.
It is the theorj- of P, expressed distinctly in Ex. vi 3, that the name
'Jehovah' was not in use before the Mosaic age : accordingly until Ex. vi. 2 — 3,
he consistently confines himself to God. J, on the other hand, uses Jth>rah
regularly from the beginning (Gen. ii 4^, 5, 7 &c.). In the OT. generally,
^ Oxf. Hex. I. 125 (ed. 2, p. 235). Mr Cai-penter instances the use of the
migration formula, Gen. lii. 5, xxxi. 18, xxxvi. 8, xlvi. 6, and the description of
Maehpelah, xxiii. 19, xxv. 9, xlix. 30, 1. 13: cf. also xii. 4'', xvi. 16, xvii. 24, 25.
xxi. 5, xxv. 26^ xli. 46»; Ex. vii 7.
2 Comp. Gen. i. 29, vi. 17, ix. 3.
' Notice the precision of description and definition in Gen. i 24, 25, 26'', 28'',
vi. 18, 20, vii. 13—14, 21, viii. 17, 18—19; x. 5, 20, 31, 32, xxxvi. 40; xxiii. 17;
xxxvi. 8, xlvi. 6 — 7 ; Ex. vii. 19 Ac.
*■ Gen. ii. 2—3, ix. 9—11, 12—17, xvii. 10—14, 23—27, xxiii. 17—20, xlix. 29—
30, 32 ; Ex. xii. 18 — 20 &.Q. In this connexion, there may be noticed particularly
an otherwise uncommon mode of expression, producing a peculiar rhythm, by
which a statement is first made in general terms, and then partly repeated, for the
purp'ise of receiving closer limitation or definition: see, for instance. Gen. i. 27
'and God created man in his own image ; in the image of God created he him -. male
and female created he them,' vi. 14 (Heb.), ix. 5, xxiii. 11 'the field give I thee &c. ;
m the presence of the sons of my people give I it thee,' xlix. 29'' — 30; Ex. xii. 4, 8,
xvi. 16, 35, xxv. 2, 11, 18, 19, xxvi. 1; Lev. xxv. 22; Nu. ii. 2, xviii. 18, xxxvi. 11 —
12 {Heb.),d-c.
* Comp. Gen. i. 7 beside v. 6, v. 12 beside v. 11, vui. 18 f. beside viii. 16 f.
« See Gen. i 6—7; 11—12: •J4— 25 ; vi 18—20 and vii. 13—16; viii. 16—17
and 18—19 ; Ex. viii. 16—17; ix. S— 10 &c.
7 See LOT. pp. 126—8 (ed. 6 or 7, pp. 133—5).
viii INTRODUCTION . [§ 1
Jehovah is much more common than God ; and to this fact is due no doubt its
having been accidentally substituted for an original God in the two passages,
Gen. xvii. 1, xxi. l^
The statenieut in Ex. vi. 3 that God appeared to the patriarchs as El
Shaddai is in agreement vnth the use of this title in xvii. 1, xxviii. 3, xxxv. 11,
xlviii. 3. The following words, ' but by my name Jehovah I was not known
unto them,' are additional proof, — if such be needed, — that Gen. xv. 7, xxviii.
13, as also the numerous passages in Gen. in which the patriarchs make use of
this name, cannot have been written by the same author.
2. Kind (po): Gen. i. 11, 12 his, 21 his, 24 his, 25 ter, vi. 20 ter, 7, 14
quater ; Lev. xi. 14, 15, 16, 19 [hence Dent. xiv. 13, 14, 15, 18], 22 qualer, 29 ;
Ez. xlvii. lot.
3. To twarm (p.K^): Gen. i. 20, 21, vii. 21, viii. 17; Lev. xi. 29, 41, 42,
43, 46; Ez. xlvii. 9. Fig. of men: Gen. ix. 7; Ex. i. 7t. Once in J, Ex.
vii. 28 [hence Ps. cv. 30j.
4. Swarming things (1*1^) : Gen. i. 20, vii. 21 ; Lev, v. 2, xi. 10, 20 [hence
DeuL xiv. 19], 21, 23, 29, 31, 41, 42, 43, 44, xxii. 5 [see p. 12 n.]t.
5. To he fruitfid and multiply (n3"l1 mc): Gen. i. 22, 28, viii. 17, ix. 1,
7, xvii. 20 (cf. vv. 2, 6), xxviii. 3, xxxv. 11, xlvii. 27, xlviii. 4; Ex. i. 7; Lev.
xxvi. 9 : also Jer. xxiii. 3; and (inverted) iii. 16, Bz. xxxvi. llf-
6. To creep (b'pn) : Gen. i. 21 (BVV. moveth), 26, 28, 30, vii. 8, 14, 21,
viii. 17, 19, ix. 2; Lev. xi. 44, 46 (EVV. moveth), xx. 25. Also Deut. iv. 18*
7. Creeping things, reptiles (t^'9^): Gen. i. 24, 25, 26, vi. 7, 20, vii. 14, 23,
viii. 17, 19, ix. 3 (used here more generally : EVV. moveth)*.
8. For food (n^DX*?) : Gen. i. 29, 30, vi. 21, ix. 3 ; Ex. xvi. 15 ; Lev. xi. 39,
XXV. 6 ; Ez XV. 4, 6, xxi. 37, xxiii. 37, xxix. 6, xxxiv. 5, 8, 10, 12, xxxix. 4t.
(In Jer. xii. 9 n'?3N'? is an infin.)
9. Generations (nn^in> lit. hegettings) :
(o) in the phrase These are the generations of...: Gen. ii. 4», v. 1 {TTiis is
the hook of the generations of...), vi. 9, x. 1, xL 10, 27, xxv. 12 [hence I Ch. i. 29],
19, xxxvi. 1, 9, xxxvii. 2; Nu. iii. 1; Ruth iv. 18 f-
(6) in the phrase their generations, hy their families: Nu. i. 20, 22, 24 &c.
(12 times in this chapter) f.
(c) in the phrase according to (S) their generations { = their parentage, or
their ages): Gen. x. 32, xxv. 13; Ex. vi. 16, 19, xxviii. 10 (d); 1 Ch. v. 7, vii. 2,
4, 9, viii. 28, ix. 9, 34, xxvi. 31.
10. To expire (yi)): Gen. vi. 17, viL 21, xxv. 8, 17, xxxv. 29, xlix. 33;
Nu. xvii. 12, 13, XX. 3 his, 29 ; Josh. xxii. 20t. (Only besides in poetry: Zech.
xiii. 8 ; Ps. Ixxxviii. 16, civ. 29; Lam. i. 19 ; and 8 times in Job.)
11. With thee {him &c.) appended to an enumeration: Gen. vi. 18, vii. 7,
13, viii. 16, 18, ix. 8, xxviii. 4, xlvL 6, 7; Ex. xxviii. 1, 41, xxix. 21 his; Lev.
viii. 2, 30, X. 9, 14, 15, xxv. 41, 54; Nu. xviii. 1, 2, 7, 11, 19 bis*. Similarly
after you {tfie.e &c.) appended to seed: Gen. ix. 9, xvii. 7 his, 8, 9, 10, 19,
XXXV. 12, xlviii. 4 ; Ex. xxviii. 43 ; Nu. xxv. 13.
§ 1] LITERARY CHARACTERISTICS OF P ix
12. And Noah did {so); according to &c. : Gen. vi. 22 : exactly the same
form of sentence, Ex. vii. 6, xii. 28, 50, xxxix. 32*", xL 16; Nu. i. 54, ii. 34,
viii. 20, xvii. 11 (Heb. 26) : of. Ex, xxxix. 43 ] Nu. v. 4, ix. 5.
13. This selfsame day (ntn DVH DVJ?): Gen. vii. 13, xvii. 23, 26 ; Ex. xii. 17,
41, 61; Lev. xxiii. 14, 21, 28, 29, 30; Dt. xxxii. 48; Jos. v. 11, x. 27 (not P:
probably the compiler) ; Ez. ii. 3, xxiv. 2 his, xl. 1 f.
14. After their families (nn"'-, DmnDB'D'p): Gen. viii. 19, x. 5, 20, 31,
xxxvi. 40 ; Ex. vi. 17, 25, xii. 21 ; Nu. i. (13 times), ii. 34, iii. — iv. (15 times),
xxvi. (16 times), xxix. 12, xxxiii. 54; Jos. xiii. 15, 23, 24, 28, 29, 31 ; xv. 1, 12,
20, xvi. 5, 8, xvii. 2 Us, xviii. 11, 20, 21, 28, xix. (12 times), xxi. 7, 33, 40 (Heb.
38) ; 1 CL v. 7, vi. 62, 63 (Heb. 47, 48 : from Josh. xxi. 33, 40). Once in J,
Nu. xi. 10; and once also in one of the earlier historical books, 1 S. x. 21 f.
15. An everlasting covenant: Gen. ix. 16, xvii. 7, 13, 19 ; Ex. xxxi. 16 ;
Lev. xxiv. 8; cf. Nu. xviii. 19, xxv. 13*.
16. Exceedingly (iko IKOl [not the usual phrase]): Gen. xvii. 2, 6, 20;
Ex. L 7; Ez. ix. 9, xvi 13 1-
17. Substance, goods (t;'1D"l)'- Gen. xii. 5, xiii. 6*, xxxL 18^ xxxvi. 7, xlvi. 6;
Nu. xvi. 32 end, xxxv. 3. Elsewhere (not P): Gen. xiv. 11, 12, IGbis, 21, xv. 14;
and in Chr. (8 times), Ezr. (4 times), Dan. xi. (3 times) f.
18. To amass, gather (tfDl — cognate with 'substance'): Gen. xii. 5, xxxi.
18 bisy xxxvi. 6, xlvi. 6 (RV. had gotten) f.
19. Soul (tJ'SJ) in the sense of person: Gen. xii. 5, xxxvi. 6, xlvi. 15, 18,
22, 25, 2G, 27 ; Ex. i. 5, xii. 4, 16 (RV. man), 19, xvi. 16 (RY . persons) ; Lev.
ii. 1 (RV. any one), iv. 2, 27, v. 1, 2 ; and often in the legal parts of Lev. Num.
(as Lev. xvii. 12, xxii. 11, xxvii. 2); Nu. xxxi. 28, 35, 40, 46 ; Josh. xx. 3, 9 (from
Nu. xxxv. 11, 15). See also below, No. 24 a. A usage not confined to P, but
much more frequent in P than elsewhere.
20. Throughout your {their) generations (D3^n'")ht>, Dnht^) : Gen. xvii. 7,
9, 12; Ex. xiL 14, 17, 42, xvi. 32, 33, xxvii. 21, xxix. 42, xxx. 8, 10, 21, 31,
xxxi. 13, 16, xl. 15; Lev. iii. 17, vi. 11, vii. 36, x. 9, xvii, 7, xxi. 17, xxii. 3,
xxiii. 14, 21, 31, 41, xxiv. 3, xxv. 30 (Ai?); Nu. ix, 10, x. 8, xv. 14, 15, 21, 23, 38,
xviii. 23, xxxv. 29 f.
21. Sqjournings (DniJO): with land. Gen. xvii 8, xxviii. 4, xxxvi. 7,
xxxvii. 1 ; Ex. vi 4 ; Ez. xx. 38 ; with days. Gen. xlvii. 9 his. Only besides
Pa. cxix. 54 : and rather differently, Iv. 15 (sing.) ; Job xviii. 19 f.
22. Possession (njriN): Gen. xvii. 8, xxiff 4, 9, 20, xxxvi. 43, xlvii 11,
xlviii. 4, xlix. 30, L 13 ; Lev. xiv. 34, xxv. 10 — 46 (13 times), xxvii. 16, 21, 22,
24, 28 ; Nu. xxvii 4, 7, xxxii 5, 22, 29, 32, xxxv. 2, 8, 28 ; Dt. xxxiL 49 ; Josh,
xxi. 12, 41, xxii. 4 (Deuterononiic), 9, 19 bis. Elsewhere only in Ezekiel
(xliv. 28 bis, xiv. 5, 6, 7 bis, 8, xlvi. 16, 18 ier, xlviii. 20, 21, 22 bis); Ps. ii 8 ;
1 Ch. vii 28, ix. 2 ( = Neh. xi 3), 2 Ch. xi. 14, xxxi If.
23. Tlie co^^iiate verb to get possessions (T^^53), rather a peculiar word :
Gen. xxxiv. 10, xlvii. 27 ; Nu. xxxii 30, Josh. xxii. 9, 19t.
X INTRODUCTION [§ 1
24 Father' t kin (D'Oy), — a peculiar usage (see on Gen. xvii. 14):
(a) that sold (or that man) shall be cut off from his father's kin : Gen.
xvil 14; Ex. xxx. 33, 38, xxxi. 14; Lev. vii. 20, 21, 25, 27, xvii. 9, xix. 8,
xxiiL 29; Nu. ix. 13t.
(6) to be gathered to on^s father's kin: Gen. xxv. 8, 17, xxx v. 29, xlix. 33
(c£ on V. 29) ; Nu. xx. 24, xxviL 13, xxxi. 2 ; Dt. xxxiL 50 bisf.
(c) Lev. xix. 16, xxi. 1, 4, 14, 15; Ez. xviii. 18 : perhaps Jud. v. 14; Hos.
X. 14.
25. Sojourner (EVV.), better settler (nSJ'in): Gen. xxiii. 4 (hence fig.
Ps. xxxix. 13, 1 Ch. xxix. 15); Ex. xii. 45; Lev. xxii. 10, xxv. 6, 23 (fig.), 36,
40, 45, 47 bis; Nu. xxxv. 15 ; 1 K. xvii. 1 (but read rather as RVm.)t.
26. The methodical form of subscription and superscription : Gen. x. [5,]
20, 31, 32, xxv. 13% 16, xxxvi. 29% 30% 40% 43% xlvi. 8, 15, 18, 22, 25 ; Ex. i. 1,
vi. 14, 16, 19, 25, 26 ; Nu. i. 44, iv, 28, 33, 37, 41, 45, vii. 17, 23, 29 &c., 84,
xxxiii. 1 ; Josh. xiii. 23, 28, 32, xiv. 1, xv. 12, 20, xvi 8, xviii. 20, 28, xix. 8, 16,
23, 31, 39, 48, 51 [cf. Gen. x. 31, 32], xxi. 19, 26, 33, 40, 41 — 42. (Not a
complete enumeration.)^
27. As those acquainted with Hebrew will be aware, there are in Heb.
two forms of the pron. of the 1st pers. sing, 'dni and 'dnoki, which are not by
all writers used indiscriminately : P now uses 'dm nearly 130 times {'dnoki
only once. Gen. xxiii. 4 : comp. in Ezekiel 'dnl 138 times, 'dnoki once,
xxxvi. 28). In the rest of the Hexateuch 'dnoki is preferred to 'dnl, and in
the discourses of Deut it is used almost exclusively.
28. For hundred P uses a peculiar grammatical form (m*'ath in the
constr. state, in cases where ordinarily me'dh would be said) : Gen. v. 3, 6, 18,
25, 28, vii. 24, viil 3, li. 10, 25, xxi. 5, xxv. 7, 17, xxxv. 28, xlvii. 9, 28;
Ex. vi. 16, 18, 20, xxxviii. 25, 27 ter; Nu. iL 9, 16, 24, 31, xxxiii. 39. So
besides only Neh. v. 11 (probably corrupt : see Ryle ad loc), 2 Ch. xxv. 9 QrS,
Est. i. 4. P uses me'dh in such cases only twice, Gen. xvii. 17, xxiii. 1.
29. For to beget P uses regularly T'^in, Gen. v. 3—32 (28 times), vi. 10, xi.
10 — 27 (27 times), xvii. 20, xxv. 19, xlviii. 6 ; not 1^% which is used by J, Gen.
iv. 18 ter, x. 8, 13, 15, 24 bis, 26, xxii. 23, xxv. 3.
30. For the idea of making a covenant, P says always D^■?^ {establish).
Gen. vi. 18, ix. 9, 11, 17, xvii. 7, 19, 21, Ex. vi. 4 (so Ez. xvi. 60, 62) f; not
nD3 (lit. cut, BW. make: see on xv. 18), as in Gen. xv. 18, xxi. 27, 32, xxvi. 28,
xxxi 44, and generally in the OT.
31. To express the idea of Jehovah's being in the midst of His people, P
says always "^ma (13 times: Ex. xxv. 8 &c.), JE anpi (13 times: Ex. iii. 20 &c.).
32. Hebron is denoted in P (except Josh. xxL 13) by J^iriath-arba^ (said
in Josh. xiv. 15 = Jud. i. 10 [J] to have been its old name): Gen. xxiii. 2,
xxxv. 27 ; Josh. xv. 13, 54, xx. 7, xxi. 11. So Neh. xi 25 f.
* The subscriptionB in J are much briefer : ix. 19, x. 29, xxii. 23, xxv. 4.
§ 1] LITERARY CHARACTERISTICS OF P xi
The following geographical terms are found only in P :
33. Machpelah: Gen. xxiii. 9, 17, 19, xxv. 9, xlix. 30, L 13 f.
34. Paddan-aram: Gen. xxv. 20, xxviii. 2, 5, 6, 7, xxxi. 18, xxxiii. IS'',
XXXV. 9, 26, xlvi. 15 ; cf. xlviii. 7 {Paddan alone). J says Aram-naharainiy
Gen. xxiv. 10 : so Dt. xxiii. 4, Jud. iii. 8, Ps. Ix. titled .
Some other expressions might be noted; but these are the most
distinctive. If the reader will be at the pains of underlirimg them in
all their occurrences, he will see that they do not occur in the Hexateuch
indiscriminately, but that they are aggregated in particular passages,
to which they impart a character of their own, different from that of
the rest of the narrative'. The literary style of P is very strongly
marked : in point of fact, it stands apart not only from that of every
other part of the Hexateuch, but also from that of every part of Judges,
Samuel, and Kings', — whether the strictly narrative parts, or those
which have been added by the Deuteronomic compiler ; and has sub-
stantial resemblances only with that of Ezekiel.
The parts of Genesis which remain after the separation of P have
next to be considered. These also shew indications of not being
homogeneous in structure. Especially from ch. xx. onwards the
narrative exhibits marks of compilation; and the component parts,
though not differing from one another in diction and style so widely
as either differs from P, and being so welded together that the lines
of demarcation between them frequently cannot be fixed with certainty,
appear nevertheless to be plainly discernible. Thus in xx. 1 — 17 the
consistent use of the term God is remarkable, whereas in ch. xviii. —
xix. (except xix. 29 P), and in the similar narrative xii. 10 — 20, the
term Jehovah is uniformly employed. The term God recurs similarly
in xxi. 6 — 31, xxii. 1 — 13, and elsewhere, particularly in chs. xL — xlii.,
xlv. For such a variation in similar and consecutive chapters no
plausible explanation can be assigned except diversity of authorship*.
At the same time, the fact that Elohim is not here accompanied by
the other criteria of P's style, forbids our assigning the sections thus
^ After Ex. vi. 2 Elohim for Jehovah disappears; but a nnmber of even more
distinctive expressions appear in its place. It is a serious mistake to suppose, as
appears to be sometimes done, that the use of Elohim for Jehovah is the only
criterion distinctive of P.
2 For pomts of contact in isolated passages, viz. parts of Jud. xx. — xxi., I S.
ii. 22^ 1 K. viii. 1, 5, see LOT. p. ISe (ed. 7, p. 143 f.).
^ It is true that Elohim and Yahweh represent the Divine Nature under
difierent aspects, viz. as the God of nature and the God of revelation respectively;
but it is only in a comparatively small number of instances that this distinction
can be applied, except with great artificiality, to explain the variation between the
two names in the Pentateuch.
xii INTRODUCTION [§ 1
characterized to that source. Other phraseological criteria are slight ;
there are, however, not unfrequently differences of representation,
which point decidedly in the same direction (e.g. the remarkable ones
in ch. xxxvii.). It seems thus that the parts of Genesis which remain
after the separation of P are formed by the combination of two
narratives, originally independent, though covering largely the same
ground, which have been united by a subsequent editor, who also
contributed inconsiderable additions of his own, into a single, con-
tinuous narrative. One of these sources, from its use of the name
Jahvceh, is now generally denoted by the letter J ; the other, in which
the name Elohim is preferred, is denoted similarly by E; and the work
formed by the combination of the two is referred to by the double
letters JE. The method of the compiler who combined J and E
together, was sometimes, it seems, to extract an entire narrative from
one or other of these sources (as xx. 1 — 17, xxi. 6 — 31 from E;
ch. xxiv. from J); sometimes, while taking a narrative as a whole
from one source, to incorporate with it notices derived from the other
(as frequently in chaps, xl. — xlv.); and sometimes to construct his
narrative of materials derived from each source in nearly equal pro-
portions (as chaps, xxviii., xxix.).
The passages assigned to E in the present volume are : xv. 1 — 2, 5, xx.,
xxi. fr— 21, 22— 32>, xxii. 1—14, 19, xxviii. 11—12, 17—18, 20—22, xxix. 1,
15—23, 25— 2s», 30, xxx. 1—3, 6, 17—20^', 21—23, xxxi 2, 4—18% 19—45,
51—55, xxxii. 1, xxxiii. 18''— 20, xxxv. 1—8, xxxviL 5—11, 19—20, 22— 25»,
26'' ', 29—30, 36, xL — xlii. (except a few isolated passages), xlv. (with similar
exceptions), xlvi. 1 — 5, xlviii. 1 — 2, 8—22, L 15 — 26.
It may suflSce to indicate the principal longer passages referred to J :
ii. 4*> — iii., iv. ; the parts of vi. — x. not referred above to P ; xi. 1 — 9 ; and
(except here and there a verse or two, — rarely, a few verses more, — belonging
to E or P) xii., xiiL, xv., xvi, xviii. — xix., xxiv^ xxv. 21 — 34, xxvi., xxviL 1 — 45,
xxix 2 — 14, xxix. 31 — xxx. 24 (the main narrative), xxx. 25 — 43, xxxii., xxxiii.,
xxxiv. (partly;, xxxni. (partly), xxxviiL, xxxix., xliii., xliv., xlvi. 28 — 34, xlvii.,
xlix., L 1— 11, 14.
The criteria distinguishing J from E are fewer and less clearly
marked than those distinguishing P from JE as a whole; and there
is consequently sometimes uncertainty in the analysis, and critics,
interpreting the evidence differently, sometimes differ accordingly in
their conclusions. Nevertheless the indications that the narrative is
composite are of a nature which it is not easy to gainsay; and the
difficulty which sometimes presents itself oi disengaging the two
sources is but a natural consequence of the greater similarity of style
§ 1] CRFTERIA DISTES^GUISHING J AKD E xiii
subsisting between them, than between JE, as a whole, and P'. At
the same time the present writer is ready to allow that by some critics
the separation of J from E is carried further than seems to him to be
probable or necessary: no doubt, the criteria which are relied upon
exist; the question which seems to him to be doubtful, is whether
in the cases which he has in view they are sufficient evidence of
different authorship. But the general conclusion that the narrative
here called ' JE ' is composite does not appear to him to be disputable :
and the longer and more clearly defined passages which may reasonably
be referred to J and E respectively, have been indicated by him accord-
ingly throughout the present volume. In important cases, also, the
grounds upon which the distinction rests have generally been pointed
out in the notes.
The following are some examples of words or expressions characteristic of
B, as disiinguished fi-om J. E prefers God (though not exclusively) and angel
of God where J x^reien Jehocah and angel of Jehocah; E uses Amorite as the
general name of the pre-Israelitish inhabitants of Palestine, while J uses
Canaanite ; E uses H'^rch, J Sinai ; in E the name of Moses' father-in-law is
Jethro, in J it is Hohab; for bondwoman E prefers dmdh, J prefers shiphhah;
B speaks of Gods coming in a dream (xx. 3, xxxi. 24; Xu. xxii. 9, 20), — an
expression not found at all elsewhere ; E also uses sometimes unusual words,
as W'jO times Gen. xxxi. 7, 41 f, kesitah (a piece of money) xxxiii. 1 9, Jos. xxiv. 32
(only besides Job xlii. ll)t, mn to rejoice Ex. xviiL 9 (otherwise rare and
poet.), riTn to see, v. 21 (very uncommon in prose), nc'l7n weakness xxxii. 18,
Dn*l3p3 nVD'J'*? for a whispering am,ong them, that rose up against them
(poet) V. 25, n'3 in a local sense ('here,' not, as usually, 'thus'}; and he has
peculiar forms of the inf.. Gen. xxxi. 28, xlvi 3, xlviiL 11, L 20. Of expressions
characteristic of J, we can only notice here Behold, now, Gen. xii. 11, xvi. 2,
xviii. 27, 31, xix. 2, 8, 19, xxvii. 2'; to call with the name of Jeh/cah, iv. 26,
xiL 8, xiii. 4, xxL 33, xxvi. 25'^ ; he (icas) the father of.., iv. 20, 21, xix. 37, 38-
(c£ ix- 18, X. 21, XL 29, xxil 21*; observe also (N'ln) Nin Dl in the same
contexts, iv. 22, 26, x. 21, xix. 38, xxii. 20, 24) ; to find favour in the eyes of
(14 times in Gen.); forasmuch as (p'^y'D, a peculiar expression), xviil 5,
xix. 8, xxxiiL 10, xxxviii. 26, Nu, x. 31, xiv. 43^; the land of Goshen (see on
xlv. 10) ; a preference for Israel (as the personal name of Jacob) after
XXXV. 22 (of. p. 353 ; E prefers Jacob throughout) ; nnriDS (peculiar word for
tack, 15 times in xlii. 27 — xliv. 12 ; not elsewhere).
* In a harmony of the four Gospels, the parts belonging to the Fourth Gospel
would, as a rule, be separable from the rest without difficulty: but those belonging
to the First and Second, it would often be scarcely possible to distinguish. J and
E differ trom P in having stylistically a considerable general resemblance (though
there are dilJerences: see, for instance, LOT. p. 17-1 f., ed. 6 or 7, p. 184 f.) to
the narrativtd (apart from the 'Deuteronomio' additions) of Judges, Samuel, and
the earlier parts of Kings.
* Not elsewhere in the Hexateuch.
liv INTRODUCTION [§ 1
For longer list* of characteristic expressions, reference must be made to
the Oxf. HeJt. L 1S5 — 192 (in the reprint of voL i., p. 3S4 ff.). The oxprosimis
quoted there are not indeed all of equal value; and some may occur in short
passages assigned to J or E (as the case may be; upon slight grounds ; but
when all deductions have been made on these accounts, the reader who will be
at the pains of exauiining the two Usts attentively will find that J and E shew
each a decided preference for particular expressions, which, though not so
strongly marked as the preferences shewn by P, nevertheless exists, and is a
reaUty. It is also to be borne in mind that words and expressions, which may
be insignificant in themselves, nevertheless, when they recur repeatedly, may
be evidence of the line of thought along which a given writer moves most
familiarly, or of the subjects in which he is chiefly interested.
Of all the Hebrew historians whose writings have been preserved
to ns, J is the most gifted and the most brilliant. He excels in the
power of delineating life and character. His touch is singularly light :
with a few strokes he paints a scene, which impresses itself indelibly
upon his reader's memory. In ease and grace his narratives are un-
surpassed : everything is told with precisely the amount of detail
that is required ; the narrative never lingers, and the reader's interest
is sustained to the end. He writes without effort, and without
conscious art.
' That some of his narratives are intentionally didactic can hardly
be questioned: the first man, the woman, the serpent, and Yahweh,
aU play their part in the Eden drama with a profound purpose under-
lying it: yet the simplicity of the story and the clearness of the
characterization are unmarred. But there are others, like the account
of the mission of Abraham's steward in Gen. xxiv., which have no
such specific aim, and are unsurpassed in felicitous presentation,
because they are unconsciously pervaded by fine ideas. The dialogues
especially are full of dignity and human feeling; the transitions in
the scenes between Abraham and his visitors in cL xviii., or between
Joseph and his brethren, are instinctively artistic; for delicacy and
pathos, what can surpass the intercession of Judah (xliv, 18 ff.), or
the self-disclosure of Joseph (xlv. 1 ff.) ? The vivid touches that caU
up a whole picture, the time-references from daybreak through the
heat to evening cool and night, the incidents that circle round the
desert welk, the constant sense of the place of cattle alike in the land-
scape and in life, the tender consideration for the flock and herd, —
all these belong to a time when the pastoral habit has not ceased,
and the tales that belong to it are told from mouth to mouth The
breath of poetry sweeps through them; and though they are set in
§ 1] LITERARY STYLE OF J AND E xv
a historic frame that distinctly implies a reflective effort to conceive
the course of human things as a whole, they have not passed into
the stage of learned arrangement; they still possess the freshness of
the elder time'.'
E in general character does not differ widely from J. But he does
not as a writer exhibit the same rare literary power, he does not
display the same command of language, the same delicacy of touch,
the same unequalled felicity of representation and expression. His
descriptions are less poetical; and his narratives do not generally
leave the same vivid impression. As compared with P, both J and E
exhibit far greater freshness and brightness of style; their diction is
more varied; they are not bound to the same stereotyped forms of
thought and expression; their narratives are more dramatic, more Ufe-
like, more instinct with feeling and character.
The question of the dates of the sources of which the Book of
Genesis is composed, cannot^ be properly answered from a consideration
of this book alone, as many of the most important criteria upon
which the answer depends are afforded by the subsequent parts of
the Pentateuch. There are indeed passages in Genesis which carmot
reasonably be supposed to have been written until after Israel had
been settled in Canaan, as xii. 6, xiii. 7; xiv. 14 ('Dan'); xxi. 32, 34
and xxyi. 1 (the Philistines, if what is stated on x. 14 is correct, were
not in Palestine till the age of Ramses III., considerably after the
Exodus); xxxvi. 31 (a verse which obviously presupposes the existence
of the monarchy in Israel); xl. 15 (Canaan called the 'land of the
Hebrews'); and ch. xlix., — at least if the considerations advanced on
p. 380 are accepted: but these are isolated passaiges, the inferences
naturally authorized by which might not impossibly be neutralized
by the supposition that they were later additions to the original
narrative, and did not consequently determine by themselves the date
of the book as a whole. The question of the date of the Book of
Genesis is really part of a wider question, viz. that of the date of the
Pentateuch, — or rather Hexateuch, — as a whole ; and a fuU considera-
tion of this wider subject obviously does not belong to the present
context. It must suffice, therefore, here to say generally, that when
the different parts of the Hexateuch, especially the Laws, are com-
pared together, and also compared with the other historical books of
the Old Testament, and the prophets, it appears clearly that they
1 Carpenter, The Oxford Hexateuch, i. 102 f. (ed. 2, p. 185 f.).
xvi INTRODUCTION [S 1
cannot all be the work of a single man, or the product of a single
age : the different strata of narrative and law into which, when closely
examined, the Hexateuch is seen to fall, reveal differences of such a kind
that they can only be adequately accounted for by the supposition that
they reflect the ideas, and embody the institutions, which were character-
istic of widely different periods of Israelitish history. The general con-
clusions to which a consideration of all the facts thus briefly indicated
has led critics, and which are adopted in the present volume, are that
the two sources, J and E, date from the early centuries of the monarchy,
J belonging probably to the ninth, and E to the early part of the
eighth cent. b.c. (before Amos or Hosea)* and that P, — at least in its
main stock (for it seems, as a whole, to have been the work of a school
of writers rather than of an individual, and particular sections, espe-
cially in Exodus and Numbers, appear to be of later origin), — belongs
to the age of Ezekiel and the Exile \ Chap. xiv. is clearly not part
of either J, E, or P, but belongs to a special source. There is, how-
ever, no sufficient foundation for the idea that it is of foreign origin, —
whether translated from a cuneiform original, or based upon an ancient
Canaanitish source ; for the narrative is genuinely Hebraic in style and
colouring. Its date is uncertain: but it has some points of contact
with P; and, as Prof. 6. F. Moore remarks {EncB. n. 1677), the
impression which the contents and style of the chapter make as a
whole is of affinity with the later rather than with the earlier Heb.
historical writing. It will scarcely be earlier than the age of the
Exile.
'The Book of Genesis assumed its present form, it is probable, by
two main stages. First, the two independent, but parallel, narratives
of the patriarchal age, J and E, were combined into a whole by a com-
piler, who sometimes incorporated long sections of each intact (or
nearly so), and at other times combined elements from each into
a single narrative, introducing occasionally in the process short ad-
ditions of his own (e.g. in xxvi. 1 — 5, xxxix. 1, xl. 1, 3, 5). The whole
thus formed (JE) was afterwards combined with the narrative P by
a second compiler, who, adopting P as his framework, accommodated
JE to it, omitting in either what was necessary to avoid needless
' On the general question of the date of the Hexateuch, and for a fuller
statement of the grounds on which these conclusiond rest, see F. H. Woods' art.
Hexateuch in DB. (of. also the art. Law in OT.); the present writer's Introduction
to the Lit. of the OT. pp. 115—150 (ed. 6 or 7, pp. 122—159) ; or the very compre-
hensive discussion of the subject by J. E. Carpenter in the Oxford Hexateuch, vol. i.
patsim (ed. 2, under the title The Compoaition of the Hexateuch, 1902).
^ 1] DATE OF GENESIS xvii
repetition, and making such slight redactional adjustments as the
unity of his work required. One chapter (xiv.), the literary style of
which distinguishes it from both JE and P, he incorporated from
a special source. The Book of Genesis is not a conglomerate of dis-
connected fragments; the three main sources, or documents, of which
it consists, once formed independent wholes, and the portions selected
from each have been combined together in accordance with a de-
finite plan.
It remains to consider the other leading characteristics of the
several sources. Here also, as in their literary features, J and E have
many similarities, though there are at the same time differences;
while P displays marked contrasts to both. J and E may be regarded
as having reduced to writing the traditions respecting the antecedents
and beginnings of their nation, which were current in the early
centuries of the monarchy. In view of the principles and interests
which predominate in both these narratives, and in contradistinction
to those which determine the form and contents of the priestly narra-
tive (p. iv.), JE, treated as a whole, may be termed the prophetical '
narrative of the Hexateuch : the ideas and points of view which are
so conspicuous afterwards in a more developed form in the writings
of the great prophets appearing in it in germ, and the general religious
spirit being very similar.
Among the characteristics of J, one that is very prominent is his
tendency to trace back to their iDeginnings, even in the primitive
history of mankind, many existing customs, institutions, or facts of
life and society. Thus in ii. 4'' — iii. he explains the origin of the
distinction of the sexes, the institution of marriage, the presence of sin
and toil in the world, the custom of wearing clothing, the gait and
habits of the serpent, the subject condition of woman, and the pain of
child-bearing. As, however, is pointed out on p. 36, the explanations
ofi'ered of these facts are not historical or scientific explanations, but
explanations prompted by religious reflection upon the facts of life.
In ch. iv. he describes, in accordance with the beliefs current among
the Hebrews, the origin of pastoral life and agriculture, of city-life,
polygamy, music, metallurgy, and the public worship of Yahweh ; in
ix. 20 — 26 that of the culture of the vine ; and in x., xi. 1 — 9 that of
the division of mankind into different nations, and of diversities of
language. He explains the origin of a common proverb or saying in
X. 9 and xxii. 14, of a remarkable pinnacle of salt overlooking the
Dead Sea in xix. 26, of the custom of not eating a particular part of
xviii INTRODUCTION [§ 1
an animal in xxxii. 32, of the Egyptian system of land-tenure in
xlvii. 26, and of a great many names of persons^ and places\ at least
according to the etymologies current at the time. Explanations of the
last-named kind are also found in E ; but much less frequently than
in J*. J explains also, in accordance with contemporary behefs, the
origin of various nations and tribes, especially of those which were
more or less closely related to Israel, as x. 8 — 12, 13 — 19, 24 — 30;
XLX. 37 f. (Moab and Ammon), xxii. 20 — 24 (the Nahoridae), xxv. 1 — 4
(the Keturaean tribes), xxv. 21 — 26' (Edom). By prophetic words
attributed, in most cases, to their respective ancestors, he accounts for
the character and political position of many of the peoples of his own
day, ix. 25 — 27 (Canaan), xvi. 12 (Ishmael), xxv. 23, xxvii. 28 f.,
39, 40 (Edom and Israel), ch. xlix. (the twelve tribes) : cf. in E xlviii.
14, 19 (Manasseh and Ephraim), 22 (Shechem). In other respects
also J loves to point to the character of nations or tribes as fore-
shadowed in their beginnings (ix. 22 — 24, xvi. 12, xxv. 25 f., 33 ; and
perhaps xix. 30 — 38, xxxv. 22 [see the notes] : cf. also xlix. 3 — 4, 5 — 7).
In J the knowledge and worship of Jehovah go back to primitive
times : Cain and Abel already make their ' presents ' to Him (iv. 3),
which may be either of the fruits of the ground or of the firstlings of
the flock. Under Sheth (Gen. iv. 24) men begin, — it may be supposed,
in some more formal and public manner, — to *caU with the name of
Jehovah.' A distinction between 'clean' and 'unclean' animals is
recognized under Noah (vii. 2), who also builds an altar, and offers
'clean' animals as burnt offerings to Jehovah (viii. 20). The same
usages prevailed during the whole patriarchal period : the patriarchs
are repeatedly spoken of as building altaxs, and ' calling with the name
of Jehovah' (see pp. xix, xx)\
» Eve (iii. 20), Cain (iv. 1), Seth (iv. 25), Noah (v. 29), Peleg (x. -25), Ishmael
(xvi. 11), Isaac (xviii. 12 — 1-5, but not explicitly), Moab and Ammon (xix. 37, 38),
Esau, Jacob, and Edom (xxv. 25, 26, 30), most of the names of Jacob's sons in
xxix. 31 — XXX. 24, Israel (xxxiL 28), Ben-oni and Benjamin (xxxv. 18), Perez and
Zerah (xxxviii. 29, 30) ; cf. ii. 7 (' man '), 23 ('woman '), xli. 45 (?aphenath-Pa'neah).
' Enoch (iv. 17), Babylon (xi. 9), Beer-lahai-roi (xvL 14), Zo'ar (xix. 22), Yahweh-
yir'eh (xxii. 14), the wells 'Esek, Sitnah, and Rehoboth (xxvi. 20, 21, 22), Beer-sheba'
(xxvi 33), Bethel (xxviii. 19), Gilead and Mizpah (xxxi. 48, 49). Ponuel (xxxii. 30),
Succoth (xxxiii. 17), Abel-mizraim (1. 11), Marah (Ex. iv. 23) : cf. also the allusions
to Seir xxv. 25, Mahanaim xxxii. 7, 10, Jabbok xxxii. 24, and Pennel xxxiii. 10.
* Isaac (xxi. 0),' Dan (xxx. 6), Issachar (xsx. 18), Zebulun (xxx. 20*'<^), Joseph
(XXX. 23), Manasseh and Ephraim (xli. 51 f.) ; Beer-sheba* (xxi. 31), Bethel (xxviii.
17, 22), Mahanaim (xxxii. 2), and AJlon-bachuth (xxxv. 8): cf. also xxxiii. 20,
xxxv. 7. The meaning of 'Ishmael' is alluded to in xxi, 17.
* This is J's representation: but it can scarcely be doubted that in his nse of the
name Jehovah (Yahweh) he in reahty merely transfers, without conscious reflection,
the usa^e of his own age to primitive, if not also to patriarchal times. The total
§ 1] CHARACTERISTICS OF J AND E xix
E, however, seems to describe a threefold stage of religious develop-
ment. What picture, indeed, he had formed of the primitive history
of mankind we do not know : though Gen. xx. 13, Josh. xxiv. 2
appear to shew that he carried back the story of Abraham to his
ancestral connexions in Haran, the first traces of his narrative which
remain are to be found in ch. xv. Bat Israel's ancestors, he declares,
* beyond tlie River ' (i.e. in Haran), were idolaters (Josh. xxiv. 2, 14, 15) ;
Jacob's wives accordingly bring their ' foreign gods ' into Canaan with
them (Gen. xxxv. 2 — 4) ; and Rachel in particular steals her father's
teraphim (xxxi, 19). By what means Abraham learnt the higher
truth, the existing narrative does not state. But he appears as a
consistent monotheist (xx. 11, 17, &c.) ; and Jacob, though his mono-
theism, at least in xxviii. 20 — 22, is of an immature and rudimentary
type, still calls upon his family and household to bury their ' foreign
gods ' under the terebinth at Shechem (xxxv. 4). The name Yahweh
is in this source first expressly revealed in Ex. iii. 14 f.
In the Book of Genesis, both narratives deal largely with the
antiquities of the sacred sites of Palestine. Thus an altar is built by
Abraham, as soon as he enters the country, at Shechem, close to ths
' Directing Terebinth ' (xii. 7), another between Bethel and Ai (xii. 8
cf. xiii. 4), a third at Hebron, by the terebinths of Mamre (xiii. 18),
and a fourth on (apparently) the site of the later Temple (xxii. 9) ;
other altars are built by Isaac at Beer-sheba (xxvi. 25) and by Jacob
at Shechem (xxxiii. 20 ; but perhaps ' pillar ' should be read here : see
the note), and at Bethel (xxxv. 1, 3, 7) : Jacob also sacrifices at Beer-
sheba on his way to Egypt (xlvi. 1). A sacred standing-stone, or
'pillar,' is set up and anointed by Jacob at Bethel on his journey from
Canaan in E (xxviii. 18, 22 : cf. xxxi. 13), and on his return to Canaan
in J (xxxv. 14) ; perhaps also he sets one up at Shechem (xxxiii. 20 :
see the note) : by another pillar he marks Rachel's grave (xxxv. 20) :
a pillar, also, marking a boundary, is erected by Jacob and Laban in
Gilead (xxxi. 45, 51, 52) ; on the last-mentioned occasion, moreover,
Jacob offers sacrifice, and a sacred meal, accompanying the sacrifice, is
absence of proper names componnded with Yahweh in the patriarchal period makes
it probable that, though not absolutely new in Mosea' time (cf. p. xlvii), it was still
current previously only in a hmited circle, — possibly, as has been suggested, in the
family of Moses (Ewald, u. 158; Wellh. Hist. 433; Konig, Hauptprobleme , 27), or
among the Xeniles (Stade, Gesch. i. 130; Budde, The Religion of Israel to the
Exile, 1899, pp. 17 — 25). Even till the age of Samuel such compounds are rare
(Joehebed, Joshua, Joash, Jotham, .Jonathan, Jud. xviii. 30); see Gray, Heb. Pr.
Names, 257 — 9 (on Ahijah, 1 Ch. ii. 25, see ibid. p. 36). (The time is hardly ripe
yet for drawing inferences from the facts mentioned on p. xlix.)
XX INTRODUCTION [§ 1
said to have been partaken of by him and Laban (v. 54). An oracle,
perhaps at Beer-sheba, appears to be alluded to in xxv. 22. Sacred
trees (mostly terebinths), which, it may be supposed, were pointed to
in the narrators' own times, are mentioned at Shechem (xii. 6, xxxv. 4 ;
of. Jos. xxiv. 26), Hebron (xiii. 18, xviii. 1 ; cf. xiv. 13), Beer-sheba
(xxi. 33 ; a tamarisk), and near Bethel (xxxv. 8)'. Abraham is further
described as 'calling with the name of Jehovah' by the altar near
Bethel in xii. 8, xiii. 4, and by the tamarisk tree at Beer-sheba, xxi. 33 ;
and Isaac as doing the same by the altar at Beer-sheba (xxvi, 25).
The passages just cited may be taken to give a picture of the forms qf
worship which, as tradition told, the patriarchs had been accustomed
to use^. In several cases, also, like many of those cited in footnotes ^
and * on p. xviii, they seem to embody traditional explanations of the
origin of the places, or objects, held sacred at the time when the
narratives in question were written, though in a later age, when religion
became more spiritualized, they fell into disrepute : they were con-
secrated by theophanies, or they commemorated other incidents in the
lives of the patriarchs.
It is characteristic of J that his representations of the Deity are
highly anthropomorphic. He represents Jehovah not only (as the
prophets generally, even the latest, do) as expressing human resolutions
and swayed by humau emotions (e.g. being pained, or repenting, vi. 6 f.,
swearing, xxiv. 7, &c.), but as performing sensible acts. Thus in
ii. 4*" — iii. Jehovah moulds ma)i out of the clods of the ground,
breathes into his nostrils the breath of life, plants, places, takes, sets,
brings, builds, closes up, walks in the garden in the cool of the day,
makes coats of skin ; elsewhere He shits Noah into the ark (vii. 16),
smells the savour of a sacrifice (viii. 21 : cf. 1 S. xxvi. 19), comes dovm
for various purposes — to examine the tower built by men (xi. 5), and
again {v. 7) to frustrate their purpose, to investigate on the spot the
truth of the report about the sin of Sodom (xviii. 21), or to deliver
Israel from its bondage (Ex. iii. 8), — visits Abraham and Lot in a
human form, and performs before them the actions of ordinar}^ men
(xviii. — xix.), wrestles with Jacob (xxxii. 24 f ), meets Moses at his
lodging-place, and seeks to slay him (Kx. iv. 24 f ), and takes off the
chariot wheels of the Egyptians (xiv. 25). Such anthropomorphic
representations are not found in E. In E, Elohim does not perform
sensible acts, or visit the eartli in personal form : He only * comes '
» Cf. Jud. iv. 11, vi. 11, 19, ix. «, 37, 1 8. x. 3, xxii. 6, xxxi. 13.
' The sabbath is not mentioned, though J uses the term 'week,' xxix. 27, 28.
§ 1] CHARACTERISTICS OF J xxi
and 'speak.s' in a vision or a dream (xv. 1, xx. 3, 6, xxi. 12 [see the
note], xxii. 1 [notice v. 3*], xxxi. 11, 24, xlvi. 2, Nu. xxii. 9 [see w. 8,
13], 20) ; or His angel calls out from heaven (xxi. 17, xxii. 11) : even
in Jacob's dream at Bethel, while in J the patriarch sees Jehovah
standing beside him, in E angels ascending and descending are the
medium of communication between heaven and earth.
In J the prophetical element is particularly prominent. His
narratives, more than those of any other historical writer of the
Old Testament, are the vehicle of moral and religious teaching. He
explains the origin of evil in the world, and expounds the moral
significance of human labour and suffering (ch. iii.). In his narratives
of Eve and Cain, he presents, in a few but effective strokes, two typical
examples of the manner in which temptation assails, and too often
overcomes, the soul. He depicts the growth of evil which accompanies
progress in the arts of life (iv. 17 ff.) ; he calls attention to the 'evil
imagination' inherent even in the descendants of« righteous Noah
(viii. 21) ; and notices the growth of wickedness and arrogance, and
the depravation of manners (vi. 5, ix. 22, xi. 4, xiii. }3, xix. 4 ff., 31 ff.).
He depicts the patriarchs not indeed as men without fault, but never-
theless as, on the whole, maintaining a lofty standard of faith, con-
stancy, and uprightness of life, both among the heathen in whose
land they dwelt, and also amid examples of worldly self-indulgence,
duplicity, and jealousy, afforded sometimes by members of their own
family. The shades, — sometimes dark shades, — on the characters of
Lot and Laban, Rebekah, Jacob, and Rachel, throw into clearer relief
the more noble and unselfish personalities of Abraham, Isaac, and
Joseph. The patriarchs are men, chosen by God (xii. 1, xxiv. 7), and
trained and educated under His providence, firstly to live as godlike
men themselves, and then to teach their families to follow in their
steps, that so in the end a holy people of God may be established on
the earth (xviii. 18 f.). The patriarchal history is, in his hands,
instinct with the consciousness of a great future : Abraham, Isaac,
and Jacob, are vouchsafed in succession glimpses of the divine plan :
their descendants are to be as countless as the sand of the sea, or the
stars of heaven ; they are to possess the land which in the patriarchs'
own days the 'Canaanite and the Perizzite' occupy (xiii. 7 ; cf. xii. 6,
xxiv. 3) : the spiritual privileges enjoyed by them are to attra.ct the
envy of all the nations of the world (xxii. 18, xxvi. 4), even if their
actual extension to them is not contemplated (xii. 3, xviii. 18, xxviii.
14, see the note on xii. 3). Though the actual words are not used, —
5 2
xxii rNTRODUCTTON [§ 1
Jehovah is first described as 'choosing' Israel in Deuteronomy
(iv. 37 a^.), — J has thus a clear consciousness of Israel's 'election'
and ' vocation.' He is further ' penetrated by the thought of Jeliovah's
mercifulness, long-suffering, and faithfulness ' (Gen. vi. 8, viii. 21 f.,
XV. 6, xviii. 23 ff., xxiv. 7, xxxii. 12; cf. Ex. xxxii. 9 — 14, xxxiii. 12 ff.) ;
and frequently by his narratives, if not in express words (cf. xxvi.
2, 24), he illustrates the providence with which Jehovah watches over
and protects His faithful worshippers. The latter is however a thought
which is perhaps more frequently and distinctly expressed in E (comp.
XX. 7, xxi. 12, 17 — 20, xxxi. 5, 7 — 9, 11, 24, 42, xxxii. 1, xxxv. 3,
xli. 39, xlv. 5, 7, 8, xlvi. 3, xlviii. 15, 21, 1. 20, 24).
P is in method and point of view hardly less different from both
J and E than he is in style. P is not satisfied to cast into a literary
form what may be termed the popular conception of the patriarchal
and Mosaic ages : his aim is to give a systematic view, from a priestly
standpoint, of the origin and chief institutions of the Israeli tish
theocracy. For this purpose, as was remarked above (p. vi.), an outline
of the history is sufficient : the narrative of P becomes detailed only at
important epochs, or where the origin of some existing ceremonial
institution has to be explained. The length of a period, if not marked
by events of any consequence, is indicated by a genealogy (ch. v.,
xi. 10 — 25). Similarly in the Mosaic age, the commission of Moses,
and events connected with the exodus, are narrated with some fulness ' :
but only the description of the Tabernacle and the ceremonial system
(Ex. XXV. — xxxi., xxxv. — xl. ; Lev. ; much of Numbers) can be termed
comprehensive : even of the incidents in the Wilderness many appear
to be introduced chiefly on account of some law or important con-
sequence arising out of them.
In the arrangement of his material, system and circumstantiality
are the guiding principles ; and their influence may be traced both in
the plan of his narrative as a whole, and in his treatment of individual
sections. From first to last the narrative is constructed with a careful
and uniform regard to chronology : the days of Creation, the ages of
the patriarchs, both in chaps, v. and xi., and subsequently, at each
important event of their lives (p. xxvi f.), the dates of the rise and fall
of the waters of the Flood (vii.6, 11, 24, viii.3^ 4, 5, 13', 14), and in
the Mosaic age the dates of the principal events of the exodus, are all
exactly noted. Moreover, the history advances along a well-defined
1 See the passages in the tsynopsis on p. v.
§ 1] CHARACTERISTICS OF P xxiii
line, marked by a gradually diminishing length of human life ; by the
revelation of God under three distinct names, Elokim, El Shaddai
(Gen. xvii. 1), and Jehovah (Ex. vi. 2, 3); by the blessings of Adam and
Noah (Gen. i. 28 — 30, ix. 2 — 6), each with its characteristic conditions ;
and by the covenants with Noah, Abraham, and Israel, each with its
special ' sign,' the rainbow, the rite of circumcision, and the Sabbath
(Gen. ix. 12 f., xvii. 11, Ex. xxxi. 13, 17). In P's picture of the
Mosaic age the minute description of the Tabernacle, sacrifices, and
other ceremonial institutions, the systematic marshalling of the nation
by tribes and families, and the unity of purpose and action which in
consequence regulates its movements (Nu. i. — iv., x. 11 — 28, &c.),
are the most conspicuous features. Wherever possible, P seeks to set
before his readers a concrete picture, with definite figures and pro-
portions : observe, for example, his exact account of the dimensions of
the ark, of the height to which it rose above the highest mountain-
tops (vii. 20) ; and afterwards, the care taken by him to particularize
the exact dimensions of the Tabernacle, sacred vessels, and other
furniture belonging to it, the exact numbers of the various tribes
(Nu. i., xxvi.), and the precise amount of spoil taken from the
Midianites (Nu. xxxi.). It is probable that in this systematized
picture of antiquity there is a considerable artificial, or ideal, element \
The same desire to produce a concrete picture is no doubt a con-
tributory cause of the consistent regard to chronology displayed by P,
as also to other statistical data : comp. for instance the lists and
enumerations in Gen. xlvi. 8 — 27, Ex. vi. 14 — 27, Nu. i. — iv., vii.,
xiii. 1 — 15, xxvi., xxxiii., xxxi v.
P's treatment of the entire period covered by the Book of Genesis
is very different from that of either J or E. He evinces scarcely any
interest in the explanation either of names, or of the facts and in-
stitutions of human life and society'. No inventions are attributed by
him to the antediluvian patriarchs : they form a mere list of names
and ages. He narrates the leading events in the lives of the patriarchs,
but, except at a few crucial points, as mere facts : on the conflicts of
interest and feeling which led Abraham, for instance, to acquiesce in
the expulsion of Ishmael, or Rebekah and Jacob to outwit Isaac, he is
1 Compaxe Ottley's Bampton Lectures for 1897 (on •Aspects of the Old Testa-
ment'), pp. 120 — 5, where this feature of P's narratives is well described and
illustrated.
^ In Genesis the only names of which the origin is stated or explained by P,
are Abraham, Sarah, and Isaac (xvii. 5, 15, 19, see v. 17), Israel (xxxv. 10), and
Bethel (xxxv. 15} : ef. the allueion t« the meaning of ' Ishma««l ' in xyii. 20.
xxiv INTRODUCTION [§ 1
silent; the dramatic movement, and the abundance of incident and
colloquy, which are such conspicuous features in the narrative of J and
even in that of E, are almost entirely lacking in those of P '. Tliere is
also a singular absence of geographical detail. Abraham dwells ' in the
land of Canaan,' Lot *in the cities of the Klkkdr' (xiii. 12; cf. xix. 29);
but the various places visited by the one, the particular city which was
the home of the other, are not indicated. The altars, wells, sacred
trees, and stones, the centres of so many picturesque scenes in J and E,
are unnoticed in P : one place only, Mamre, or Hebron, is named with
repeated emphasis on account of the adjacent family sepulchre of
Machpelah (p. xi, No. 33) ; Bethel also is referred to once (xxxv. 15).
In his religious theory of the patriarchal age, P differs also
markedly from both J and E. The name Yahweh is unknown : it is
first revealed in the age of Moses (Ex. vi. 2 f.). Altars, sacrifices,
sacred pillars are equally unknown; the only ceremonial institutions
recognized by him as pre-Mosaic are the Sabbath (observed by God at
the end of the week of Creation, but first enjoined upon Israel in the
Mosaic age), the prohibition to eat blood (ix. 4 f ), and circumcision :
no act of worship seems to be thought of till the appropriate place has
been constructed, and the right persons appointed, for its performance ;
accordingly, the first sacrifice recorded is that of Aaron and his sons in
Lev. viii. Primitive humanity is represented by P as subsisting wholly
on vegetable food (Gen. i. 29) ; animal food is first permitted after the
Flood, coupled however with the restriction against eating the blood ;
permission is also given at the same time for capital punishment to be
inflicted upon the murderer (ix. 3 — 6). In this view of primitive
lustory, — as in the other instances referred to above (p. xxiii), — there is
a large artificial element : it is the embodiment not of a genuine
historical tradition, but of an ideal. The promises given to the
patriarchs (see on xii. 2 f.), unlike those of J (see ibid.), are limited to
Israel itself: they do not embrace other nations. The substance of
these promises is the future growth and glory (' kings shall come out
of thee ') of the Abrahamic clan ; the establishment of a covenant with
its members (in J mentioned in Genesis once only, and in very different
terms, xv. 18), implying a special relation between tliem and God
(xvii. 2 — 21 (repeatedly), Ex. ii. 24, vi. 4 f ), and the confirmation of
the 'land of their sojournings' as their possession. The writer's ideal,
^ And so N3, the particle of en'ie Uy, I beseech thee, or now (enclitic), so common
in colloquy, which occurs 110 times iu J£ in the Hexateuoh, is found but twice in
P (Nu. xvi. 8, Josh. xxii. 26).
§2] CHARACTERISTICS OF P xxv
however, the theocracy, is not reached in Genesis ; and the cuhninating
promise, declaring the abiding presence of Jehovah with His people, is
only found in Ex. xxix. 43 — 46, attached to the directions for the
construction of the Tabernacle.
P's representations of God are far less anthropomorphic than those
of J, or even of E. No visions or dreams are mentioned by him : no
angel either calls from heaven, or walks on earth. God is indeed
spoken of as 'appearing' to men, and as 'going up ' from them (xvii. 1,
22 f., XXXV. 9, 13, xlviii. 3, Ex. vi. 3), at important moments of the
history : but no further description of His appearance is given ; nor
is He ever represented as assuming a personal form : usually the
revelation of God to man takes the form of simple ' speaking ' to them
(i. 29, vi. 13, viii. 15, ix. 1, 8, Ex. vi. 2, xii. 1 at). So in the account
of Creation, in P God is represented simply as ' speaking ' : the reader
cannot localize Him : He acts as a spirit ; and the creative word
realizes itself : in J, on the other hand (ii. 4** fF.), the reader pictures
Jehovah as walking upon the earth, and He is represented as per-
forming a series of sensible acts (p. xx f.) : in other words, P's
representation of the Deity is far more ' transcendent ' than that of J.
Anthropomorphic expressions are indeed in general either avoided
by P, or ' reduced to these harmless figures without which it is hardly
possible to speak of a personal God at all ' ; and anthropopathisms are
almost uniformly eschewed by him.
§ 2. The Chronology of Genesis.
Under this head two questions have to be considered : (1) is the
chronology of Genesis consistent with itself? and (2) if, and in so far
as, it is consistent with itself, is it consistent with such external data
as we possess for fixing the chronology of the period embraced in the
Book?
(1) The first of these questions need not detain us long. It is
shewn, in the notes on xii. 11, xxi. 15, xxiv. 67, xxxv. 8, and pp. 262,
365 n., 368, tiiat there are a number of points in the Book at which
the statements made about one or other of the patriarchs in J or E are
not consistent with the ages or families ascribed to them in P : in other
words, that in several instances J and E pictured the patriarchs as
being aged differently from what they must have been, if the ages
noted in P are correct, and that consequently the chronology of P is
not consistent with that presupposed by J and E.
xxvi INTRODUCTION [§ 2
(2) In the Book of Genesis the only systematic chronology is that
of P. It is true, there are in J and E occasional notes or other
indications of time' ; but they are not sufficient to form a continuous
chronology : they authorize no inference as to the length of the ante-
diluvian period ; and as to the patriarchal period, though they state
that Abraham and Sarah had both reached a great age when Isaac was
born, they do not mention what their ages were ; and they contain
nothing to suggest that the period from the birth of Abraham to the
death of Jacob was materially in excess of what it would be if measured
by the ordinary standards of human life : in other words, all that they
suggest about it is that it embraced some 180 years, instead of ex-
tending, as the figures of P give it, to 307 years. And the data
contained in J and E include, at least in Genesis, no synchronism with
external history : they contain nothing, for instance, enabling us to
infer with what Babylonian or Egyptian kings, Abraham, Isaac, or
Jacob was contemporary.
In P however there is a systematic chronology running through
the Book from the beginning almost to the end, so carefully and
methodically constructed, that every important birth, marriage, and
death, has its assigned place in it. This chronology may be thus
summarized :
Heb. text Sam. LXX.
From the Creation of man to the Flood
(Gen. v., vii. 11) 1656 1307 2262*
From the Flood to the Call of Abraham
(Gen. xi. 10—26, xii. 4) 365 1016 11463
From the Creation of man to the Call
of Abraham 2021 2322 3407
In the rest of Genesis P has the following notes* :
75 Age of Abraham at call (xii. 4).
[85] „ „ „ marriage with Hagar (xvi 3).
86 „ „ „ birth of Ishmael (xvi. 16).
99 „ MM promise of Isaac (xvii. 1). [Sarah 89, xviL 18.]
100 „ „ „ birth of Isaac (xxl 5).
[137] „ „ „ death of Sarah, aged 127 (xxiii. 1).
175 „ „ „ death (xxv. 7).
1 See XV. 13, 16; xxxi. 38, 41; xii. 1, 47, 53, 54, xlv. 6; 1. 22, 26; and such
notices as that Isaac, Joseph, and Benjamin were, respectively, born in their fathers'
'old age' (xxi. 2; xxxvii. 3; xliv. 20).
* See particulars of this period on p. 79.
* See p. 138. The 'two years' of Gen. xi. 10 are disregarded: see v. 82, viL 11,
* The Inures enclosed in brackets are not actually stated, but inferred.
§2] CHRONOLOGY OF GENESIS xxvii
13 Age of Ishmael at circumcision (xvii. 25)k
137 ,) „ ,, deathi (xxv. 17).
40 Age of Isaac at marriage (xxv. 20).
60 „ „ „ birth of Jacob and Esau (xxv. 26).
[75 „ „ „ death of Abraham.]
[100] „ „ „ marriage of Esau, aged 40 (xxvi. 34).
180 „ „ „ death (xxxv. 28). [Jacob would be now 120.]
130 Age of Jacob at arrival in Egypt (xlvii. 9).
147 „ „ „ death (xlvii. 28).
17 Age of Joseph when sold (xxxvil. 2).
30 „ „ „ promoted in Egypt (xli. 46).
Taking account of those notices only which give the length of the
period, we get :
Prom the Call of Abraham to the birth of Isaac 25 years
Age of Isaac at birth of Jacob and Esau 60 „
Age of Jacob when he went down into Egypt 130 „
The period of the patriarchs' sojourn in Canaan was thus 215 „
We obtain accordingly, for the number of years from the Creation
to the Exodus :
From the Creation of man to the Call
of Abraham
The period of the patriarchs' sojourn in
Canaan
The period of the Israelites' sojourn in
Egypt according to Ex. xii. 40, 41 (P)
Prom the Creation of man to the Exodus 2666 2762 3837
Now, 1 K. vi. 1 equates the fourth year of Solomon, the year in
which the Temple was founded, with the 480th year from the Exodus.
Accepting, then, Ussher's date for the reign of Solomon, B.C. 1014 —
975, — it ought probably, the chronology of the kings being corrected
from Assyrian data, to be really 40 or 50 years later^, — we get B.C. 1491
for the Exodus, and so we obtain the following Table of the principal
earlier Biblical dates, in years B.C. :
^ Sam. and lxs. read in Ex. xii. 40 'The sojourning of the children of Israel in
the land of Egypt, and in the land of Canaan, was 430 years,' reducing the period of
the sojourn in Egypt to half of that stated in the Hebrew text (cf. Gal. iii. 17;
Jos. Ant. 11. 15. 2).
^ See DB. l 401 ; and cf . the writer's Isaiah, his life and times, p. 13.
Heb.
Sam.
LXX.
2021
2322
3407
215
215
215
430
215*
215^
xxviii INTRODUCTION [§ 2
Heb.
Sam.
LXX.
Creation of man*
41572
4243
5323
The Deluge
2501
2936
3066
Call of Abraham
2136
1921
1921
Jacob's migration into Egypt
1921
1706
1706
The Exodus
1491
1491
1491
It follows from what is said on pp. 79, 138, that the higher dates in the
LXX. for the Creation of man, and the Deluge, are chiefly a consequence of
the fact that in the lists in Gen. v. and xi, 10 — 26, the age of each patriarch at
the birth of his firstborn is in the LXX. in many cases 100 years more than it
is in the Hebrew text
It is impossible now that these figures, — or, at least, the majority
of them, — can be historical. (1) As will be shewn in the following
section, it is certain that man existed upon the earth long before either
B.C. 4157 or (lxx.) 5328 ^ (2) The ages to which the several patriarchs,
in the two lists of Gen. v. and Gen, xi, 10 — 26, lived, and at which, at
least in the majority of cases in Gen. v., their eldest sons are stated to
have been born, are incompatible with the constitution of the human
body ; and could only have been attained if that constitution had dififered
from what it now is, to an extent which we are entirely unwarranted
in assuming to have been the case (cf. p. 75). (3) We possess no
independent information as to the date of the local inundation in
Babylonia, which, if the assumption made on p. 108 is correct, will
have formed the basis of both the Babylonian and the Biblical
narratives of the Flood: in the abstract, either 2501, 29.36, or 3066 B.C.,
would be possible for it. (4) The question of the dates of Abraham
and the Exodus, and of the interval between them, is a more dillicult
one, and m\ist be considered at greater length. The date of Ham-
murabi, king of Babylon, cannot at present be fixed exactly ; but with
1 Here and elsewhere the expression 'creation of ma«' has been used designedly
in order to leave open the possibility that the 'days' of Gen. i. denote periods.
There is however little doubt that the writer really meant ' days ' in a literal sense,
and that Pearson was right when he inferred from the chapter that the world was
represented as created '6000, or at farthest 7000,' years from the 17th cent. a.d.
(cf. pp. 19, 20—22, 26).
2 Ussher's date, as is well known, is b.o. 4004 : but he (1) interpolates, most
unnaturally, 60 years in Gen. xi. 26 (see the footnote, p. 142); and (2) he adopts in
Ex. xii. 40 the computation implied in the reading of Sam. and lxx., which the
rendering of AV., forced and artiticial though it is, seems to make possible even for
the Hebrew (contrast RV.). And 4157 + 60 - 215 = 4002 (the odd 2 years are the two
neglected in Gen. xi. 10, p. xxvi, footnote ^).
> Or, calculating back from the probable aetucd date of the Exodus, c. 1230 b.o.
isee p. xxix), b.c. 8896 or (lxx.) 5067.
§2] CHRONOLOGY OF GENESIS xxix
our present knowledge, the most probable date for his reign appears
to be B.C. 2130 — 2088': if, therefore, he is the Amraphel of Gen. xiv.
1, and if, further, the role assigned to Abraham in this chapter is, at
least substantially, historical, this fixes Abraham's date to c. 2100 B.C.
Can, now, the date of the Exodus be determined upon external
grounds? {a) The Tel el-Amarna letters shew that, at the time
when they were written, — which, from the names of the kings men-
tioned in them, viz. Amen-hotef IV. of Egypt, and Burna-buriash of
Babylon, Egyptologists and Assyriologists are agreed, must have been
c. 1400 B.C., — Palestine was still an Egyptian province, under the rule
of Egyptian governors : the entry of the Israelites into Canaan could
not, consequently, have taken place tiU after B.C. 1400. (6) It is
stated in Ex. i. 1 1 that the Israelites built in Egypt for the Pharaoh
two store-cities, Pithom and Raamses. The excavations of M. Naville
have, however, shewn that Ramses IL, of the 19th dynasty, was the
builder of Pithom ; and the name of the other city, though it is still
not certainly identified, is sufficient evidence that he was its founder
likewise. Egyptian chronology is unfortunately imperfect ; but Petrie,
Breasted, and Meyer agree in assigning to Ramses II. dates varying
only from b.c. 1310—1244 to B.c. 1292—1225". But if Ramses II.
was the Pharaoh of the oppression, the Pharaoh of the Exodus may
be naturally assumed (cf Ex. ii. 23) to have been his successor, i.e.
Merenptah; and so the Exodus will have taken place between c. 1240
and c. 1220 B.C. Thus, according to the best available authorities, the
interval between Abraham and the Exodus will be some 900 years.
It is however evident that such a period is inconsistent with the
Biblical figures, — whether the 645 of the Heb. text, or the 430 of
the Sam. and lxx. (5) There is no external evidence enabling us to
Tliat the probable absolute date of the Exodus differs from the Biblical
date, B.C. 1491, is not a serious diflBculty: tlie date 1491 rests essentially upon
the 480 (lxx. 440) years of 1 K. vi. 1, which is opeu to the suspicion of not
being really traditional, but as having been arrived at by computation (e.g. of
12 generations of 40 years each).
^ See the note on p. 156 in the Addenda.
2 Piot'essor bayce's date for Ramses II., b.o. 1348 — 1281 {Mon. 230, 242), quoted
here in previous editions, is that fixed by the astronomer Mahler iu 1«90: but
though it is true that a 'Sothic' period (see the note on p. xxxiii in the Addenda)
began in b.c. 1318, it seems that Mahler was mistaken in supposing that a certain
horoscope in the Ramesseura connected the beginning of this period with Ramses'
30th year (Eisenlohr, PSBA. 1895, p. 282; Meyer, Aeg. Chronol., 1904, p. 38).
The date 1348 — 1281 for Ramses II., and with it Prof. Sayce's date for the Exodus,
B.C. 1277, conseciuently fail through altogether.
XXX INTRODUCTION [§ 2
fix the date of Jacob's migration into Egypt: the personal name of
the Pharaoh with whom Joseph and Jacob had to do is not mentioned;
and there is nothing in the Book of Genesis which enables us either
to conjecture his identity or even to judge of the djmasty to which
he belonged. All that we can say is that, if the Israelites were 430
years in Egypt, and the Exodus took place c. 1230 B.C., the Pharaoh of
Joseph will have been one of the Hyksos kings (who ruled, according
to Petrie, from B.C. 2098 to 1587, or, according to Meyer and Breasted,
from c. B.C. 1680 to 1580). (6) The 430 years of Ex. xii. 40, 41 (Heb.
text) are in substantial agreement with the 400 years of Gen. xv. 1 3.
If however (see 4) a period as long as 900 years intervened between
Abraham and the Exodus, it is evident that the Israelites must have
been in Egypt for much more than the 430 years of the Heb. text,
— to say nothing of the 215 years of the Sam. and lxx. And the
'fourth generation' of Gen. xv. 16 cannot even embrace as much as
400 years; for though (cf. the note, and Ex. vi. 16, 18, 20, vii. 7 P)
it might perhaps have been assumed that a generation in the later
patriarchal period equalled 100 years, it is not credible that it should
have done so in reality*.
The only conclusion which the facts thus snmmed up justify is
that the chronology of the Book of Genesis, — which is, in effect, P's
chronology, — in spite of the ostensible precision of its details, has no
historical value. The sole value which it possesses is that it sets before
us the manner in which the author himself viewed the chronology of
the period, and the perspective in which he placed the various person-
ages who figure in it. It is an artificial system, which must have been
arrived at in some way by computation ; though the data upon which
it was calculated have not at present been ascertained*. For the
entire period, the only synchronisms with external history which we
at present possess, are those of Abraham with Amraphel (supposing
the ordinary view of ch. xiv. to be accepted), and of the building of
Ra'amses and Pithom with Ramses II. And if, as there seems no
sufl&cient reason for doubting, the dates assigned to these kings are
approximately correct, and there is an interval between them approach-
1 It is remarkable that P's genealogies (see on xv. 16) should assign just four
generations for the same period (Levi, Kohath, 'Amram, Moses; Levi, Kohath,
Izhar, Korah; Eeuben, Pallu, Eliab, Dathan and Abiram: the somewhat longer
one in Nu. xxvi. 28 — 33, xxvii. 1, Jos. xvii. 3, including Gilead, the name of a
country, must be artificial: cf. p. liv). It is possible that the 'fourth generation,'
though incorrect in fact, had nevertheless, when the actual period had been
forgotten, acquired a conventional currency in tradition.
^ For a conjecture as to part of it, see below, p. 80.
§3] CHRONOLOGY OF GENESIS xxxi
ing 900 years, the period between Abraham and Moses must be far
greater than is allowed for by the chronology of the Pentateuch^
§ 3. The Historical Value of the Booh of Genesis.
a. The prehistoric period {chs. i. — xi.).
On the Biblical narrative of the Creation (Gen. i.) enough has been
said on pp. 19 — 33. It has been there shewn that while the progress
of scientific discovery in modem times has left the theological value of
this sublimely-conceived narrative unimpaired, it has made it evident
that it possesses no claim to contain a scientific account of the origin
of the world, or to describe, — even in popular language, — the process
by which actually the universe was constituted in its present order,
and the earth was gradually adapted to become the home of its
wondrous succession of ever-progressing types of life. For our know-
ledge of the stages, so far as they can be determined, advancing with
slow and measured steps through unnumbered ages, by which in the
providence of God these eflFects were produced, and of the movements,
on the one hand of colossal magnitude, on the other of far more than
microscopic minuteness, by which the existing fabric of the universe
has been marvellously built up, we must go to the mathematical and
physical sciences, not to the Bible.
It remains now to consider the historical value of the statements of
Genesis, so far as they relate to the early history of mankind. And
as we have seen, the date fixed by them for the creation of man is
equivalent to B.C. 4157, or (according to the higher figures of the lxx.)
B.C. 5328. It is however certain that man existed upon the earth long
before even the earlier of these dates, and that the vicissitudes through
which the human race passed have been far more diversified, and must
have occupied a far longer period to accomplish, than is allowed for by
the Biblical narrative.
The great antiquity of man upon the earth is apparent from the
following considerations.
1. It is the unanimous opinion of Assyriologists that in Babylonia
the beginnings of civilization are to be found long before B.C. 4000.
Thus Professor R. W. Rogers, a most cautious and guarded American
1 Cf. Sayce, EUH. 143 — 146, who, after a discussion of the pnbject, arrives at
the conclusion that the chronology of the OT. is of no value until we reach the
time of David.
xxxii INTRODUCTION [§ 3
Assyriologist, writes \ *If we call up before us the land of Babylonia,
and transport ourselves backward until we reach the period of more
than 4000 years before Christ, we shall be able to discern here and
there signs of life, society, and government in certain cities. Civiliza-
tion has already reached a high point, the arts of life are well
advanced, and men are a!)le to write down their thoughts and deeds
in intelligible language and in permanent form. All these presuppose
a long period of development running back through millenniums of
unrecorded time.* And he proceeds to give particulars of some of the
kings at this early date. — for instance, of Lugal-zaggisi, who at about
B.O. 4000 made Uruk (the Erech of Gen. x. 10) his capital, whose
inscriptions engraved on vases have been found among the debris of
the temple at Nippur (50 m. SE. of Babylon), and who claims to have
been invested with the 'kingdom of the world,' and to have ruled
'from the lower sea of the Tigris and the Euphrates to the upper sea'
(the Mediterranean Sea). Sargon of Accad, who (p. 173 n.) conquered
the 'land of the Amorites,' lived, according to Nabu-na'id, the last
native king of Babylon (b.c. 555 — 538), 3200 years before himself',
i.e. at about B.C. 3800. The kings of Lagash — now Telloh, about
80 miles SE. of Nippur — have left monuments of themselves, —
sculptured stones, with inscriptions^ — belonging substantially to the
same age. Mr Boscawen^ upon the basis of M. de Morgan's excava-
tions, concludes that civilization began in Susa before B.c. 5000 ; and
after citing part of an inscription of more than 2000 lines, carved on
the four faces of a granite obelisk found at Susa, and containing an
account of payments made by a king called Manishtu-irba, in con-
nexion with certain estates, remarks upon the striking evidence
afforded by it of the antiquity of civilization in these parts : ' Here,
in an inscription more than 6000 years old, we have a complete system
of commerce, land estimated at corn value, and a currency and system
of weights based on the sexagesimal scale. This alone is proof of long
and continued usage.' It must indeed be evident that, if empires
were founded, public buildings constructed, and writing, — even in the
difficult cuneiform script, — and other arts familiarly practised, as early
» Hist, of Bnh. avd Asf. (New York, 1900), i. 349 f.
^ The correctness of tliis statement has beeu questioned; but it is accepted by
most Assyrioloj^'ists (e.g. Sayce, Exp. Times, x. 25; L. W. King, EncB. i. 437;
Maspero.'i. 599 n.; cf. Rogers, i. 318 f., 337).
» Anatic Quarterly Eeview, Oct. 1901, pp. 333 f., 350, 352. The inscriptions
found by M. de Morgan are published, with translations, in Scheil'e Textes Elamitei-
S6mitiques, n. (1900).
§ 3] THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN xxxiii
as B.C. 4000, the beginnings of civilization in Babylonia must have
i)receded this date by a period which, if impossible to estimate pre-
cisely by years, must nevertheless have been very considerable. It is
also to be noticed that already at this early date two distinct races,
speaking two distinct languages, meet in B.-ibylonia : the old Sumerian
population of the country, and the Semitic immigrants, who are
gradually superseding them\
The same lesson has been taught by exploration in Egypt. Menes,
the founder of the first of the 31 dynasties enumerated by Mangtho,
is assigned by Petrie to B.C. 4777, and by Meyer and Breasted to
c. B.C. 3400^ But in 1897 the tomb of Menes was discovered by
M. de Morgan at Nak^da, about 30 miles N. of Thebes; and the
objects of art,— incised ivory, vases, statuettes, &c., — and hiero-
glyphics, found in it', shew that the civilization of Egypt was already
far advanced. The huge and skilfully-constructed pyramids of the
fourth dynasty,— beginning B.C. 3998 (Petrie), or B.C. 2S00 (Meyer)
— and the remarkable finish of the sculptures, paintings, and other
works of art*, belonging to this dynasty, support the same conclusion.
Nor is this all. Between 1894 and 1901 excavations, carried on
principally by Petrie, Am(5lineau, and de Morgan, in the tombs at
NakMa and Gebel^n (in the same neighbourhood) brought to light
remains of a ' pre-dynastic ' period (i. e. of a period preceding Menes),
extending at least 7 — 800 years before Menes, in which the inhabitants
of the Nile Valley, though they had not yet developed the arts
practised in the early ' dynastic ' period", displa3^ed a marvellous skill
in fashioning flint into weapons, tools, and implements of all kinds;
they were also clever in the manufacture of pottery, although the
^ Other authorities give similar dates for the earliest known kings of Bahylonia,
an Hommel, DB. i. 224 (before b.o. 4000), King, EncB. i. 44'2; Pinches, OT. in the
light, etc. p. 124 (of. 150). In the galleries of the British Museum, many objects
and inscriptions are marked with a date 4500 B.o. See also the very instructive
shilling Guide to the Bab. and Ass. Antiquities of the Brit. Museum (1900), pp. xi,
3, 80, 124.
' In explanation of these divergences, see the note in the Addenda.
8 See Masp. i. ed. 4 (1901), pp. 232 b, 233; Budge, Hist, of Eg. i. 171,
177—192.
* See in Masp. i. 859 — 379 illustrations of the pyramids, and contomporary
diorite statues, of the kings of this dynasty.
^ See the careful comparison of pre-dynastic and early dynastic civilization in
Epypt, as illustrated by objects found in tombs, with a summary of results, in G. A.
Reisner's The Early Dynastic Cemeteries of Naga-ed-De)- (in the University of Cali-
fornia Publications), Leipzig, 1908, pp. 126 — 135. The earliest tombs at present
ixplored are dated by Reisner 7—800 years before Menes (Meyer's date). Copper
implements first appear in the middle of the pre-dynastic period (pp. 114 — 7).
xxxiv INTRODUCTION [| 3
potter's wheel was unknown to them^ The flint implements belong to
the ' neolithic ' stage of civilization (see p. xli) : but numerous imple-
ments belonging to the earlier "' palaeolithic ' age have also been found
in Egypt^ Sir John Evans, the leading authority in England upon
archaic stone implements, after a review of the evidence, concludes
(on the basis of Petrie's dates) that the 'neolithic' age cannot have
come to its close later than B.C. 5000, ' fully a thousand years before
the date which many of us in our childhood were taught to assign
for the Creation of the Universe^.' Aud the perfection of work-
manship, shewn by the flaked and fluted flint knives, would seem to
indicate that this age must have begun in Egypt long previously*.
2. The evidence afforded by the differences of language and race
points to the same conclusion, and shews indeed that the antiquity of
man upon earth must extend far beyond even the dimmest beginnings
of either Babylonian or Egyptian civilization. As is shewn on p. 133 f.,
the narrative of the Tower of Babel cannot give an historically true
account of the origin of different languages : for (1) we possess in-
scriptions of a date greatly earlier than that at which the confusion of
tongues is placed, — in fact as early, at least, as B.C. 4000, — written in
three entirely distinct languages, the pre-Semitic Sumerian, the Semitic
Babylonian, and the Egyptian ; (2) to take but one of these languages,
the Babylonian : as Prof. J. F. McCurdy points out", it has already
at this date assumed the form which it exhibits 3000 years later ;
i.e. it exhibits signs of 'advanced phonetic degeneration,' and difiers
from Hebrew, Aramaic and the other Semitic languages almost exactly
as it does afterwards : how many thousands of years must we con-
sequently go back beyond B.C. 4000, before we reach the time when the
common ancestors of all the Semitic peoples lived together, and spoke
a common language ! (3) radical differences of language, — i.e. not such
differences as have developed by gradual differentiation from a com-
mon parent-tongue, but differences distinguishing languages entirely
um'elated to each other (as, for instance, Latin and Chinese), are
1 Budge, I. 49 £f., 84 ff., 92 ff., 101 f. (with illustrations): comp. p. 102 ff. (the
contents of their graves). The flint implements (with other objects) are found
interred with the dead, — no doubt with the idea, widely prevalent among peoples of
primiuve culture, that they would be of use in a future life.
-* Budge, I. 87 f.. Ill f. ; King and Hall, Egypt and West. Asia (1907), pp. 5—14.
^ TJie Antiquity of Alan., icith especial reference to the Stone Age in Egypt (an
Address delivered in the Town Hall, Birmingham, Oct. 25, 1899, before the
Birmingham and Midland Institute), pp. lo, 14.
* ibid. pp. 10, 11. 6 i,]j^ V. 88.
§3] THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN xxxv
dependent upon differences of race, wliich are not accounted for by
the Biblical narrative.
Something like 100 families of lan^iage are known, all entirely unrelated to
each other, i.e. all so differing from each other that none could have arisen out
of any of the others by either development or decay, and each comprising
mostly a variety of individual languages or groups of languages^ Languages
belonging to different families, now, differ from each other not only radically
in vocabulary and grammar, but also, very frequently, in a manner which it is
more diflBcult for those, liite ourselves, familiar with only one type of language,
to realize, viz. ' morphologically,' or in the manner in which ideas are built up
into a sentence. Different races do not think in the same way ; and con-
sequently the forms taken by the sentence in the languages spoken by them
are not the same. The five main morphological types of language are the
* inflectional ' (W. Asia and Europe), the 'agglutinative' (Turkey, Central Asia,
Pacific Islands, many parts of Africa), the 'incorporating' (Basque), the
'isolating' (E. Asia), and the 'polysynthetic' (America)". These morpliological
types are characteristic of particular races: thus the different families of
language spoken in America, though utterly unrelated to each other, are
nevertheless all 'polysynthetic' It will follow, also, from what has been said
respecting the nature of 'families' of language, that they must either have
arisen independently, in virtue of the faculty of creating language possessed
by man (below, p. 55), at different centres of human life^, or more probably,
perhaps, have been developed gradually, at the same time that races were
developed, out of some very primitive, inorganic type of speech*.
Comparative philology thus teaches that radical differences of
language depend upon, and presuppose, differences of race. Differences
of race, however, are not explained by the Biblical narrative ; for
though Gen. x. is ostensibly an explanation of the origin of different
nations, and though Gen. xi. 1 — 9 might conceivably be understood as
such, if it could be supposed that at the dispersion there described
small groups of men, speaking the different languages which then
arose, migrated into different quarters of the earth, and so became the
founders of different nationahties, yet (as will appear directly) no
adequate explanation is thereby obtained of the racial differences
exhibited by mankind, which must, in point of fact, have had their
starting-point in an age vastly anterior to that at which either Gen. x.
or Gen. xi. is assigned by the Biblical chronology.
3. The consideration of differences of race leads to the same
conclusion. It is impossible here to particularize details ; but it may
^ See Kayce, Science of Language (1880), ii. 33 — 64,
* See fuitber particulars in Sayce, op. cit. i. 118 — 132, 374 ff., ii. 188 ff.
* 8ayco, ibid. ii. y22, 323.
* Keane, Ethnology (Cambridge, 1901), pp. 159, 105, 197 f., 20y— 215.
D. /
xxxvi INTRODUCTION [§ 3
be mentioned generally that differences of race include many distinct
features — the colour of the skin, the physical structure and arrange-
ment of the hair, the stature and proportions of the body, the shape
of the skull, the contour of the face, the mental capabilities and
character. They are also in many cases, as hardly needs to be pointed
out, strongly marked : we are all familiar with the differences between
the Chinaman, the Negro, and ourselves ; and there are many other
races which, though they may be less familiarly known, are not less
markedly distinguished from each other — for instance, the chocolate-
coloured iVustralians, the light-brown Maoris, the reddish-brown native
tribes of America, the yellow-hued Mongolians of Central Asia and
China, the tall Patagonians, and the diminutive Bushmen of South
Africa'. With the schemes that have been proposed for classifying
these and the other races, or sub-races, of mankind we are not here
concerned*: what more concerns us is the great permanence of type
which, so far as we can observe them, these racial varieties mostly
exhibit : as depicted on the Egyptian monuments, Egyptian and Negro
differed 4000 years ago as they differ now; races transplanted into new
climates retain their former physical characteristics practically un-
changed ; while conversely physically different races, such as the
Negros and Bushmen in Africa, shew no tendency to approximate to
each other, even under the influence of the same climate and the same
general physical surroundings.
It has, now, been much debated among ethnologists whether man
appeared originally upon the globe at one centre or at many centres.
The former of these alternatives is preferred by modern scientific
authorities. Thus Mr Darwin, after reviewing the arguments on both
sides, sums up in its favour — upon the ground, stated generally, that
the resemblances, physical and mental, between different races are such
that it is extremely improbable that they should have been acquired
independently by aboriginally distinct species or races*. But, which-
* See Sayce, Races of the OT. 14—24; or, in greater detail, Tylor, Anthropology,
chap. III., Keane, Ethnology, chaps, viii. ('Physical criteria of race'), and ix.
(' Mental criteria of race'). There are reasons for thinking that the colour of the
skin in primitive man was yellowish (Keane, p. 237).
2 See Keane, p. 163 ff.
8 Darwin, Descent of Man, vol. i. oh. vii. (pp. 231—233, ed. 1871). The argu-
ment of course assumes that Man is the result of an evolutionary process, not of a
special creation. The same conclusion is expressed by Lyell, Principles of Oeology^^
(1875), II. chap. 43; Huxley, Collected Essays, vii. 249 ff.; Tylor, art. Anthropology
in the Encycl. Brit.^, and in his volume Anthropology (1895), p. 6; and Keane,
ch. VII. ('The specific unity of man'), who however considers the existing races of
mankind to have developed not from a single human pair, but from a single pair of
§ 3] THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN xxxTii
ever of these alternative!? be adopted, it must be evident that differences
of race are not accounted for in the Biblical nanative : the case of the
several primary races originating independently at different centres, is
not contemplated in it at all : if, on the other hand, racial differences
were giadually developed by the play of natural selection upon the
descendants of a single pair, migrating into new climatic and other
physical conditions, then the growth of these differences is neither
explained by the Biblical narrative, nor, in fact, reconcileable with it.
For, taking account only of the simplest and most obvious division of
mankind into the white, the yellow, the reddish-brown, and the black
races', even Gen. x., with the single exception of Gush (Jer. xiii. 23), —
and, possibly, of Magog (if by this are meant the Scythians), —
enumerates only tribes and nations belonging to the white race ; while
from the observed persistency of racial types, as noticed above, it
seems clear that, if the four mentioned races, with the many sub-races
included in each, all differing very materially from each other, have
been developed from a single original pair, the process must have
occupied a greatly longer period of time than is allowed by the Book
of Genesis, even though we adopt the view that the Deluge was a
merely local inundation, and place the starting-point of the growth
of racial distinctions at the Biblical date for the creation of man,
B.C. 4157, or (lxx.) B.C. 5328'.
4. The high antiquity of man is attested also by evidence, which
cannot be gainsaid, from another quarter. During the last half-century
or so, relics of human workmanship have been found, chiefly in England,
Belgium, and France, but also in other ]iarts of the world, including
America, shewing that man, in a rude and primitive stage of develop-
ment, ranged through the forests and river- valleys of these continents,
in company with mammals now extinct, at an age which cannot
indeed be measured precisely in years B.C., but which, upon the most
moderate estimate, cannot be less than 20,000 years from the present
anthropoid ancestors, stinding ranch further back in the evolutionary pedigree
(pp. 223—5, 229, 239 f.; of. the diagiams, pp. 19, 38, 224).
^ Corresponding in general to the Caucasian, the Mongol, the native American
and the Negro races. See in detail Keane, cbap. x. (' The main divisions of the
Hominidae'), chaps, xi. — xiv. (the survey of each group in particular).
' Comp. Sir W. H. Flower, Encycl. Brit.' xv. 445 ( = Flower and Lydekker,
Hist, of Mavimals, 1891, 741, 742!.), who speaks of the 'vast antiquity of man,'
and of the 'long ante-historic period, during which the Negro, the Mongolian, and
the Caucasian races were being gradually fashioned into their respective types';
and Sayce, Racet of the OT. ^. 37, who expresses himself similarly. j. c)
XXXVlll
INTRODUCTION
[§3
Tertiary
day'. Here is an enlarged Table of the 'Cainozoic' age, embracing
the perioda numbered 11 and 12 on p. 21*:
'1. Eocena Orders and families of mammals now living
(e.g. ancestral forme of the horse, the deer,
and the hyaena) represented, but not living
genera or species.
2. Meiocene. Genera of mammals now living represented,
but not species,
3. Pleiocena Living species of mammals begin to appear,
but are still rare: extinct species abundant.
/4. Pleistocene. Living species more abundant Man appears.
Extinct species rarer.
5. 'Prehistoric.' Liviug species (including Man) abundant,
i Animals domesticated, and fruits culti-
vated. Only one extinct species of mam-
mal (the Irish elk).
^8. Historift No extinct species. Historical records.
Post-Tertiary
or
Quaternary
In the first four of these periods the geography and climate of
Europe both underwent many changes. Thus. in the Eocene period the
British Isles were probably united with the present Continent of Europe
on the one side, and with the Faroe Islands, Iceland, and Greenland on
the other ; and there was a partially enclosed sea extending from about
the coast of Dorsetshire to Denmark. The climate of Britain was then
tropical : the sea just spoken of teemed with sharks, rays, sea-snakes,
&c., alligators and turtles abounded on the banks of the Thames, and the
land was covered with a luxuriant vegetation. In the Pleiocene period
the climate becomes colder : the elephant now appears in France, and
the first hving species of mammal, the common hippopotamus, is found
in the same country and in Italy. The Pleistocene period is remarkable
on account of the alternations of climate by which it was marked. At
first there was severe cold : and thick beds of glaciers covered most of
Scotland, Ireland, the NW. parts of England and Wales, as also the
greater part of N. and central Europe. Then, as many think, came
a submergence, reducing Britain to clusters of glacier-covered islands
rising out of the sea, and surrounded by icebergs, till after a while tlie
climate grew warmer and the glaciers disappeared. After this a period
1 The late Sir Joseph Prestwich, a peolopist not addicted to rash or extreme
opinions, assigned, as a ' rough a})proxiniate limit,' a period of from 20,000 to
30,000 years from the present time (Geology, 188S, ii. 534).
2 The following statements are made on the authority of Boyd Dawkins, Early
Man in Britain (1880), pp. 9f., 12, 18 f., 81, 115 ff., 150 fl"., 257, &c.: but statement's
to the same effect will be found in any recent manual of geology, — e.g. Geikie'a
Class-book of Geology (1902), pp. 394 ff., 404 ff. See also Keane's Ethnology, ch. iv.
§ 3] THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN xxxix
of cold supervened : the glaciers and icebergs reappeared ; the British
Isles again rose above the sea, — this time, however, no longer united
to Greenland, though still forming part of a large N. -Westerly ex-
tension of France, Holland and Denmark : finally, the climate again
became temperate. Thus there were in Britain two ' glacial ' periods,
and an intervening warmer * inter-glacial ' period. Similar climatal
changes took place in what is now the Continent of Europe : in the N.
and central parts there are still numerous marks of the former presence
of glaciers.
Indubitable traces of man first become abundant in the later
Pleistocene period\ On the slopes of river-valleys such as those of the
Ouse or the Somme, 60 or 100 ft. above the present river-banks, there
are beds of what is called drift-gravel, deposited by the river when
it flowed at a much higher level than it does at present; and
in this drift-gravel, side by side with the remains of various extinct
mammals, have been found numerous rude implements of flint chipped
by the hands of men, sometimes into flakes, sometimes into pear-
shaped, or pointed, hatchets, or scrapers ''. Geology shews that these
drift-gravels were deposited during the middle and later Pleistocene
period. The animals with whose remains these implements are found
appear to shew that on the Continent of Europe man was pre-glacial
and inter-glacial (i.e. that he advanced from the S. northwards in the
warmer inter-glacial periods mentioned above), but that in England,
at least N. of the Thames, he was only post-glacial (i.e. that he
appeared in this country only after the ice had finally left it). And
so in this remote age, jmlaeolithic man, or the * river-drift hunter,' as
he has been called, lived a rude hunter's life in the lower valley of the
Thames, side by side with vast herds of reindeer, bisons, horses, and
uri, the woolly rhinoceros and the elephant, the hippopotamus and
the lion, and many other creatures, now entirely unknown in this
^ Some authorities (among whom was Sir J. Prestwich) think that traces of a
yet earUer race of men have been found in the 'eoliths,' or flints, very rude in shape,
and but slightly chipped, occurring in older gravels and at yet higher levels. OtherS:
however, maintain these to be natural forms.
2 On the question whether these are really implements of human workmanship,
Bee Lord Avebury (Sir J, Lubbock), Prehistoric Times, ed. 6 (1900), p. 328. No
geologist doubts that they are. Similar implements are made at the present day
by savages such as the native Australians (Tylor, Anthropology, p. 186) and
Tasmanians (Keane, p. 293). For further particulars on the subject, see Sir
J. Evans, The Ancient Stone Implements, Weapons, and Ornaments of Great Britain^
(1897), (on their antiquity, pp. 703—9). In one of the galleries of the British
Museum, there is a large collection of these implements, both of the earlier and
later Stone age, arranged as far as possible chronologically : gee descriptions, with
illustrations, in the shilling QuidLe to these cmtiquities (1902).
xl INTRODUCTION [§ 3
island*. And there is evidence that he lived under similar conditions
in other parts of central and southern England, in France, Belgium,
and elsewhere on the Continent. In particular, in a cave in Dordogne,
in the valley of the Vez^re, a little E. of Bordeaux, there has been
found the drawing of a mammoth — a huge kind of elephant, which has
left many remains of itself, but has now been long extinct — incised by
human hands upon a piece of its own ivory, which must date from the
same period''. Marks of the presence of man in the same age have
also been found in Africa, Palestine, and India: the diffusion of the
same stage of culture over countries so widely separated from each
other is an indication that it must have been of long duration*.
Whether, however, even palaeolithic man is rightly termed ' primitive ' is
doubted by Dr Tyler. ' The life which the men of the mammoth- period must
have led at Abbeville or Torquay, shews on the face of it reasons against its
being man's primitive life. These old stone-age men are more likely to have
been tribes whose ancestors while living under a milder climate gained some
rude skill in the arts of procuring food and defending themselves, so that
afterwards they were able by a hard struggle to hold their own against the
harsh weather and fierce beasts of the Quaternary period' {Anthropology,
p. 33).
In the later part of the palaeolithic period, a somewhat higher
stage of culture appears, represented by the Cave man, belonging, it
may be, to another race, perhaps (Dawkins) allied to the Eskimos.
Relics of the workmanship of the Cave man are found, for instance, in
caves in a valley between Derby and Nottingham, in Kent's Hole, near
Torquay, and in different parts of Belgium, France, Germany, &c.
Improved flint implements, bone needles and awls, harpoon heads of
antler, and especially drawings of horses, reindeer, and other animals,
testify to the advance in culture of the Cave man, as compared with
the river-drift hunter of the earlier part of the palaeolithic age*.
The Pleistocene period, says Mr Dawkins, was of ' vast duration ' ;
and the river-drift man ' probably lived for countless generations before
the arrival of the Cave-men, and the appearance of the higher culture '
(pp. 231, 233).
The 'prehistoric' period is marked by the advent of neolithic
mem, i.e. of man belonging to the newer stone period, in which his
stone implements were often polished, and in other respects also
1 Dawkins, pp. 137, 155 f., 172 f.
2 See Dawkins, p. 105; Tylor, p. 31; Lyell, Antiquity of Man, ed. 4, p. 139.
* Dawkins, pp. 165 — 7, 172 f.
* On PalaeoUthio man, see also Keaiie, ch. r. (with lUustrationB).
§3] THE A:NTIQUITY OF MAN xli
display a higher type of workmanship. In the course of this period,
culture considerably advanced : the soil was cultivated, animals were
domesticated, wood was cut with stone axes fixed in wooden handles,
spears, arrows, &c. were manufactured, and clay was moulded into
rude cups and other vessels : the dead began also now to be buried in
barrows or cairns. It is to this period that at least the earlier of the
famous pile-dwellings, constructed in some of the Swiss lakes, belong :
the inhabitants of these lake-villages cultivated many seeds and fruits
familiar to ourselves. The neolithic men appear to have belonged to
a different race from their predecessors, the Cave men, and entered
Europe, it is generally agreed, from the East or South. The duration
of the neolithic civilization varied in different countries : it main-
tained itself, for instance, in northern and central Europe long after it
had yielded to a higher culture in Greece and Italy, and also, it may
be added, till long after highly organized empires had been estabhshed
in Eg)rpt and Babylonia \
The neolithic period was followed by the Bronze age, during which
iron either was not known, or could not be worked, and when aU
weapons and cutting instruments were made of bronze, — the only other
metal known being gold, which was used for ornaments. Most nations
have passed through a Bronze age, though not all at the same time :
the Spaniards, for instance, when they conquered Mexico and Peru,
found the natives working in bronze with some skill, but knowing
nothing of iron.
The Bronze age was succeeded by the Iron age, which began with
the first introduction of iron for the manufacture of weapons and
cutting instruments, and which has continued, — with of course immense
developments in every direction, — to the present day.
The general conclusion to which the facts mentioned in the pre-
ceding pages point can hardly be better summed up than in the words
of Dr Tylor: 'It is true that man reaches back comparatively little
way into the immense lapse of geological time. Yet his first appear-
ance on earth goes back to an age CQmpared with which the ancients,
as we call them, are but moderns. The few thousand years of recorded'
history only take us back to a prehistoric period of untold length,
during which took place the primary distribution of mankind over the
earth and the development of the gi'e'at races, the formation of speech
and the settlement of the great families of language, and the growth of
^ On Neolithic man, oomp, also Eeane, oh. vi.
xlii INTRODUCTION [§ 3
culture up to the levels of the old world nations of the East, the fore-
runners and founders of modern civilized life^'
In what hght, then, in view of this conclusion, are we to view the
representation contained in the early chapters of Genesis ? The facts
cannot be denied : yet the narrative of Genesis takes no account of
them, and, indeed, leaves no room for them. The great antiquity of
man, the stages of culture through which he passed (comp. the note
on iv. 17 — 24), and the wide distribution of the human species, with
strongly marked racial differences, over the surface of the earth are
all alike unexplained, and inexplicable, upon the historical system of
Gen. i. — xi. No doubt, Gen. x. and xi. 1 — 9 explain ostensibly the
distribution of man ' over the face of the whole earth ' ; but after what
has been said, it wiU be evideijt that they do not do so in reality : the
dispersion is placed too late to account for the known facts respecting
both the distribution of man and the diversity of races. To say that
the Biblical writers spoke only of the nations of whom they knew is
of course true: bat the admission deprives their statements of all
historical or scientific value : ' palaeolithic ' and ' neolithic ' man, and
the various distinct races inhabiting Central and Eastern Asia,
Australia, America, &c., all existed ; and any explanation, purporting
to account for the populations of the earth, and the diversity of
languages spoken by them, must take cognizance of them. An ex-
planation not taking account of the facts to be explained can be no
historically true account either of the diffusion of mankind, or of the
origin of different races. We are forced therefore to the conclusion
that though, as may be safely assumed, the writers to whom we owe
the fii'st eleven chapters of Genesis, report faithfully what was currently
believed among the Hebrews respecting the early history of mankind, at
the same time, as is shewn in the notes, making their narratives the
vehicle of uviay moral and spiritual lessons, yet there was much which
they did not know, and could not take cognizance of: these chapters,
consequently, we are obliged to conclude, incomparable as they are in
other respects, contain no account of the real beginnings either of the
earth itself, or of man and human civilization upon it^
* Anthropology, p. 34.
' Mr Capron (Conflict of Truth, 270 — 85) has devised an extraordinary method
(cf. below, p. 24 71.) for 'reconciUng' the great antiquity of man with the statements
of Genesis: man, he supposes, may have existed long before as a natural being;
Genesis describes only his elevation into a spiritual being by the super-adding of
spiritual faculties. But it is surely the intention of Genesis to describe both the
beginnings of man, and also his beginnings as a complete being ; one can hardl}'
§ 3] THE PATRIARCHAL NARRATIVES xliii
b. The patria/rclial period (chs. xii. — I!).
It remains to consider the historical character of Gen. xii. — ^1., the
narratives of the patriarchal period. Here it must at the outset be
frankly admitted that these narratives do not satisfy the primary
condition which every first-class historical authority must satisfy : they
are not contemporary (or nearly so) with the events which they purport
to relate : even if Moses were their author, he lived many centuries
after Abraham — according to Ussher's chronology 400 years, in reality
(p. xxix), — if we adopt for Abraham's date the only fixed datum that
we possess, the synchronism with Hammurabi (p. 156), — some 900
years; aud upon the critical view of the date of these narratives,
the interval is of course still greater, — in fact, between Abraham
and J, something like 1300 years. The supposition that the writer
(or writers) of Genesis may have based his (or their) narratives upon
written documents, contemporary with the events described, does not
alter the case : there is no evidence, direct or indirect, that such
documents were actually used as the basis of the narrative ; and upon
a mere, hypothesis, for the truth of which no positive grounds can be
alleged, and which therefore may or may not be true, it must be
apparent that no further conclusions of any value can be built. It is
not denied that the patriarchs possessed the art of writing ; but the
admission of the fact leads practically to no consequences ; for we do
not know what they wrote, and there is no e-zidence that they left any
written materials whatever behind them.
These facts, it is evident, must seriously diminish the confidence
which we might otherwise feel as regards the historical character of the
patriarclial narratives. A narrative committed to writing for the first
time, so far as we know, 1000 years or more after the events related
in it occurred, would be regarded under ordinary circumstances as
destitute of historical value ; we could have no guarantee that during
such a long period of oral transmission it had not in many details
become materially modified, — sometimes accidentally, through failure
of memory, sometimes, it may be, intentionally, by the addition, for
instance, of embellishing traits. Are there however any considerations
which might tend to modify this unfavourable conclusion in the case
believe one's eyes when one reads {p. 279) that human nature is to be divided into
four parts, and that Gen. ii. describes the beginning of two of these (material form
and vitality), and Gen. i. the beginning of the other two (intellectuality and
spirituality) ! The explanation of the Fall, proffered on p. 321 f. , is not less out of
the question. Reconciliations of the Bible with science which depend upon forced
exegesis osn never be sound ones.
xKv INTRODUCTION [§ 3
of the patriarchal narratives of Genesis ? We can never indeed regard
them as historical autiiorities in the strictest sense of the word : but
that, be it observed, is a claim which they never make themselves ;
they nowhere claim, even indirectly, to be the work of eye-witnesses ;
and there may be circumstances connected with them which may at
least shew the position to be a tenable one that, though they cannot
be placed in the same rank with, for example, the history of Thucydides,
their contents are nevertheless substantially authentic.
1. In nations possessing no written records, the memory is more
exercised, and more tenacious than it is with us ; and popular stories
once enshrined in the memory of a nation may have been transmitted
substantially unaltered, from father to son, for many generations. The
tenacity of the memory, under such circumstances, is greater than we
can readily imagine ; and there are many surprising instances on record
of its power'. And the memory might be expected to be exceptionally
tenacious, in the case of national records, or accounts of ancient
worthies whose memories were cherished on the part of a nation,
which held itself aloof from its neighbours, and was proud of its
ancestry.
2. The critical analysis of Genesis furnishes an argument of some
weight in favour of the general trustworthiness of the narrative.
Disregarding P (which appears not only to contain in parts artificial
elements, but also to be later than the other sources, so that by the
side of J and E it can hardly claim to represent an independent
tradition), we have two narratives of the patriarchal period, one
written, in all probability, in Judah, the other in the Northern
Kingdom ; and these, though they exhibit discrepancies in detail, still
on the whole agree : though they may contain, for instance, divergent
representations of the same events, they do not present two entirely
contradictory traditions ; in other words, they shew that on the whole
the traditions current in the N. and S. Kingdoms agreed with one
another. They thus bear witness to the existence in ancient Israel of
a ' firm nucleus of consistent tradition ' (Kittel). * The value of this
nucleus is by no means small, for it supplies the fundamental condition
* 'One of the most noted Rawis [reciters], Hammad by name, is said to have
been able to recite 3000 loug poems, all of the time before Mohammed '
(A. B. Davidson, Bibl. and Literary Essays, 1902, p. 26S). See also Grote,
Hist, of Greece, i. 526 — 30, 532 n. (ed. 1862), — with referencp to the oral preservation
of the Homeric poems ; and Max Miiller, Hibbert Lectures (1878), 153, 156 f., on the
oral preservation of the Kig-Veda.
§3] THE PATRIARCHAL NARRATIVES xIt
of a real history. If the traditions were confusedly intennixed, this
would stamp them as arbitrary creations, or the products of popular
fancy. Their not being so, though far from proving them positively to
be historical, justifies the presumption that we may perhaps succeed in
finding a historic core in the patriarchal narratives*.'
3. The patriarchal narratives are marked by great sobriety of
statement and representation. There are no incredible marvels, no
fantastic extravagances, no surprising miracles : the miraculous hardly
extends beyond manifestations and comTQunications of the Deity to the
earlier patriarchs, and in the case of Joseph there are not even these ;
the events of his life move on by the orderly sequence of natural cause
and effect. There is also great moderation in the claims made on
behalf of the patriarchs. Only once, in a narrative taken evidently
from a special source (ch. xiv.), is Abraham represented as gaining
successes in war ; only once also (ch. xxxiv. ; of xlviii. 22) does Jacob
come into hostile collision with the native Canaanites : elsewhere, the
patriarchs live peaceful, quiet lives, neither claiming nor exercising
any superiority over the native princes ; and sometimes even rebuked
by them for their moral weakness. There is also another consideration,
of considerable weight, urged by Ewald. ' Ewald reminds us,' says
Kittel, 'that whilst all the accounts agree in representing it as the
Divine purpose that Abraham and the other patriarchs shall provision-
ally take possession of the land of Canaan, they are never represented
as actually possessing the whole. They confine themselves to particular
small districts in the South (Abraham and Isaac) and centre (Jacob) of
Canaan, and these, for the most part, of minor importance. If the
patriarchs had never actually lived in Canaan, if their abode there and
their very personality had belonged merely to the realm of legend, it
might have been confidently expected that the later legend would have
provided a firmer and more lasting foundation for the Israelites' claim
to the whole land than this mere partial possession by their fathers".'
The moderation of the prophetic outlooks (ch. xii. 2 — 3, &c.) into the
future fortunes of Abraham's descendants, at least in J and E, — for
only P (see on xvii. 6) speaks of 'kings' to be sprung from him, —
might be taken also as an indication that these narrators were keeping
themselves within the limits of a tradition which they had received,
rather than freely creating ideal pictures of their own.
> Kittel, Gesch. der Eebrder (1888), i. 152 (Enpr. tr. i. 168).
» Kittel, I. 154 (Eng. tr. i. 170 f.). See Ewald, Hist. t. 305 f.
xlvi INTRODUCTION [§ 3
4. Do the patriarchal narratives contain intrinsic historical im-
probabilities ? or, in other words, is there anything intrinsically
improbable in the lives of the several patriarchs, and the vicissitudes
through which they personally pass? In considering this question a
distinction must be drawn between the different sources of which these
narratives are composed. Though particular details in them may be
improbable (e.g. xix. 31 flF.), and though the representation may in
parts be coloured by the religious and other associations of the age
in which they were written (cf. p. Iviii ff.), it cannot be said that the
biographies of the first three patriarchs, as told in J and E, are,
speaking generally, historically improbable : the movements, and per-
sonal lives, of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are, taken on the whole,
credible. It is true, the chronology of Genesis cannot, as it stands, be
maintained (see p. xxx) ; but the inconsistencies in it arise out of the
combination of JE with P ; and the critical conclusion that the
narrative of P was originally entirely distinct from that of JE, and
that its chronology is artificial and late, leaves the narratives of J and
E free from difficulty upon this score. Chapter xiv. belongs to a
special source ; so that, whatever verdict be ultimately passed upon it,
our estimate of J and E would remain unafiocted.
It is true, of course, that in parts of J and E we have what seem to
be different versions of the same occurrence ; but this is a fact not in-
consistent with the general historical character of the narrative as a
whole. Only the Joseph-narratives stand in some respects in a position
by themselves. On the one hand, it cannot be denied that improba-
bilities attach to some of the details of these narratives, especially
(p. Ix) to some of those relating to the famine : but these, again, do
not affect the substance of the narratives. It also might be felt by
some that the Joseph-narratives contain more dramatic situations than
are likely to have happened in real life : both Joseph and his brethren
pass through a series of crises and adventures, any one of which might
easily have closed the drama, though all, in fact, lead on happily to
the final denoument. On the other hand, truth is proverbially stranger
than fiction ; and Joseph's biography may not have been more remarkable
than many other biographies in history. The changes in Joseph's
fortunes are of a kind quite natural in Oriental countries : in the general
fact of a foreigner, by a happy stroke of cleverness, winning the favour
of an Eastern despot, and rising in consequence to high power, there'
is nothing unprecedented ; and in the case of Egypt in particular the
monuments supply examples of foreigners attaining to positions of
§ 3] THE PATRIARCHAL NARRATIVES xlvii
political distinction (see p. 344), It is also worthy of notice that the
biography is in itself entirely free from anything which would tempt a
reader to regard it as legendary : no Deus ex machind appears at any
point of it; if the hand of God is an overruling power in the back-
ground, human motives and human actions are the only overt agencies
by which the web of incident is woven. Of course, in view of the fact
that the Joseph-narratives are plainly not the work of a contemporary
hand, but were, so far as we know, only committed to writing many
hundred years afterwards, these considerations afford no guarantee of
their being a literal record of the facts ; particular episodes or details
may, for instance, have been added during the centuries of oral
transmission : but they do supply reasonable grounds for concluding
that the narratives are in substance historical.
5. As Wellhausen has observed, it cannot be doubted that to
Moses Jehovah was the God of Israel, and Israel the people of Jehovah ;
and also that this truth, though it assumed in Moses' hands a new
;2a^/owaZ significance, was not promulgated by him for the first time'.
'The religious position of Moses stands before us unsupported and
incomprehensible unless we believe the tradition (Ex. iii. 13 E) that
he appealed to the God of their fathers. Moses would hardly have
made his way amongst the people, if he had come in the name of a
strange and hitherto unknown god. But he might reasonably hope for
success, if a fresh revelation had been made to him by the God of
Abraham, T^ho was still worshipped in some circles and still lived in
the memory of the people.' We may also ask, Why, unless there had
been positive historical recollections forbidding it to do so, did not
Israelite tradition concentrate all the glory of founding the national
Church and State upon Moses? If, in spite of the great deliverance
undoubtedly achieved by Moses, Israelitish tradition nevertheless goes
back beyond Moses, and finds in the patriarchs the first roots not only
of the possession of -the land, but also of the people's higlier worship of
God, this can only be reasonably accounted for by the assumption that
memory had retained a hold of the actual course of events*.
1 Wellhausen, Eist. of Isr. 433.
2 With this paragraph, comp. Kittel, p. 174. The undeveloped character of the
patriarchs' religious beliefs — their childlike attitude towards God, for instance, the
freedom and familiarity with which they are represented as approaching Him, their
absence (till xxxix. 9) of a clear sense of sin, or of the need of penitence, and the
fact that such truths as the unity of God, the love of God to man and of man to
God, and the holiness of God, though throughout implied, are not explicitly taught
— has also been pointed to (Watson, The Booh Genesis a true History, 1892,
xlviii INTRODUCTION [§]3
These are virtually all the considerations of any weight which
(apart from theological grounds) can be alleged in favour of the
historical character of the patriarchal narratives. Probabilities of
greater or less weight may be adduced : but with our present know-
ledge, it is impossible to do more\ The case would of course be
different, if there existed contemporary monumental corroboration of
any of the events mentioned in Genesis. But unfortunately no such
corroboration has at present been discovered. With the exception of
the statement on the stel6 of Merenptah that ' Israel is desolated,' —
which may indeed be the 'Egyptian version' of the Exodus, but certainly
does not 'confirm' the Hebrew account of it, — the first event con-
nected with Israel or its ancestors which the inscriptions mention or
attest is Shishak's invasion of Judah in the reign of Rehoboam, and
the fii'st Israelites whom they specify by name are Omri and his son
Ahab*. Upon the history and civilization of Babylonia, Egypt, and
to a certain extent of other countries, including Palestine, in the
centuries before Moses, the monuments have indeed shed an abundant
and most welcome light ; but nothing has hitherto been discovered
sufficiently specific to establish, even indirectly or inferentially, the
historicity of the patriarchs themselves. Thus contemporary inscrip-
tions, recently discovered, have shewn that there were x^morite settlers
in Babylonia, in, or shortly after, the age of Hammurabi, and that
persons bearing Semitic names identical, or nearly so, with those of
some of the patriarchs were resident there in the same age : but these
facts, interesting as they are in themselves, are obviously no corro-
boration of the statements that the particular person called Abraham
lived in Ur and migrated thence to Haran and afterwards to Canaan,
as narrated in Gen. xi. 28, 31.
On the ' Amorite quarter' in Sippar (80 m. NW. of Babylon), in the reign
of Ammi-zaduga, the fourth successor of HamniTirabi, see the footnote, p. 142;
and on the mention of Amorites in Bab. contract-tablets of the same age,
Pinches, 07! in the light of the records of Ass. and Bab. (1902), 157, 17(».
In other contract-tablets of the same period there occur the names Ya'kuh
p. 105 &.), &B tending to establish the historical character of the patriarchal
narratives, at least of J and E. Just as Dr Watson's characterizations are,
however, it may be doubted whether his argument proves more than that these
narratives reached their present form at the time supposed by critics (p. xvi),
which, it will be remembered, was before the age at which the canouical prophets,
Amos, Hosea &c., began to emphasize and develope beliefs and truths such as those
referred to.
1 Cf. Kittel's Bab. Excavations and Early Bible History (1903), p. 37.
* See Hogarth's Authority and Archaeology, pp. 87 f., 89, 93.
§[3] ARCHAEOLOGY AND GENESIS xlix
( = Jacob), and Ya'kub-ilu ( = Jacob el)*, as well as others of Heb. or Canaanite
form; according to Sayce, aloo, tiie name Ishmael occurs on a raarblo slab
from Sippar, which is as early as about 4000 B.C. The persons beariug these
names appear to possess all the rights and privileges of Babylonian citizens^.
The names are interesting as testifying to the intercourse between Babylonia
and the West at this early date, and also as 8he\ving that persons of ap-
parently either Hebrew or Canaanite extraction weie settled then in Baby-
lonia ; but they obviously prove nothing as to the historical character of
Abraham or the other patriarchs.
It is remarkable that a proper name— if not three proper names — com-
pounded apparently, with the Divine name, Yahweh, has been found recently,
dating from the period of Hammurabi. The wiiter of a letter now in the British
Museum bears the name Ya-u-um ilu, the other names are Ya-a^-ve-ilu
and Fa-re-iYw,— all apparently meaning 'Yah is God' ( = 'Joel,' at least as
usually explained). The names are not Babylonian, and must therefore have
belonged to foreigners, — whether Canaanites, or ancestors of the Hebrews.
See Sayce, Exp. Times, Aug. 18.98, p. ;j22, Rdlg. of Anc. Eg. and Bab.
(1902), 484—7, Delitzsch, Bahel und Bihel (1902), 46 f (Bng. tr. 71, and esp.
133 — 141). The names are at present, however, too isolated for inferences to
be drawn from them with any confidence: though they might, for instance,
indicate tliat the Heb. 'Yahweh' was already worshipped, they still would not
tell us what character or attributes were associated witli liim. Mr C. H. W.
Johns, of Queens' College, Cambriilge, permits me to add ' The reading of the
names has been questioned without suiticient ground.' The interpretation
is open to question, as YaiX-ilu or Ya'ce-ilu may mean "God is, or does,
something"' (see further his art. in the Expositor ^ Oct. 19J3, p. 289 ffi, and the
note in the Addenda).
The monuments, again (as is pointed out on p. 172 f.), though they
have thrown some light on the kings' names mentioned in Gen. xiv. 1,
and have shewn that it would be no impossibility for a Babylonian or
Elamite king of the 22nd cent. B.C. to undertake an expedition to
the far West, make no mention of the particular expedition recorded
in Gen. xiv. : they consequently furnish, no independent corroboration
of it; nor do they contribute anything to neutralize the improbabilities
Avhich, rightly or wrongly, have been supposed to attach to details of
it (p. 171 f.). They thus fall far short of demonstrating its historical
^ A name of the same form as Ishmael, ' May God hear I ' Jerahmeel, ' May God
be compassionate 1' &c. : cf. pp. 182, 295. The statement made here in former
editions, on the authority of Hommel {AHT. 74«., 96?i.), Sayce {EHH. 13—14,
38, 128), and Pinches (p. 148), that the name Ahe-rama ( = 'Abram') appears on
a contract-tablet of the Hammurabi-age, was incorrect : the name was misread by
Hommel; and it is re&lly Ahi-erah: see A. H. Clay, Light on the OT. from Babel
(Philadelphia, 1907), p. 142; Kanke, Fersoncnnamen, p. 58. In Pincheb=* (1908),
p. 148, the comparison is withdrawn. At a much later date, however, Abu-ramu
{ = Abram) does occur as the name of the Ass. official who gave his name to the
5th year of Esarhaddon (b.c. 677) : see KAT.^ p. 479.
' Pinches, pp'. 157, 183, 243; Sayce, Babylonians and Ansyriam, pp. 187—190.
1 INTRODUCTION [§ 3
character'. And still less do they demonstrate that the role attributed
to Abraham in the same chapter is historical. The evidence for both
these facts rests at present solely upon the testimony of the Book of
Genesis itself. Upon the same testimony we may believe Melchizedek
to have been a historical figure, whose memory was handed down by
tradition : but no evidence of the fact is afforded by the inscriptions
(see p. 167 f.).
The case is similar in the later parts of Genesis. The argument
which has been advanced, for instance, to shew that the narrative of
the purchase of the cave of Machpelah (ch. xxiii.) is the work of a
contemporary hand, breaks down completely : the expressions alleged
in proof of the assertion are not confined to the age of Hammurabi ;
they one and all (see p. 230) occur, in some cases repeatedly, in the
period of the kings, and even later : they consequently furnish no
evidence that the narrative was written at any earlier date. There is
no antecedent reason why Abraham should not have purchased a plot
of ground near Hebron from the native inhabitants of the place : but
to suppose that this is proven, or even made probable, by archaeology,
is completely to misinterpret the evidence which it furnishes. As
regards the Joseph-narratives, it is undeniable that they have an
Egyptian colouring : they contain many allusions to Egyptian usages
and institutions, which can be illustrated from the Egyptian monu-
ments. Moreover, as Kittel has pointed out, this colouring is common
to both J and E : as it is improbable that two writers would have
added it independently, it may be inferred that it was inherent in
the common tradition whi?;h both represent. This is a circumstance
tending to shew that in its origin the Egyptian element was consider-
ably anterior to either J or E, and increases the probability that it
rests ultimately upon a foundation in fact. On the other hand the
extent of the Egyptian colouring of these narratives must not be over-
estimated, nor must the conclusions drawn from it be exaggerated.
The allusions are not of a kind to prove close and personal cognizance
of the facts described : institutions, officials, &c. are described in
general terms, not by their specific Egyptian names*. Egypt, it must
be remembered, was not far distant from Canaan ; and, as the
prophecies of Isaiah, for instance, shew, there was frequent intercourse
* Mr Grote long as^o pointed out the fallacy of argning that because a given
•penon was historical, therefore a particular action or exploit attributed to him by
tradition was historical likewise (Hist, of Greece, Part i., ch. xvii., ed. 1862, vol. i.,
p. 391 f., with reference to legendary exploits attributed to Charlemagne).
' Contrast the long lists of specific titles in Brugsch's Aegyptologie, pp. 206 — 232.
§3]
ARCHAEOLOGY AND GENESIS 11
between the two countries during the monarchy : Isaiah, in the single
chapter (xix.) which he devotes to Egypt, shews considerable acquaint-
ance with the peculiarities of the country. It is a complete illusion to
suppose that the Joseph-narratives can be shewn by archaeology to be
contemporary with the events recorded', or (as has been strangely
suggested) translated from a hieratic papyrus : the statement* that the
Egypt which these narratives bring before us is in particular that of
the Hyksos age is destitute of foundation*.
Among' the names of the places in Palestine conquered by Thothraes III.
of the 18th dynasty (Petrie, b.c. 1503—1449; Meyer, Breasted, 1501—1447),
which are inscribed on the pylons of the Great Temple at Karnak, there occur
1 Notice in this connexion the absence of particulars in the narrative, which a
contemporary would almost naturail}' mention, such as the personal name of the
Pharaoh, and the place in Egypt at which he held his court. The names Potiphar,
Poti-phera', Zaphenath-Pa'neah and Asenath can hardly be genuine ancient
names: see the note on xli. 45.
The Hebrew of the Joseph-narratives is perfectly idiomatic and pure, and shews
no traces whatever of having been translated from a foreign original. It contains
(besides proper names) four or five Egyptian words ; but they are all words which
were naturalized in Hebrew ; they occur in other parts of the Old Testament, and
consequently aliford no clue as to the date of the narratives in which they are found.
They are Pharaoh (see on xii. 15); y^'or, xli. 1, 2, 3, 17, 18, the common Heb. name
for the Nile (Is. vii. 18, and frequently); dhii, 'reed-grass,' xli. 2, 18 (also Job
viii. 11); shesh, 'fine linen,' xli. 42 (also Ex. xxv. 4, and often in Ex. xxvi. — xxviii.,
XXXV. — xxxix. [all P], Ezek. xvi. 10, 13, xxvii. 7, Prov. xxxi. 22); perhaps also
sohar, the name of the prison into which Joseph was cast (see on xxxix. 20), and
hartumvlim, 'magicians' (see on xli. 8); and possibly rdind, 'chain,' xli. 42 and
Ezek. xvi. 11 (see on this word the note * in DB. u. 775'': it is quite uncertain
whether it is really Egyptian).
2 Sayce, EHH. p. 90; of. p. 93.
■ Egyptian institutions were of great fixity; and there is no allusion in these
narratives to any institution or custom known to be characteristic of the Hyksos
age, and not to occur in any later age. Comp. the judgment of Ebers, as cited in
EncB. II. 2594.
Prof. Sayce, it is to be observed, though he comes forward ostensibly as an
enemy of criticism, nevertheless makes admissions which shew that he recognizes
many of its conclusions to be true. Thus he not only asserts the compilatory
character of the Pentateuch {EHH. 129, 134, 203), but in Genesis he finds
(p. 132 f.) two groups of narratives, and 'two Abrahams,' the one 'an Abraham
born in one of the centres of Babylonian civilization, who is an ally of Amorite
chieftains, and whom the Hittites of Hebron address as a "mighty prince"' [the
Abraham of Gen. xiv. and of P], the other 'an Abraham of the Bedawin camp-fire,
a nomad whose habits are those of the rude independence of the desert, whose wife
kneads the bread while he himself kills the calf with which his guests are enter-
tained' [the Abraham of J and E]. The former narrative he considers, though
upon very questionable grounds, to have been based upon contemporary documents,
the latter to have been 'like the tales of their old heroes recounted by the nomad
Arabs in the days before Islam as they sat at night round their camp-fires. The
details and spirit of the story have necessarily caught the colour of the medium
through which they have passed' (p. 62). All the principal details of the patriarchs'
lives are contained in J and E : but if these narratives were handed down for
generations by 'nomad reciters' round their camp-fires, what better guarantee of
their historical truth do we possess than if their memory had been preserved in the
manner supposed above l*
D. 9
lii INTRODUCTION [§ 3
(No8. 78 and 102) the names Y-^-k-b-d-ru and Y-sh-p-Orru ; as the Egyptian I
stands also for r, these names would represent a Canaanitish or Hebrew
Yukob-el, and Yoshep-el; and we learn consequently that places bearing these
names 1 existed in Palestine, apparently in the central part 2, in the 16tli or
loth cent. b.c. The name Jacob itself is thought by many to be an elliptical
form of Jacob-eP ; but whether that be correct or not, it is at least remarkable
to find a place-name, including the name of the patriarch Jacob, in Palestine
at this date. But the information which the name brings us is too scanty to
enable us to found further inferences upon it: if Jacob was a historical person,
his name may have clung to this place in Palestine; on the other hand, the
name may have arisen independently of the patriarch altogether, in which
case it would obviously have no bearing on the question whether he was a
historical person or not ; there are also other conceivable ways in which the
name of the patriarch (whether that of a real person or not) might have been
connected with the place. In Yoshep-el, the sibilant does not properly
correspond to that in Joseph : so that it is doubtful here whether the names
are really the same. However, "W, Max MiiUer allows the identification to be
'possible'*: if it is correct, it is certainly a singular coincidence to find the
names of both patriarchs embodied in place-names in Palestine, though it may
be difficult to determine with confidence how the fact is to be explained.
In lists of tovras in Palestine belonging to the age of Seti I. and his
successor, Ramses II. (the Pharaoh of the oppression), mention is made of a
'mountain of User' or *Aser,' between Tyre and Shechem, and between
Kadesh (on the Orontes) and Megiddo, and approximately, therefore, in the
position occupied afterwards by the tribe of Asher'. W, Max Miiller, Sayce,
and Hommel, accordingly, do not doubt that the tribe of Asher, — or at least
what was reckoned afterwards as the tribe of Asher, — was settled in Palestine
before the other tribes of Israel had even left Egypt. The statement hardly
has a bearing on the historical character of Jacob's son Asher ; though it
ought not to surprise us, if it should ultimately prove that the number of the
sons of Jacob (some of whom, as individuals, i>iay no part in the patriarchal
narratives, and are really notliing more than mere names) was artificially
raised to twelve, because there were in historical times twelve tribes of Israel,
and also that the immigration of the entire nation into Canaan was accom-
plished in reality a good deal more gradually than is represented as having
been the case in Nvl xxxii., Dt. i. — iii., and Joshua i. — xii.
^ Cf. for the form (compounded with El, 'GoJ') the place-names Jezre'el,
Jahne'el, Jos. xv. 11 { = Jahneh, 2 Ch. xxvi. 6), Jiphtah-el, Jos. xix. 14, 27, 'God
sows, builds, opens,' respectively; see also Gray, Heb. Pr. Names, 214 f.
* W. Max Miiller, Asien u. Europa nach Altagypt. Denkmdlem (1893), pp. 159,
* In which case, 'el would be the subject of the verb, and the real meaning of
the nauie would be May God follow (or search out)! or May God reward! or May
God overreach (so. our foes)/ — according as the sense of the root in Aramaic, Arabic,
or Hebrew be adopted.
* Op. cit. pp. 159, 162 f. ; and as cited in EncB. u. 2581—2.
« W. Max Miiller, op. cit. 236—9; Savce, Movumeiits, 244, Pair. Pal. 219,
EHH. 78 f. ; Hommel, ART. 228, 266. Cf. Authority and Archaeology, p. 69 {.
(with the references) ; and Asheb in EncB.
§3] ARCHAEOLOGY AND GENESIS Uii
The accurac}'' of the topography, and the truthfulness of the
descriptions to Eastern life even in modern times, have also some-
times been appealed to as confirmatory of the historical character of
the patriarchal narratives. But the argument, as a little reflection
will shew, is inconclusive. The exactness in these respects of the
nan'atives of Genesis is only what would be naturally expected from
the circumstances under which they were written. The relative
situations of places do not alter from age to age ; and manners and
customs in the East remain unclianged from generation to generation.
The narratives of Genesis, upon the view taken of them by critics, were
written by men, whose own home was Canaan, who were acquainted
personally with its inhabitants, and familiar with the customs, for
instance, of tent-life and of travel in the desert ; and such men would
as a matter of course describe correctly the relative positions and
situations of places in Palestine mentioned by them, and represent
their characters aa adopting the manners and customs which were
usual at the time. The narratives of Genesis are wonderful photo-
graphs of scenery and life ; but they carry in themselves no proof that
the scenerj'- and life are those of the patriarchal age and not those of
the age of the narrators*.
Prof. G. A. Smith, in his Modern Criticism and the Preaching of the
Old Testament, expresses conclnsions substantially identical with those reached
in the preceding pages. Thus, after illustrating the nature of the light thrown
by archaeology on the ages before Moses, he continues (p. 101), 'But, just as
we have seen that in all this archaeological evidence there is nothing to prove
the early date of the documents which contain the story of the patriarchs, but
on the contrary even a little which strengthens the critical theory of their
date, so now we must admit that while archaeology has richly illustrated the
possibility of the main outlines of the Book of Genesis from Abraham to
Joseph, it has not one whit of proof to offer for the personal existence or
characters of the patriarchs themselves.' Formerly, the world in which the
patriarchs moved seemed to be almost empty; now we see it filled with
embassies, armies, busy cities, and long lines of traders, passing to and fro
between one centre of cinlization and another : ' But amidst all that crowded
life we peer in vain for any trace of the fathers of the Hebrews : we hsten in
vain for any mention of their names. This is the whole change archaeology
has wrought : it has given us an atmosphere and a background for the stories
of Genesis ; it is unable to recall or certify their heroes^.'
1 To the same effect, G. A. Smith, EG. 108 ; Modern Criticism dc. 67—70.
2 The results proved by archaeology have, in their bearing upon Biblical
criticism, been greatly exaggerated, especially by Prof. Sayce. See Hogarth's
Authority and Archaeology, 143 ff., 149 f.; G. B. Gray, Expositor, May 1898,
p. 337 ff. ; and G. A. Smith, op. cit. p. 56 S. 9
Kv INTRODUCTION [§ 3
It is remarkable how in Genef5is, as also, sometimes, in other parts
of the Old Testament, individuals and tribes seem to be placed on the
same level, and to be spoken of in the same terms, and how, further,
individuals seem frequently to be the impersonation of homonymous
tribes. Thus Bethuel is mentioned as an individual (Gen. xxii. 23,
xxiv. 15, &c.), but his brothers 'Uz and Buz are tribes (see on xxii. 21).
Keturah, again, is spoken of as Abraham's second wife (xxv. 1) ; but
her sons and grandsons are tribes (xxv, 2 — 4). In Gen. x. nations are
quite manifestly represented as individuals : the same chapter also
illustrates well the Hebrew custom of representing the tribes dwelling
in, or near, a given country, as ' sons ' of a corresponding homonymous
ancestor (as v. 12 the Ludim, 'Anamim, &c. 'begotten' by Mizraim,
i.e. Egypt; v. 16 the Jebusite, Amorite, &c. 'begotten' by Canaan).
So Machir, in Gen. 1. 23 an individual, but in Nu. xxxii. 40 a clan, in
Nu. xxvi. 29 ' begets ' (the country) Gilead (cf. the note on 1. 23) ; and
in Jud. xi. 1 Gilead (the country) ' begets ' Jephthah. Again, Canaan,
Japheth, and Shem, in Noah's blessing (Gen. ix. 25—27), represent
three groups of nations ; Ishmael (xvi. 12) is in character the personi-
fication of the desert tribes whose descent is traced to him ; Esau * is
Edom ' (xxv. 30, xxxvi. 1, 8, 19), and Edom is the name of a people, as
'Esau' also is in Ob. 6, Jer. xlix. 8. Jacob and Israel, also, both
names of the patriarch, are likewise national names, the latter a
standing one, the former a poetical synonym (Gen. xlix. 7 ; Nu. xxiii.
21, 23 ; Am. vii. 2, 5, and frequently) : Isaac and Joseph are some-
times national names as well, — Isaac in Am. vii. 9, 16, and Joseph in
Am. v. 15, vi. 6, Ps. kxx. 1, Ixxxi. 5, and elsewhere^ This peculiarity
is, at least largely, a consequence of the fact that in the Semitic
languages, the names of nations and tribes are very frequently not, as
with ourselves, plurals, but singulars, — Asshur (Is. x. 5 RVm.), Israel,
Moab, Edom, Midian, Aram (Gen. x. 22 : see the note), Kedar (xxv.
13), Sheba, Cain or Kain (Nu. xxiv. 22, Jud. iv. 11, RVm. : cf. p. 72),
Judah, Simeon, Levi, &c. : all these are names of nations or tribes,
but they might be, and in some cases actually also are, the names of
individuals'.
1 So in 1 Ch. vii. 20—24 'Ephraim,' though spoken of as if an individual, must
be in reality the tribe; cf. Bekiah in DB.
2 When it ia desired to speak of the individual members of a tribe or nation,
'sons' ('children') is commonly used, as in 'children of Israel.' Some tribes are
also desij^nated by gentilic adjectives, as Hiwwi, the 'Hivite,' 'Emori, the 'Amorite,'
ye6fi«t, the 'Jebusite,' &c.
It is in agreement with the usage explained in the text that the tingular
pronoun (generally concealed in EVV.) is used often of a nation: as Ex. xiv. 25,
§ 3] TRIBES REPRESENTED AS INDIVIDUALS Iv
The question arises, How far this principle of tribes and nations
being represented as individuals is to be extended ? Can it be applied
in explanation of the patriarchal narratives ? and if so, in what sense ?
It is the opinion of many modern scholars that it can be so applied.
According to many modern scholars, nearly all the names in the
patriarchal narratives, though they seem to be personal names, repre-
sent in reality tribes and sub-tribes : a woman, for example, representing
a smaller or weaker tribe (or clan) than a man ; a marriage representing
the amalgamation of two tribes, if the wife be a slave or a concubine,
the tribe represented by her being of foreign origin or otherwise
inferior, the birth of a child representing the origin of a new family
or tribal subdivision, the firstborn being the one which acquires supre-
macy over the rest, and an early death, or unfruitful marriage,
representing the disappearance of a family : the movements, changes
of fortune, and mutual relations, of tribes and sub-tribes being thus
expressed in a personal and individual form. This was Ewald's view.
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob represent the successive migratory move-
ment of Hebrew tribes from the original common home of the Hebrew
and Aramaean nationalities in Aram-naharaim across the Euphrates.
Jacob's father, Isaac, was already settled in Canaan: his mother was
an Aramaean (Gen. xxv. 20) ; he marries two Aramaean wives : after a
long contest with his uncle (and father-in-law) Laban, ' the Aramaean '
(xxv. 20, xxviii. 5, xxxi. 20, 24), he ultimately comes to terms with
him, returns to Canaan with great wealth, and finally gives his name
to the people settled there : this means that a new and energetic
branch of the Hebraeo- Aramaic race migrated from its home in Aram-
naharaim, pushed forward into Canaan, amalgamated there with the
Hebrews (' Isaac ') already on the spot (becoming thereby Isaac's
'son'), and, in virtue of the superior practical abilities displayed by
it, acquired ultimately supremacy over all its kin ; the contest with
Laban ' represents the struggle which continued, probably for centuries,
between the crafty Hebrews on the opposite banks of the Euphrates,
showing how in the end the southern Hebrews gained the upper hand
and the northern were driven off in derision ' : Edom was a branch
(' son ') of the tribe represented by ' Isaac ' ; ' Jacob,' becoming fused
with this tribe, is Esau's 'brother,' but at the same time his younger
•And Egypt said, Let me flee,' Nu. xx. 18, 'And Edom said (sing.) to him (Israel),
Thou shait not pass through me, lest I come forth to meet thee with the sword,'
Josh. xvii. 14, Jud. i. 3. So Israel (the nation) and Edom, for instance, are
spoken of as each other's ' brother,' Am. i. 11, Nu. xx. 14 al.
M INTRODUCTION [§ 3
brother, as arriving later in Canaan, though, as he became afterwards
the more powerful nation, he is described as having wrested from him
his birthright ; similarly Jacob's wives and sons represent the existence
of different elements in the original community, and the growth of
tribal distinctions within it'. Ewald, however, held at the same time
that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, were historical characters, prominent
leaders of the nation at successive stages of its history*. In the same
way, Joseph (who was likewise a real person) was a leader or dis-
tinguished member of a portion of the nation consisting of the two
tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh (which afterwards separated) : these
tribes migrated into Egypt before the rest ; Joseph there rose to power,
and conferred great benefits both upon his own people and upon the
country, and in the end also attracted the remaining and stronger part
of his people to the Eastern frontier of Egypt. Joseph's personality
was a remarkable one : and in after ages it was transfigured in the
memory of his people ; under the influence of the religion of Israel it
became an ideal of filial and fraternal affection, a high example of good-
ness, devotion to duty, sincerity, and love". The views of Dillmann
and Kittel are similar to that of Ewald*. Other recent scholars have
however gone further, and denied the presence of any personal element
in the patriarchal narratives ; the narratives represent throughout, —
even, it is sometimes said, according to the intention of the narrators, —
tribal movements and tribal relations : the patriarchs and most of the
other figures in Genesis are the eponymous ancestors of corresponding
tribes, created after Israel had become a united nation and was settled
in Canaan ; and the histories about them partly express phases in the
early history of Israel and its neighbours, and are partly reflections of
the circumstances and relations of the same tribes in the age in which
the narratives themselves originated*.
1 Ewald, Hist. i. 273 f., 287, 309—317, 338, 341—344, 346, 3-18—350, 363,
371—376, 378—381.
2 Pp. 301, 305 f., 340, 342, 345.
8 Ewald, Hist. i. 363, 382, 405, 407—9, 412—20.
* Dillmaun, Alttest. Theologie, 77 — 81 (the patriarchs were the leaders of large
migratory bodies of Semites, pressing forward from Haran into Canaan, where
Moab and Ammon, the Ishmaelites, the Keturaean tribes (Gen. xxv. 1 — 4), and the
Edomites branched off from them ; the Hebrews in the narrowest sense of the term,
i.e. the Israelites (corresponding to 'Jacob'), being the latest arrival among them),
Comm,. on Gen. pp. 218, 219, 316, 403 (Engl. tr. ii. 2—5, 190, 353); Kittel, Hist, of
the Hebrews, i. 153, 157, 168 f. (Engl. tr. i. 170, 174 f,, 186—8). Cf. Ottley, Hist,
of the Hebrews, 49—52; Wade, OT. Hist. 81 f. [See further the Addenda.]
» See further on this view Reuss, L'Hist. Sainte et la Loi (1879), i. 98 £f •
Stade, Oesch. 28—80, 127 f., 145 ff.; Wellh. Hist. 318 ff.; Cornill, Hist, of Isr.
(1899), p. 29 ff. ; the commentaries of Holzinger and Gunkel ; Guthe, Gesch. det
Volkes Israel (1899), pp. 1—6, 25, 41 f., 47—9, 55 f., 161—8; and the articles
§ 3] HISTORICITY OF THE PATRIARCHS Ivii
No doubt Ewald's theory rests upon the observation of real facts,
and is also, \vithin limits, true ; but applied upon this very compre-
hensive scale, it cannot be deemed probable. An unsubstantial figure,
such as Canaan (Gen. ix. 25 — 7), might be an example of a personified
group of peoples ; there are also no doubt other cases, especially those
occurring in genealogies, in which what seem to be individuals stand
for tribes, and there are besides (cf. p. lixf.) particular cases in which
the relations or characteristics of a later age appear to have been
reflected back upon the patriarchs: but the abundance of personal
incident and detail in the patriarchal narratives as a whole seems to
constitute a serious objection to this explanation of their meaning :
would the movements of tribes be represented in this veiled manner
on such a large scale as would be the case if this explanation were the
true one ? Moreov er, as the Canaanites actually remained in the land
till a much later period than that at which the patriarchs {ex hyp.)
lived, it is difficult to understand how large bodies of immigrants, such
as Ewald's hypothesis postulates, could have swept across it, or found
room to settle in it, without many hostile conflicts with the natives, of
which nevertheless the patriarchal narratives, — except in the isolated
case of Shechem (ch. xxxiv. ; xlviii. 22), — are silent : individuals, with
a relatively small body of retainers, would be more likely than large
tribes, to pass unmolested through the land, and find a home in it.
It is also much more difficult to think of Joseph as a tribe rising to
power in Egypt, than of Joseph as an individual. The explanation
may be adopted reasonably in particular instances (pp. liv, Ix) ; but
applied universally, it would seem to create greater difficulties and
improbabilities than it removes.
Although, however, as has been shewn (p. xliii f.), the evidence for
the historicity of the patriarchs is not such as will satisfy the ordinary
canons of historical criticism, it is still, all things considered, difficult
to believe that some foundation of actual personal history does not
underlie the patriarchal narratives'. And in fact the view which on
the whole may be said best to satisfy the circumstances of the case is
the view that the patriarchs are historical persons, and that the
accounts which we have of them are in outline historically true, but
on the names of the Israelitish tribes in EncB. It is criticized by Konig
in Neueste Prinzipien der AT. Kritik (1902), pp. 36 — 69, and in an art. in the
Sunday Scliool Times (Pbiladeiphia), Dec. 14, 1901 (see a summary in the E^p.
Times, Mar. 1902, p. 243 f.). There being no tribe correspoiidui^ to Abraham,
CornUl (pp. 21, 34), and Guthe (pp. 164, 167), regard Abraham a» a historical
person, with a definitely marked religious character.
^ So also G. A. Smith, Modern Criticism &p., p. 106 f.
Iviii INTRODUCTION [§ 3
that their characters are idealized, and their biographies not un-
frequently coloured by the feehngs and associations of a later age.
'J,' says Mr Ottley', and his remarks are equally true of E, 'describes
the age of the patriarchs as in some essential respects so closely similar
to later periods, that it can only be regarded as a picture of primitive
life and religion drawn in the light of a subsequent age. We have
here to do with the earliest form of history — traditional folk-lore about
primitive personages and events, worked up according to some pre-
conceived design, by a devout literary artist.' The basis of the
narratives in Genesis is in fact popukvr oral tradition : J and E give
us pictures of these traditions as they were current in the early
centuries of the monarchy ; in P, it can scarcely be doubted, we have
a later and more artificial form, by no means so directly and freshly
transcribed from the living voice of the people. Popular tradition
being, however, what it is, we may naturally expect it to display in
Genesis the same characteristics which it does in other cases. It may
well include a substantial historical nucleus, even though we may not
always be in a position to ascertain precisely how far this extends : for
details may readily be due to the involuntary action of popular in-
vention or imagination, operating during a long period of time : from
a religious point of view the characters and experiences of the
patriarchs may have been accommodated to the spirit of a later age ;
while in the form, also, something will be due to the narrators who
cast the traditions into their present literary shape.
How far, in the existing narratives, the original historical nucleus
has been modified or added to by the operation of each of these three
causes, it is of course impossible to determine exactly : an objective
criterion is seldom attainable ; and subjective impressions of what is
probable or not are mostly all that we have to guide us. There are
however some narratives in which the feeling that we have before us
the record not of actual historical fact, but of current popular belief,
forces itself strongly upon us. As has already been pointed out
(p. xvii ff.), one very conspicuous interest in these narratives is the
explanation of existing facts and institutions, — for instance, many
names of persons and places, the sanctity of Bethel and its famous
monolith, the origin of the great border-cairn in Gilead, a current
proverb or custom, the ethnological or political relations subsisting
between Israel and its neighbours, or the characteristics of different
^ Bampton Lectures, p. 209.
§3] IDEAL ELEMENT IN GENESIS lix
peoples, the Ishmaelites, Edom, &c. In some of these cases, — notably
in xix. 30 — 38, — it is next to impossible that we can be reading
accounts of the actual historical origin of the names or facts referred
to, and not rather explanations due to popular imagination or suggested
by an obvious etymology : other cases it is but consonant with analogy
to regard as similar ; in some instances, also, it will be remembered,
we find duplicate and inconsistent traditions respecting the same
occurrence. Uncertainty on subordinate points of this kind need
not however affect our general estimate of the narrative as a whole.
Another respect in which the histories of the patriarchs have
probably been coloured in the course of oral transmission is by later
tribal relations being imported into them : the patriarchs and their
descendants, though it is going too far to say that they are mere
reflections of the tribes descended, or reputed to have been descended,
from them, do nevertheless appear upon occasion invested with the
characteristics of these tribes ; and it is even possible that sometimes
episodes of tribal life are referred back to them in the form of incidents
occurring within the limits of their own families. Ishmael, for instance,
in xvi. 12 may be the personal son of Abraliam : but if he is this, he
is also something more ; he impersonates the Bedawin of the desert.
Jacob and Esau, in their struggles for supremacy, are more than the
twin sons of Isaac ; they impersonate two nations ; and the later
relations subsisting between these two nations colour parts of the
representation, — especially, for instance, the terms of the oracle in
XXV. 23, and of the blessings in xxvii. 28 f , 39 f. Jacob and Laban,
when fixing on the mountains of Gilead the border which neither will
pass, seem like^^^se to be types of the later Israelites and Aramaeans
who often in the same region contended with one another for mastery.
It is extremely difficult not to think that, as a whole, the narratives
about Joseph are based upon a personal history : at the same time, it
is quite possible that they have been coloured in some of their details
by later events, and even that particular episodes may have originated
in the desire to account for the circumstances and relations of a
later age.
The hostility of the brethren to Joseph, the learTership in one narrative (E)
of Reuben, in the other (J) of Judah, the power and pre-eminence of Joseph,—
like that of the double tribe (especially Ephraini) descended from him,— as
compared with his brothers, the fact that Benjamin, afterwards the smallest
tribe, is the youngest brother, the adoption of Joseph's two sous by Jacob
(Le. their elevation to the same rank as his own sons), and the priority so
Ix INTRODUCTION [§ 3
pointedly bestowed by him upon the younger, are, for instance, points at which
it is at least possible that popular imagination has been at work, colouring or
supplementing the historical elements of the Joseph-tradition by reference to
the facts and conditions of later times. The improbabilities which certainly
attach to some of the details connected with the famine, and the measures by
which it was relieved, may be accounted for in the same way : popular tradition
magnifies the achievements of the famous heroes of antiquity, and the Oriental
mind loves hyperbole^.
It is also not impossible that episodes or movements of tribal life,
sometimes belonging to the patriarchal period itself, sometimes re-
riected bacli into it from the later history, are occasionally narrated in
the form of events in the lives of individuals, as in ch. xxxiv. (Shechem
and Dinah : see p. 307 £), xxxviii. (Jiidah and Tamar : see p. 331 f.),
and in different tribal genealogies, as xxii. 20 — 24, xxv. 1 — 4, 12 — 16,
ch. xxxvi. (Edom), &c. ; cf. on xi. 29.
The biographies of the patriarchs seem, thirdly, to have been
idealized from a religious point of view. In the days of the patriarchs,
religion must have been in a relatively rudimentary stage ^; there are
traces of this in the idea, for instance, of the revelations of deity being
confined to particular spots, and in the reverence paid to sacred
trees and pillars : but at the same time the patriarchs often express
themselves in terms suggesting much riper spiritual capacities and
experiences, and in some cases indeed borrowed evidently from the
phraseology of a much later age. It is difficult here not to trace; the
hands of the narrators, who were men penetrated by definite moral and
religious ideas, and who, while not stripping the patriarchs of the
distinctive features by which they were traditionally invested, never-
theless unconsciously coloured their pictures of them by the feelings
and beliefs of their own age, and represented them as expressing the
thouglits, and using the phrases, with which they were themselves
familiar ^ To the narrators, also, will be due the literary form of tlie
^ In Gen. xli. 47 — 9, 54, 56, 57, for instance, there must be sorae exaggeration;
and in xlvii. 14 — 26, though the system of land-tenure described undoubtedly
existed in the age of the narrator, yet, as Dillm. remarks, the details, sroh as the
connexion with the seven years of famine, the exhaustion of the Egyptians' money,
the sale of their cattle &c., will be due to the naivete of the tradition.
2 Cf. Wade, OT. History, p. 84 ff.
'^ It is thus possible that both the ' call,' and the other religious experiences of
Abraham may have been less definite and articulate than they are represented as
being in the existing narrative; they may have taken, for example, in his con-
sciousness, the form of religious dissatisfaction with his surroijndings, a sense that
God was directing his steps elsewhere, and a presentiment borne in upon him that
his adopted country would in time become the home of his descendants. Comp.
Bruce, Apologetics, p. 199; Ottley, Bampt. Led. p. 111.
§ 4] IDEAL ELEMENT IN GENESIS Ixi
patriarchal narratives — the delicacy of expression and charm of style
characteristic of J (especially) and of E, not less than the very
differently constructed phrases and periods of P. The narratives of P
we shall hardly he wrong in regarding, even in details, as far more the
author's own creation than those of J or E.
§ 4. The Religious Value of the Book of Genesis.
Our survey of the contents and historical character of the Book of
Genesis is ended. We have analysed it into the main sources of which
it is composed, we have considered the leading characteristics of each
of these sources, and we have done our hest to estimate tlie historical
value of the narratives contained in them. We have found that in
the first eleven chapters there is little or nothing that can be called
historical in our sense of the word : there may be here and there dim
recollections of historical occurrences ; but the concurrent testimony of
geology and astronomy, anthropology, archaeology, and comparative
philology, is proof that the account given in these chapters of the
creation of heaven and earth, the appearance of living things upon the
earth, the origin of man, the beginnings of civilization, the destruction
of mankind and of all terrestrial animals (except those preserved in
the ark) by a flood, the rise of separate nations, and the formation of
different languages, is no historically true record of these events as
they actually happene"^ And with regard to the histories contained
in chs. xii. — 1., we have found that, while there is no sufficient reason
for doubting the existence, and general historical character of the^
biographies, of the patriarchs, nevertheless much uncertainty must be
allowed to attach to details of the narrative: we have no guarantee
that we possess verbally exact reports of the events narrated; and
there are reasons for supposing that the figures and characters of the
patriarchs are in different respects idealized. And, let it be observed,
not one of the conclusions reached in the preceding pages is arrived at
upon arbitrary or a priori grounds : not one of them depends upon any
denial, or even doubt, of the supernatural or of the miraculous ; they
are, one and all, forced wprni us by the facts ; they follow directly from
a simple consideration of the facts of physical science and human
nature, brought to our knowledge by the various sciences concerned,
from a comparison of these facts with the Biblical statements, and from
an application of the ordinary canons of historical criticism. Fifty or
Ixii INTRODUCTION [§ 4
sixty years ago, a different judgment, at least on some of the points
involved, was no doubt possible : but the immense accessions of know-
ledge, in the departments both of the natural sciences and of the
early history of man, which have resulted from the researches of
recent years, make it impossible now : the irreconcileability of the
early narratives of Genesis with the facts of science and history
must be recognized and accepted. To be sure, particular points might
probably be found, at which, by the adoption of forced interpretations
of the words of Genesis, such as are both unnatural in themselves, and
also obviously contrary to the intention of the writer, the conclusion in
question could, in appearance, be evaded : but this method is at once
unsound in principle and ineffectual : a forced exegesis is never
legitimate ; passages remain to which the method itself cannot be
applied ; nor, probably, has anything done more to bring the Bible
into discredit than the harmonistic expedients adopted by apologists,
which by those whom they are intended to satisfy and convince are
seen at once to be impossible \ And to turn for a moment to another
consideration, it is realized now, more distinctly than it was by a past
generation, that a historical document, if it is to lay claim to credibility,
must be contemporary, or virtually so, with the events described in it ;
this is a primary principle of modern historical science. But the Book
of Genesis, whatever view be taken of its authorship, does not satisfy
this condition : none of the documents of which it is composed either
claims to be, or has as yet been shewn to be, contemporary with the
events narrated in it.
It follows that the Bible cannot in every part, especially not in its
early parts, be read precisely as it was read by our forefathers. We
live in a light which they did not possess, but which it has pleased the
Providence of God to shed around us ; and if the Bible is to retain its
authority and influence among us, it must be read in this light, and
our beliefs about it must be adjusted and accommodated accordingly.
To utilize, as far as we can, the light in which we live, is, it must be
remembered, not a privilege only, but a duty. And to take but a
single example of the gain to be derived from so doing : it is certain
that an infinitely more adequate conception of the astonishing breadth
and scope of creation, and of the marvellously wonderful and compre- ;
hensive plan by which the Creator has willed both to organize and r^
develope life upon the earth, and afterwards gradually to civilize and \
1 Comp. the just remaxks of KautzBoh in his lecture on Die bUibende Bedeutung
des ATs. (1902), p. 9 ff.
§4] RELIGIOUS VALUE OF GENESIS Ixiii
educate human beings upon it, can be obtained from a study of the
sciences of astronomy, geology, and anthropology than from the early
chapters of Genesis : on the other hand, these chapters of Genesis do
seize and give vivid and forcible expression to certain vital and funda-
mental truths respecting the relation of tbe world and rban to God,
which the study of those sciences by themselves could never lead to ;
the Bible and human science thus supplement one another : but we
musf go to human science' For the material facts of nature and life,
and to the Bible for the spiritual realities by which those facts are
illuminated, and (in their ultimate origin) explained. The only science ,
and early history known to the Biblical writers were both imperfect : /
but they made a superb use of them ; they attached to them, and en- '
shrined in forms of undying freshness and charm, the great spiritual
truths which they were inspired to discern. It is impossible, if we
compare the early narratives of Genesis with the Babylonian narratives
from which in some cases they seem plainly to have been ultimately
derived, or with the pictures of prehistoric times to be found in the
literatures of many other countries, not to perceive the controlling
operation of the Spirit ot God, which has taught these Hebrew writers
to make a right use of the materials whjch came to their hands, to
' take the primitive traditions of the humfti race, to purify them from
their grossness and their polytheism, and to make them at once the
foundation and the explanation of the long history that is to follow^'
Our duty, then, is to recognize this double aspect of these narratives ;
and to read them accordingly in such a way as to seize and retain the
spiritual truths of which they are the expression, while discarding, at
least as an object of intellectual belief, the material fabric which was
once necessary to give them substance and support, but which is now
seen to have in itself no value or reality ^
The position that the Book of Genesis may contain statements not
historically true may appear to some readers surprising and question-
able. It must, however, be remembered that the doctrine that the
Bible contains nothing but what is historically true is one for which
there is no foundation either in the Bible itself, or in the formularies
of our Church. This doctrine is intimately connected with, if not
directly dependent upon, a particular theory of inspiration. .As is
1 Kirkpatrick, The Divine Library of the Old Testament, p. 97.
' On the distinction between the external form, and the inner or spiritual
fiuhstance, of a narrative, see also the Bishop of Eipon's excellent Introduction to
the Temple Bible, pp. 17, 18, 42—46.
V/'
Ixiv INTRODUCTION [§ 4
well-known, the Cliurch of England has formulated no definition of
inspiration : nevertheless, a theory has become prevalent, both within
and without the pale of our own communion, which conceives of in-
spiration as operating mechanically, and maintains accordingly the
verbal exactitude of every statement contained in Scripture, — on
points, for instance, of science, or history, or psychology, not less
than on points of spiritual doctrine and duty. The present is not
the place to discuss at length the subject of inspiration' : it must
suffice therefore to point out that such a theory is entirely without
scriptural authority: we read indeed (2 Tim. iii. 16) that 'every
scripture inspired of God' is 'profitable' for certain moral and
spiritual ends, but nothing is said, either there or elsewhere, of the
other conditions to wliich an ' inspired ' book must conform ; nor is
any claim to immunity from error made on its behalf in any part
of Scripture. The doctrine of the verbal inspiration and verbal
exactitude of Scripture is in fact an a priori theory, framed not upon
the basis of any warrant contained in Scripture itself, but upon an
antecedent conception of what an ' inspired ' book must necessarily be.
It is however a complete mistake of principle and method to frame
first an cL priori theory ofiinspiration, and then to insist that the
Bible must conform to it :#he Bible is the only ' inspired ' book that
we know of; and as no independent definition of inspiration exists,
the only sound method is to study the facts presented by the Bible,
and to formulate our theory of inspiration accordingly. If, then, in
the course of our inquiry we should find in -the Bible statements, or
representations, which, after an impartial survey of the facts, should
prove to be unhistorical, our only legitimate conclusion would be that
the existence in it of such statements or representations is not in-
compatible with its inspiration, and the ci prim'i definition, which
would exclude them, must be modified accordingly.
A consideration which has no doubt been largely responsible for the
reluctance of theologians to admit the presence of unhistorical elements in the
Bible is apprehension of the consequences to which the admission may lead,
especially with regard to the historical character of the Gospel records. It is
1 The writer has dealt with it more fally in the seventh of his Sermons on the
Old Testament (p. 143 ff.); comp. also the preceding Sermon (p. 119 ff.) on 'The
Voice of God in the Old Testament,' with particular reference to the ditferent kinds
of literature represented in the OT. And see besides Satiday's Bampton Lectures
for 1893 (on 'Inspiration'), p. 155 ff., and Lect. viii.; Kirkpatrick's Divine Library
of the OT. (1891), Lect. iv. ; Farrar, The Bible, its meaning and supremacy, passim;
Watson, The Book of Genesis, pp. 256—265; and the Bishop of Ripon's Introd. to
the Temple Bible, pp. 83—101.
§ 4] INSPIRATION" Ixv
difficult not to think that such apprehensions are groundless. "We must trust,
as we do in all other histories, to the application of sound historical methods.
It is however certain that the historical character of the Gospel records is far
more endangered by their credibility being made to depend upon the axiom
of the exact and equal historical truth of every part of Scripture, than by this
axiom, as such, being unconditionally abandoned, and the credibility of the
Gospel narratives being left to be establislied by the historical evidence which
they themselves afford, interpreted in the light of the indirect testimony
supplied by other parts of the New Testament, by the early Churcli, and by
the Old Testament, regarded generally (apart from the exact and equal
historical value of every part of it) as a preparation for Christ No competent
student of the Old Testament can deny that there are elements in it which,
though they may have a high value religiously, are not historical; they
describe, for instance, not things as they actually happened, but things as they
were viewed, in an idealized form, by writers living long afterwards ; but to
rest the truth of Christianity upon an axiom as baseless as the one referred
to above, is the height of unwisdom. Notliing therefore is lost tliat can be of
service to Christianity, nothing is given up which forms a real bulwark of the
faith, when that axiom is abandoned. It is a responsibility which, if they
realized it, few would surely take upon tliemselves, to weight Christianity with
a view of the Old Testament, which has no authority or support either in the
Bible itself or in the formularies of the Church, which will not bear examina-
tion, but on the contrary, when confronted with the facts, is at once seen to be
refuted by them.
The nemesis on doctrines of verbal inspiration is not far to seek.
Mr Laing, in chap. viii. of his Modern Science and Modern Thought,
lays it down that an inspired book is one ' miraculously dictated by an
infallible God, and therefore absolutely and for all time true'; and
then proceeds to refer to some of the statements contained in the early
chapters of Genesis, which are now known to be not historically true :
the conclusion follows, — and from the premises respecting the nature
of inspiration follows logically and necessarily, — that the Bible is not
inspired, and consequently has no claim to contain a revelation to man.
But where is it anywhere said in the Bible that the historical state-
ments made in it are 'dictated' by God? The whole conception of
inspiration implied in the words quoted is a figment, — a figment, no
doubt, devised in the first instance for the purpose of supporting and
fortifying a good cause, but not the less, as a result of the progress of
knowledge, capable of being employed with disastrous effect to ruin
and destroy it. But, if we modify our conception of inspiration, and
by making proper allowance for the human element cooperating with
the Divine, bring it into agreement with the phaenoraena to be ex-
plained, then all those facts which are fatal to the authority of the
Ixvi INTRODUCTION [§ 4
Bible upon the theories referred to above are adequately accounted for,
and the Bible becomes a consistent whole, inspired throughout, though
not ' dictated,' and with its authority firmly established upon a sound
and logical basis.
See further, on the same subject, the very pertinent remarks of Prof.
G. A. Smith, in his Modern Criticism and Preaching of the Old Testament,
where, after commenting (pp 26 — 28) upon the often disastrous effects of the
dogmas of a verbal inspiration and of the equal validity of all parts of
Scripture, and of the refusal to accept what is legitimately involved in the
truth of a ' progressive Revelation,' he describes what he learnt from a perusal
of the correspondence of the late Henry Drummond, who was often consulted
upon religious difficulties : his correspondents, he says, ' one and all tell how
the dogma that the entire Bible stands, historically and morally, upon the
same level — the faith which finds in it nothing erroneous, nothing defective,
and (outside of the sacridces and Temple) nothing temporary — is what haa
driven them from religion.'
-"^- In the Book of Genesis we have to do with scientific and historical,
•£ . . . .
* more than with moral difficulties. And certainly it can occasion little
surprise that, when a man of scientific culture is told, — for this, though
not the Church's teaching, and though many individual teachers have
of course abandoned it, is nevertheless still the current theological
teaching of the day, — that an acceptance of the literal truth of the
early chapters of Genesis is an integral part of the Christian faith, he
should turn with repugnance from a creed which seems to him to be
thus associated with a series of beliefs which his own studies prove to
him to be impossible. But, as was said before, with a better-grounded
theory of inspiration, all these difficulties disappear; and the man of
science who gives due weight to the religious instincts of his nature
will be ready to recognize the reli^jious truthfulness, — as distinct from
the scientific truthfulnesp, — of these narj-atives of Genesis^
Nor, upon antecedenjt grounds, can any valid objection be raised
against the view that the Bible may contain elements more or less
unhistoricaL We are dealing confessedly in Genesis with narratives
^ It ought assuredly to be possible so to teach the historical parts of the OT.
to those who have reached the age of 15 or 16 that, when they enter into manhood,
they may have nothing to unlearn on the fjrouud of either science or history.
Comp. a pater by the present writer on ' The Old Testament in the Light of
To-day' in the Ksnositor, Jan. 1901, p. 45 ff. ; and on the often lamentable conse-
quences of failing to do tnis, Archdeacon Wilson in the Contemn. Rev., March,
1903, p. 303 f. The danger of teaching as practically de fide things which are
directly contradicted by what may be learnt from any Encyclopaedia or other work
of secular information has been felt also by thoughtful Roman Catholics in France:
see Alb. Hoiitm, La Question BibUaue chez les CatholiqueK de France au xix' tiicU
(1902), pp. Ib9 f., 206 ff. Cf. also the Guardian, Oct. U, 1903, p. 1523».
§4] SCOPE OF INSPIRATION Ixvii
committed to writing long after the events narrated took place, and
in some cases relating to periods so remote that it is certain no
genuine historical recollections could have been handed down from
them. Why should narratives relating to such a more or less distant
past not exhibit among the Hebrews characteristics similar to those
which narratives written down under similar circumstances among
other nations would unquestionably exhibit? The former do indeed,
on their spiritual side, exhibit very different characteristics ; but these
are accounted for by the inspiration of their authors : why, however,
should they be different, on their material side ? We should naturally
expect them on their material side to exhibit the work of the
imagination, and display an element of legend, filling up a gap in
the past with a web of fancy, and presenting the dimly-seen heroes of
antiquity as ideal figures. Where nothing is defined as to the nature
or limits of the inspiring Spirit's work, have we the right to limit it
by arbitrary canons of our own ? Many — perhaps all — forms of the
national literature of Israel are represented in the Bible, and made
channels through whi^-h ' in many parts, and in many modes ' (Heb.
i. 1) God manifested Himself to His people : upon what principle, or
by what right, is a form of narrative which is common to almost every
nation, and which appeals with peculiar force to the comprehension of
men in particular stages of national development and intellectual
growth, to be excluded ? * The imagination, as all must allow, is an
instrument of extraordinary efficacy for instruction and edification ; it
has exerted in the past, and it exerts still, a powerful influence in
education : why, then, should it be deemed incapable of consecration
to the service of God ? If the poems of Homer were an educational
force in ancient Greece, why should it be deemed incredible that
legends of primitive history, and idealized traditions of national heroes,
only inspired by a higher and purer religious spirit, and exemplifying
not the conflicts and jealousies of gods and goddesses, but the purposes
and character of the One God, and His dealings with His children, —
especially when moulded as they are into forms of singularly impressive
dignity and grace, — should exert a similar power in Israel, and should
be incorporated by the prophets and teachers of the nation as a
treasured heirloom in their sacred books ?
^ Comp. the late Archbishop Benson, as cited by Kirkpatrick, The Divine
Library of the OT. p. 104 ; and Bishop Westcott, who says {Life, 1903, ii. 69),
' I never could understand how any one reading the first three chapters of Genesis
with open eyes could believe that they contained a literal history, yet they disclose
to us a Gospel. So it is probably elsewhere.' Cf. Westcott's Gospel of Life,
p. 187 f.
Ixviii INTRODUCTION [§ 4
See further, in this connexion, in the Bibl. Sacra, Jan. 1901, p. 103 ff., an
address by Prof. Ives Curtiss, of Chicago, on 'The Book, the Law, and the
People ; or Divine Revelations through ancient Israel,' dehvered after a visit
of some length to the Holy Land, where it is pointed out that while on the
one hand observation of Oriental character makes it impossible to believe that
the Bible is a merely natural product of the Oriental mind, on the other hand
it warns us that we have no right to theorize d priori upon the ways in which
God could or could not speak through it; a revelation addressed to an Oriental
people would naturally be clothed in forms of thought and expression with
which they were familiar. ' The Oriental is least of all a scientific historian,
lie is the prince of story-tellers : narratives, real and imaginative, spring from
his lips, which are the truest portraiture of composite rather tlian individual
Oriental life, though narrated under forms of individual experience.' Comp.
also a paper by R. Somervell on ' The Historical Character of the OT.
narratives* in the Exp. Times, Apr. 1902, p. 298 flf. ; and the many admirable
words spoken by the Rev. G. S. Stieatfeild in A Parish Clergyman's Thoughts
about the Higher Criticism, (Midland Educational Co., Birmingham ; reprinted,
with additions, from the Ex'posiior, Dec. 1902), p. 11 ff., on the interpretation
of the early chapters of Genesis, and on the value of a critical and historical
appreciation of the Old Testament, in illuminating many parts of it, and in
removing difBculties. Cf. Westcott, Lessons from, Work, pp. 32 f., 178, 179.
If, now, upon the basis of the considerations advanced in the
preceding pages, we proceed to the question which after all is of the
most inimediate interest not only to the theologian in the technical
sense of the word, but also to the man of general religious sympathies,
we shall find that the religious value of the narratives of Genesis, while
it must be placed upon a different basis from that on which it has
hitherto been commonly considered to rest, remains in itself essen-
tially unchanged. It is true, we often cannot get behind tlie narratives, —
in chaps, i. — xi., as we have seen, the narratives cannot be historical,
in our sense of the word, at all, and in chaps, xii. — 1., there are at
least many points at which we cannot feel assured that the details are
historical : we are obliged consequently to take them as we find them,
and read them accordingly. And then we shall find that the narratives
of Genesis teach us still the same lessons which they taught our fore-
fathers. The drama which begins with the tragedy of Eden and ends
with the wonderful biography of Joseph is still enacted before our eyes
as vividly as ever. Eve and Cain still stand before us, the immortal
types of weakness yielding to temptation, and of an unbridled temper
leading its victim he knows not whither ; Noah and Abraham are still
the heroes of righteousness and faith ; Lot and Laban, Sarah and
Rebekah, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, in their characters and experiences,
are still in difierent ways tvttoi ly/iwj', and still in one respect or another
Ip] INSPIRATION OF GENESIS Ixix
exemplify the ways in which God deals with the individual soul, and
the manner in which the individual soul ought, — or ought not, — to
respond to His leadings. And what, if some of these figures pass
before us as on a stage, rather than in real life? Do they on that
account lose their vividness, their truthfulness, their force? On the
contrary, not only do they retain all these characteristics unimpaired,
but, if it be true that the figures in Genesis, as we have them, are
partly, — or even, in some cases, wholly, — the creations of popular
imagination, transfigured in the pure, 'dry' light which the inspired
genius of prophet or priest has shed around them, the Book of Genesis
is really more surprising than if it were even throughout a literally
true record of events actually occurring. For to create such characters
would be more wonderful than to describe them. The Book of Genesis
is a marvellous gallery of portraits, from whatever originals they may
have been derived. There is no other nation which can shew for its
early history anything in the least degree resembling it. There is
nothing like it in either Babylonia, or Egypt, or India, or Greece.
The mythology of Greece, — especially as it stands before us in the
two great epics with which Greek literature opens, and as particular
episodes of it are made the vehicles of splendid lessons in the great
tragedies of a later age, — is indeed a wonderful creation of the human
mind, and an abiding monument of the intellectual genius of the
nation which produced it : but the Book of Genesis stands on a
different plane altogether ; and even though it be not throughout
what our fathers understood it to be, a verbally exact record of actual
fact, this very difference, which distinguishes it so strikingly from
the corresponding literature of any other nation, remains still the
strongest proof of the inspiration by its authors : the spirituality of
its contents, the spiritual and moral lessons which are continually
exemplified by it, and which, though they are often expressed in a
simple and even childlike external garb, are nevertheless to all intents
and purposes the same as those taught afterwards by the great prophets,
constitute a cogent ground for inferring the operation of a spiritual
agency differing specifically from that which was present when the
mythology of Egypt or Babylonia, of India or Greece, was in process
of formation. St Paul does not point his readers to the Old Testament
Scriptures for instruction in science or ancient history, but he says
that they are profitable 'for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for
instruction which is in righteousness' (2 Tim. iii. 16); and the Book
of Genesis, even though it be understood in parts as parable
Ixx INTRODUCTION [
rather than as historj', is most assuredly 'profitable' for all these
purposes.
Let us endeavour, then, to sum up in outline the reli^iou^s value of
Genesis. On the first eleven chapters little can be added substantially
t6"what has been said in the notes'. From the beginning the history is
penetrated with religious ideas. The narrative of the Creation sets
forth, in a series of dignified and impressive pictures, the sovereimty
of God ; His priorifcy to, and separation from, all finite, material
nature ; His purpose to constitute an ordered cosmos, and gradually
to adapt the earth to become the habitation of living beings ; and His
endowment of man with the peculiar, unique possession of self-
conscious reason, in virtue of which he becomes capable of intellectual
and moral life, and is even able to know and hold communion with his
Maker. In chs. ii. \^ — iii we read, — though again not in a historical,
but in a pictorial or symbolical form, — how man was once innocent,
how he became, — as man must have become, whether in 'Eden' or
elsewhere, at some period of his existence, — conscious of a moral law,
but how temptation fell upon him, and he broke it. The Fall of man,
the great but terrible truth, which history, not less than individual
experience, only too vividly teaches each one of us, is thus impressively
set before us. Man, however, though punished by God, is not forsaken
by Him, nor left, in his long conflict with evil, without hope of victory.
In chap, iv., the increasing power of sin, and the fatal consequences to
which, if unchecked, it may lead, is vividly portrayed in the tragic
figure of Cain. The spirit of vindictiveness, and of bj^utal triumph in
tlve power of the sword, is personified in Lamech. In the narrative of
the Flood, God's just wrath against sin, and the divine prerogative of •
mercy, are alike exemplified : Noah is a standing illustration of the
truth that * righteousness delivereth from death ' ; and God's dealings
with him after the Flood form a striking declaration of the purposes
of grace and goodwill, with which He regards mankind. The narrative
of the Tower of Babel (xi. 1 — 9) emphasizes Jehovah's supremacy over
the world ; and teaches how the self-exaltation of man is checked
by God.
In passing to chaps, xii. — 1. we may notice first the teaching about
God. If in chaps, i. — xi. God appears chiefly as the Creator and
Judge of the world, in chaps, xii. — 1. He appears more particularly
1 On these chapters the small but helpful volume by Professor (now Bjshop)
Ryle, called The Early Narratives of Genesis (which has been seveial times quoted
in the notes), is much recommended to the reader.
4
»
4] RELIGIOUS TEACHING OF GENESIS Ixxi
as One who has a care and love for raen. Naturally, He hates and
punishes sin (xiii. ly, xv. 16, xviii. 20 f., xix., xxxix. 9, xliv. 16 ;
cf. XX. 6, 11, xlii, 21, 28); but these chapters contain principally
revelations of His regard for man, not only in the promises disclosing
His gracious purposes towards the patriarchs and their seed (see on
xii. 2 f.), but also on many other occasions : for instance, in the
manner in which righteousness receives His approval and blessing
(xxi. 22, xxiv. 1, 27, 35, xxv. 11, xxvi. 28, 29 end, xxxix. 2, 21, 23,
and indirectly elsewhere), in the regard shewn by Him to the solitary
Hagar in the wilderness (xvi. 9 flf., xxi. 17 ff.), to Lot in Sodom (xix.),
to the heathen, but guileless, Abimelech (xx. 6), to Jacob in his
solitude at Bethel (xxviii. 12 tf, : cf. p. 268), or in a foreign land
(xxxi. 3, 5, 13, 24, 42, xxxv. 3, xlviii. 15 f.), and to Pharaoh (xli. 25,
32). His mercy is also illustrated by xviii. 23 if., xix. 16 ; His
providence, overruling the events of life for good, by xxiv., xlv. 5, 7,
1. 20, and other passages ; and His justice is appealed to in xvi. 5,
xviii. 25, XX. 4, xxxi. 49, 50, 53. In ch. xxii. the meaning of 'pro-
bation,' and the nature of the sacrifice which is pleasing in God's sight,
are both strikingly exemplified'.
In the sphere of human conduct, the drama of an entire life takes
in chaps, xii. — 1. the place of the single, isolated episodes characteristic
of chaps, i. — xi. ; and principles and motives find accordingly fuller
and more vivid expression. The patriarchs vary considerably in
character; there is no monotony in the delineation. Nor ."re they
without their faults, especially Jacob, and the subordinate characten
(as Lot and Labau) : the women, in particular, aie often jealous,
imperious, and designing. AU have more or less a typicfi' cliavacter.
Abl'aham is not only conspicuous for such virtues as courtesy,
hospitality, high-mindedness, generosity ; he is also the primary Olri
Testament example of obedience, and devotion to God ; spirituality of
thought and aim, not austere, but attractive and winning, is the
leading motive of his life. He is *an historic personage, but he is
also a spiritual type : he is the ideal representative of the life of faith
and of separation ifrom the idolatries of an evil world : he prefigures
the ideal character and aims of the people of God^' Isaac lives a
quiet, uneventful life : he is the ideal son : he ' impersonates the
peaceful, obedient, submissive qualities of an equable trust in God,
distinct alike from the more heroic faith of Abraham, and the lower
1 See also above, p. xxi f. * Ottley, Bampton Lectures, p. 125 f.
Ixxii INTRODUCTION [§ 4
type which in Jacob was learned through discipline and purged of
self-will ',' Jacob; is a mixed character: he possesses the good qualities
of ambition "aS^d perseverance, though he employs them at first, with
great unscrupulousness, for selfish and worldly ends : after his great
spiritual struggle at Penuel, however, his lower self is left behind, and
in his old age his character appears still further mellowed by the
discipline of trial and bereavement. Joseph is an example of a stable,
upright character, faithful to his trusts, proof against temptation, led,
under God's providence, through many perils and many sorrowful and
discouraging experiences, to a situation of exaltation and dignity, in
which he employs his talents to promote the welfare of his fellow-men,
and in which he displays an even Christian spirit of magnanimity and
forgiveness towards those who once had bitterly wronged him. The
, biographies of the patriarchs present to us spiritual types, — repre-
' sentative examples of the varied experiences, the hopes and'fears, the
S disappointments and the pleasures, the sorrows and the joys, the
) domestic trials and successes, which may be the lot of any one of us ;
\ and they exemplify the frame of mind, — the trust, or resignation, or
S forbearance, or gratitude, — with which, as the case may be, they should
) be received, and the countless ways in which, under God's hand, the
> course of events is overruled for good*.
There is also another point of view from which we ought not to
omit to regard the Book of Genesis. It was a primary function of the
Hebrew historians not merely to narrate facts as such, but also to
interpret them, and in particular to interpret their religious signi-
ficance, and to shew their bearing upon the religious history of Israel
as a whole. This aspect of the work of the Hebrew historians is
particularly conspicuous in Genesis. Be the details history or legend,
or be they, as in some cases it is quite possible that they may be, an
intermixture of both, all are subordinated to this point of view.
Historically, the narrators may have been on some points imperfectly
informed ; but nevertheless what they all aim at shewing is how
\\ 'throughout the period of obscure beginnings God was forming a
Upeople whose destiny it was to give to the world the true religion.'
From Gen. iii. 14 onwards a redemptive purpose irradiates the entire
narrative, shining forth at certain definite epochs with particular
1 Byle, DB. s.v. (ii. 484").
2 The typical religious value of the patriarchal narratives, even with the
admission that they contain ideal tlements, is well brought out by Mr Ottley,
Bampt. Led. p. 126 f. S^e also Kautzsch, Bihelwisseruschaft und ReLigloniimter-
richt (1900), p. 41 f,, and Die bleibende Bedeutung des ATs., p. 24 £f.
§ 4] RELIGIOUS VALUE OF GENESIS Ixxiii
brightness, and of course continuing to display itself in subsequent
parts of the Old Testament. This is one of the features which gives
the narrative its unique character and unique value. The history of
the beginnings of the earth and man, and the story of Israel's ancestors,
might both have been told very differently. They might have been
told from a purely secular point of view. The narratives might have
been impregnated with foolish superstitions. The legends respecting
the beginnings of other nations are sometimes grotesquely absufd.
But in the hands of Israel's inspired teachers the Hebrew legend is
froi^]ig beginning suffused with pure and ennobling spiritual ideas ;
and they trace in it the beginnings of the same Providential purposes
which they find also in the Hebrew history into which afterwards it
insensibly merges.
Nor, finally, in estimating the religious value of the Book of
Genesis should we forget the character of the age to which it relates^^
and the intellectual and spiritual capacities of those to whom in the
first instance it was addressed. In the Bible we have the record of a
progressive revelation, in each stage of which the measure of truth
— V-p - ■•-"•Tina ) - ■ -^^tn
disclosed is adaptea to the mental and spiritual level which has been
reached by those who are to be its recipients. The Book of Genesis
gives a picture of the infancy and childhood of the world : it was also
primarily, at least in its principal and larger part (J and E), addressed
to men who, though far from uncivilized, and enjoying the advantages
of settled life and organised government, were nevertlieless in many
respects spiritually immature : the teaching of Amos and Hosea, Isaiah
and Jeremiah, for example, was still unknown to them. In contents
and style alike it is accordingly naturally fitted to the comprehension
of those for whose use and instruction it was primarily designed. In
an artless but attractive dress, and in forms adapted to impress and
delight those who read them, the story of Israel's ancestors is told in
it. W^hout any conscious moral purpose pervading the narrative,
elementary lessons about right and wrong, and God and man, are
taught through the simple experiences and vicissitudes of four
generations in an Eastern home. In Genesis, more than in any other
part of the Bible, God talks with men, as a father with his child^
Need we be surprised, therefore, that there should in this book be
some accommodation to the habits and modes of thought with which
children are familiar ? From tales a child may learn many a lesson,
without stopping to ask either himself or his teacher whether every
particular tale is true or not. And the tales of Genesis, whether
Ixxiv INTRODUCTION [§ 4
history or parable, are in either case inimitable, and full of lessons.
Truths and duties, especially those belonging to the ' daily round and
common task,' such as we all need to learn, and continually through
our lives have occasion to practise, are illustrated and enforced in it
by anecdotes and narratives, which the youngest can understand, from
which the oldest can still learn, and which never cease to fascinate and
enthral those who have once yielded themselves to their spell. * The
power of the Patriarchal narratives on the heart, the imagination, the
faith of men can never die : it is immortal with truthfulness to the
realities of human nature, and of God's education of mankind'.'
1 G. A. Smith, Modern Criticism and the Preaching of the OT. p. 109. Prof.
Smith's estimate of the historical character of the narratives of Genesis is sub-
stantially the same as that adopted in the preceding pages. Comp. also, on
the general question of both the historical and the religious value of the narratives
of Genesis, the very useful Introduction to Dr Wade's Book of Genesig (1896),
pp. 37 S., 49 a., 61 fi. .
THE BOOK OF GENESIS.
PART I. THE PREHISTORIC PERIOD.
CHAPTERS I.— XL
The Book of Genesis begins with an account of the creation of the universe,
and of the early history of man upon the earth. It describes, in accordance
with the beliefs current among the Hebrews, the process by which the earth
assumed its present form, and was adapted to become the habitation of man
(ch. i.) ; the situation of man's original dwelling-place, and the entrance of sin
and trouble into the world (ch. ii. — iii.) ; the beginnings of civilization (ch. iv.) ;
the growth of population (ch. v.) ; the increasing prevalence of wickedness, and
destruction of the whole human race, with the exception of a single family, by
a flood (ch. vi. — ix.) ; and lastly the re-peopling of the earth, and the rise of
separate nations, and of the Hebrews in particular, out of the descendants
of this family (ch. x. — xi.). Though in parts of these chapters there may be
dim recollections of historical occurrences, the narrative, as a whole, cannot
be regarded as an historical record of actual events. The reasons for this
conclusion will appear more fully in the sequel : it must, however, be almost
self-evident that trustworthy information respecting periods so remote as those
here in question could not have been accessible to the Biblical writers ; and it
is also certain that there are statements in these chapters inconsistent with
what is known independently of the early history of the earth, and of mankind
upon it. The narrative of these chapters consists rather of * a series of infer-
ences relating to times which are pre-historic. It represents the explanations,
arrived at in ways that it is now impossible to trace, which reflection furnished
of the many questions spontaneously occurring to a primitive race respecting
themselves and their surroundings^.' Sifiilar narratives are found in the early
literature of many other peoples. The nearest parallels to the Biblical records
are afforded (as will shortly become apparent) by Babylonia, a country with
which the Hebrews were once closely connected ; and recent discoveries have
«hevvn ' that certain common behefs concerning the beginnings of the earth
and of man must have prevailed in the circle of nations to which both Baby-
lonians and Hebrews belonged 2.' The disting-uishing characteristics of the
Biblical narrative are however the lofty religious spirit by which it is dominated,
and the spiritual lessons of which it is the expression : these remain, even
though the seemingly historical narratives with which they are associated
should prove to be no record of actual events, but to represent merely the
course of the past as it was pictured by the Biblical writers. To us, the
principal value of the narrative consists in the spiritual teaching thus implicit
in it ; and this it will be an object of the following commentary to point out
^ Wade, Old Test. Hist. (1901), p. 37. 8 Ibid.
2 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
Chapters I. 1— II. 4'.
The Creation of the World.
The Book of Genesis opens with a sublime and dignified narrative, describ-
ing the creation of heaven and earth, and the stages by which, as the narrator
pictured it, the latter was gradually fitted to become the habitation of man.
Starting with a state of primaeval chaos, in which the earth is represented as
enveloped in a huge mass of sun-ounding waters, shrouded in darkness, yet
brooded over by the Spirit of God, the writer describes successively (1) the
production of light ; (2) the division of this mass of primaeval waters into
two parts, an upper and a lower, by means of a 'firmament'; (3) the emergence
of the dry land out of the lower waters ; (4) the clothing of the dry land with
grass, herbs, and trees ; (5) the creation of sun, moon, and stars ; (6) the pro-
duction of fishes and birds ; (7) the appearance of terrestrial animals ; (8) the
creation of man ; (9) God's rest after His work of creation. There are thus
eight distinct creative works, which, with God's rest at the close, are adjusted
with remarkable symmetry to the week of seven days. The six days of creation
fall into two sections of three days each ; and the third and the sixth days have
each two works assigned to them. The first three days, moreover, are days of
preparation, the next three are days of accomplishment. On the first day
light is created, and on the fourth day comes the creation of the luminaries
which are for the future to be its receptacles ; on the second day the waters
* below the firmament,' and (as we should say) the air, appear, and on the fifth
day fishes and birds are created to people them ; on the third day the dry land
appears, and the earth is clothed with vegetation ; on the sixth day terrestrial
animals and man are created, who are to inhabit the dry land, and {vv. 29, 30)
to live upon food supplied by its vegetation. In the order in which the diff'erent
creative works are arranged there is an evident gradation, each work as a rule
occupying the place in which it might be naturally regarded as the condition,
or suitable forerunner, of the work next following, and in the case of living
things, there being an obvious ascent from lower to higher, the climax of the
whole being formed by man.
The narrative belongs to the Priestly source of the Kexatcuch (see p. iv),
the literary characteristics of which it displays in a marked degree. It will
be sufficient to notice here the use throughout of the name God {not Jehovah),
and the methodical articulation of the narrative into sections, each marked by
the recurrence of stereotyped formulae. Thus each creative act is introduced
by the words And God said {vv. 3, 6, 9, 11, 14, 20, 24, 26) ; and it was so is
found six times {vv. 9, U, 16, 24, 30); the murk of Divine approval, and God
saw that it was good, is repeated seven times (in Lxx. eight times, once after
each work), vv. 4, 8 (lxx.), 10, 12, 18, 21, 25, 31 (the last time, with a significant
variation) ; and the close of each day's work is marked by the standing
formula, and evening came, arid morning cam,6,...day im. 5, 8, 12, 19, 23, 31).
On some general questions arising out of the narrative, see p. 19 flf.
I.,,.] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 5
I. 1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the t
earth. 2 And the earth was waste and void ; and darkness was
1. 1. Introduction. The verse (as rendered in EW.) gives
a summary of the description which follows, stating the broad general
fact of the creation of the universe ; the details of the process then
form the subject of the rest of the chapter'.
In the beginnitig. Not absolutely, but relatively : at the begin--
ning of the order of things which we see, and in the midst of which
human history unfolds itself (Perowne, Expositor, Oct, 1890, p. 248).
God. On the Heb. word, see the Excursus at the end of the volume.
created. The root signifies to cut (see, in the intensive conjug.,
Josh. xvii. 15, 18 ; Ez. xxiii. 47) : so probably the proper meaning of
N"a is to fashion hy cutting, to shape. In the simple conjugation,
however, it is used exclusively of God, to denote viz. the production
of something fundamentally new, by the exercise of a sovereign
originative power, altogether transcending that possessed by man.
Although, however, the term thus unquestionably denotes a super-
human, miraculous activity, it is doubtful whether it was felt to
express definitely the idea of creatio ex nihilo"'-; and certainly, as
Pearson {On the Creed, fol. 52) points out, this doctrine cannot be
established from it. The word is very frequent in tlie Second Isaiah
(as xl. 26, 28, xlii. 5, xlv. 7, 12, 18). In Ps. civ. 30 it is used of the
ever-recurring renovation of life upon the earth. Its figurative ap-
plications are also noticeable : as of the formation of a nation by
Jehovah, Is. xliii. 1, 15 ; and of the production of some surprising
or striking effect, or of some new condition or circumstances, beyond
the power of man to bring about, as Ex. xxxiv. 10 (RVm.); Nu. xvi. 30
(RVm.) ; Jer. xxxi. 22 ; Is. xlv. 8, bcv. 17.
the heaven and the earth. I.e. the universe, as it was known to the
Hebrews, in its completed state.
2. The writer now turns at once to the earth, in which, as the
future home of man, and the theatre of human activity, he is more
particularly interested ; and proceeds to describe what its condition
was when God 'spake,' as described in v. 3.
the earth. As the sequel shews, the tenn here denotes the earth,
not as we know it now,, but in its primitive chaotic, unformed state.
was without forin and void. Heb. tohu wa-hohu — an alliterative
description of a chaos, in which nothing can be distinguished or
defined. TohR is a word which it is difticnlt to express consistently
in English : but it denotes mostly something unsubstantial, or (fig.)
1 Many modern scholars, however (including Dillmann), construe vv. 1 — 3 in
this way : 'In the beginning of God's creating the heaven and the earth, — now the
earth was without form, &c. [v. 2], — God said, Let there be light,' <fec. So already
the celebrated Jewish commentator Eashi (a.d. 1040 — 1105), and similarly Ibn
Ezra (1092—1167).
2 oi'k i^ ovTwv, 2 Mace. vii. 28. Cf. the Shepherd of Hermas, t. i. 6 with the
parallels from Ecclesiastical writers collected in the note in Gebhardt and Hamack's
edition. On Heb. xi. 3, see Westcott'e note.
1—2
2 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [i. i
unreaP ; cf. Is. xlv. 18 (of the earth), ' He created it not a tohu, he
fashioned it to be inhabited,' ■?;. 19 ' I said not. Seek ye me as a toku
(i.e. in vain)' Bohu (only twice besides), as Arabic shews, is rightly
rendered empty or void. Comp. the same combination of words to
suggest the idea of a return to primaeval chaos in Jer. iv. 23, and
Is. xxxiv. 11 ('the line of tohu and the plummet of bohu'y.
upon the face of the deep. Heb. fhom. Not here what the 'deep'
would denote to us, i.e. the sea, but the primitive undivided waters, the
huge watery mass which the writer conceived as enveloping the chaotic
earth. Milton (P. L. vn. 276 flf.) gives an excellent paraphrase :
The earth was formed, but, in the womb as yet
Of waters, embryon immature, involved.
Appeared not, — over all the face of earth
Main ocean flowed.
In the Babylonian cosmogony, also, as reported by Berossus (see DB.
I. 504''; or KAT.^ (1902), p. 488), all things began in darkness and
water; and fhom recalls at once the Bab. Tidnmt (see p. 28).
the spirit of God &c. In the OT. the 'spirit' of man is the
principle of Ufe, viewed especially as the seat of the stronger and more
active energies of life ; and the ' spirit ' of God is analogously the
Divine force or agency, to the operation of which are attributed
various extraordinary powers and activities of men, as also super-
natural spiritual gifts (see e.g. Gen. xh. 38; Ex. xxxi. 3j Num. xi. 17;
1 S. xi. 6, xvi. 13 ; Mic. iii. 8 ; Is. xi. 2, xlii. 1, lix. 21, Ixi. 1 ; Ez. xxxvi.
27); in the later books of the OT., it appears also as the power which
creates and sustains life (cf. Ez. xxxvii. 14; Is. xliv. 3f. ; Jobxxxiii. 4;
Ps. civ. 30'). It is in the last-named capacity that it is mentioned
here. The chaos of v. 2 was not left in hopeless gloom and death ;
already, even before God 'spake' (v. 3), the spirit of God, with its
life-giving energy, was ' brooding ' over the waters, like a bird upon its
nest, and (so it seems to be implied) fitting them in some way to
generate and maintain life, when the Divine ^a^ should be pronounced*.
^ The following are its occurrences (besides those noted above) : Is. xxix. 21
'that turn asile the just [from their right] with a thing of nought,' i.e. by baseless
alleviations, xl. 17 'are counted by him as made of nothing and tohu (EV. vanity),'
23 (RV. vanity, || nothing), xh. 29 (EV. conju^^ion, \\ wind), xliv. 9 {vanity, marg.
confusion), xlix. 4 for nought {=in vain), lix. 4 vanity (i.e. moral unreaUty,
falsehood); Job xx^i. 7 (RV. empty space); 1 S. xii. 21, of idols (RV. vain things);
Is. xxiv. 10 (RV. confusion). It is also used sometimes poetically of an undefined,
untracked. indeterminable expanse, or waste : Dt. xxxii. 10, Job vi. 18 RV.,
xii. 24 = Ps. cviL 40. The ancient Versions usually render it by words signifying
emptiness, nothingness, vanity (as k€v6v, oiiSiv, fidraLov, inane, vacuum, vanuin).
2 Lxx. render here aoparos Kal cLKaraaKevacrTos. Cf. Wisd. xi. 17 (18) i] vavToS'uvafJiin
ffov x-i-P '^o.i KTiff aua rbv Kofffjiov i^ dfJ.6pcpov v\r)s.
3 Comp. in the KT. John vi. 63 ; 1 Cor. xv. 4.5 ; 2 Cor. iii. 6 ; and in the Nicene
Creed to Kvpiov Kal I^uiottoIovv.
* Comp. Milton (P. L. vn. 233 ff.) : — ' Darkness profound
Cover'd the abyss ; but on the watery calm [see 1. 216]
His brooding wings the Spirit of God outspread,
And vital virtue infus'd, and vital warmth,
Throughout the fluid mass.'
i.a-s] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 6
upon the face of the deep : and the spirit of God ^ moved upon l-'
the face of the waters. 3 And God said, Let there be hght :
and there was light 4 And God saw the light, that it was
good : and God divided the light from the darkness. 5 And
^ Or, was brooding upon
moved. Was brooding (RVm.), The word occurs besides only
in Dt. xxxii. 11, where it is used of an eagle (properly, a griffon-
vulture) hovering over its young. It is used similarly in Syriac.
It is possible that its use here may be a survival, or echo, of the
old belief, found among the Phoenicians, as well as elsewhere (Euseb.
Praep. Ev. i. 10. 1, 2 ; Arist. Ayes 693 if. : Dillm. pp. 4, 7, 20), of a
world-egg, out of which, as it split, the earth, sky, and heavenly bodies
emerged; the crude, material representation appearing here trans-
formed into a beautiful and suggestive figure.
3 — 5. The First Day, and the first work. Light.
Light is the first work, because it is the indispensable condition of
all order, aU distinctness, all life, and aU further progress.
3. And God said. So at the beginning of each work of creation,
— including the two providential words of vv. 28, 29, ten times in all
(hence the later Jewish dictum, 'By ten sajdngs the world was created,'
Ahoth v. 1). As Dillm. has pointed out, in the fact that God creates
by a word, there are several important truths implicit. It is ah
indication not only of the ease with which He accomplished His work,
and of His omnipotence, but also of the fact that He works consciously
and deliberately. Things do not emanate from Him unconsciously,
nor are they produced by a mere act of thought, as in some pantheistic
systems, but by an act of will, of which the concrete word is the
outward expression. Each stage in His creative work is the realization
of a deliberately formed purpose, the 'word' being the mediating
principle of creation, the means or agency through which His will
takes effect. Cf. Ps. xxxiii. 6, 9; also cvii. 20, cxlvii. 15, 18, in which
passages the word is regarded as a messenger between God and His
creatures. This usage of the OT. is a preparation for the personal
sense of the term 'The Word' which appears in the NT. (John i. 1),
— though doubtless this usage is in part, also, dependent upon Philo.
4. that it was good. The Divine approval is signified seven times
in the chapter, after each work, except the second — where, however,
the Lxx. have it (v. 8). The for.nula used marks each work as one
corresponding to the Divine intention, perfect, as far as its nature
required and permitted, complete, and the object of the Creator's
approving regard and satisfaction.
and God divided &c. Light and darkness are henceforth to have
each its separate sphere, and special time of appearance (y. 5). The
And (1. 19 ff.) :—
' Thou from the first
Wast present, and, with mighty wings outspread
Dove-like, sat'st brooding on the vast abyss,
And mad'st it pregnant.'
6 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [1.5,6
God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. P
And there was evening and there was morning, one day.
6 And God said, Let there be a 'firmament in the midst of
^ Heb. expanse.
origin of darkness, like that of chaos, is not mentioned : chaos dis-
appears by being converted gradually into an ordered cosmos ; darkness,
though neither called iuto being by a creative word, nor described as
' good,' is nevertheless by this act of separation recognized as having
equally with light its place in the ordering of the world.
In this 'separation' of the hght from the darkness there seems,
however, to be something more involved than their mere alternation, or
successive appearance, by day and night. Not only is light created
before the luminaries (v. 161 but in Job light and darkness seem to be
represented as having eacn its separate and distinct dwelling-place
(xxxviii. 19 'Where is the way to the dwelling of light, And as for
darkness, where is the place thereof?' 20 ; xxvi. 10 'He hath circum-
scribed a boundary [the horizon] upon the face of the waters, Unto the
confines of light and darkness [i.e. the border between them]'). It
seems thus that, according to the Hebrew conception, light, though
gathered up and concentrated in the heavenly bodies, is not confined
to them (Perowne) ; day arises, not solely from the sun, but because
the matter of light issues forth from its place and spreads over the
earth, at night it withdraws, and darkness comes forth from its place,
each in a hidden, mysterious way (Dillm.). An idea such as this may
seem strange to us : but the expositor has no right to read into the
narrative the ideas of modern science ; his duty is simply to read out
of it the ideas which it expresses or presupposes.
5. And God called &c. God designed the distinction to be
permanent, and therefore stamped it with a name. An indirect way
of saying that a distinction which all men recognize, and express in
language, was part of the Divine purpose and a Divine ordinance
(similarly t>v. 8, 10). The alternation is a beneficent one ; and already
the future adaptation of the earth to the needs of men and animals is
in view (see Ps. civ. 20 — 23).
And evening came, and morning came [= cycVcro, not rjv], one day.
The chaotic darkness is antecedent to all reckoning : the creation of
light marks the beginning of the first day, so the first full day closes
with the following morning. This is indicated by saying, in accordance
with the distinction just estabhshed between ' Day ' and ' Night,' that
first evening came, and then morning came.
6 — 8. Second Day, and second work. The division of the primitive
chaotic waters into two parts, an upper and a lower, by means of a
'firmament.'
6. a firmament. Vulg. firmamentum, from the Lxx. <7Tep£w/u,a, i.e.
something made solid. The Heb. is rakia\ something pressed^ down
firm, and so beaten out (the cogn. verb means to stamp, Ez. vi. 11';
^ In the Syriao Version of Lk. vi. 38 it stands for irtiriejixiyoy, 'pressed down.*
f. fi-8] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 7
the waters, r.nd let it divide the waters from the waters. 7 And
God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were
under the firmament from the waters which were above the
firmament: and it was so. 8 And God called the firmament
applied to metals, to beat out (Nu, xvi. 39 ; Jer. x. 9), fig. of the earth,
Is. xlii. 5, xliv. 24 [RV. spread abroad], Ps. cxxxvi. 6), i.e. a firm and
solid expanse' capable of supporting the masses of water confined
above. The dome or canopy of heaven, which we, of course, know
to be nothing but an optical illusion, was supposed by the Hebrews
to be a solid vault (cf Job xxxvii. 18 ' Canst thou like him beat out the
skies, which are strong as a molten mirrorV and Prov. viii. 28*),
supported far off by pillars resting upon the earth (Job xxvi. 11 ;
Amos ix. 6; cf. 2 S. xxii. 8)^: above this vault there were vast
reservoirs of water, which came down, in time of rain, through opened
sluices (v. 7, vii. 11 ; Ps. civ. 3 'who layeth the beams of his upper-
chambers in the waters'; 13 'who watereth the mountains from his
upper-chambers'; Am. ix. 6 'who buildeth his upper-chambers in the
heaven, and hath founded his vault upon the earth ') ; and above these
waters Jehovah sat enthroned. The present verse shews how this was
supposed to have been brought about. By the Divine word, a solid
* firmament ' was created, which separated the huge mass of primitive
waters enveloping the earth into two parts, one being above the
firmament, and the other below it.
let it divide. More exactly, 'let it be dividing,' the participle
denoting that the division is to be permanent.
the waters from the waters. I.e. the waters below the firmament
firom the waters above it.
7. the waters which were above the firmament. Cf. Ps. cxlviii. 4.
and it tvas so. The clause is apparently misplaced. According to
the analogy of the otlier cases in which the words are used (vv. 9, 11,
15, 24, 30), and in which they immediately follow the words spoken
by God, they should stand at the end of v. 6, where the lxx. actually
have them.
8. And God called &c. Cf. v. 5. lxx. add here (as the Heb.
text does at the conclusion of all the other works, vv. 4, 10, 12, 18, 21,
25, cf. V. 31) 'And God saw that it was good.' It is true, the words
may have dropped out here accidentally ; on the other hand, it has
also been supposed that they were not placed here by the original
writer, because the separation of the waters by a firmament was only a
preliminary and imperfect stage in what was completed only on the
Third Day, viz. the gathering together of the lower waters into seas
and the emergence of dry land.
^ EVm. 'expanse' (alone) suggests a false sense : the word means an expanded
or extended thing.
2 Homer speaks similarly of the heaven as of bronze lOd. xv. 329 al.) or iron
(II. xvii. 425)
8 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [i. 8-10
Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, a P
second day.
9 And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered
together unto one place, and let the dry land appear : and it
was so. 10 And God called the dry land Earth ; and the
gathering together of the waters called he Seas : and God saw
And evening came, and morning came &c. As v. 5.
9 — 13. Third Day ; third and fourth works. The emergence of
the dry land out of the lower waters ; and its being clothed with
vegetation.
9, 10. The part of the chaotic waters, which remained below the
'firmament,' and for the present still enveloped the earth, is now
gathered into ' seas ' — the plural referring probably to the aggregate of
waters which the ancients generally (c£ the Gk 'flKcai/ds) pictured as
encircling the earth — and the surface of the earth appears. The idea
is that, whether by the earth rising, or by room being made around and
under it, the waters flowed away from its surface, and the dry ground
appeared. It must be remembered that to the Hebrews the earth was
not a large globe, revolving through space round the sun, but a
relatively small flat surface, in shape approximately round, supported
partly, as it seemed, by the encircling sea out of which it rose, but
resting more particularly upon a huge abyss of waters underneath,
whence hidden channels were supposed to keep springs and rivers
supplied, and also the sea (cf Dt. viii. 7 [read deeps for depths] ; Pr. iii.
20 ' by his knowledge the deeps were cleft open ' — with allusion to the
formation of these channels)'. These vast subterranean waters are
often alluded to, as vii. 11, xlix. 25 (see the notes) ; Ex. xx. 4 ('the
waters under the earth') ; Job xxxviii. 16 ; Pr. viii. 28'' ; Ps. xxxiii. 7^
xxxvi. 6; cf Ps. xxiv. 2 'For he hath founded it upon the seas, And he
maketh it fast upon the streams'; cxxxvi. 6 'To him that spread abroad
the earth upon the waters' There is a graphic poetical description of
this part of the Third Day's work in Ps. civ. 6 — 8 :
Thou coveredst it with the deep [i.e. with the primitive waters] like as
with a vesture;
The waters stood above the mountains :
At thy rebuke they fled,
At the voice of thy thunder they sped in alarm —
The mountains rose, the valleys sank —
Unto the place which thou hadst founded for them.
Confining the sea within its barriers is spoken of as a work of Divine
omnipotence also in Jer. v. 22, Job xxxviii. 8 — 11.
10. And God called &c. Cf on v. 5.
Earth. The word is used here in a somewhat different sense from
V. 2 : there it denoted the chaotic earth, enveloped in water, Milton's
1 See the illustratiou in DB. i. 603.
I. 10-14] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 9
that it was good. 11 And God said. Let the earth put forth P
grass, herb yielding seed, and fruit tree bearing fruit after its
kind, wherein is the seed thereof, upon the earth : and it was so.
12 And the earth brought forth grass, herb yielding seed after
its kind, and tree bearing fruit, wherein is the seed thereof, after
its kind: and God saw that it was good. 13 And there was
evening and there was morning, a third day.
14 And God said, Let there be Hghts in the firmament of the
'embryon immature'; here it denotes the land, as we know it, in
opposition to the sea.
11, 12. The clothing of the earth with vegetation. Three of the
more conspicuous descriptions of vegetable produce are mentioned,
which may be regarded as representing the whole.
11. grass. Heb. deshe\ often rendered tender grass (i.e. young,
fresh grass, such as appears after rain (2 S. xxiii. 4 ; Job xxxviii. 27) ;
and so used suitably of the fresh young verdure, which the narrator
pictured as first brought forth by the earth.
herb. I.e. larger plants, especially such as vegetables and cereals :
cf V. 29, iii. 18 ; Ps. civ. 14.
yielding seed. I.e. possessing the means of self-propagation, and
also furnishing products often useful for man.
fruit tree. The writer thinks more particularly of trees producing
food for man.
after its kind. Rather, after its kinds (the word being collective),
i.e. according to its various species : so vv. 12, 24, 25. The addition
calls attention to the number and variety of the different species
included under each head. The point is one often emphasized in the
technical enumerations of *P' : see the Introduction, p. viii : and cf. vi.
20, vii. 14 ; Lev. xi. 14—16, 19, 22, 29.
wherein is the seed thereof. I.e. containing in itself the means of
self-propagation. The object of the v. is to shew how all vegetation
originated in the command of God, how the earth produces its multitu-
dinous species by His appointment, and how further these species
contain within themselves the means of continuous reproduction.
14 — 19, Fourth Day, and fifth work. The creation of luminaries
in heaven.
14. lights. Heb. m^'oroth, places (or instruments) of light, i.e.
lumitiaries.
in the firmament of the heaven. I.e. fastened to it (cf. v. 17), and
helow the ' waters above the firmament ' of v. 7. The Hebrews were
unconscious of the immense (and varying) distances by which the
heavenly bodies are separated from the earth ; and supposed them
to have their positions, and courses, in some way assigned to them
in the solid 'firmament,' which seems to the spectator to extend, as
a huge cupola, above him.
10 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [i. u, n
heaven to divide the day from the night ; and let them be for P
signs, and for seasons, and for days and years : 15 and let them
be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon
The luminaries are described as subserving three purposes :
1. to divide the day from the night — or (v. 18) to divide the light
from the darkness, and to rule over the day and over the night — i.e. to be
the permanent regulators of the distinction laid down in vv. 4, 5 ; the
sun serving to distinguish the day from the night, and by the splendour
and potency of its rays ' ruling ' over it ; and the moon, though of
course equally visible by day, being more conspicuous by night, and
so, with the stars, ser\ing to distinguish it from the day, and 'ruling'
over it by imparting to it a character of its own.
2. to he for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years,
(a) for signs, e.g. as helping to fix what we should call the points
of the compass, or by tlieir appearance betokening the future state
of the weather, perhaps also, by extraordinary phenomena, as eclipses,
portending (as antiquity believed) extraordinary occurrences \ (b) for
seasons, i.e. not the four seasons of the year (though these may
be included), but fixed times (Heb. mo'adim, from yd'ad, to fix,
appoint), whether secular or sacred : as months and weeks, deter-
mined by the moon (cf. Ps. civ. 19 'he made the moon for fixed
times'), periods of human occupation, as agriculture and navigation^
or of animal life (cf. Jer. viii. 7 'the stork in the heaven loioweth
her fixed time,' viz. for migration), or of the flowering and seed-time
of plants, and similarly the fixed periods of the year which we call
' seasons ' ; and also sacred seasons — the festivals and other sacred
occasions in the Jewish calendar being fixed for definite days in the
week, month, or year (see esp. Lev. xxiii.), and the same word mo^ddlm
being frequently applied to them (see ibid., where ten such mo'dd'im^
are enumerated), (c) for days and years, determining their length, and
regular succession.
3. to give light upon the earth (v. 15). A necessary condition of
life, and progress ; and essential for the existence and development of
the human race. The various functions assigned here to the heavenly
bodies have all, it is to be noticed, reference to the earth — and especially
to the earth as a habitation for living beings : in Job xxxviii. 33 they
are summed up in the expression, ' the dominion of the heavens over
the earth.' For darkness and night, as having their place in the
Divinely-appointed economy of nature, see Ps. civ. 20.
^ Comp. the manner in which the prophets sometimes represent extraordinary
darkenings of the heavenly bodies as accompanying great political catastrophes
(Am. viii. 9 ; Ez. xxxii. 7 ; Is. xiii. 10) ; see also Joel ii. 31, Luke xxi. 25. How-
ever, an undue regard to such ' signs of heaven ' is condemned in Jer. x. 2.
2 Determined often in ancient times by the heliacal risings and settings of the
fixed stars : see Astbonomia in Smith's Diet, of Antiquities.
* RV. set feasts (RVm. appointed seasons) ; elsewhere also appointed feasts, as
Is. i. 14; Hos. ii. 11 (RVm.). (The word rendered 'feast' simply, and meaning
properly & pilgrimage (Ex. xxiii. 14 — 17 al), is quite different.)
I. is-20] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 11
the earth : and it was so. 16 And God made the two great P
lights ; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light
to rule the night: he made the stars also. 17 And God set
them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the
earth, 18 and to rule over the day and over the night, and to
divide the light from the darkness : and God saw that it was
good. 19 And there was evening and there was morning, a
fourth day.
20 And God said, Let the waters * bring forth abundantly the
^ Heb. swarm with swarms of living creatures.
16 — 18. The manner in which God gave effect to His command.
The luminaries are first 'made' {v. 16), and then 'set' (v. 17) in the
firmament.
16. And God made. ' And,' following the command of w. 14, 15,
is equivalent virtually to Thus, or So. Similarly tw. 21, 25.
to rule &c. Hence Ps. cxxxvi. 7 — 9. Cf. also Jer. xxxi. 35.
he made the stars also. The stars hold a subordinate place, because,
so far as the earth and life upon it are concerned, they are of less
importance than the sun or moon. The Hebrews had no idea that the
'stars' were in reality, at least in many cases, far vaster and more
wonderful in their structure than the sun. Even the questions in
Job xxxviii. 31, 32, have a far fuller meaning to us than they had
to the poet who framed them.
17. set them in the firmament. Cf. on v. 14 (p. 9).
'This whole description of the creation of the heavenly bodies is
written from the ancient geocentric standpoint : and it is vain to
attempt to bring it into scientific agreement with the teachings of
modern astronomy. But the object of the writer is a religious one ;
and for the religious point of view it is suthcient to know that the
heavenly bodies are marvels of the creative power of God, and in
other respects to consider them according to what they are for us.
They subserve human needs, in accordance with God's ordinance, in
the manifold ways indicated in the narrative ; and they are thus a
means of filling our minds with a profound sense of the wonderful
harmony of the universe, and of the might and wisdom of the Creator
(cf Pss. viii., xix., civ.) ' (Dillm.^. There is at the same time a tacit
opposition to the wide-spread belief of the ancients that the heavenly
bodies were themselves divine, and to be treated as objects of worship
(Dt. iv. 19 &c.; Job xxxi. 26 ; Wisd. xiii. 2).
20 — 23. Fifth Day and sixth work. The water and air peopled
with living beings.
20. Let the waters swarm with swarming things, (even) living
souls. The RV. here, unfortunately, fails entirely to give the reader
a clear idea of what is intended ; and even RVm. only partially supphes
12 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [i.2o,ai
moving creature that hath life, and let fowl fly above the earth P
Mn the open firmament of heaven. 21 And God created the
great sea-monsters, and every living creature that moveth, which
the waters brouglit forth abundantly, after their kinds, and
every winged fowl after its kind : and God saw that it was good.
^ Heb. on the face of the expanse of the heaven.
the deficiency. 'Swarming things' (Heb. sherez) is a technical ex-
pression, and is applied to creatures that appear in swarms — whether
(as here) those that teem in the waters (both fishes and other small
aquatic creatures)', or those which swarm on the ground or in the air
(i.e. creeping and flying insects, small reptiles, and small quadrupeds,
as the weasel and the mouse: see Lev. xi. 20 — 23, 29 — 31)^^.
(even) livitig souls. A ' soul ' (nepkesh) in the psychology of the
Hebrews is not peculiar to man ; it is the principle of life and sensibility
in any animal organism, and is then transferred to the sentient organism
itself. The rendering ' creature ' obliterates a distinctive characteristic
of Hebrew thought. Here the term denotes all kinds of aquatic
organisms, including even the lowliest. Comp. Ez. xlvii. 9 ' all soul that
swarmefh,' of fish ; and of other sentient things, ch. i. 21, 24, ix. 10,
12, 15, 16; Lev. xi. 10, 46, &c. (RV. each time, 'creature'), xxiv. 18
(Heb. 'he that smiteth the soul of a beast,' and then 'soul for soul').
fowl. Or, flying things. As Lev. xi, 20, 21, 23 (Heb.) shews, the
term may include insects.
in front of the firmament of heaven. Le. in the air, in front o/the
firmament, as a spectator standing upon the earth looks up towards it.
The RV. is incorrect, the Hebrew words not admitting of the rendering
given ; and the firmament, moreover, according to Hebrew ideas, not
being anything of which ' open ' could be predicated. The lxx. adds
at the end of this verse 'And it was so' (as w. 9, 11, 15, 24, 80).
21. The creatures thus produced specified somewhat more par-
ticularly.
sea-monsters. Heb. tanmn, a long reptile, applied sometimes to
land-reptiles (Ex. vii. 9 [see RVm.], 10, 12; Dt. xxxii. 33 [EVV.
dragon\ ; Ps. xci. 13 [RV. serpent ; PBV. dragonj) ; but usually
denoting the crocodile (Is. xxvii. 1, li. 9 ; Ez. xxix. 3, xxxii. 2 j
Ps. kxiv. 13 [EVV. in all, dragon]), or other aquatic monster (Jer. li.
34 ; Ps. cxlviii. 7 [see RVm.] ; Job vii. 12 [RV. sea-monster]). Here
it means sea- (and river-) monsters generally.
and every living soul (v. 20) that creepeth [or glideth], where-
1 So Lev. xi. 10 (read 'swarm' for 'move') ; Ez. xlvii. 9.
2 So vii. 21 (see RVm.), Lev. v. 2 (RV., unhappily [see on vv. 21, 24], ' creeping
things'). See especially Lev. xi. 20—23, 29—31, 41—44, 46: the reader who
desires to understand properly the distinctions referred to in this chapter should
mark on the margin of his Revised Version 'swarm,' 'swarmeth,' 'swarming'
against 'creep,' 'creepeth,' 'creeping' each time in these verses (as also against
'move' in v. 10), and 'creepeth' against 'moveth' in vv. 44, 46.
I. «-24] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 13
22 And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and P
fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.
23 And there was evening and there was morning, a fifth day.
24 And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living
creature after its kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of
with the waters swarm {v. 20). I.e. fishes, as well as other aquatic
creatures, which either glide through the water, or creep along its bed.
The word rendered 'creep' is used mostly of land-creatures (see on
V. 24) : it is used of aquatic creatu'-es, as here, in Lev. xi. 46 ;
Ps. Ixix. 34 (read ' creepeth,' or * glideth,' for RV. moveth) ; cf. the
corresponding subst. in Ps. civ. 25 ('wherein are things creeping
innumerable ').
22. As animate beings, the creatures just produced receive, not
only the customary mark of Divine approval {v. 21 end), but a blessing,
the terms of which shew that it is part of the Divine plan that they
should increase and multiply in the earth. The purpose was similar in
the creation of. plants {v. 11) ; but no such permission is addressed to
them, their growth and movement being spontaneous, and not controlled
by a conscious will, as is the case, in a greater or less degree, with
animate beings.
Be fruitful, and multiply. A combination characteristic of P :
cf. V. 28, viii. 17, ix. 1, 7, xvii. 20 al. (see the Introd. p. viii, No. 5).
24 — 31. The Sixth Day ; the seventh and the eighth works. The
creation of land-animals, and of man.
24. bring forth the living creature. Bring forth living soul
(collectively) : see on v. 20.
kind (twice). Kinds : so v. 25. In this, and the next verse, three
prominent classes of terrestrial animals are specified, as representing
the whole (cf. v. 11).
cattle. Heb. bhemdh (lit., as Eth. shews, that which is dumb), i.e.
large quadrupeds, sometimes (esp. when opposed to ' man ') including
wild animals (as vi. 7, 20, vii. 23^ ; but often, as here, referring more
particularly to domestic animals (cf. xxxiv. 23, xlvii. 18).
creeping thing. Heb. remes, i.e. things which 'move along the
ground either without feet, or with imperceptible feet' (Dillm.), i.e.
reptiles (lizards, snakes, &c.), a class of animal very abundant in the
East, and small creatures with more than four feet. So vv. 25, 26, vi.
7, 20, vii. 14, 23, viii. 17, 19 ; 1 K. iv. 33 ; Hos. ii. 18 al. ; cf the cognate
verb, Lev. xi. 44 (read 'creepeth' for RV. movethy, xx. 25 (RVm.).
beast of the earth. Lit. living things (=^aJa) of the earth,' i.e.
which roam on the wide e&rth., -wild animals: so vv. 25, [26], 30,
ix. 2, 10; 1 S. xvii. 46; Ps. Ixxix. 2 al. In ii. 19, 20, iii. 1, 14, the
expression used is 'beast (living thing) oiih^fieldJ
^ But EV. 'creep' in Lev. xi. should throughout be 'swarm': see the footnote
on p. 12 ; and cf. Gbebpino things in DB.
14 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [1.24-^6
the earth after its kind : and it was so. 25 And God made the P
beast of the earth after its kind, and the cattle after their kind,
and every thing that creepeth upon the ground after its kind :
and God saw that it was good. 26 And God said, Let us make
man in our image, after our likeness : and let them have
25, How God gave effect to His command. The verse is related
to V. 24, as V. 21 to v. 20, vv. 16 — 18 to vv. 14, 15, and v. 7 to v. 6.
26, 27. The creation of man. The creation of man is introduced
with solemnity : it is the result of a special deliberation on the part of
God, and man is a special expression of the Divine nature.
Let us make man. The plural in God's mouth (which occurs other-
wise in the entire OT. only xi. 7 ; Is. vi. 8 — for ch. iii. 22 is evidently
different) is remarkable and has been variously explained. (1) The
general Jewish interpretation, and also that of some Christians (notably
Delitzsch), is that God is represented as including with Himself His
celestial court (1 K. xxii. 19 f ; Is. vi. 8 ; Ps. Lxxxix. 5, 6, &c.), and
consulting with them, before creating the highest of His works, man'.
The words of the text seem however clearly to imply that those who
are included in the 1st pars. pi. are invited to take part in the creation '
of man, which, if they are angels, is not probable : Delitzsch's
argument that it is not their co-operation, but only their sympathy,
which is invited, implies a strained limitation of the expression used.
(2) Others, especially the Fathers, have regarded the plural as ex-
pressing a plurality of persons in the Godhead, and so as suggesting, at
least by implication, the doctrine of the Trinity. But this is to
anticipate a much later stage in the history of revelation. (3) Hebrew
possesses what is called a ' plural of majesty ' : the words for ' lord,'
' master,' even when applied to a single person, are often, for instance,
plural (see e.g. xxxix. 20 ; Ex. xxi. 29, 34 ; Is. xix. 4), for the purpose
of conveying the ideas of dignity and greatness ; the usual Hebrew word
for ' God ' (^Elohivi) is similarly, as a rule, plural (indicative, no doubt,
of the fulness of attributes and powers conceived as united in the
Godhead) : hence (DiUm., Perowne) it might well be that, on a solemn
occasion like this, when God is represented as about to create a being
in His own 'image,' and to impart to him a share in that fulness of
sovereign prerogatives possessed by Himself, He should adopt this
unusual and significant mode of expression.
in owr image, after our likeness. Of the two words used, ' image '
(1 S. vi. 5 ; Dan. iii. 1, &c. ; but not used elsewhere in the sense of
'resemblance,' except in the parallels, v. 27, v. 3, ix. 6) suggests,
perhaps, more particularly the idea of material resemblance, ' likeness '
(Ez. i. 5, 10, 13, 16, &c. ; and ch. v. 1, 3), that of an immaterial
1 Cf. Pesikta 34» (ed. Buber), 'God took counsel with the ministering angels,
and said unto them, Let us make,' &o. : similarly in the Targ. Ps.-Jon. on thi
verse. Comp. the later Jewish saying (Edersheim, Life and Times, ii. 749), 'Goo
never does anything, without first consulting the family above.'
I. ,6] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 15
dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, P
and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every
resemblance : but the distinction cannot be pressed' : both words refer
here evidently to spiritual resemblance alone ; and the duplication of
synonyms is intended simply to emphasize the idea of resemblance
(cf. the duphcations in x. 5, 20, 31, 32, xxv. 16).
What however is meant by the * image of God,' which man is thus
said to bear ? It is (1) something which evidently forms the ground
and basis of his entire preeminence above animals ; (2) it is something
which is transmitted to his descendants (v. 1, 3, ix. 6), and belongs
therefore to man in general, and not solely to man in a state of
primitive innocence ; (3) it relates, from the nature of the case, to
man's immaterial nature. It can be nothing but the gift of self-
conscious reason, which is possessed by man, but by no other animal.
In all that is implied by this, — in the various intellectual faculties
possessed by him ; in his creative and originative power, enabling him
to develop and make progress in arts, in sciences, and in civilization
generally ; in the power of rising superior to the impulses of sense, of
subduing and transforming them, of mounting to the apprehension of
general principles, and of conceiving intellectual and moral ideals ; in
the ability to pass beyond ourselves, and enter into relations of love
and sympathy with our fellow-men ; in the possession of a moral sense,
or the faculty of distinguishing right and wrong ; in the capacity for
knowing God, and holding spiritual communion with Him, — man is
distinguished fundamentally from other animals ^ and is allied to the
Divine nature ; so that, wide as is the interval se])arating him from
the Creator, he may nevertheless, so far as his mental endowments are
concerned, be said to be an ' image,' or adumbration, of Him. From
the same truth of human nature, there follows also the possibility
of God being revealed in man (John i. 1 — 14). Comp. in the NT.
1 Cor. xi. 7, Jas. iii. 9 ; and the application of the same figure to the
spiritual formation of the 'new man,' Col. iii. 10 (c£ Eph. iv. 24).
See also Ecclus. xvii, 3 if. ; Wisd. ii. 23.
and let them ham dominion &c. In virtue of the powers implied in
their being formed in God's 'image,' all living beings upon the earth
are given into their hand. Cf Ps. viii. 5 ff., ' For thou hast made him
lack but Httle of (being) God [viz. by the powers conferred upon him],
and thou crownest him with glory and state : Thou makest him to rule
over the works of thy hands ; thou hast put all things under his feet.'
and over all the earth. Pesh. ' and over all the beasts of the earth '
^ Notice in v. 27, ix. 6 'image' alone, and in v. 1 'likeness' alone, lxx.,
inserting kuI, accentuate the distinction unduly, and led some of the Fathers to
endeavour fruitlessly to distinguish elKuv from ofioiioa-n. Cf. Oehler, Theol. of OT.
§68.
^ It is true, some of the faculties mentioned are possessed, in a limited degree,
animals : but in none of them are they coupled with self-conscious reason ; and
•noe they do not form a foujidation for the same distinctive character.
16 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [1.26-30
creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. 27 And God P
created man in his own image, in the image of God created he
him ; male and female created he them. 28 And God blessed
them : and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and
replenish the earth, and subdue it ; and have dominion over the
fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living
thing that 'moveth upon the earth. 29 And God said, Behold,
I have given you every herb yielding seed, which is upon the
face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of
a tree yielding seed ; to you it shall be for meat : 30 and to
every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to
every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is ^life,
^ Or, creepeth * Heb. a living soul.
{v. 25). The word (nTi) has probably dropped out accidentally (Del.,
Dillm. a/.y.
28. The Blessing on man. The blessing is analogous to the one
in V. 22 (see also ix. 1 — 7), but ampler in its terms : man may not only
*be fruitful and multiply,' but, in accordance with the Creator's
purpose {v. 26), 'subdue' the earth, and subject to himself its living
inhabitants.
replenish. Fill, — which indeed was the meaning of 'replenish' in
Old English, and is what is intended here. In the Heb. the word is
exactly the same as the one rendered 'fill ' in v. 22. So ix. 1.
subdue. The word {kcibash, — properly tread down) is used of the
subjugation of a conquered territory, Nu, xxxii. 22 ; Josh, xviii. 1.
29, 30. Provision made for the food of men (v. 29), and other
terrestrial animals and birds (v. 30) : men are to have as food the seed
and fruit of plants ; terrestrial animals and birds are to have the leaves.
The food of men and animals is thus part of a Divine order. The
details are however given in only the broadest outline ; nothing for
instance is said respecting the food of aquatic animals, or of milk and
honey ; the aim of the verse is simply to define, with reference to
u 11 f., how the different kinds of plants there mentioned may be
utilized for food.
29. for meat. For food. 'Meat' in Old English was not re-
stricted, as it is with us, to the flesh of animals ; it meant food in
general. The archaism has been sometimes elsewhere retained in KV.,
as 1 K. xix. 8 ; Ps. Ixix. 21 ; Is. Ixii. 8 ; Joel i. 16.
30. life. A living soul. See on v. 20.
^ Ovid's description of the creation of man {Blet. i. 76 ff.) is worth quoting: —
'Sanctius his animal mentisque capacius altae Deerat adhuc, et quod dominari in
caetera posset.. ..Finxit in efiQgiem moderantum cuncta deorum. Pronaque quum
spectent animalia caetera terrain, Os homini sublime dedit ; caelumque videre
luBsit, et ereotoB ad sidera tollere vultus.'
1. 30, 31— 11. I, ^] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 17
/ have given every green herb for meat : and it was so. 31 And P
God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very
good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth
day.
II. 1 And the heaven and the earth were finished, and all
the host of them. 2 And on the seventh day God finished his
every green herb for meat. Eather, all the green of herbs (i.e.
the leaves) /or food.
The condition of things presupposed in v. 30 is inconsistent with
the evidence of palaeontology, which makes it certain that carnivorous
animals existed upon the earth long before the appearance of man, and
that these ' preyed upon one another, precisely as the same species or
their successors do now.' The truth is, the writer portrays an ideal.
'Animal food can only be had at the cost of animal life, and the'
taking of animal life seemed to him to be a breach of the Divine order,
which from the beginning provides only for the continuance and main-
tenance of hfe' (Perowne, Expositor, Feb. 1891, p. 129). Hence he
represents both men and animals as subsisting at first only on vegetable
food (animal food, according to the same writer, is first permitted to
man in ix. 2)'.
31. The closing verdict on the entire work of creation. The work
of each particular day is good : the combination of works, each dis-
charging rightly its own function, and at the same time harmonizing as
it should do with the rest, is characterized as very good. As has
been remarked, a note of Divine satisfaction runs through the whole
narrative, and it reaches its climax here ; but the severe simplicity and
self-control of the writen does not allow it to find any stronger ex-
pression than this. Contrast the more exuberant tone of Ps. civ. 31.
Cf. 1 Tim. iv. 4 (' for every creature of God is good,' &c.).
II. 1—3. The Seventh Day. The rest of God.
1. host. The word means an army (xxi. 22 &c.) ; and the ex-
pression 'host of heaven' occurs fi-equently, denoting sometimes the
stars (Dt. iv. 19), sometimes the angels (1 K. xxii. 19), both being
conceived as forming an organized and disciplined body. The term is
used here, exceptionally, with reference to the earth, by a species of
attraction. The ' host ' of heaven and earth means all the component
items of which they consist, — whether mentioned expressly or not in
eh. i., — conceived as constituting an organized whole.
2. finished. The 'finishing' is regarded as a separate, substantive
act, and assigned accordingly to a separate day : God formally brought
His work to its close by not continuing it on the seventh day, as He
had done on each of the preceding days.
^ The idea that in the 'Golden Age' the first men lived only on vegetable food ia
found also in classical writers: see e.g. Plato, Legg. vi. 782c; Ovid, Met. i. 103 — 6,
XV. 96—103, Fasti iv. 395 ff.
D. 2
18 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [ii. 2, 3
work which he had made ; and he rested on the seventh day P
from all his work which he had made. 3 And God blessed the
seventh day, and hallowed it : because that in it he rested from
all his work which God had created and made.
his work which he had made [twice]. Better, Ms business which
he had done, — i.e. the work of creation which He had set Himself.
M^ldchdh means work appointed, or imposed (e.g. Nu. iv. 3) ; it is the
word used regularly of the 'work' or 'business' forbidden on the
sabbath (Ex. xx. 9, 10, xxxv. 2 ; Jer. xvii. 22, 24, al).
rested. Better, desisted. Shdbath means (see viii. 22 ; Is. xiv. 4)
to desist, cease (cf. Arab, sabata, to cut off, interrupt) : so that what
the verse predicates of God is not the positive 'rest' of relaxation
(Heb. nUah) but the negative ' cessation ' from activity'. The former
idea is however found elsewhere in the same connexion, as in the
Decalogue (Ex. xx. 11), 'and rested on the seventh day,' and Ex. xxxi. 17
(P), 'and on the seventh day he desisted and was refreshed [lit. took
breath].' In the verb used (shdbath) there is an evident allusion to
the ' sabbath ' (properly shabbdth).
3. blessed... and hallowed it. Distinguished it from ordinary days
(Sir. xxxiii. 7 — 9), by attaching special blessings to its observance,
and by setting it apart for holy uses. Cf. Ex. xx. 8, 11^; Jer. xvii.
22, 24, 27 ; Is. Iviii. 13. The remark is made in view of the later
institution of the sabbath (Ex. xx. 8 — 11 &c.) as a day sacred to
Jehovah ; for there is no indication or hint of its being observed as
such in pre-Mosaic times.
because that in it he desisted from all his business, in doing
which God had created, i.e. which he had creatively done. The ex-
pression characterizes God's work as a creative work.
The formula which marks the close of each of the first six days is
absent in the case of the seventh day : and hence it has been sometimes
supposed that the 'rest' of the seventh day was to be regarded as ex-
tending indefinitely through the whole of history. It is doubtful however
whether this view is correct. The ' day,' to which in v. 2 the ' rest ' is
distinctly assigned, will be understood naturally in the same sense as
in the case of the six preceding ' days,' and the work from which God
is represented as 'resting' or 'desisting' is not work in general, but
only creatine work. The idea of the writer seems to have been that
God's sabbath intervened between the close of His work of creation
and the commencement of what, in modern phraseology, is usually
termed His sustaining providence. The sabbath by which God is said
to have closed His work of creation is thus a type of the weekly
recurring sabbath of the later Israelites. The truth that God's
sustaining providence is operative on the sabbath, not less than on
1 Cf. Ex. xxiii. 12 (E) ' On the seventh day thou ebalt desist, that thy ox and thy
ass may re&t, and the son of thy bondwoman, and thy sojourner [resident foreigner],
may be refreshed [lit. may take breath] ' ; xxxiv. 21 (both times ♦ desist ').
IT. 4] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 19
4 These are the generations of the heaven and of the earth p
when they were created,
other days (Jn. v. 17), is of course tacitly presupposed by the writer,
but he does not explicitly refer to it. — See further on the Sabbath
p. 34f.
4*. These are... created. The subscription to the preceding nar-
rative,— supposed by many critics to have originally stood, perhaps
without 'when they were created,' as the superscription to i. 1, and to
have been transferred here by the compiler of the book\ See further
the Introd. pp. ii, vi, viii (No. 9).
generations. Lit. begettings (quite a different word from the one
used in xvii. 7, 9, &c,) ; hence (successive) generations, especially as
arranged in a genealogy (v. 1, x. 1, xi. 10), also, somewhat more
generally, particulars about a man and his descendants (vi. 9, xi. 27,
Kxv. 19). Here the word is applied metaphorically to 'heaven and
earth ' ; and it will denote, by analogy, particulars respecting heaven
and earth and the things which might be regarded metaphorically as
proceeding from them, — i.e. just the contents of ch. i.
The student should examine, and compare with the preceding narrative,
other passages of Scripture containing tlioughts or lessons suggested by the
religious contemplation of nature : for instance, Am. iv. 13, v. 8, ix. 6 ; Jer.
xxxii. 17 ; ii Isaiah xl. 12—14, 21—2, 26, 28, xlii. 5, xlv, 7, 12, 18 ; Jer. x. 12 f.;
Ps. viii., xix. 1 — 6, xxxiii. 6 — 9, cii. 25, civ. (the * Poem of Creation '), cxxxvi.
5 — 9, cxlviii. ; Pr, iii. 19 f., viii. 22—31 ; Job ix. 8 f., xxvi. .5 — 13, and especially
the two magnificent chapters, xxxviii. — xxxix. ; Wisd. xiii. 3 — 5; Jn. i. 1 — 5;
Rom. i. 20 ; Col. i. 16 ; Heb. i. 2, 3, xi. 3 ; Rev. iv. 11.
The Cosmogony of Genesis^.
It remains to consider some important questions to which the cosmogony
which we have just been studying gives rise. We have to ask, namely,
(i) Does the picture which it affin-ds of the past history of the world agree
with that which is disclosed by science 1 (ii) What is the origin of the
cosmogony? and (iii) What is its true value and import to us?
(i) Those who have read Pearson On t1ie Creed may remember how at the
end of his exposition of Art. i. (fol. 68) he says that heaven and earth were created
' most certainly within not more than six, or at farthest seven, thousand years,'
from the age in which he was writing. That was the 17tli century. But since
Pearson's time geology has become a science, and has disclosed, by testimony
1 ' These ' may point indifferently forwards (as x. 1) or backwards (as x. 32) ;
but the corresponding formula stands everywhere else as the superscription to the
section which follows (see v. 1, vi. 9, x. 1, xi. 10, 27, &c.).
2 The following pages are adapted in the main, with some abridgment, from an
article contributed by the present writer to the Exjjositor, Jan. 1886, PP- 23 — 45.
2-2
20 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
which cannot be gainsaid, the immense antiquity of the earth. The earth, as
we now know, reached its present state, and acquired its rich and wondrous
adornment of vegetable and animal life, by a gradual process, extending over
countless centuries, and embracing unnumbered generations of living forms.
Those white cliffs which rise out of the sea on our southern coasts, when
examined by the microscope, are seen to consist mostly of the minute shells of
marine organisms, deposited at the rate of a few inches a century at the bottom
of the ocean, and afterwards, by some great upheaval of the earth's crust, lifted
high above the waves ^. Our coal measures are the remains of mighty forests,
which have slowly come and gone upon certain parts of the earth's surface,
and have stored up the energy, poured forth during long ages from the sun,
for our consumption and enjoyment^. These and other formations contain
moreover numerous fossil remains ; and so geologists have been able to
determine the order in which, during the slowly passing ages of their growth,
higher and higher types of vegetable and animal life were ever appearing upon
the globe. Nor is this all. Astronomers, by the study and comparison of the
heavenly bodies, have risen to the conception of a theory explaining, by the aid
of known mechanical and physical principles, the formation of the earth itself.
The solar system — i.e. the sun, earth, and other planets with their satellites —
existed once as a diffused gaseous mass, or nebula, of immense dimensions,
which gradually condensed, and became a rotating sphere ; and from this in
succession the different planets were flung off, while the remainder was more
and more concentrated till it became what we call the sun. One of these
planets, the earth, in process of time, by reduction of temperature and other
changes, developed the conditions adequate for the support of life^. The time
occupied by all these processes cannot of course be estimated with any
precision ; but it will in any case have embraced millions of years : a recent
work on astronomy places the time at which the moon was thus flung off from
the then liquid earth, at about 57,000,000 years ago*.
Is now the teaching of geology and astronomy on the subjects referred to
in the preceding paragraph consistent with what we read in Gen. i. ?
Obviously it is not consistent with it, if by 'day' is meant a period of
24 hours. It is, however, conceivable that the writer, in spite of his regular
mention of 'evening' and 'morning,' may have used the word in a figurative
sense, as representing a period, aware indeed that the work of the Creator
could not be measured by human standards, but at the same time desirous of
artificially accommodating it to the period of the week. Let us, now, at least
provisionally, grant this metaphorical use of the term 'day': the following
questions will then arise. Do the 'days' of Genesis correspond with well-
defined geological periods ? and does the order in which the different living
things and the heavenly bodies are stated to have been created agree with the
^ See Huxley's striking lecture 'On a Piece of Chalk' in his Lay Sermons (re-
printed in his Collected Essays, vol. viii.).
* Comp. two fine passages on the ' Slowness of the Creative Process ' in
Pritchard's Analogies in the Progress of Nature and Grace, 1868 (the Hulsean
Lectures for 1867), pp. 11 ff., 19 iff.; also Bonney's Old Trutlis in Modern Lights,
p. 89 ff.
8 See Sir R. S. Ball's The Earth's Beginnings (1901), esp. p. 246 ff.
« Prof. H. H. Turner, Modern Astronomy (1901), p. 277.
THE COSMOGONY OF GENESIS
21
facts of geology and astrouomy ? To both these questions candour compels
the answer, No. Here is a table of the succession of life upon the globe, taken
(with some modification of form) from Sir J. W. Dawson's Chain of Life in
Geological Time^ : —
Eozoio
1. Laurentian.
2. Huroniau.
3. Cambrian.
4. Silurian.
5. Devonian.
Palaeozoic
H
6. Carboniferous.
7. Permian.
Mesozoic
Cainozoic
' 8. Triassio.
9. Jurassic.
.10. Cretaceous.
11. Tertiary.
1 12. Post-Tertiary.
ANIMAL LKIS.
Eozoon Ganadense^.
Age of Protozoa (low-
liest marine animals).
Invertebrata : Age of
molhisks, corals, and
crustaceans. In 4
fishes begin.
Fishes abundant (bat
no modern species).
Earliest insects*.
Amphibians begin (spe-
cies allied to frogs,
newts, and water -
lizards, some of the
last large crocodile-
like creatures).
Insects (spiders, beetles,
cockroaches, &c.).
Earliest true reptiles.
Earliest mari:upial
mammals.
Age of monster reptiles
and of birds.
Age of extinct mam-
mals. First living
invertebrates.
Age of modern viam-
nials and man.
VEGETABIiE LIFE.
Doubtful 3.
Indications of plants
not determinable.
Marine plants (sea-
weeds, &c.).
Earhest land plants.
Coal plants ; chiefly
tree-ferns and large
mosses (flowerless
plants), pines, and
cycads.
Earliest modern trees.
Age of palms and dicoty-
ledonous Angiosperms.
The earliest organic forms appear in the remains belonging to the period
first named, marked, as its name implies, by the ' dawn of life.'
In Genesis the order is : —
Third Day. Grass, herbs (i.e. vegetation more generally), trees.
(Fourth Day. — Luminaries.)
Fifth Day. — Aquatic animals, both small (yw, 'swarming things') and
great (D''3^3n, 'sea-monsters'), and winged creatures (birds; also probably
such insects as usually appear on the wing).
Sixth Day. — Land animals, both domesticable and wild, and creeping
things (small reptiles; perhaps also creeping insects). Man.
The two series are evidently at variance. (1) The geological record con-
tains no evidence of clearly defined periods, such as (ex hyp.) are represented
1 Ed. 3 (1888). See the Table opposite to p. 1; and (on No. 6) pp. 142—157.
Cf. the same writer's Relics of Primaeval Life (1897), p. 2.
^ If this be of organic origin, a question on which geologists still differ. Comp.
Geikie's Text Book of Geology (1893), p. 694 f.; Bonney, Geol. Mag. 1895, p. 292.
^ Perhaps to be assumed from the large quantity of graphite (carbon) present in
these rocks : see Geikie, p. 696, with note 1 ; Prestwich, Geology (1888), ii. 21 f.
* E.g. a kind of May-fly, as well as other forms (Chain of Life, p. 139 ff.).
22 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
by the * days ' of Genesis. This, however, may perhaps be considered a minoi
discrepancy. (2) In Genesis vegetation is complete two 'days,' — i.e. two
periods, — before animal life appears : geology shews that they appear
simultaneously — even if animal life does not appear first. The two are found
side by side in humble forms; and they continue side by side, advancing
gradually till the higher and more complete types are reached : one does not
appear long before the other. (3) In Genesis fishes and birds appear together
(Fifth Day), and precede all land-animals (Sixth Day); according to the
evidence of geology, birds appear long after fishes, and they are preceded by
numerous species of land-animals (including in particular ' creeping things ').
The second and third of these discrepancies are formidable. To remove
them, harmonists have had recourse to different expedients, of which the
following are the principal.
(1) It has been supposed that the main description in Genesis does not
relate to the geological periods at all, that room is left for these periods
between v. 1 and c. 2, that the life which then flourished upon the earth was
brought to an end by a catastrophe the results of which are alluded to in v. 2,
and that what follows is the description of a second creation, immediately
preceding the appearance of man. This, implying" as It does a destruction and
subsequent restoration, is called the ' restitution-hypothesis.' It labours under
most serious difiiculties. The assumption of an interval between v. 1 and v. 2,
wide enough to embrace the whole of geological time, though in the
abstract exegetically admissible, is contrary to the general tenor of the
opening verses of the narrative ; the existence of the earth, together with the
whole flora and fauna of the geological periods, prior to the creation of hght
and formation of the sun is scientifically incredible ; and the existing species
of plants and animals are so closely related to those which immediately
preceded man, that the assumption of an intervening period of chaos and ruin
is in the last degree improbable. Arbitrary in itself, and banned by science,
the restitution-hypothesis, though advocated in the last century by Kurtz and
Dr Chalmers, has otherwise been seldom adopted by modern apologists.
(2) The vision-theory. Upon this view the narrative is not meant to
describe the actual succession of events, but is the description of a series of
visions, presented prophetically to the narrator's mental eye, and representing
not the first appearance of each species of life upon the globe, but its
maximum development The * drama of creation,' it is said, is described not
as it was enacted historically, but optically, as it would present itself to a
spectator, in a series of pictures, or tableaux, embodying the most character-
istic and conspicuous feature of each period, and, as it were, summarizing in
miniature its results. The Third Day is identified with the Carboniferous
period (No. 6 in the Table), the marine Ufe of the preceding periods, copious
though it was, being supposed to be not visible in the tableaux, and con-
sequently disregarded. This theory was attractively expounded in Hugh
Millei-'s Testimony of the Rocks (1857), a work which was for many years
extremely popular in this country. The objections to it are enumerated by
Delitzschl The revelation of the miknown past to a historian, or even to
1 Covim. iiber die Genesis, ed. 4 (1872), p. 18 f.
THE COSMOGONY OF GENESIS 23
a prophet, by means of a vision, is unexampled in the OT., and out of analogy
with the character and objects of prophecy ; the narrative contains no indica-
tion of its being the relation of a vision (which in other cases is regularly noted,
e.g. Am. vii. — ix.; Is. vi.; Ez. i. &c.); it purports to describe not appearances
(^And I saw, and behold...'), but facts Q Let the earth... And it was so'), and
to substitute one for the other is consequently illegitimate ; the resemblances
between Gen. i. and other cosmogonies — especially the Babylonian — shew that
the writer has before him 'not a vision, but a tradition.' There is also the
material difficulty that, while marine animals, small as well as great, were not
hidden from view in the tableau of the Fifth Day, the fishes so characteristic
of the Devonian period (which precedes th^ Carboniferous period) are not
described : in accordance with the hypothesis itself, these should have been
noticed before the vegetation of the Third Day. Indeed this last difficulty
may be stated more generally: if the past was expressly revealed in the form
of a vision, is it likely that the picture as a whole would be so widely different
from the reality as it unquestionably is ?
(3) Sir J. W. Dawson \ a distinguished Canadian geologist of the last
century, rejecting (p. 193) the hypothesis of Hugh Miller, as Hugh Miller
before him had rejected that of Kurtz, adopted another method of reconcilia-
tion, assigning nearly the whole of the Palaeozoic and Mesozoic periods (Nos. 4
to 9 in the Table) to tho Fifth Day, and supposing Nos. 2 and 3 to contain such
relics as survive of the work of the Third Day. The objections to this scheme
are : (a) it brings together fishes and birds, which neverthelcos are in reality
widely separated (Nos. 4 and 9 in the Table) ; (&) Genesis places the appear-
ance of 'creeping things' on the Sixth Day (Nos. 11 and 12), while in fact they
appear in what Sir J. W. Dawson assigns to the Fifth Day (Nos. 6 and 7)^ ;
(c) in Genesis vegetation, including trees, is complete on the Third Day
(Nos. 2 and 3), whereas prior to the Silurian period (No. 4) nothing but the
humblest forms of marine vegetation is observable. Sir J. W. Dawson is
conscious of the last difficulty; and he allows that the existence before the
Siku-ian period of vegetation that would satisfy the language of Genesis awaits
proof. He is sanguine himself that in time this proof may be forthcoming; but
the fact that vegetable life is admitted to have advanced progressively from
lower to higher forms is not favourable to the expectation, and it is certain
that no other geologist shares it^.
^ Origin of the World according to Revelation and Science^ (1886), pp. 192 — 5.
2 To escape this difficulty Sir J. W. Dawson (Expositor, Apr. 1886, p. 297)
limits remes (see on i. 24) to ' small quadrupeds ' ; but the limitation is arbitrary ;
for it is impossible to exclude reptiles from the expression.
2 The harmony represented as existing between Gen. i. and science, in the
Table facing p. 1 of Sir J. W. Dawson's Modern Science in Bible Lands^ (1895) is
purely illusory: 'vegetation,' for instance, in the Biblical column means entirely
land-plants, whereas the ' Protogens in graphite beds ' which correspond ostensibly
in the column headed ' Vegetable life ' consist entirely of marine plants, to the
exclusion of land-plants ; and reptiles actually appear long before birds, not
simultaneously with them, as they are represented as doing in the column headed
'Animal life.' The Table on p. 353 of the Oripin of the > arid is illusory also upon
similar grounds. Comp. the note on p. 26 in the Addenda.
The reader of Sir J. W. Dawson's works should be aware that his statements on
Biblical matters, especially where questions relating to science or criticism are
involved, are to be received with much caution and distrust.
24 THE BOOK OP GENESIS
(4) Professor Dana*, accepting the nebular hypothesis of the origin of the
solar system, begins by seeking to accommodate it to the first five verses of
Gen. i. Accordingly, following substantially Prof. Guyot^, he considers that the
terms 'earth ' and 'waters' in r. 2 do not denote anything which we should call
by those names, but matter in that unimaginable condition in which it was not
yet endowed with force or the power of molecular action : the creation of
' light ' {v. 3) was in reality the endowment of this ' inert ' matter with these
capacities ; vv. 6 — 8 (the Second Day) describe the making of the earth,
'water' there not denoting what the Hebrews knew as water, but the
attenuated substance of the universe, while yet diffused, in a nebulous or
vaporous form, through space, and v. 7 describing the separation of the earth
from this diffused matter; and when it is said that on the Third Day the
earth brought forth grass, herbs, and fruit-trees, the meaning really is, that it
brought forth different species of sea-weed, and the lowest, seedless types of
land-vegetation (these being all the forms of vegetation which geology recog-
nizes before fishes, which are assigned by Genesis to the next day : see Nos. 3,
4 in the Table), Prof. Dana was a most eminent geologist ; but the fact that,
in order to harmonize the cosmogony of Genesis with the teachings of science,
he was obliged to have recourse to such extraordinary and unnatural interpre-
tations of the words of Genesis, is the best proof that the two are in reality
irreconcilable 3.
So much for the geological difficulties of the cosmogony of Genesis. Let
us now consider the astronomical difficulties presented by it. (1) The creation
of the sun, moon, and 8tars°*after the earth. The formation of the heavenly
bodies after the earth is inconsistent with the entire conception of the solar
system — and indeed, if we think also of the stars, with that of the whole
* In the Bibliotheca Sacra, April, 1885, p. 201 ff.
* Creation (1884), p. 36 : ' The Heb. word maim does not necessarily mean
waters, but applies as well to a gaseous atmosphere' (1). And 'earth ' is similarly
explained as denoting (pp. 35, 38) a formless sphere of gas — the 'primordial cosmic
material,' out of which the universe was ultimately formed.
The solution of the discrepancies proposed recently by Mr Capron {The Conjiict
of Truth, 1901, pp. 170 &., 194), viz. that the text speaks only of the order in which
the creative words were uttered, not of that in which the resulting effects were
produced, yields a sense which is contrary to the obvious intention of the writer.
Mr Capron argues also (p. 205 ff.) that by 'earth' and 'water' in Gen. i. 1, 2
is denoted gaseous matter ; but the sense which he supposes to be expressed by
these two verses (pp. 136 ff., 213) is not credible {v. 2 'And matter was then in
a gaseous condition; for it was formless, homogeneous, and invisible, and the
Spirit of the Almighty agitated with molecular vibrations the fluid mass ').
* When therefore Prof. Dana's authority is quoted for the opinion that Gen i. is
in harmony with science, it must be carefully remembered how this harmony was
obtained by him, viz. by imposing upon the words of Genesis meanings which it is
simply impossible that they can ever have been intended to convey.
See further, on Prof. Dana's theory of reconciliation, the critique of the
present writer in the Andover (U.S.A.) Review, Dec. 1887, pp. 641 — 9; and
President Morton's articles referred to below (p. 33). Comp. also Prof. T. G.
Bonney at the Norwich Church Congress {Report of the Norwich Church Congress,
p. 311; or in the Guardian, Oct. 16, 1895, p. 1588): 'The story of Creation in
Genesis, unless we play fast and loose either with words or with science, cannot
be brought into harmony with what we have learnt from geology.' Canon Bonney
permits the writer to add that the statements on geological subjectfi contained in
the preceding pages are in his opinion correct. [See further the Addenda,"]
THE COSMOGONY OF GENESIS 25
celestial universe — as revealed by science. Both the stars in their far-distant
courses, and the planetary system with which this globe is more intimately
connected, form a vast and wonderfully constituted order, so marked by
correlation of structure, by identity of component elements (as revealed by the
spectroscope), and by unity of design, as to forbid the supposition that a
particular body (the earth) was created prior to the whole, of which it is
a single and subordinate part. (2) The commonly accepted theory (Laplace's)
of the formation of the solar system by the gradual condensation of a nebula,
does not permit the consolidation of the earth, the appearance upon it of water,
and the growth of vegetation, before the sun was 'made,' i.e. while the substance
of the sun was still in a diffused gaseous state. At such a period, it is doubtful
if the earth itself would not also have been in a gaseous state ; certainly, it
would not have cooled sufficiently for water to exist upon it, and trees to
grow^ The solution usually offered of these difficulties is that he in v. 14
means appear, and made in v. 16 means woi formed, but either (Dana) made to
appear, or (Dawson) appointed, viz. to their office and work : the luminaries,
it is argued, may thus have existed long previously, but it was only on the
Fourth Day that they * appeared ' (the thick vapour around the earth having
previously concealed them), and were * appointed ' to the functions enumerated
in vv. 14 — 18, But this explanation is quite untenable. Hebrew is not such
a poverty-stricken language as to have no word expressing the idea of 'appear '
(see V. 9) ; and had the writer intended ' appear,' it may be safely affirmed that
he would have said so. The sense attached to * made ' is also illegitimate : in
the very few passages where HK^y means appointed, either this sense is at
once apparent fi-om the context-, or the word is followed by a specification of
the office or function intended ^ ; used absolutely, it can be only a synonym of
'formed*.' Verses 14 — 18 cannot be legitimately interpreted except as implying
that, in the conception of the writer, luminaries had not previously existed ;
and that they were ' made,' and ' set ' in their places in the heavens, after the
separation of sea and land, and the appearance of vegetation upon the earth
{vv. 6 — 8, 9 — 13), No reconciliation of this representation with the data of
science has as yet been found.
One discrepancy more, of a different kind, remains still to be noticed.
From the injunction in v. 30 it is a legitimate inference that the narrator
considered the original condition of animals to be one in which they subsisted
solely on vegetable food. This is not merely inconsistent with the physical
structure of many animals (\vhich is such as to require animal food), but is
^ Cf. Prof. Pritchard, late Savilian Professor of Astronomy at Oxford, Expositor,
Jan. 1891, p. 49 f. : 'The existence of water [on the earth] before the concentration
of the sun into the form of a sun is inconceivable with a competent knowledge of
the facts of nature. So too is the existence of grass and fruit trees, antecedent to
the same, or even under the condition of the invisibility of the sun as a sun ' (cf.
p. 53). To the same effect, Occasional Notes oj an Astronomer, p. 262 f.
^ As, 'He made priests from among all the people' (1 K. xii. 31) ; 2 S. xv. 1
and 1 K. i. 5 (where 'prepared' is lit. made); 2 K. xxi. 6 (EVm.)- But really in
these passages 'made' means more than 'appointed'; it means institute'!,
organized, i.e. it is merely a metaphorical application of the proper sense of 'made.'
3 As Ps. civ. 4 ; 1 S. viii. 16.
* As V. 26, v. 1 ; Am. v. 8 ; Job ix. 9 ; Ps. cxv. 15, and regularly.
26 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
contradicted by the facts of palaeontology, which afford conclusive evidence
that animals preyed upon one another long before the date of man's appearance
upon the earth.
From all that has been said, only one conclnsion can be drawn. Read
without prejudice or bias, the narrative of Gen. i. creates an impression
at variance with the facts revealed by science : the efforts at reconciliation
which have been reviewed are but different modes of obliterating its character-
istic features, and of reading into it a view which it does not express. The
harmonistic expedients adopted by Sir J. W. Dawson and Prof Dana are in
reality tantamount to the admission that, understood in the natural sense of
the words — and we have no right to impose any other sense upon them — it
does not accord with the teachings of science. While fully bearing in mind
the immediate design of the writer, to describe, viz. in terms intelligible to
the non-scientific mind, how the earth was fitted to become the abode of man,
it is impossible not to feel that, had he been acquainted with its actual past,
he would, while still using language equally simple, equally popular, equally
dignified, have expressed himself in diflerent terms, and presented a different
, picture of the entire process. It will also, further, be now apparent that the
I admission, granted provisionally above (p. 20), that * day ' might be interpreted
as representing a period, is of no avail for bringing the narrative into harmony
jwith the teaching of science ; and that consequently there is no occasion to
understand the word in any but its ordinary sense.
(ii) "What then may we suppose to have been the source of the cosmogony
of Genesis ? In answering this question, we must bear in mind the position
wliich the Hebrews took among the nations of antiquity. In the possession of
aptitudes fitting tliera in a peculiar measure to become the channel of revela-
tion and the exponents of a spiritual religion, the Hebrew nation differed
materially from its neighbours ; but it was allied to them in language, it shaded
with them many of the same institutions, the same ideas and habits of thought.
Other nations of antiquity made efforts to fill the void in the past which begins
where historical reminiscences cease, and framed theories to account for the
beginnings of the earth and man, or to solve the problems which the observation
of human society suggested. It is but consonant with analogy to suppose that
the Hebrews were conscious of the same needs ; and either formed similar
theories for themselves, or borrowed tliose of their neighbours. Thus many,
perhaps most, nations, where they had no knowledge of science to guide them,
have given the reins to their imagination, and framed cosmogoniesK These
cosmogonies reflect partly the impressions made upon the nation framing it by
the physical world, partly the general mental characteristics of the nation,
partly the conception of deity current in it. That the physical element in such
cosmogonies was usually eiToneous, and often grotesque, was a natural conse-
quence of the ignorance of pliysical science possessed by those who constructed
them. The theological element varied according as the conceptions of deity
current in a particular nation were more or less spiritual : where, for instance,
polytheism prevailed, places had to be found in the process for the various
divine beings, and the. cosmogonies consequently became often thtogonies.
* See particulars in the art. Cosmogony in the Encycl. Britannica, ed. 9.
THE COSMOGONY OF GENESIS 27
The cosmogony of Genesis seems, in its arrangement, to have been deter-
mined ultimately by the observation that there is a rank and order in natural
products, and by the reflexion that one part of nature is in various ways
dependent upon, or supported by, another.
The more immediate source of the Biblical cosmogony, however, there can
be little doubt, has been brought to light recently from Babylonia. Between
1872 and 1876 that skilful collector and decipherer of cuneiform records, the
late H^ George Smith, published, partly from tablets found by him in the
British Museum, partly from those which he had discovered himself in Assyria,
a number of inscriptions containing, as he quickly perceived, a Babylonian
account of Creation. Since that date other tablets have come to light ; and
though the series relating to the Creation is still incomplete, enough remains
not only to exhibit clearly the general scheme of the Cosmogony, but also
to make it evident that the cosmogony of the Bible is dependent upon it.
The tablets themselves come from the Library of Asshurbanipal (668 — 626 b.c.)
at Kouyunjik (Nineveh); but Asshurbauipal's Library is known to have
included many transcripts of earlier texts ; and Assyriologists entertain no
doubt that the contents of the tablets are much more ancient than the 7th
cent. B.C., and are probably (Sayce) as old as the 22nd or 23rd cent. B.o.
There is no occasion to give here a translation of the whole of the tablets
which have been discovered^ ; but the reader cannot properly estimate their
bearing upon the Biblical narrative without having the characteristic parallels
placed before him, and being made acquainted with the general outline of
their contents. It should only be premised that some particulars of the
Babylonian cosmogony were known before these discoveries from extracts
which had been preserved from Berossus — a Babylonian priest, who lived
about 300 B.C., and compiled a work on Babylonian history — and Damascius
(6th cent, a.d.) ; and the accuracy of these particulars (apart from certain
textual corruptions) has been fully established by the inscriptions 2.
The inscriptions preserved on these tablets are written in a rhythmical
form ; and form in reality a kind of epic poem, the theme of which is the
glorification of Marduk (Merodach, Jer. 1, 2), the supreme god of Babylon,
declaring how, after a severe conflict, he had overcome the powers of chaos
and darkness, and had so been enabled to create a world of light and order.
The poem is conceived polytheistically ; but this fact does not neutralize
the miderlying resemblances with Gen. i The first tablet (of which only
1 See, for a translation, Ball's Light from the East (1899), pp. 2—18 ; KB. vi.
(1900), p. 3tf. (by Jenseu), with notes, p."302ff.; L. W. King's The Seven Tablets of
Creation (l'J02), i. 3 ff. [vol. u. has cuneiform texts only], with many important
new fragments; or Gressmann's useful Altorientalische Texte u. Bilder zum AT.
(1909), I. 4 if. (by Ungnad). See also Jastrow's ReUqion of Bah. and Ass. (Boston,
U.S.A., 1898), pp. 407—453 ; and Zimmern in KAT.^ (1902), pp. 491 ff., 584—6.
* See the Greek text of Damascius in KAT.^ p. 490, or in Jensen's Kosmologie
der Bab. p. 270 ; and translations in G. Smith, Chald. Gen. p. 49 f., Lenormant,
Origines de Vhistoire^ (1880), i. 493 f., Gunkel's Schopfung and Chaos (1895),
p. 17; KAT.^ I.e.: cf. also KAT."^ p. 12. It is parallel to "the first extract from the
Creation epic, cited below. For the Greek text of Berossus, see Miiller, Fragm.
Hist. Graec. 11. 497 f., KAT.^ 488 — 90; and lor translations, G. Smith, op. cit.
pp. 40—42, Lenormant, p. 506 f., Gunkel, pp. 17—20, DB. i. 504", KAT.^ I.e. : cf.
also EAT.^ pp. 6—9, 12—14, and EncB. art. Cbeation, § 15,
28 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
a fragment is preserved) describes how, before what we call earth or heaven
had come into being, there existed a primaeval watery chaos {Tidmat, corre-
sponding to the Heb. thorn, the 'deep' of Gen. i. 2), out of which tlie
Babylonian gods were evolved : —
When above | the heaven was not yet named,
And the land beneath | yet bare no name,
And the primaeval Apsu (the abyss), | their begetter,
And chaos (?), Tianiat, | the mother of them both —
5 Their waters | were mingled together,
And no field was formed, | no marsh was to be seen;
When of the gods | still none had been produced,
No name had yet been named, | no destiny yet [fixed] ;
Then were created | the gods in the midst of [heaven ?]
10 Lachmu and Lachamu | were produced.
Long ages passed ....
Anshar and Kishar | were created, and over them ....
Long were the days, then there came forth ....
Anu, their son ....
15 Anshar and Anu ....
And the god Anu ....
Ea, whom his fathers, [his] begetters ....
Different Babylonian deities thus gradually came into being. Tidmat, or
the deep, represents ' a popular attempt to picture the chaotic condition that
prevailed before the great gods obtained control, and established the order ot
heavenly and terrestrial phaenomena': in the sequel she is personified as a
gigantic monster. The belief that tlie world originated out of water was a
consequence, Assyriologists hold, of the climatic conditions of Babylonia.
During the long winter, the Babylonian plain, flooded by the heavy rains, looks
Uke a sea (Bab. tiamtu, tidmat). Then comes the spring, when the clouds and
water vanish, and dry land and vegetation appear. So, thought the Babylonian,
must it have been in the first spring, at the first New Year, when, after a fight
between Marduk and Tiamat, the organized world came into being\
The subsequent parts of the first tablet describe how Apsu, disturbed at
finding his domain invaded by the new gods, induced Tiamat to join with him
in contesting their supremacy : he was, however, subdued by Ea ; and Tiamat,
left to carry on the struggle alone, provides herself with a brood of strange and
hideous allies*.
The second, third, and fourth tablets, describe how the gods, alarmed at
Tiamat's preparations, having taken counsel together, appointed Marduk
as their champion, and how Marduk equips himself with winds and lightnings
for the fray. The account of the combat, in the fourth tablet, is told with
dramatic force and vividness. Armed with his weapons, Marduk advances;
he seizes Tiamat in a huge net, and transfixes her with his scimitar. The
^ Jastrow, op. cit. pp. 411 f., 429 f., 432 f. ; Zimmern, Ceeation (§ 4) in EncB.
* Alluded to also in the extract from Beroesus (see DB. i. 504'' ; and cf. Jastrow,
pp. 414, 419). They are a further symbol of the disorder which ruled in chaos,
aud which had to be overcome before an ordered world could be produced.
THE COSMOGONY OF GENESIS 29
carcase of the monster he split into two halves, one of which he fixed on high,
to form a firmament supporting the waters above it : —
137 He cleft her like a flat(?) fish | into two parts,
The one half of her he set up, | and made a covering for the heaven,
Set a bar before it, j stationed a guard,
140 Commanded them not | to let its waters issue forth.
He marched through the heaven, | surveyed the regions thereof,
Stood in front of the abyss, | the abode of the god Ea.
Then BeP measured | the structure of the abyss,
A great house, a copy of it, | he founded E-sliarra;
145 The great house E-sharra, | which he built as the heaven,
He made Anu, Bel, and Ea, | to inhabit as their city.
* It is evident that the canopy of heaven is meant. Such is the enormous
size of Tiamat that one-half of her body, flattened out so as to serve as a
curtain, is stretched across the heavens to keep the "upper waters" — the
" waters above the firmament " as the Book of Genesis puts it — from coming
down ' (Jastrow)^. The ' abyss ' was the huge body of waters on which the earth
was supposed to rest (cf. on vv. 9, 10). E-sharra (' house of fulness or fertility,'
Jensen) is a poetical designation of the earth, which was conceived by the
Babylonians as a hollow hemisphere, similar in appearance to the vault of
heaven, but placed beneath it (with its convex side upwards), and supported
upon the ' abyss ' of waters underneath ( Jastrow, p. 431).
The fifth tablet (still incomplete) describes the formation of the sun and
moon, and afterwards the appointment of years and mouths : —
1 He made the stations | for the great gods.
As stars resembling them | he fixed the signs of the zodiac,
He ordained the year, | defined divisions.
Twelve months with stars, | three each, he appointed.
5 After he had .... the days of the year | . . . . images.
He fixed the station of Nibir (Jupiter), | to determine their limits,
That none (of the days) might err, | none make a mistake.
8 The station of Bel and Ea, | he fixed by his (Jupiter's) side.
12 He caused the moon-god to shine forth, | entrusted to him the night;
Appointed him as a night-body, | to determine the days.
The opening lines of tablet VII., where Marduk is hailed as the ' Bestower
of planting,' and ' Ci-eator of grain and plants, who caused the green herb to
spring up,' shew that the poem mentioned the creation of vegetation ; and it is
probable that tliis was recorded in the lost parts of tablet V. ( King, p. l).
The sixth tablet (the opening and closing lines of which have been
recovered by Mr King) describes the creation of man ; —
1 I.e. Lord, a title of Marduk (cf. Is. xlvi. 1 ; Jer. 11. 44).
2 According to Berossus, the other half of the monster's carcase was made into
the earth. However, that is not stated in the present tablet.
30 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
When Marduk heard the word of the gnds,
His heart prompted him and he devised [a cunning plan].
He opened his mouth, and unto Ea [he spake],
[Tliat which] he had conceived in his heart he imparted [unto him]:
5 'My blood^ will I take, and bone will I [fashion],
I will make man, that man may ....
I will create man who shall inhabit [the earth?],
J That the service of the gods may be established, and that [their] shrines
I [may be built] V
^ The seventh tablet consists of a hymn, addressed by the gods to Marduk,
celebrating his deeds and character, and representing him as all-powerful,
beneficent, compassionate, and just^ (cf. King, pp. lxiii ff., lxxxix).
The diflferences between the Babylonian epic and the first chapter of
Genesis are sufficiently wide : in the one, particularly in the parts not here
repeated, we have an exuberant and grotesque polytheism; in the other,
a severe and dignified monotheism : in the one, chaos is anterior to Deity, the
gods emerge, or are evolved, out of it, and Marduk gains his supremacy only
after a long contest ; in the other, the Creator is supreme and absolute from
the beginning. But, in spite of these profound theological differences, there
are material resemblances between the two representations, which are too
marked and too numerous to be explained as chance coincidences. The outline,
or general course of events, is the same in the two narratives. There are in
both the same abyss of waters at the beginning, denoted by almost the same
word, the separation of this abyss afterwards into an upper and a lower ocean,
the formation of heavenly bodies and their appointment as measures of time,
and the creation of man. In estimating these similarities, it must further be
remembered that they do not stand alone : in the narrative of the Deluge
(see p. 104 f.) we find traits borrowed unmistakably from a Babylonian source ;
80 that the antecedent difficulty which might otherwise have been felt in
supposing elements in the Creation-narrative to be traceable ultimately to the
same quarter is considerably lessened. In fact, no archaeologist questions
that the Biblical cosmogony, however altered in form and stripped of its
original polytheism, is, in its main outlines, derived from Babylonia. Nor
ought such a conclusion to surprise us. The Biblical historians make no
claim to have derived their information from a supernatural source : their
^ Cf. Berossus, I.e. The emendation adopted in EncB. i. 946 n. 4 is seen no\r
to be unnecessary (King, pp. lvi, lvii).
2 The passage cited in Auth. and Arch. 13 does not belong here (King, 202 f.).
3 There seem also to have been some points of contact between the Heb. and
the Phoenician cosmogony. The Phoenician cosmogony (as reported by Eus. Praep.
Ev. I. 10. 1, 2), placed at the beginniug of all things an aiqp ^ocpuiSrji kuI wvevfiaTd}-
5i7S and a x^os doXepbv ipejSuidei, both being dtrtipa; after an indefinite period of
time, the B-veO/ia, acting upon the x<io^ g*'*'^ rise to Mwt — i.e. perhaps (see
Cbeation in EncB., § 7) rb Ma)r= niOhFl the deeps — a watery, muddy mass (iXiJs),
containing the germs of all subsequent existence {irdca airopa fcrtVewj), which
assumed the form of a huge egg. See further Dillm. ; Lenormant, i. 532 ff.; EncB.
I.e. (also on the Phoen. Baav [=bohu], said in Eus. § 4 to mean 'night,' and to
be the mother of Aluv (the world?) and n.pwT6yovos); DB. i. 504».
THE COSMOGONY OF GENESIS 31
materials, it is plain (cf. Luke i. 1 — 4), were obtained by them irom the
best human sources available ; the function of inspiration was to guide
them in the disposal and arrangement of these materials, and in the use to
which they applied them. And so, in his picture of the beginnings of the
world, having nothing better available, the author has utilized elements derived
ultimately from a heathen source, and made them the vehicle of profound
religious teaching.
We have said 'derived ultimately^ ; for naturally a direct borrowing from
the Babylonian narrative is not to be thought of: it is incredible that the
monotheistic author of Gen. i., at whatever date he lived, could have borrowed
any detail, however slight, from the polytheistic epic of the conflict of Marduk
and Tianiat. The Babylonian legend of Creation must have passed through a
long period of naturalization in Israel, and of gradual assimilation to the spirit
of Israel's religion, before it could have readied the form in which it is presented
to us in the first chapter of Genesis. How, or when, it was first introduced
among the Hebrews, must remain matter of conjecture. Its introduction may
reach back to the time when the ancestors of the Hebrews lived side by side
with the Babylonians in Ur (xi. 28) \ or when they 'dwelt beyond the River'
(the Euphrates), in Mesopotamia, and 'served other gods' (Jos. xxiv. 2).
Since, however, the Tel el-Amarna letters (c. 1400 B.C.) have shewn how strong
Babylonian influence must have been in Canaan, even before the Israelitish
occupation, this has been thought by many^ to have been the channel by which
Babylonian ideas penetrated into Israel ; they were first, it has been supposed,
naturalized among the Canaanites, and afterwards, — as the Israelites came
gradually to have intercourse with the Canaanites, — they were transmitted to
the Israelites as well. But, whether one of these or some other explanation is
the true one, the fact remains that we have in the first chapter of Genesis the
Hebrew version of an originally Babylonian legend respecting the beginnings
of all things. But in the Biblical narrative, the old Semitic cosmogony appears
in a form very diflferent from that in which, we read it in the Babylonian
Creation-epic It appears 'in the form which it received at the hands of
devout Israelites moved by the Spirit of God, and penetrated with the pure
belief in the spiritual Jehovah. The saints and prophets of Israel stripped
the old legend of its pagan deformities. Its shape and outline survived.
But its spirit was changed, its religious teaching and significance were
transformed, in the light of revelation. The popular tradition was not abolished ;
it was preserved, purified, hallowed, that it might subserve the Divine purpose
of transmitting, as in a figure,' to future generations, ' spiritual teaching upon
eternal truths' (Ryle, Early Narratives of Genesis, p. 12 f.)^
(iii) It remains only to indicate in outline the nature of this teaching.
^ Jastrow, Jewish Quart. Rev. 1901, p. 653.
^ E.g. by Sayce, Gunkel, Winckler, Zimmern.
* That Heb. folk-lore told of a conflict of Jehovah with a dragon is apparent
from Job ix. 13, xxvi. 12 {Rahab, 'boisterousness,' though in Is. xxx. 7, Ps. Ixxxvii. 4,
a poetical name of Egypt, being here manifestly the name of some monster). The
context in Ps. Ixsiv. 13 — 17, Ixxxix. 9 — 12, where there follow allusions to Jehovah's
creative work, seems even to shew that the victory over Rahab, as an aboriginal
monster symbolizing chaos, was pictured as having preceded the work of creation :
32 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
(1) The Cosmogony of Genesis shews, in opposition to the conceptions
widely prevalent in antiquity, that the world was not self-originated ; that it
was called into existence, and brought gmHualTy^Thto its present state, at the
will of a spiritual Being, prior to it, independent of it, and deliberately planning
every stage of its progress. The spirituality, not less than the dignity, of the
entire representation is indeed in marked contrast to the self- contradictory,
grotesque speculations of which the ancient cosmogonies usually consist. * It
sets God above the great complex world-process, and yet closely linked with it,
as a personal intelligence and will that rules victoriously and without a rival *
(Whitehouse, art. Cosmogony in DB., p. 507'').
(2) Dividing artificially the entire period into six days, it notices in order
the most prominent cosmical phaenomena; and groups the living creatures
upon the earth under the great subdivisions which appeal to the eye. By this
means it presents a series of representative pictures, — none, indeed, corre-
sponding, in actual fact, to the reality^ but all standing for, or representing
it, — of the various stages by which the earth was gradually formed, and peopled
with its living inhabitants ; and it insists that each of these stages is no product
of chance, or of mere mechanical forces, but is an act of the Divine will,
realizes the Divine purpose, and receives the seal of the Divine approval ^ It
is uniformly silent on the secondary causes through which in particular cases,
or even more generally, the effects described may have been produced ; it
leaves these for the investigation of science ; it teaches what science as suck
cannot discover (for it is not its province to do so), the relation in which they
stand to God. The slow formation of the earth as taught by geology, the
gradual development of species by the persistent accumulation of minute
variations, made probable by modern biology, are but the exhibition in detail
of those processes which the author of this cosmogony sums up into a single
phrase and apparently compresses into a single moment, for the purpose of
declaring their dependence upon the Divine will. ''
(3) It insists on the distinctive pre-eminence belonging to man, implied in
the remarkable self-deliberation taken in his case by the Creator, and signified
expressly by the phrase ' the image of God.' By this is meant, as was shewn
above, man's possession of self-conscious reason, — an adumbration, we may
suppose, however faint, of the supreme reason of God, — enabling him to know,
in a sense in which animals do not know, and involving the capacity of
apprehending moral and religious truth (see more fully on v. 26). Whether,
as a matter of fact, man appeared originally as the result of an independent
creative act, or whether, as modern biologists commonly hold, he appeared
as the result of a gradual evolution from anthropoid ancestors, does not afi"ect
the truth which is here insisted on : however acquired, rational faculties are
still his ; and whether this opinion of modern biologists be true or not, there
can at least be no theological objection to the supposition that, as God has
undoubtedly endowed the organism of the individual with the power of
cf. Is. 11. 9, 10», where the same cosmogonic myth of the destruction of the monster
of disorder, and the formation of dry land by the drying up of the 'great t'liom'
(above, p. 4), appear to be alluded to. Cf. Zimmern, The Bab. and Heb. Gcnesit,
pp. 8—12 ; KAT:^ 507 ff. ; and art. Kahab in DB.
1 Comp. above on vv. '6, 4.
THE COSMOGONY OF GENESIS 33
developing mind out of antecedents in which no sign or trace of mind is
discernible, it may also have pleased Him, by the workings of His providence
in a far-distant past, to endow certain forms of organized being with the
capacity of developing, in His good time, under the action of a suitable
environment, the attributes distinctive of man.
It is important to have a clear and consistent view of the first chapter of
Genesis. It stands upon the threshold of the Bible; and to all who have
anything more than a merely superficial knowledge of the great and far-
reaching truths which science has brought to light, it presents the greatest
difficulties. These difficulties are felt now far more acutely than they used to
be : 70 or SO years ago there was practically no geology ; but the progress of
science has brought the Cosmogony of Genesis into sharp and undisguised
antagonism with the Cosmogony of science. The efi"orts of the harmonists
have been well-intentioned; but they have resulted only in the constmction
of artificial schemes, which are repugnant to common sense, and, especially
in the minds of students and lovers of science, create a prejudice against
the entire system with which the cosmogony is connected. The Cosmogony of
Genesis is treated in popular estimation as an integral element of the Christian
faith. It cannot be too earnestly represented that this is not the case. A
definition of the process by which, after the elements composing it were
created, the world assumed its present condition, forms no article in the
Christian creed. The Church has never pronounced with authority upon the
interpretation of the narrative of Genesis. It is consequently open to the
Christian teacher to understand it in the seuso which science will permit;
and it becomes his duty to ascertain what that sense is. But, as the
Abbe Loisy has justly said, the science of the Bible is the science of the
age in which it was written ; and to expect to find in it supernatural in-
formation on points of scientific fact, is to mistake its entire purpose. And
so the value of the first chapter of Genesis lies not on its scientific side,
but on its theological side. Upon the false science of antiquity its author
has grafted a true and dignified representation of the relation of the world
to God. It is not its office to forestall scientific discovery ; it neither
comes into collision with science, nor needs reconciliation with it. It must
be read in the light of the age in which it was written ; and while the
spiritual teaching so vividly expressed by it can never lose its fi-eshness or
value, it must on its material side be interpreted in accordance with the
place which it holds in the history of Semitic cosmological speculation ^
^ See, further, on the subject of the preceding pages, Huxley, Collected Essays,
IV. 64 ff., 139—200; Riehm, Der Biblische Schopfungshericht, Halle, 1881 (a lecture
pointing out the theological value, at the present day, of the cosmogony of
Genesis) ; C. Pritchard, Occasional Notes of an Astronomer on Nature and Revela-
tion, 1889 (a collection of sermons and addresses, often very suggestive), p. 257 ff.
(' The Proem of Genesis,' reprinted from the Guardian, Feb. 10, 1886) ; Dr Ladd,
What is the Bible ? (New York, 1890), chap. v. (' The Bible and the Sciences of
Nature') ; Ryle, Early Narratives of Genesis (1892), chaps, i., ii. ; H. Morton, The
Coitmugony of Genesis and its Reconcilers, reprinted from the Bibliotheca Sacra,
April and July, 1897 (a detailed criticism, by a man of science, who has also
theological sympathies, of the schemes of the reconcilers. President Morton's
general conclasions are the same as those adopted above. See a note by the
present writer in the Expositor, June, 1898, pp. 464 — 9) j Whitehouse, art.
D. 3
34 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
Tlie Sabbath.
The sabbath, it is not improbable, is an institution ultimately of Babylonian
origin. In a lexicographical tablet (ii Rawl. 32, 1. 16), there occurs the equa-
tion ilin wOh Ubhi^shabattum, or 'day of rest of the heart' (i.e. as parallel
occun-ences of the same phrase shew, a day when the gods rested from their
anger, a day for the pacification of a deity's anger) = sabbath. Further, in
a religious calendar for two of the Assyrian months which we possess',
prescribing duties for the king, the 7th, 14th, IGth", 21st and 28th days, are
entered as 'favourable day, evil day' (i.e. a day with an indeterminate
character, which might become either one or the other, according as the
directions laid down for its observance were followed or not), while the
others are simply ' favourable days.' On the five specified days, certain acts
are forbidden : the king is not, for instance, to eat food prepared by fire, not
to put on royal dress or ofi"er sacrifice, not to ride in his chariot or hold court,
&c. ; on the other hand, as soon as the day is over, he may oflFer a sacrifice
which will be accepted. The days, it is evident, are viewed superstitiously:
certain things are not to be done on them, in order not to arouse the jealousy
or anger of the gods. It is not however known that the term shabattum was
applied to these days ; nor is there at present [1909] any evidence that a con-
tinuous succession of 'weeks,' each ending with a day marked by special
observances, was a Babylonian institution^. Nevertlieless, there is undoubtedly
a decided similarity between the Babylonian and the Hebrew institution ; and
it is more than possible that Schrader, Sayce, and other Assyriologists are
right in regarding the sabbath as an institution of Babylonian origin. Many
other institutions of the Jewish law (cf. on ch. xvii.) were common to Israel's
neighbours, as well as to Israel itself, though the Israelites, in appropriating
them, stamped upon them a new character ; so there is no d, priori objection to
the same having been the case with tlie sabbath us well. If this view of its
origin be correct, the Hebrews, in adopting it, detached it from its connexion
with the moon (fixing it for every seventh day, irrespectively of the days of the
calendar month), they extended and generalized the abstinence associated with
it, they stripped it of its superstitious and heathen associations, and made
it subservient to ethical and religious ends*.
Cosmogony in BB.; Zimmern and Cheyne, art. Ceeation in EncB.; Zimmern, The
Bab. and Heb. Genesis (in a series of short, popular brochures, called 'The Ancient
East'), 1901, pp. 1 — 28; the Abb6 Loisy, Les Mi/thes Babyloniens et les premiers
chapitres de la Genese (1901), pp. 1 — 102; Jastrow, Jewish Quart. Rev. July, 1901,
pp. 620—654 ; L. W. King, Bab. Religion and Mythology (popular), pp. 53—146.
^ See Jastrow, Religion of Bab. and Ass. 376 if.
2 Perhaps the 49th (i.e. the 7 x 7th) day from the let of the preceding month.
The contract-tablets seem to shew that in the Hammurabi-age (p. 156) there was a.
marked absttntion from work in Babylonia: see the note in the Addenda.
^ Shabattum is at present known to occur only three or four times altogether in
the Inscriptions. The terms in which Frof. Sayce speaks (Monuments, 74 — 77;
EHH. 193) would lead a rea,der to suppose that the resemblance between the
Babylonian and the Hebrew institution was greater than it is.
* See further the writer's art. Sabbath in DB. (especially § ii.), with the
references: in §^ iii., iv. , also, there will be found some notice of references to the
sabbath in the Mishna, auil other post-Biblical Jewish writings^ in t,he NT., and.
in early Christian writer.^!. See also now KAT.-'^ 592 S.
THE BOOK OF GENESIS 35
Gen. ii. 1 — 3, it will be observed, does not name the sabbath, or lay down
any law for its observance by man ; all that it says is that God ' desisted ' on
the seventh day from His work, and that He 'blessed' and 'hallowed' the day.
It is, however, impossible to doubt that the introduction of the seventh day is
simply part of the writer's representation, and that its sanctity is in reality
antedated : instead viz. of the seventh day of the week being sacred, because
God desisted on it from His six days' work of creation, the work of creation
was distributed among six days, followed by a day of rest, because the week,
ended by the sabbath, existed already as an institution, and the writer wished
to adjust artificially the work of creation to it. In other words, the week,
ended by the sabbath, determined the ' days ' of creation, not the * days ' of
creation the week.
Chapters II. 4^^—111. 24.
The Creation and Fall of Man.
With ii. 4'' we enter into an atmosphere very different from that of
i. 1 — ii. 4* That the narrator is a different oup is so evident as not to need
detailed proof: it will be sufBcient to notice here some of the more salient
points of difference, ii. 4'' ff. differs then firstly from ch. i. in style and form.
The style of ch. i. is stereotyped, measured, and precise ; that of ii. 4'' ff. is
diversified and picturesque ; there are no recurring formulae, such as are so
marked in ch. i. ; the expressions characteristic of ch. i. are absent here (e.g.
to create); and where common ground is touched (as in the account of the
formation of man), the narrative is told very differently, and without oven
any allusion to the representation of ch. i. (e.g. to the 'image of God').
Ch. i. displays, moreover, clear marks of study and deliberate systematiza-
tion : ii. 4''ff. is fresh, spontaneous, and^ at least in a relative sense, primitive :
we breathe in it the clear and free mountain air of ancient Israel. The present
narrative differs secondly from ch. i. in representation. Both the details and
the order of the events of creation (in so far as they are mentioned in it — for
the narrator deals briefly with everything except what relates directly to man)
differ from the statements of ch. 1. The earth, instead of emerging from the
waters (as in i. 9), is represented as being at first dry (ii. 5), too dry, in fact, to
support vegetation : the first step in the process of filling it with living forms
is the creation of man (ii. 7), then follows that of beasts and birds {v. 19), and
lastly that of woman {v. 21 f.); obviously a different order from that of ch. i.^
Another, in some respects, even more vital difference, is that in ii. 4''ff. tlie
conception of God is much more anthropomorphic than it is in ch. i, : whereas
there God accomplishes His work of creation by a series of words, or by per-
forming other acts (as creating, dividing, making, setting), which (taken in
connexion with the objects on which they are performed) imply nothing local
^ The separation between the creation of man and woman, if it stood alone,
might indeed be reasonably explained by the supposition that ii. 4'' ff. was intended
simply as a more detailed account, by the same band, of what is described
summarily in i. 26 — 30 ; but this explanation does not account for the many other
differences subsisting between the two narratives.
3—2
36 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [11.4,5
or sensible in the Divine nature, Jehovah here, for instance, moulds, breathes
into man the breath of life, plants, places, takes, sets, brings, builds, closes up,
walks in the garden (which is evidently regarded as His accustomed abode), so
that even the sound of His footsteps is heard, and makes coats of skin (ii. 7, 8,
15, 19, 21, 22, iii. 8, 21) ; in other words, He performs various sensible acts, and
is evidently conceived as locally determined within particular limits in a
manner in which the author of ch. i. does not conceive Him\
An interest conspicuously prominent in the entire narrative is the desire to
explain the origin of existing facts of human nature, existing customs and
institutions, especially those which were regarded as connected with the loss
by man of his primaeval innocence. Thus among the facts explained are, for
instance, in ch. ii. the distinction of the sexes, and the institution of marriage,
and in ch. iii. the presence of sin in the world, the custom of wearing clothing,
the gait and habits of the serpent, the subject condition (in the ancient world)
of woman, the pain of child-bearing, and the toilsomeness of agriculture. The
explanations offered of these facts are, however, not historical or scientific
explanations, they are explanations prompted by religious reflection upon the
facts of i;^"?. The narrative 'purports to account for the entrance into the
world of sin, suffering, and shortened life. In carrying out this purpose, it
is less faithful to historical than to moral and religious truth. The evidence of
archaeology, geologj', biology, and allied sciences points to the conclusion that
man, so far from having begim his existence upon the globe in the happy
surroundings of an Eden, has slowly emerged from a state of savagery, in
which he was, externally at least, little removed from the brute creation. His
primitive condition was not one of harmony and happiness, but of fierce
conflict against opposing forces. Pain and death prevailed upon earth before
man made his appearance, and have, it would seem, been prime factors in his
evolution. The narrative is valuable, therefore, not as a description of
historical events, but as a declaration of certain important ideas 2.' See
fui'ther the remarks, p. 51 ff,
II. 4''...in the day that ^the Lord God made earth and heaven. J
5 And no plant of the field was yet in the earth, and no herb of
* Heb. Jehovah, as in other places where Lokd is put in capitals.
II. 4^ — 7. The formation of man.
4'', 5. In the day that Jehovah God made earth and heaven, no
shrub (xxi. 15 ; Job xxx. 4, 1\) of the field was yet, &c.' The words,
taken in connexion with the sequel {v. 7), are intended to describe the
1 The same contrasted conceptions of the Divine nature recur in many subse-
quent parts of the same two documents.
a Wade, Old Test. History (1001), p. 60 f.
' Dillm. and others, however, render ' In the day that Jehovah God made earth
and heaven — when no shrub of the field was yet, &c. [vv. 5, 6] — Jehovah God
formed,* &c. (cf. the footnote on i. 1). If this construction (here and i. 1 — 3) is
correct, it may, as Hommel has remarked, be more than an accidental coincidence
that the Bab. account of creation (p. 28) begins also with a long sentence
containing a paienthesis.
II. 5-7] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 37
tl 'c field had yet sprung up : for the Lord God had not caused j
it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till
the ground; 6 but there went up a mist from the earth, and
watered the whole face of the ground. 7 And the Lord
God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed
into his nostrils the breath of life ; and man became a living
condition of the earth at the time when man was created : no shrub
or herb, — and a fortiori, no tree, — had yet appeared upon it, for it was
not sufficiently watered to support vegetation. According to i. 11 f.,
plant- and tree-life was complete three 'days' before the creation of
man : obviously the present writer views the order of events differently.
in the day. I.e. at the time, — Heb. usage compressing often what
may have been actually a period of some length into a ' day,' for the
purpose of presenting it vividly and forcibly : see e.g. Jer. xi. 4, xxxiv. 13.
Jehovala God. An unusual combination, recurring throughout
ii. 4*" — iii. 24, but found elsewhere in the Hex. only Ex. ix. 30, and
generally uncommon. It is usually supposed that in ii. 4^ — iii. 24 the
original author wrote simply Jehovah ; and that God was added by the
compiler, with the object of identifying expressly the Author of life of
ii. 4'' — 25, with the Creator of ch. i. On the name ' Jehovah ' (properly
* Yahweh '), see the Excursus at the end of the volume.
5. and there was not a man to till the ground, — and, it is to be
understood, to supply the deficiency of rain by artificial irrigation.
6. hut a mist used to go up..., and water &c., — and so at least
prepared the soil for the subsequent growth of vegetation.
a mist. The word (^ed) occurs again only in Job xxxvi. 27. In
Ass. edu means the overflow of a river, esp. of the Euphrates, such as
annually irrigated the plains of lower Babylonia; and some recent
scholars are of opinion that we ought to render here ' but a flood used
to come up,' &c. (cf EncB. i. 949).
7. formed,. The fig. is that of a potter (lxx. cTrXao-ci/), moulding
the plastic material in his hands. The word is often used of the
Divine operation, with reference, not only to material objects (as here,
Ps. xciv. 9, xcv. 5, civ. 96), but also more generally, as of a nation,
Is. xxvii. 11, xliii. 1, and even of sJuiping, or pre-ordaining, events of
history. Is. xxii. 11, xxxvii. 26, xlvi. 11.
man of the dust of the ground. The words contain a point not
reproducible in English ; for in Heb. ' ground ' {'cidmndh) is in form
the fem. of ' man ' {'dddm) : thus to the Hebrews man by his very
name seemed to be connected with the 'ground,' and to find his
natural occupation in working it (v. 5, iii. 19, 23). — Cf. xviii. 27 ;
Ps. ciii. 14 ; Job iv. 19, viii. 19, xxxiii. 6 ; Wisd. vii. 1 ; 1 Cor. xv. 47.
See also p. 53 n. 2.
breath of life. Cf. (of animals generally) vii. 22 (see note) ; also
spirit of life in vi. 17, vii. 15 (both P). Breath is evidently, in the
great majority of animals ordinarily known, the physical accompaniment
38 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [ii. 7-9
soul. 8 And the Lord God planted a garden eastward, in J
Eden ; and there he put the man whom he had formed. 9 And
out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that
aud condition of life ; and so the meaning of the clause is, endowed
him with the faculty of life : cf Is. xlii. 5 ; Job xxvii. 3 (where 'hfe'
= * breath' here : Heb. nfshd7ndh), xxxiii. 4^ xxxiv. 14.
a living soul As explained on i. 20, a ' soul ' is in Heb. psychology
common to both animals and men ; hence no pre-eminence of man is
declared in these words: they simply state that he became a living
being. Man's pre-eminence, according to this writer, is implied in the
use of the special term breatJied, which is not used of the other animals
{v, 19), and which suggests that in his case the ' breath of hfe ' stands
in a special relation to the Creator, and may be the vehicle of higher
faculties than those possessed by animals generally. Cf Ez. xxxvii. 9 ;
and, in a spiritual sense, Jn. xx. 22. Note also the contrast with the
'life-giving spirit' (p. 4 n.) of the 'last Adam ' in 1 Cor. xv. 45 (RV.).
8 — 17. God does not leave man to himself: He places him in a
garden specially prepared for him, and assigns to him specific duties.
8. a garden. Rather what we should caU a park. lxx. (both here
and elsewhere) TrapaScio-os {— Paradise : a Pers. word signifying properly
an enclosure, and then in particular a park), which hence became the
usual name in the Christian Church for the ' garden ' planted in Eden.
eastward. The original home of man is placed in the far-
distant East, in a region in or near Babylonia, the seat of the most
ancient and influential civilization known to the Hebrews.
'Eden. As a Heb. word, 'eden would mean pleasure, delight (see
cognate words in Is. xlvli. 8 ; Neh. ix. 25), and this sense was no doubt
suggested by it to the Hebrews (cf lxx., in iii. 23, 24, and generally,
6 TTapaScicros T17S Tpv<f}r}^) : if it be the true original meaning of the
word, we must suppose 'Eden' to be an abbreviation for 'land of
Eden.' "But 'Eden' is the name, not of the garden itself, but of the
region in which it lay, so that there is no particular appropriateness
in such a meaning ; and it is possible that it is the Sumerian edinu,
a word explained in Ass. word-lists as meaning ' plain, prairie, desert,'
in which case it will denote simply the great alluvial plain watered by
the Tigris and the Euphrates'. Elsewhere the 'garden of Jehovah'
(or ' of God '), or the ' garden of Eden,' is alluded to as the type of a
fertile, well-watered place, abounding in noble trees : see ch. xiii. 10 ;
Ez. xxviii. 13, xxxi. 8 f , 16, 18, xxxvi, 35 ; Is. li. 3 ; Joel ii. 3.
9. Emphasis is laid on the trees with which the garden was stocked
(cf Ez. xxxi. 8 f, 16, 18), partly on account of the two which are
singled out for special mention, but partly also, it would seem, because,
according to the conception of the writer, man was originally intended
^ Cf. Friedrich Delitzsch, Wo lag das Paradies? 79 f.; KAT.^ 26 f. t Sayce,
Monuments, 95; Zimmern, KAT.^ 529; Pinches, The OT. in the light of the hist,
records of Ass. and Bab. (1902), 70 — 72; and see Muss-Arnolt, Ass. Lex. p. 21.
II. 9-12] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 39
is pleasant to the sight, and good for food ; the tree of life also J
in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil. 10 And a river went out of Eden to water the
garden ; and from thence it was parted, and became four heads.
1 1 The name of the first is Pishon : that is it which compasseth
the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold ; 12 and the gold
of that land is good : there is bdellium and the ^onyx stone.
1 Or, heryl
to subsist on the fruit of trees (cf. v. 16) ; he is not condemned to live
on herbs till iii. 18.
the tree of life. Cf. on iii. 24. The expression occurs also, in a fig.
sense, in Prov. iii. 18, xi. 30, xiii. 12, xv. 4.
10 — 14. Provision made for the irrigation of the garden. The
reference is implicitly to a system of canals, such as existed in
Babylonia, from at least the time of Hammurabi (c. 2300 B.C.) onwards',
conveying the water from a main stream to different parts of the land.
The river arose in Eden, outside the garden ; it passed through the
garden, providing water for its irrigation ; and from thence, i.e. as
it issued from the garden, it was divided, and became fou/r heads, i.e.
(cf. Ez. xvi. 25, xxi. 19; and the use of the expression 'heads of
rivers' in Arabic of the parting-point of two streams, cited by Del.)
the heads of four streams, each taking its separate course, as described
in vv. 11 — 14. The representation gives an idea of the magnitude of
the river flowing through the garden : even after leaving it, it could
still supply four large streams*.
11. Pishon. Not elsewhere mentioned. See p. 58 fi".
HamUxh. Most probably (see on x. 29) a region in the NE. of
Arabia, on the W. coast of the Persian Gulf. The gold of Arabia was
famed in antiquity.
12. hdelUiim. Heb. Ifdblah, mentioned also Nu. xi. 7, where
the manna is compared to it, so that it must have been a well-known
substance. Most probably it was what the Greeks called (3Se\\a or
/SScXAtov, a transparent, wax-like gum, valued for its fragrance, and
soothing medicinal properties (Diosc. i. 80; Pliny, UN. xn. ix_. ;
Plant. Cure. 101, in a list of perfumes). The best came from Arabia
(Diosc), or Bactria (Pliny) ; but it was found also in Gedrosia
(Beloochistan), India, and other places. See further the art. in EncB.
onyx. Heb. shuham, the name of a precious stone, much esteemed
by the Hebrews (Job xxviii. 16 ; cf. Ex. xxviii. 9, 20), though there is
^ See Maspero, ii. 43 f. ; and cf. below, p. 156 n. 5.
2 This is the obvious and generally accepted interpretation of the verse : there
is however another view according to which it describes, not four streams diverging
from one, but four streams converging into one (see below, p. 58 f.). But the
narrator is manifestly following in his description the downward course of the
stream; it is most unnatural to suppose that by the words \from thence it was
parted' he means to describe its upward course, above the garden.
40 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [ii. 13-15
13 And the name of the second river is Gihon : the same is it J
that compasseth the whole land of Cush. 14 And the name of
the third river is ^Hiddekel : that is it which goeth ^iu front of
Assyria. And the fourth river is Euphrates. 15 And the Lord
God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress
1 That is, Tigris. * Or, toward the east of
some uncertainty what it was, philology throwing no light upon the
word, and the ancient versions var}dng much in their renderings
(lxx. 07ii/iV, heryl, sarditis, emerald, &c. ; Pesh. and Targ. heryl; Vulg.
usually onyx). Either beryl or onyx seems most probable (see Beryl
in EncB., and Onyx in DBX According to Pliny {HN. xxxvn.
§ 86 ff.) the onyx was obtained specially from India and Arabia.
In Ass. there is a gem scimtu, often mentioned ; but it is at present
unfortunately quite uncertain what it is : 'turquoise' (Sayce), and
'pearl' (Haupt), are both conjectural renderings.
13. Gihon. Not mentioned elsewhere in the OT.': see p. 58 ff.
Cush. The usual Heb. name of Ethiopia : see on x. 6.
14. Hiddekel (also Dan. x. 4). The Tigris : Ass. Idiglat, Aram.
Deklath, Arab. Dijlat*.
in front of. The expression might mean in frmit of (from the
standpoint of the narrator), i.e. in reality, west of: 'in front of,'
however, means commonly in Heb. (cf iv. 16, xii. 8 ; 1 S. xiii. 5
Heb.) east of', but this rendering is open to the objection that Assyria
extended far to the East of the Tigris : hence, if it is adopted, it must
either be supposed that the description is a vague and inexact one
(cf. Is. vii. 20) ; or (Sayce) Asshur must be taken to be the 'city of
Asshur,' now KaVat SherJcut, on the W. bank of the Tigris, about
60 miles S. of Nineveh, the capital of Assyria, until superseded by
Calah and Nineveh, and a city repeatedly mentioned by the Assyrian
kings in their inscriptions (e.g. KB. I. 29, 33, 39, 125, 127, 133, &c.).
But the fact of this city being not elsewhere referred to in the OT.
makes it somewhat unlikely that it should be named here as a land-mark.
Euphrates. Heb. P^rdth ; Ass. Purdtu (the Gk form Euphrates
is based upon the Old Persian Ufrdtu).
15. Continuation of v. 'd^, after the digression, w. 10 — 14. Man
is not made simply to enjoy life ; he is to labour and work. Even
such a garden as the one described in v. 9 gives scope for man's
activity : he is to till it, to develop its capacities, and adapt it to
his own ends, and to keep (Is. xxvii. 3) or guard it, against the
natural tendency of a neglected garden to run wild, and against damage
from wild animals or other possible harm.
1 For of course the ' Gihon ' of 1 K. i. 33 al. cannot be intended. As a Heb.
word Gihon \xould mean a gushing forth: see the cognate verb in Job xl. 23''.
2 Tigris. Old Pers. Tigrd, means the arrow-like, i.e. the swift (cf. Stiabo, xi. 14.
8), from Old Pers. tighra, sharp, tighri, arrow.
II. 15-19] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 41
it and to keep it. 16 Aud the Lord God commanded the man, J
saying, Of every tree of the garden thou may est freely eat :
17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt
not eat of it : for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt
surely die.
18 And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man
should be alone ; I will make him an help ^meet for hira. 19 And
out of the gi'ound the Lord God fonned every beast of the field,
* Or, answering to
16, 17. 'But man is not designed solely to till and keep the garden.
There are dormant in him capacities of moral and religious attainment,
which must be exercised, developed, and tested. A command is
therefore laid upon him, adapted to draw out his character, and
to form a standard by which it may be tested. It is a short and
simple command, unaccompanied even by a reason ; but it is sufficient
for the purpose : man's full knowledge of what he must do or not do
can be attained only as the result of a long moral and spiritual
development, it cannot exist at the beginning. And the command
relates to something to be avoided : the acknowledgment and observance
of a limitation, imposed upon his creaturely freedom by his Creator and
Lord, must be for man the starting-point of everything else ' (Dillm.).
17. The knoivledge of good and evil, — implying the power of
distinguishing them, and estimating each at its proper worth, — is a
capacity not possessed by little children (Dt. i. 39), but gradually
acquired by them (Is. vii. 15, 16), and accordingly deficient in second
childhood (2 S. xix. 35) ; it is specially necessary for a judge (1 K. iii. 9),
and is possessed in a pre-eminent degree by divine beings (ch. iii. 5, 22),
and angels (2 S. xiv. \1^).
18 — 25. The formation of animals and of woman.
18. It is not enough to place man in the garden : further provision
is yet required for the proper development of his nature, and satisfaction
of its needs : a lielp, who may in various ways assist him, and who may
at the same time prove a companion, able to interchange thought with
him, and be in other respects his intellectual equal, is still needed.
an help meet for Mm. Better, corresponding to hi^n, i.e. adequate
to him, intellectually his equal, and capable of satisfying his needs and
instincts I Cf Ecclus. xxxvi. 24.
19. First of all beasts and birds are formed, also from the ground,
and brought to the man to see how they would impress him, and
^ AV., E.V. had : but the Heb. is the same ; and in fact the expression includes
what is beneficial and injmious, as well as what is morally good and evil.
2 'Meet' is of course an archaism, meaning adapted, suitable (cf. Ex. viii. 26;
Mt. iii. 8 [AV.], xv. 26). To speak of woman (as is sometimes done) as man's 'help-
meet ' (absolutely) is an error implying strange ignorauce of the English language.
42 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [ii. ,9-2,
and every fowl of the air ; and brought them unto the man to J
see what he would call them : and whatsoever the man called
every living creature, that was the name thereof. 20 And the
man gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to
every beast of the field ; but for ^man there was not found an
help meet for him. 21 And the Lord God caused a deep sleep
^ Or, Adam
whether they would satisfy the required need. Fishes are not
mentioned ; the possibility of their proving a ' help ' to man being out
of the question.
In ch. i. animals are all created before man : so that it is again
apparent that the writer of ch. ii. 4** if. follows a different conception
of the order of creation. (The rend. ' had formed' is against idiom.)
ivhat he would call them. The name being (primarily) the
expression of what a man thinks, this is tantamount to saying, what
impression they would make upon him, and how he would regard them
m relation to himself
living creature. Living soul (exactly as in v. 7) : see on i. 20.
20. gave names &c. Distinguished, it is implied, their different
characters, or appearances, and gave them corresponding names. A
hint is here given of one of the earliest uses to which man would put
his faculty of language (cf p. 55) : animals, by their variety, their
often remarkable forms and habits, their life and activity, in many
features so singularly resembling his o^vn, would impress him vividly,
and quickly give him occasion to put this faculty, possessed by him, to
practical use.
But amongst all the animals thus surveyed by him, there was
found no 'help, corresponding to' himself. Many animals are
serviceable to man, and so a ' help ' ; some may even become his
companions : but none are on an equality with him ; there are none
with whom he can converse intelligently, or whom he can treat as his
intellectual or social equal. ' The dignity of human nature could not,
in few words, be more beautifully expressed' (Dillm.) : compare the
parallel in i. 26.
for man. The Massorites have here and iii. 17, 21 pointed DtN?
without the article, treating it as a proper name ; but, inasmuch as,
where the article is part of the consonantal text, it appears consistently
till iv. 25 (see e.g. ii. 21, iii. 22, 24, iv. 1), it is better to point
accordingly here (ladddm, not l"dddm), and to render /or the man.
21, 22. The need thus awakened in the man God now proceeds
to satisfy by creating woman.
21. a deep sleep. In order that the secret of God's operation might
remain concealed from him. The word, as ch. xv. 12, 1 S. xxvi. 12.
We have here a wonderfully conceived allegory, designed, by a
most significant figure, to set forth the moral and social relation
iT.ai-is] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 43
to fall upon the man, and he slept ; and he took one of his ribs, J
and closed up the flesh instead thereof: 22 and the rib, which
the Lord God had taken from the man, ^made he a woman, and
brought her unto the man. 23 And the man said, This is now
bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh : she shall be called
2 Woman, because she was taken out of ^Man. 24 Therefore shall
a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his
wife : and they shall be one flesh. 25 And they were both
naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.
^ Heb. builded he into. ^ Heb. Isshah. ^ Heb. Ish,
of the sexes to each other, the dependence of woman upon man, her
close relationship to him, and the foundation existing in nature for the
attachment springing up between them, and for the feelings with which
each should naturally regard the other. The woman is formed out of
the man's side : hence it is the wife's natural duty to be at hand, ready
at all times to be a ' help ' to her husband, it is the husband's natural
duty ever to cherish and defend his wife, as part of his own self.
23. The man at once recognizes in the woman one intimately
related to himself, and fitted to be his intellectual and moral consort.
This is now &c. I.e. now at last, in contrast to the animals which
had before been brought to him. The exclamation, which has almost
a poetical rhythm, gives expression to the joyful surprise with which
he beholds her.
bone of my hones &c. Cf., though the expression is not so strong,
xxix. 14 ; Jud. ix. 2 ; 2 S. v. 1.
Woman. The assonance of the Heb. (see RVm.) is in this case
fairly reproducible in English. Symmachus for the same purpose uses
dvSpt?, Luther Mdnnin.
24. The narrator's comment, explanatory of the later existing
custom (cf. X. 9, xxii. 14^ xxxii. 32)\ Therefore, — viz. because man
and woman were originally one, and hence essentially belong together, —
doth a man leave his father and his mother, and cleave tmto his vnfe;
and they become one flesh : the attachment between them becoming
greater, and the union closer, even than that between parent and child.
Marriage, — and moreover monogamic marriage, — is thus explained as
the direct consequence of a relation established by the Creator.
Cf. Mt. xix. 4—6 (II Mk. x. 6—8); 1 Cor. vi. 16, xi. 8—12 ; Eph. v.
28—33 ; 1 Tim. ii. 12—14.
they. Lxx. the twain, whence Mt. xix. 5, Mk. x. 8, 1 Cor. vi. 16.
25. The narrative closes with a picture of their child-like innocence.
The particular direction in which their innocence is represented as
displapng itself, is due probably to the narrator's intention of explaining
afterwards (iii. 7, cf. 21) the origin of clothing.
^ The tenses used have a frequentative force: see G.-K. §§ 107^, 112™.
44 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [iii. i
Chapter III.
The Fall and its Conseque^nces.
The chapter describes how man was seduced into disobedience : and how,
after a judicial inquiry held by God, sentence was passed successively upon the
seducer, upon the woman, and upon the man. The sinful desire, though it has
its real seat within the 3oul, is excited by an outward object, appealing to the
senses ; and here it is stimulated into activity, and directed towards its object
(the forbidden fruit), by the serpent. The serpent is introduced in the fii'st
instance simply as one of the animals which had passed before the man : it
appears soon, however, that it is more, at any rate, than an ordinary animal :
it possesses the faculty of speech, which it exercises with supreme intelhgence
and skill The serpent is a creature which among primitive and semi-primitive
peoples nearly always attracts attention : its peculiar form and habits, so diflfer-
ent from those of other animals, suggest that there is something mysterious
and supernatural about it ; the Arabs, for instance, say that in every serpent
there lurks a jinn (or spirit). The serpent had moreover in antiquity the
reputation of wisdom (Mt. x. 16), especially in a bad sense : it was insidious,
malevolent, ' subtil.' And so it appears here as the representative of the power
of temptation; it puts forth with great artfulness suggestions, which, when
embraced, and carried into action, give rise to sinful desires and sinful acts.
The serpent is not, however, in the narrative identified with the Evil One. The
OT. does not mention the being whom we call ' Satan ' till the period of the
exile; and even then he is not the 'tempter' of the NT.^: it was only later,
when it had become usual to connect the power of evil with a person, that those
who looked back upon this narrative saw in the serpent the Evil One. The
identification appears first in Wisd, ii. 24 (' by envy of the devil death entered
into the world'); of. Rev. xii. 9, xx. 2,
III. 1 Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of J
the field which the Lord God had made. And he said mito the
woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of '^any tree of the
* Or, all the treet
III. 1. The serpent begins by addressing the woman, the weaker
vessel, who moreover had not herself actually heard the prohibition
(ii. 16 f.). It first distorts the prohibition, and then affects surprise
at it when thus distorted ; thus it artfully sows doubts and suspicions
in the heart of the unsuspecting woman, and at the same time
1 See A. B. Davidson's note on Job i. 6 in the Cambridge Bible for Schooli,
III. 1-6] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 46
garden ? 2 And the woman said unto the serpent, Of the fruit J
of the trees of the garden we may eat : 3 but of the fruit of the
tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall
not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die. 4 And the
serpent said unto the woman. Ye shall not surely die : 5 for
God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes
shall be opened, and ye shall be as ^God, knowing good and evil.
6 And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food,
and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was ^to be
desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did
1 Or, god* " Or, desirable to look upon
insinuates that it is itself qualified to judge of the propriety of such
a prohibition.
subtil. Or, wily (Jos. ix. 4), crafty (Job v. 12) ; used also in a
good sense {=callidus), Pr. xii. 16, 23 al.
2, 3. The woman corrects the serpent; and, to shew how fully
aware she is of the strictness of the prohibition, adds (what is not
contained in ii. 16 f.) that they are not even to touch the fruit of the
tree.
4. 5. The serpent now goes on to deny flatly the truth of the
threat, to suggest an unworthy motive for it, and to hold out the hope
of a great boon to be secured by disobedience. The immediate reward,
adroitly though fallaciously put forward, thus sets out of sight the
remoter penalty.
5. /w God doth know &c. It is not on your account, to save you
from death, but on His account, to prevent your becoming like Him,
that He has forbidden you to eat this fruit. The serpent attributes
the proliibition to envy, the quality so often ascribed to the gods by the
Greeks (e.g. Hdt. i. 32, iii. 40, vn. 10, 48).
as God. Or, as gods (RVm. = AV.). The Heb. is ambiguous (the
Heb. for *God' being plural in form) ; so that the marg. is quite possible
(cf -y. 22 ; 2 S. xiv. 17). The distinction between God and divine
beings was not so clearly drawn by the Hebrews as it is by us (cf 1 S.
xxviii. 13; perhaps, also, Ps. Ixxxii. 1, 6, xcvii. 7, cxxxviii. 1) : angels
are called sometimes the ' sons of God ' (or ' of the gods ' ; c£ on v. 22,
and p. 82 n.).
6. The woman does not repel the suggested doubt as to God's
truth and love, but yields to it : the prospect of the tree in
front of her, and the thought of the boon to be so speedily and
easily acquired, overpower her : she both eats of the fruit herself,
and also offers it to her husband, who naturally follows the example
which she has set.
to make one wise. Better, though the general sense remains tlie
same, for becoming wise (Ps. ii. 10, xciv, 8). To look iq^n '(lxx.,
46 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [iii. 6-9
eat ; and she gave also unto her husband with her, and he did J
eat. 7 And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew
that they were naked ; and they sewed fig leaves together, and
made themselves ^aprons. 8 And they heard the ^ voice of the
Lord God walking in the garden in the ^cool of the day : and the
man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord
God amongst the trees of the garden. 9 And the Lord God
called unto the man, and said unto him, Where art thou?
* Or, girdles ' Or, sound ' Heb. wind.
Pesh., Vulg., Ges., RVm.) is a meaning of hiskil which is not otherwise
known. (It occurs in Aramaic, and post-Biblical Hebrew, but only in
the reflexive conjug., properly to shew oneself attentive.)
7. They had eaten of the tree of knowledge ; and so, the idea is,
they had passed in a moment — as we all pass, though only in the
course of years — from the innocence of childhood into the knowledge
which (see on ii. 17) belongs to adult age. Their sense of guilt betrays
itself unconsciously, before long, in their behaviour as described in v. 8.
For the present, however, the narrator notices only their acquisition of
another t;ense, in which adult age differs from childhood, and the
absence of which had been noted in ii. 24 as a mark of innocence.
the eyes of them both were opened. The expression is used of any
sudden, or miraculous, enlightenment, xxi, 19, 2 K. vi. 17. The
serpent's words {v. 5) were thus fulfilled : but the knowledge gained
was very difierent from that which they had been led to anticipate.
fig leaves. Why in particular ^(/-leaves ? Probably because among
the leaves of Palestinian trees those of the fig-tree were the largest.
The mention of the fig is an indication that the narrative, if Babylonian
in origin, must have been domesticated in Palestine : for the fig-tree is
indigenous in Syria and. Palestine, and (Hdt. i. 193) there were ' no fig-
trees ' in Babylonia.
aprons. Girdles, such as used to be worn round the loins, — in
later times, outside the dress. See the same word in 1 K. ii. 5, Is. iii. 24.
8 — 13. God's judicial inquiry.
8. voice. Rather, sound. The garden was one in which, it is
implied, God and man were wont to meet and discourse together : but
now, when they hear His footsteps, they are afraid — for the voice of
conscience tells them that they have incurred His displeasure — and
make a vain attempt to hide themselves.
toward the cool of the day. I.e. toward evening, when in the East
a coohng wind arises (Cant. ii. 17 = iv. 6), and the Oriental can issue
forth from his dwelling (contrast ch. xviii. 1).
9. Where art thou? 'The call which, after every sin, repeats
itself to the man who seeks to deceive himself and others concerning
his sin' (Dillm.).
m. IO-I4] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 47
10 And he said, I heard thy ^ voice in the garden, and I was J
afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself. 11 And he
said, Who told thee that thou wast naked ? Hast thou eaten of
the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not
eat? 12 And the man said. The woman whom thou gavest to
be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat. 13 And the
Lord God said unto the woman, What is this thou hast done ?
And the woman said. The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat.
14 And the Lord God said unto the serpent. Because thou hast
done this, cursed art thou ^above all cattle, and ^above every
beast of the field ; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt
1 Or, sound 2 Qr, from among
10. Being no longer able to hide himself, but shrinking still from
acknowledging the entire truth, the man at first alleges only his
nakedness, as the cause of his concealment.
11, 12. But the Judge presses for a full confession, so the man
now owns the deed, but seeks immediately to extenuate it by casting
the blame for it upon the woman, and even ultimately upon God
('whom thou gavest to be with me').
13. The woman, when questioned, in her turn casts the blame
upon the serpent. Cf 2 Cor. xi. 3 ; 1 Tim. ii. 14.
The object of the questions is to elicit from both the man and the
woman a full admission of their guilt. No such questions are put to
the serpent, because, being not a morally responsible being, the awaken-
ment of a sense of guilt in it is not needed, or indeed possible.
14 — 19. Tlie sentences.
14, 15. The sentence on the serpent. The serpent, being an
animal, is not morally responsible : but it is punished her^ as the
representative of evil thoughts and suggestions ; man must recognize,
in its punishment, how the curse of God rests upon all evil thoughts,
such as those of which it has been the instigator.
14. above. Lit. out of, or (RVm.) from among, i.e. selected out of
others as cursed, and not implying (as 'above' might suggest) that
other animals are cursed likewise.
■upon thy belly &c. The mark of the serpent's curse consists in its
crawling gait, and dusty food (cf Is. Ixv. 25) ; not that it actually
lived on dust, but moving as it did with its mouth upon the ground, it
might readily be supposed to swallow more dust than other animals (cf
Mic. vii. 17).
As the serpent, by the stealthiness and rapidity of its attack, and
its often deadly bite, was a fit emblem of the destructiveness of the
power of evil, so, by its life passed in the dust, it was to remind man a
of the prostrate condition in which it was God's design and intention I
that the power of evil should ever be held down. '
48 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [iii. 14-16
thou eat all the days of thy life : 15 and I will put enmity J
between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her
seed : it shall ^bruise thy head, and thou shalt ^bruise his
heeL 16 Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy
sorrow and thy conception ; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth
^ Or, lie in wait for
all the days of thy life. The serpent is obviously identified here
with the serpent-Trtcg ; and suitably so, for it represents the ever-
reviving, ever newly active, power of evil (cf 'seed ' in v. 15).
15, The serpent is to be not only a grovelling creature; there is
to be irreconcilable enmity between it and man. The terms of the
sentence are suggested by the relation actually existing between the
human race and (speaking generally) the serpent race ; but it is evident
that the words used include more than this : the serpent, even more
clearly than in v. 14, is the representative of the power of evil.
bruise. The word recurs Job ix. 17; Ps. cxxxix. 11 ^ 'Bruise,'
however, does not properly suit the last clause (where it is used of the
serpent) ; hence many moderns render aim at, make for (cf LXX.
Tr]p7Ja-ei(^) ; Onk. watck, observe), supposing shuph to be a cognate form
of shaaph, prop, to pant (Jer. xiv. 6), fig. to pant after, be eager for
(in a hostile sense), Ps. Ivi. 1, 2, Ivii. 3 al. [RV. would swallow me up\
It may, however, be doubted whether this poetic, metaphorical applica-
tion (RVm. lie in wait for is too free) is here very suitable either ; and
it seems better, on the whole, to retain bruise, supposing it to be used
improperly of the serpent in the last clause on account of its use of the
woman's seed in the clause before.
The passage has been known for long as the Protevangelium ; and
no doubt it is that : but we must not read into the words more than
they contain. No victory of the woman's seed is promised, but only a
perpetual antagonism, in which each side, using the weapons which it is
natural to it to employ, will seek to obtain the mastery of the other.
Only from the general drift and tenor of the passage can it be inferred
that the conflict is one in which the ' seed of the woman ' may hope
ultimately to have the victory : as Dillm. remarks, a conflict ordained
by God, in which the serpent is viewed evidently as the offender and
aggressor, cannot but end in the triumph of its opponent. The passage
thus ' strikes at the outset of redemptive history the note of promise
and of hope' (Ottley, History of the Hebrews, p. 11). See further
p. 57.
16. The sentence on the woman : p.ain, especially the pain
attendant upon child-bearing, and evils arising out of her relation
to her husband.
thy pain and thy conception. I.e., probably, pain (in general), and
especially such as is the result of pregnancy. 'Pain' (|i3Xy, only
1 Here probably corrupt (read prob. '^Sb'^^ 'screen me') : for 'darkuess' cannot
be said naturally to ' bruise ' a person. RV. is no rendering of the Hebrew.
III. i6, ,7] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 49
children ; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall J
rule over thee. 17 And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast
hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree,
of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it :
cursed is the ground for thy sake ; in Hoil shalt thou eat of it all
^ Or, sorrow
besides v. 17, v. 29) includes bodily as well as mental pain ; and is not
to be limited to what we should now describe as ' sorrow ' (see v. 29).
in pain &c. The Hebrews spoke proverbially of the severe pain (^^n,
not 3^y, as here) of child-bearing (e.g. Is. xxi. 3 ; Jer, vi. 24 ; Ps. xlviii.
6) ; and here it is represented as the penalty for Eve's transgression.
thy desire &c. Woman is to be dependent in two respects upon
her husband : (1) she will desire his cohabitation, thereby at the same
time increasing her liability to the pain of child-bearing ; (2) he will
rule over her, with allusion to the oppressed condition of woman in
antiquity, when she was often not more than the slave of her husband,
and was liable to be treated by him with gi*eat arbitrariness.
It is of course evident that the presence of sin in the world has
been the cause of immeasurable suffering to woman in precisely many
of the ways that are here indicated ; but it is not to be supposed that
the physical constitution of the human fi-ame has been so altered by it
that a function, which would otherwise have been exercised painlessly,
should have become a painful one : in so far, therefore, as the text
implies this, we can only conclude that, as in other instances, the
writer was guided by moral rather than by historical considerations
(cf p. 36). At the same time, even in regard to child-bearing, it
is no doubt the case tliat at this critical and anxious moment of
a woman's life, the sense of past wrong-doing weighs peculiarly
upon her, and also that men's cruelty and women's folly have con-
tributed to make the process more painful and perilous for women
than it is for animals.
17 — 19. The sentence on the man. Worh had been appointed
for man before (ii. 15) : the penalty is to consist in its laboriousness,
and in the disappointments and vexations which often accompany it.
Agriculture is specified in particular, because it was one of the earliest,
and has always been one of the most necessary, of human employments ;
and a curse is accordingly laid upon the soil and upon its productive
power. Human wilfulness and human sin have in innumerable ways
embittered toil ; but, as before, we cannot suppose that the sin of Adam
affected directly the physical productivity of the earth'.
17. toil. Heb. ]i3^y, pam, as v. 16* ; here oi painful toil, as v. 29;
cf. the use of the cognate 2ii; in Pr. x. 22**, xiv. 23'', v. 10^ Ps. cxxvii. 2.
1 It may be worth recalling that classical antiquity also supposed that in the
Golden Age the earth brought forth spontaneously all that was required for human
needs, and that the cultivation of the soil was only introduced at a later period (see
e.g. Hes. Op. et Dies, 118 f.; Ovid, Met. i. 101 ff.; and cf. Verg. G. i. 121 ff.).
r. 4
50 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [m. 17-23
the days of thy life ; 18 thorns also and thistles shall it bring J
forth to thee ; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; 19 in
the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto
the ground ; for out of it wast thou taken : for dust thou art,
and unto dust shalt thou return. 20 And the man called his
wife's name ^Eve ; because she was the mother of all living.
21 And the Lord God made for Adam and for his wife coats of
skins, and clothed them.
22 And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as
one of us, to know good and evil ; and now, lest he put forth
his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for
ever : 23 therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the
garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.
^ Heb. Havvah, that is, Living, or, Life,
18. tlie herb of the field. Herbs, it is implied, need to be toil-
somely cultivated, to prevent their being choked by weeds, whereas the
fruit of trees (ii. 16) matures spontaneously.
19. till &c. Emphasizing the thought of -w. 17 end^ that the toil
is to be life-long.
and unto dust &c. Cf. Job x. 9, xxxiv. 15 ; Ps. xc. 3, civ. 29 (of
animals), cxlvi. 4 ; Eccl. iii. 20, xii. 7.
20. Em. Heb. Havnvdh, ' life' ; the name being explained as
implying that all (human) life originated from her. The word must be
a very old one in Hebrew ; like Jehovah (' Yahweh'), it is derived from
a form (with w for y) obsolete in ordinary Hebrew, though preserved in
Phoenician, as hdwdh, ' to be,' is preserved in Aramaic.
21. The feehng which prompted the making of girdles of fig-leaves
(v. 7) is recognized as a sound one ; only coverings of a more permanent
and substantial kind are provided. The origin of clothing is at the
same time explained. Skins of animals are mentioned as the simplest
and most primitive kind of clothing in practical use.
coats. Rather, tunics.
22 — 24. The expulsion from Paradise. Man was created, it is
implied, mortal ; though, if he had continued innocent he might have
secured immortality by eating of the tree of life. But immortality — or
at least immortality to be so attained — is out of the question for a
sinful being : to prevent him therefore from obtaining it, he is driven
forth to till the ground to which he belongs (ii. 7, iii. 19), under the
toilsome conditions imposed m v. 17 ff.
22. as one of us. Man has acquired to a certain degree what is a
divine prerogative or distinction. It is not however said that he has
become like Jehovah, but only that he has become like one of the class
of divine beings (cf. on v. 5) to which Jehovah also belongs.
III. .4] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 51
24 So he drove out the niaii ; and he placed at the east of the J
garden of Eden the Cherubim, and the flame of a sword which
turned eveiy way, to keep the way of the tree of life.
24. The Cherubim, and the flaming sword, set to guard the n-ay
to the tree of life, are a sjonbolical expression of the truth that the
garden of innocence and purity and ideal happiness cannot be entered
again by man upon earth.
But the garden, with the tree of immortality in its midst, thus lost
to man in his earthly existence, came in a later age, when the belief
in a future life began more definitely to shape itself, to supply imagery
for the ideal place of happiness after death. And so we find ' the
garden of Eden' (11.y \l) in post-Biulical Jewish writings^ and 'Paradise
(see on ii. 8) in 2 Esdr. viii. 52, the NT. (Lk. xxiii. 43 ; 2 Cor. xii. 4 ;
Rev. ii. 7), and other Christian writings, used to denote the future
abode of the blessed; comp. the 'tree of life' in Enoch xxv. 4 f.^
(2 cent. B.C.) ; 2 Esdr. viii. 52 ; Rev. ii. 7, xxii. 2.
On the emblematic figures called Cherubim, see further p. 60 f.
Allusions to the Fall scarcely occur in other parts of the OT. (for IIos. vi. 7,
Job xxxi. 33, are both uncertain: see RVm.): they appear, however, in the
Apocrypha, as Wisd. ii. 24, x. 1 ; Ecelus. xxv. 24; 2 Esdr. iii. 21, iv. 30, vii. 48
(118); of. Apoc. of Baruch liv. 15, 19 (see Sandav-Headlam, Romans, p. 137);
and in NT. the references to it are frequent; see Rom. v. 12 — 21; 1 Cor.
XV. 21 f,; 2 Cor. xi. 3; 1 Tim. ii. 14; Rev. xii. 9, xx, 2.
On the narrative ii. 4'' — iii. 24.
In reading these two chapters we must distinguish between the narrative
itself, — the scenery and incidents, as such, — and the spiritual teaching which
they are intended to convey. The material side of the narrative was derived,
there can be little doubt, from the representations and traditions current
among the wi-iter's fellow-countrymen, though not entirely of native origin.
The narrative contains features which have unmistakable counterparts in the
religious traditions of other nations; and some of these, though they have been
accommodated to the spirit of Israel's religion, carry indications that they are
not native to it. A 'golden age' standing at the beginning of history, in which
the earth yielded its products freely, and men lived a life of ideal happiness,
unalloyed by care or sin, by toil or trouble, was pictured by many ancient nations,
Persians and Indians, for instance, as well as Greeks (e.g. lies. Op. et Dies,
90—92, 109—120) and Romans (Ov. Met. i. 89—112). The idea of a garden
upon earth, which is God's own abode, and in which supernatural gifts are
confeiTed by means of the fniits of trees, is akin to (though not identical
with) the representations current in India and Persia, according to which the
1 E.g. Ahoth v. 20 (Taylor 29) ; Targ. of Cant. iv. 12. Cf. Enoch Ix. 8 ' the
garden where the elect and righteous dwell,' with Charles' note.
* Where, however, its truit confers only long life, not immortality.
4—2
62 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
dwellings of gods and genii on the sacred mountains contained wonderful trees
able to confer many different kinds of blessings, especially (as the Soma plant)
immortality. Both these and other elements in the representation, as the
Cherubim and the flaming sword, perhaps even the serpent, have in fact a
mythical colouring, and suggest the inference that they have been derived
ultimately from a mythological source. There are also features tending
specifically to connect the narrative with Babylonia. As different represen-
tations of the course of creation were current in Israel, so, as we now know,
they were also current in Babylonia; and one in which, as in ch. ii., the
formation of man precedes that of plants and animals, exists in a veiy ancient
narrative (according to Hommel, as old as 3 — 4000 b.o.) which was published by
Mr Pinches in 1890. It is too long to translate verbatim''-', but it describes
how when as yet 'no reed had sprung up, no tree had been created' [cf. Gen. ii. 5],
no house or city built, Nippur and Erech, with their temples, not yet founded,
and when the world was all a sea, Marduk formed the dry land, and made it
an abode for the gods; and after this how he 'created mankind,' made beasts
of the field, living things of the field, the Tigris and the Euphrates in their
places, the verdure of the field, grass, marshes, reeds, the wild-cow with her
young, the young wild-ox, the ewe with her young, the sheep of the fold, parks
and forests, and finally houses and cities, and Nippur and Erech with their
temples. In view of the antiquity of this narrative. Prof. Sayce^ does not
hesitate to see in it 'the earliest starting-point yet known to us of that form of
the story of creation, which we find in Gen. iL' Two of the rivers mentioned
in Gen. ii. are Babylonian; perliaps 'Eden,' and the shohmn-stone (ii. 12) are so
likewise. The irrigation of a tract of country by a large river (with, it is to be
understood, cross-canals) is Babylonian. A sacred palm-tree, with two winged
figures, having the heads sometimes of eagles, sometimes of men, standing or
kneeling on either side, is often depicted on Assyrian gems'. It is possible that
these figures are the prototypes of the Bibhcal 'cherubim' (see further p. 60 f.).
A very ancient inscription may be here cited, describing a sacred garden with
a mystic tree, which in its general conception is a counterpart of the Heb.
'garden of God*'—
At Eridu^ a palm-stalk grew overshadowing ; in a holy place did it become
green ;
its root was of bright lapis-lazuli which stretched towards the abyss^ ;
[before] the god Ea was its growth at Eridu, teeming with fertility;
its seat was the (central) place of the earth;
its foliage (?) was the couch of Bahu, the (primaeval) mother.
^ It may be read in full in Ball's Light, from the East, p. 18, or KB. vi. S9 — ^3.
See also Jastrow, Rel. of Bab. and Ass. 444 — 450; Zimmern, KAT.^ 498.
2 Monuments, p. 93. « Ball, op. cit. pp. 28, 29—33.
* Pinches, Trans. Vict. Inst. xxix. (1897), p. 44 ; Pinches, op. cit. (above, p. 38 n.),
p. 71 (with some differences in the translation); Sayce, Moivuments, p. 101.
* Eridu was a very ancient sacred city of Babylonia ; formerly, when the
Persian Gulf extended further inland than it does now, it stood upon its south
shore ; now its site (Abu-Shahrein) is on the riaht bank of the Euphrates, about 50
miles from its mouth (Maspero, r. 561, 568, 614 f., with map). Its oracle is alluded
to by Eri-aku [p. 15(5] : see the Addenda on p. 156.
* The 'waters under the earth.'
THE NARRATIVE OF PARADISE 55
Into the heart of its holy house which spread its shade like a forest hath
no man entered.
In its interior is the sun-god, Tammuz,
Between the mouths of the rivers (which are) on both sides*.
Enough will have been adduced to shew that, though no complete Baby-
lonian parallel to the story of Paradise is at present known, there are features
in the narrative which point strongly towards Babylonia, and in the light of
the known fact that other elements in the early chapters of Genesis are derived
from Babylonia, authorize the inference that echoes of Babylonian beliefs
supplied, at least in part, the framework of the representation^.
In considering the qiiestion of the origin and character of this represen-
tation, it must not be forgotten that the beginnings of the human race reach
back, it is certain (p. xxxi ff.), to a period far more remote than that from
which any trustworthy recollections could have been transmitted to historical
times : and hence we are not entitled to suppose that the Hebrews had more
trustworthy information I'especting the life and condition of the first men than
other nations of the ancient world : on the contrary, we have every reason for
believing that the pictures which their historians offer of primitive times were
derived from the same source as those drawn by other nations, viz. folk-lore, —
whether native or borrowed, cannot, naturally, in every particular detail be
precisely determined. And so we may conclude, in view of the facts mentioned
above, that a legend respecting the first beginnings of man upon earth, contain-
ing elements derivetl partly from Babylonia, partly, it may be, from elsewhere, but
at the same time, in other features, strongly Hebraized, was current in ancient
Israel; and that this, stripped of its primitive polytheism, and retaining only
faint traces of what was probably its original mythological character, formed
the material setting which was adapted by the narrator for the purpose of
exhibiting, under a striking and vivid imaginative form, the deep spiritual
truths which he was inspired to discern ^ As ch. i. gives no scientific account of
^ There is also a scene depicted on an ancient Bab. cylinder, now in the British
Museum (Smith, Chald. Gen. p. 91 ; Ball, p. 25) — two figures seated on either side
of a fruit-tree, to which they are both stretching out their hands, while behind one
of them a serpent is coiling upwards — which recalls forcibly Gen. iii. : but as no
inscription accompanies it, its interpretation is uncertain ; and it is hazardous to
suppose it to represent the Bab. story of the Temptation. And the passage quoted
by Sayce, Monuments, p. 104 (cf. p. 65 n.), Ryle, p. 40, and in DB. i. 839'' (cf.
Wade, OT. Hist. p. 49 bottom) from the third tablet of the Creation-epic (11. 132
— 138), has certainly no reference to the Fall : it describes the feast held by the
'great gods' before appointing Marduk their champion against Tiamat (above,
p. 28) : see the context, and an amended translation, in Ball, p. 7, by Zimmern, in
Gunkel, p. 410, or Jensen, KB. vi. 21 : cf. also Jastrow, p. 424. On the myth of
Adapa (who, beguiled by Ea, lost immortality), and possible traces of its influendt
in Gen. iii., see Zimmern, Bab. and Heb. Gen. 34 &., KAT.^ 520 ff. , Jastr. 544 ff.
^ Comp. also, with the formation of man from dust, or ^Job xxxiii. 6) clay, how in
the Gilgamesh-epic (see p. 103) , i. 34 (KB. vi. 121 ; Jastrow,' pp. 448, 474 ; KA T.* 430),
Aruru creates Eabani out of clay (t3^L3) ; and how also, according to Berossus —
seemingly in the Creation-epic — men were formed of earth mingled with the blood of
a deity [KAT.^ 489, 497; cf. above, pp. 27 n. 2, 30 n. 1).
* Cf. Dr Bernard in DB. i. 840»: 'We believe, then, that we have in this
Biblical record of the Fall a purified form of legendary narrative concerning man's
early history, which had wide currency among Semitic peoples.'
62 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
the process of creation, so ch. ii. 4* — iii. 24 contains no scientific solution of the
problems of anthropology. But the narrative expresses a variety of ethical and
theological truths respecting human nature in a figurative or allegorical dress,
the details not being true in a literal sense, but being profoundly true in a
symbolical sense (cf. p. 32), i.e. as expressing in a symbolical or representative
form real facts of human nature, and real stages through which human nature
actually passed. And the writer, in constructing his narrative, has shewn a
wonderful power of combining deep thoughts upon man and God with an
almost child-like simplicity of outward form: he has thus produced, not
only a narrative singularly impiessive and attractive in itself, but one more-
over which can 'be imderstood by the simplest, as it may also be studied with
spiritual benefit by the wisest of mankind.'
Let us, then, while keeping our eye on the teachings of modern science,
consider how we may regard the narrative of Gen. ii. 4^ ff., and what lessons we
may derive from it.
Of the actual beginnings of man upon this earth we know nothing: science,
by a patient collection and examination of facts, may make certain conclusions
as to our physical antecedents and ancestry more or less probable ; but that is
all. The general trend of modern science is to regard man as having developed
gradually out of humbler anthropoid ancestors ; and the possibility of this
theory being true must at least be reckoned with by the theologian : as was
remai'ked above (p. 32 f.), there can be at least no d, priori objection to it upon
dogmatic grounds. But at what moment, or with what feelings, man first
awoke to consciousness of himself, we know as little as we know in the case of an
infant child. Every individual among us has emerged by gradual steps out of
a state of unconsciousness, firstly into a state of sensitive consciousness, in which
he could be sensible of pleasures and pains, but could not reason, and after-
wards into a state of intellectual and moral consciousness, in which he can use
the powers of reason, can apprehend moral distinctions, and xise to the con-
ception of spiritual realities. In our own cases, the influence of the civilization
around us, and the instruction and example of parents and elders who have
been educated before us, and are able to help us to rise to their own level,
facilitate and accelerate the process : in the case of the first men, it must
have been vastly slower and more gradual. But of the stages by which all this
took place neither history nor science tells us anything definite. Nor are the
early chapters of the Bible intended to supply this deficiency. What they do
is to seize and express, under forcible concrete images which all can imderstand,
certain important moral and theological truths respecting the nature of man.
And in estimating the manner in which they do this, we must bear in mind the
stage of knowledge and culture reached by those to whom they were in the
first instance addressed. They were addressed to men who were wliolly un-
acquainted with the teachings of physical science, and who had never made
human nature the subject of either archaeological or psychological study. They
were addressed to men, by no means destitute of civilization and culture, —
their polished literary form is alone suflBcient to shew that, — but still to men
who were untouched by all the deep and varied influences which (to speak
summarily) owe their origin to Greece, and Rome, and modern Europe. They
were addressed to men whose intellectual aptitudes and modes of thought were
THE NARRATIVE OF PARADISE 65
thus, speaking relatively, those of children. And accordingly the truths which
they contain are expressed in a form which men such as these would naturally
understand.
What then are some of the truths which these chapters of Genesis thus
bring before us?
1. Man, it is said, was formed out of the 'dust.' This is obviously a
pictorial, or symbolical, expression of the fact that there is a material side to
his nature, and that on this side of it he is connected with the earth. But by
what process he was thus ' formed ' ; through what intermediate forms, if any,
the 'dust' passed before it became man, — these are questions which do not
come within the range of the author's thought. It may be that, as science
teaches, man, like many other species of living beings, arose by gradual differ-
entiation and development, under varying conditions of environment, from a
pre-existing form (or succession of forms) of life : but, if, and in so far as this
theory is true, it simi^ly implies an alteration in the manner in which God is
conceived as having acted ; what was supposed to have been accomplislied by
Him, as the result of a single act, some 6000 years ago, was —oni-
plished by Him as the result of a long process, extending through u
years: the essential point, which the old Hebrew narrator has hei
remains unaffected, that God (mediately, or immediately) 'formed man
dust of the ground V The second part of the same verse, 'and breathea
his nostrils the breath of life,' suggests (as pointed out in the note) that thci ^
is also another and higher side to man's nature. And so the verse teaches by
implication the truth of man's double nature. On the one hand, man has a
material body, in virtue of which he is dependent for his support and welfare
upon the material world, and has to accommodate himself to the material
conditions under which he finds himself; on the other hand, his life is in some
special sense a divine gift ; it brings with it intellectual and moral capacities,
differing from those possessed by other animals, a sense of the reality and
distinctive character of which is strongly impressed upon the narrative.
2. Man was made not to be idle, but to work, to attend to the garden in
which he was placed, and to develop its capacities. Man is intended to
exercise his faculties ; and so there is declared in nuce the truth that it is
part of the Divine order that man should progress ; and as years went on,
originate and develop all the various arts, employments, and sciences, which
are in different ways conducive to the welfare or knowledge of humanity.
3. The narrative hints at one of the earliest uses to which man would put
his reason, the creation of language (ii. 19 f.). The power of creating language
essentially differentiates man from animals. Animals distinguish : they know
(in many cases) one man, or one creature, from another, they know one food
from another : but only man fixes such distinctions, by associating them with
particular sounds, and thereby creating language. The power of giving names
to animals implies the possession of reason,
^ For a fuller discussion of the theistic aspects of Evolution, the writer may be
permitted to refer to the first of his Sermons on Subjects connected with the Old
Testament (1892), pp. 1 — 27. See also the illuminative treatment of the subject in
Aubrey Moore's Science and the Faith (1889), pp. 162 — 235, and in Oxford House
Papers, No. 21 (1889), 'Evolution and Christianity.'
66 THE BOOK OF GEISTESIS
4. The account given of the formation of woman is, naturally, not to be
understood literally; but under a eymbolical form, it teaches (as indicated in
the notes on ii. 18 ff.) the deep ethical and social significance, which under-
lies the difference between the sexes.
5. The narrative teaches that man possesses a moral nahtre, which must
be exercised, and tested ; and a command is accordingly laid upon him for the
purpose (cf. on ii. 16 f.). Tlie command is broken; and man falls thereby from
his state of innocence, and forfeits the blessing of the Divine favour, and the
Divine presence, which he had before enjoyed. The command, of which the
man became conscious, and which he disobeyed, can be meant only to represent,
as in a figure, the moral law, a sense of which, — though we cannot define when,
or where, — awoke in primitive man, but almost as soon as it did awake, was
contravened. It is the awakening conscience of the human race, the awakening
sense of right and wrong, the operation of which is thus figuratively brought
before us.
6. The narrator analyses very completely the psychology of temptation,
bringing out particularly the insidiousness with which suggestions of evil
come upon a man, prompting him often, with fatal effect, to do something
which is apparently harmless, or which can plausibly be represented as
harmless.
7. The narrative teaches that man possesses freewill: he was created
with the capacity to remain innocent, but also with the capacity to sin (Ecclus.
XV. 11 — 20; Jas. i. 13 f.). Temptatioii, though it does not proceed from God,
is permitted by Him: it tests man's c niracter; and tends to strengthen and
perfect it by giving him the opportunit} of manifesting his readiness to prefer
God's will to his own, and thereby of est iblishing a fiabit of goodness.
8. As regards the condition of man before the Fall, there is a mistake
not unfrequently made, which it is important to correct. It is sometimes
supposed that the first man was a being of developed intellectual capacity,
perfect in the entire range of his facultiiis, a being so gifted that the greatest
and ablest of those who have lived subsi^quently have been described as the
' rags ' or ' ruins ' of Adam. This view of the high intellectual capacities of our
first parents has been familiarized to many by the great poem of Milton, who
represents Adam and Eve as holding discourse together in words of singular
elevation, refinement, and grace. But there is nothing in the representation
of Genesis to justify it ; and it is opposed to everything that we know of the
methods of God's providence. All that, as Christian theologians, we are called
upon to believe is that a time arrived, when man's faculties were sufficiently
developed for him to become conscious of a moral law, and that, having become
conscious of it, he broke it : he may have done this, witiiout possessing any of
those intellectual perfections with which he has been credited, but the existence
of which, at such a stage of history, would be contrary to the whole analogy
of providence : progress, gradual advance from lower to higher, from the less
perfect to the more perfect, is the law which is stamped upon the entire range
of organic nature, as well as upon the history of the civilization and education
of the human race. The fact that this law is the general rule is not aftected
by retrogression in civilization in particular cases. But it is sufficient for
Christian theology, if we hold that, whatever the actual occasion may have
THE NARRATIVE OF PARADISE 57
been, and however immature, in intellect and culture, he may have been at
the time, man failed in the trial to which he was exposed, that sin thus
entered into the world, and that consequently the subsequent development of
the race was not simply what God intended it to be ; it has been attended
through its whole course by an element of moral disorder, and thus in different
ways it has been marred, perverted, impeded, cr thrown back. And what has
been said remains true, even though it should be the case — though (p. xxxvi)
this is not the view which commends itself to modern anthropologists — that
mankind are not all descended from a single human pair, but arose in-
dependently in different centres of the globe : the real unity of the human
race consists not in unity of blood, but in identity of mental constitution, and
of moral and spiritual capacities^ ; in this case, therefore, as the facts are
suflScient evidence of the presence of sin in all the races of mankind, the
natural inference would be that each race independently passed through
similar moral experiences, and each similarly underwent a ' fall.' The typical
truth of the narrative of Gen. iii. would thus, if anything, be enhanced rather
than diminished, if this supposition were true^.
9. The Protevangelium (iii. 15) lays down a great ethical principle.
There is to be a continual spiritual struggle between man and the manifold
temptations by which he is beset. Evil promptings and suggestions are ever
assailing the sons of men ; and they must be ever exerting themselves to repel
them. It is of course true that the great and crowning defeat of man's
spiritual adversary was accomplished by Him who was in a special sense the
* seed ' of the woman, the representative of humanity, who overcame once and
for all the power of the Evil One. But the terms of the verse are perfectly
general ; and it must not be interpreted so as to exclude those minor, though
in their own sphere not less real, triumphs, by which in all ages individuals
have resisted the suggestions of sin and proved themselves superior to the
power of evil. It is a prolonged and continuous conflict which the verse
contemplates, though one in which the law and aim of humanity is to be
to resist, and if possible to slay, the serpent which symbolizes the power of
temptation.
The site of Paradise.
The question of the site of Paradise is one that has exercised many minds :
and very extraordinary speculations have sometimes been propounded on the
subject. After what has been said in the preceding pages, however, it will be
evident that Paradise, as described in the Book of Genesis, is an ideal locality;
and hence what we have to consider is not the question of the site of Paradise
* Though, if the doctrine of evolution be true, there would in this case also be a
unity of blood, only its starting-point would be further back ; and it would be
based, not upon descent from a single human pair, but upon descent from a single
group of anthropoid precursors.
2 With the main thought of the preceding paragraph comp. especially a sermon
by Canon (now Bishop) Gore in LuxMundi, App. ii (ed. 10, p. 526 ff.) ; and the same
writer's Epistle to the Romans (1900), ii. 220 — 2, 228 — 235; also a lecture reported
in the Church Times, Feb. 19, 1897, or, more briefly, in the Exp. Times, Apr. 1897;
and Illingworth, Bampt. Lect. vi. pp. 143—7, 154—161. Cf. DB. iv. 528''.
68 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
as a real locality, but the question of its site, as it was pictured by the Hebrew
narrator. And. even this qut^stion is not one the answer to which is obvious.
A river, branching into four, of which two are the Tigris and the Euphrates,
corresponds to nothing which is to be found — or, we may safely add, was ever
to be found — on the surface of the earth. And when we endeavour to identify
the two remaining rivers, the Pishon and the Gihou, by what we know of the
countries which they are represented as flowing around, they elude our grasp.
Havilah (see on xsv. 18) was probably in N.E. Arabia; Gush is generally
Ethiopia, though it might (see on x. 8) denote the Kasshites, a people dwelling
in the mountainous region between Babylonia and the Caspian Sea, who figure
rather prominently in early Babylonian histoi7, and indeed gave Babylon
a dynasty of kings who ruled for 576 years (c. 1786 — 1211 B.C.). None of
these identifications however enable us to determine the Pishon and the
Gihon consistently with what we know of the geography of the regions in
question.
The following are the principal proposals, which have been made for fixing
the site of Paradise, in accordance with the description in Genesis.
1. The Tigris and the Euphrates rise in the same country, Kurdistan;
and hence some older scholars, as Keil, placed Paradise there, the Pishon
being either the Phasis or (Keil) the Araxes (which, joining the Kur, runs into
the Caspian Sea on the B.), and the Gihon being the Oxus (now the Jihoun).
But these rivers do not actually rise together, in fact the Oxus rises far to the
East of the Caspian Sea, in Afghanistan ; and there are no grounds for locating
5avilah and Cush in this region.
2. Friedrich Delitzsch, the eminent Assyriologist, son of the well-known
commentator, in 1881 propounded the view that Eden was the whole 'plain'
(see on ii. 8) of Babylonia; 'Paradise' was the region close to Babylon, on
the N., where the Tigris and the Euphrates approach each other most closely ;
the Pishon was the Pallakopas, a canal running for a long distance (from above
Babylon) on the W. and S. of the Euphrates, and debouching finally in the
Persian Gulf ; the Gihon was the canal, called now the Shatt en-Nil^ which
runs, on the E. of the Euphrates, from Babylon, till it joins the Euphrates
again near the ancient Ur, Cush being a name of Babylonia (derived from
the fact, mentioned above, that a Kasshite dynasty ruled in Babylonia for
many centuries). Prof. Delitzsch's work is full of most valuable information,
collected from the inscriptions, respecting the geography and antiquities of
Babylonia and the surrounding countries ; but it is generally felt by scholars
that these identifications do not agree sufficiently with the Biblical descriptions
to be probable.
3. Professor Sayce^ adopting the view of ii. 10, mentioned in the footnote
on p. 39, considers that the river parted into four heads is the Persian Gulf
(which the Assyrians do not seem to have recognized us an arm of the sea, for
they called it Ndr Marratum, the ' Bitter River ') ; the Pishon was the
Pallakopas canal ; the Gihon the Khoaspes (now the Kerkha), which, rising
1 Monuments, pp. 95 — 103 ; art. Eden in DJ5. Similarly (except that the Pishon
is identified with the Karun, E. of the Kerkha) Sir J. W. Dawson, Modern
Science in Bible Lands, chap. iv.
THE SITE OF PARADISE 59
in the mountains of the Kasshites (who are meant by * Gush '), flowed formerly
into the Persian Gulf ^ ; Eden was the 'plain' of Babylonia; Paradise was the
sacred garden of Eridu (see p. 62), which stood formerly (ibid.) on the S. shore
of the Persian Gulf. This view has the advantage of identifying Paradise
with a known sacred garden of the Babylonians; but it seems impossible
(p. 39) to accept the interpretation of Gen. ii, 10, upon which it depends.
4. Hommel- — following largely Ed. Glaser^, who, by his travels and the
numerous inscriptions which he has collected, has made many important
additions to our knowledge of the geography and ancient history of Arabia —
places Paradise at Eridu, and considers Eden to have been the ' plain ' about
it : the Pishon, Gihon, and Hiddekel, he id^intifies with the Wddy Dawdsir,
the Wddy Rmnmd, and the Wddy Sirhdn, three Wadys in N. Arabia, which
run down from the neiglibourhood of Mecca, Medina, and Damascus, respec-
tively, in tlie direction of the Persian Gulf. These identifications are supported
with Hommel's usual cleverness and ingenuity ; but besides being open to the
serious objection that the three Wadys mentioned are not 'rivers,' but dry
valleys, they involve too many pm-ely hypothetical elements to have any claim
to be regarded as probable*.
5. Delitzsch and Dillmann identify the Pishon vdth the Indus (the gold-
country being then India), and the Gihon (as was already done by Josephus,
Ant. 1. 1. 3) with the Nile^ (Gush being then, as generally in the OT., Ethiopia).
These identifications may seem startling, in the light of modern geographical
knowledge : but it must be remembered that the ancients, to a much later
date than that at which Gen. ii. must have been written, had most inexact
ideas of the geography of distant parts : of distant rivers they had only a dim
and vague knowledge, not at all realizing their actual courses, or the points at
which they ran into the ocean, and being ignorant in particular of the geography
of S. Arabia and of the Red Sea®. There is no reason for supposing that the
Hebi'ews were better informed^.
6. Paul Haupt, the well-known Assyriologist, in an article on the site
of Paradise^, holding similarly that, in our localization of the rivers in Gen. ii.,
we must not start with the conceptions of modem geography, thinks that the
^ The Kerkha, the Tigris, and the Euphrates, formerly entered the Persian Gulf
by separate mouths ; but the head of the Gulf has since aneieut times been largely
silted up, and the three rivers now converge in the Shatt el-Arab, about 100 miles
above the spa.
^ AUT. 314—16 ; more fully (with map at end) Aufsdtze und Abhandlungen, in.
i. (1901), pp. 281—4, 292, 298, 335—9.
3 Skizze der Gesch. und Geogr. Arabiens von den dltesten Zeitsn his zum Propheten
Muhammad (1890), ii. 317—357.
* They are rejected by Prof. Sayce {Exp. Times, 1901, p. 564) : see also the
detailed criticism by Konig, FUnfncue Arab. Landschaftsnamen im, AT. p. 66 ff.
^ Of. Jer. ii. 18 lxx. ; Ecelus. xxiv. 27. Jos. identifies the Pishon with the Ganges.
* Alexander was led, by the crocodiles in the Indus, to think at first that he
had reached the sources of the Nile (Arrian, Exp. Alex. vi. 1. 3).
' ' The inspiration of the Bibhcal writers did not in matters of natural know-
ledge raise them above the level of their age : it need therefore cause no surprise if
the Biblical representation of Paradise bears marks of the imperfect geographical
knowledge of the ancients ' (Delitzsch, New Comm. on Genesis, 1887, on ii. 13).
* In Ueber Land und Meer, 18J4 — 5, No. 15 (with maps).
60 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
view underlying the description is that there was on the N. of Mesopotamia
a large body of water (perhaps suggested by a dim knowledge of the Black
Sea), which was the source of the four rivers : the Euphrates and the Tigris,
flowing southwards, ended in marshes^ ; the Pishon (suggested by the Kerkha),
starting more to the E., flowed into the Persian Gulf (supposed to be a river),
then turning westwards it encircled Havilah ( = Arabia), and ended in the Red
Sea; there was land beyond the Pishon, and the Gihon (suggested by the
Kanin), starting still further to the E., flowed first southwards, then, turning
westwards, it passed through this land, and encircling Gush ( = Ethiopia) ended
finally in the Nile.
Something of this kind, inconsistent as it is with actual geography, does
seem to be what the description in Gen. iL points to. The general relative
positions of the Euphrates and the Tigris were no doubt known ; and this
must form the starting-point of any attempt to fix the site of Paradise, as
pictured by the Hebrews. The cradle of humanity was believed to be some-
where to the East of Palestine (Gen. ii. 8), in or near Babylonia ; and there, in
a region watered by the supposed common source of the two greatest rivers
which they knew, and also of two others, the course of which it is impossible
to determine consistently with actual geography, the Hebrews located
Paradise.
Tlie Uheruhim.
The chernbim were composite emblematic figures, which are mentioned
in the OT. chiefly (1) as bearers of the Deity ; (2) as guardians of sacred
things. Thus (1) in Ps. xviii. 10, Jehovah rides on the cherub in the thunder-
storm ; in the Tabernacle, two small cherubim facing each other are described
as rising out of the ends of the mercy-seat on the ark (Ex. xxv. 18 — 20), and
in the Temple stood two colossal cherubim which with their wings over-
shadowed the ark (1 BL vi. 23 — 8), at once protecting it and also forming
a throne on which Jehovah was regarded as being seated (' Thou that sittest
upon the cherubim,' Ps. Ixxx. 1 al.Y) in the visions of Ezek. (i. 5 fl"., cf. x. 1 ff".)
four cherubim bear the 'firmament' which supports Jehovah's throne — here it
is said that each had four faces, that of a man, a lion, an ox, and an eagle,
four wings, the hands of a man, and the feet of calves (i. 6 — 10), though
whether these reproduced exactly the cherubim of the Temple is uncertain :
it is possible that they represent elaborations, constructed partly with elements
derived directly from Babylonia, of an older and simpler conception. In
Gen. iii. the cherubim appear as guardians of God's abode and of the spiritual
treasures reserved therein. The passage which ought on all grounds to be
1 Cf. the curious ancient map of Babylonia, in which the conntry is represented
as surrounded by an actual circle, expressly called Nar Marratum (i.e. the Persian
Gulf), and the Euphrates does enter, at least partly, apparu or 'marshes': see
Ball, Light from Die East, p. 23, or (more fully) Ezekiel, in Haupt's Polychrome
Bible, p." 101.
* Figures of cherubim were also carved as ornaments, together with palm-trees
and open flowers, upon the walls and doors of the Temple (1 K. vi. 29, 32, 35 ; cf.
Ez. xli. 18 — 20 [here with two faces, one that of a man, the other that of a lion], 25),
and on the bases of the ten lavers (1 K. vii. 29) : cf. also Ex. xxvi. 31.
THE CHERUBIM 61
compared is Ez. xxviil 13 — 17, where the 'prince of Tyre' is represented as
a glorious being bedecked with gold and precious stones, who had been placed
' in Eden, the garden of God,' had there ' walked up and down in the midst of
stones of fire ' (i.e. flashing gems), but had forfeited his high estate by pride,
and had been expelled from the lioiy 'mountain of God' by a cheriib'^. Ezek.,
it is probable, had access to traditions about Paradise more ample than those
preserved in Gen., and perhaps in some respects different from them ; and he
makes use of them here for the purpose of representing pictorially the fall of
the king of Tjto.
The cherubim are to be iutei-preted as symbolic beings — imaginative
symbols of the mysteriousness, the ubiquity, the dread unapproachability
of the Deity. The origin of the conception is uncertain. The word has no
Heb. etymology. Lenormant's statement {Origines, i. 118; cf. Sayce, Monw-
ments, 102) that he had read kirubu ('may the gracious kiriibu give
protection ') on a talisman in M. de Clercq's fine collection of Assyrian and
Babylonian gems, as a synonym for the usual shidu, the name of the huge
winged human-headed bulls which guard the entrance of Assyrian palaces and
temples^, has not been verified : no such inscription is quoted in the catalogue
of the collection wliich has recently been published^ Ps. xviii. 10 would suggest
that the conception arose in a personification of the thunder-cloud (upon, or
within, which, as the context of the verse plainly shews, the Hebrews believed
Jehovah to be borne along). Composite figures of difi"crent kinds were how-
ever common in the art of most of Israel's neighbours — Egyptians, Phoenicians,
Hittites, Babylonians, and AssjTians — from one or other of whom they also
found their way into early Greek art*; and it is quite possible that the
idea of the cherub was borrowed from some of these (see further Chkrub
in EncB.y.
It need only be added here that in the OT. the cherubim are the attendants
or guardians of Deity upon earth : they are first ti-ansfeired to heaven in the
Book of Enoch, where they appear among the highest angels, as the unsleeping
guardians of God's celestial throne (xiv. 11, IS, xx. 7, Ixi. 10 flf., Ixxi. 6f.):
cf. the four fwa (the name as in Ezek., but with different functions) of Rev. iv.
6 — 8, V. 6, 11, 14, vi. 1 — 7, vii. 11, xiv. 3, xv. 7, xix. 4.
1 The test is in parts obscure and corrupt ; but there is little doubt that this is
the real meaning ; see Davidson's Gomm. (in the Camb. Bible), p. 207. Eead (after
Lxx.) in V. 14 'With the cherub I set thee, thou wast in the holy mountain of God,'
&c., and in v. 16 exd ' and the cherub destroyed thee from the midst,' &c.
2 See Ball, op. cit., Plate opposite p. 28 ; and cf. KAT.^ 529 f.
* It is now stated that the reading rests upon a mistake (KAT.^ 632 n. 5).
* Especially in the form of the gold-guarding ypOires (eagle-headed lious), Aesch.
P. V. 803 f. ; Hdt. iii. 116, iv. 13, 27, derived, according to Furtwangler, from
Hittite art. See his elaborate article Gkyps in Roscher's Mijthol. Lex.
^ Comp, the 'cherubic' figures in Ball, pp. 28, 29, 30, 31 — 33 (winged human
figures standing or kneeling before a sacred tree, and one eagle-headed winged
human figure) ; but (N.B.) there is no Bab. or Ass. text in which any of these is
called a 'cherub.' Dr Tylor has shewn {PSBA. June, 1890, p. 383 ii'.; cf. Masp.
I. 555 f., 557) that in many cases these figures are represented as fertilizing the
date-palm with the pollen from the male palm-spathe : the date was of great
importance in Babylonia as an article of food ; and probably some religious
eignificauce attached to the act. Observe the cherubim by the side of palm-trees in
many of the passages cited p. 60 n. 2, especially Ez, xli. is, 19.
62 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
Chapter IV.
The Progress of Manhind in (lie line of Cam.
This chapter deals with three subjects : (1) Cain's mui'der of his brother
Abel, and the banishment which was its punishment, vv. 1 — 16; (2) the origin
of early arts in the line of Cain's posterity (which is traced, for seven genera-
tions from Adam, as far as Lamech's sons), vv. 17 — 24 ; (3) the first two links
in the parallel line of Seth, vv. 25, 26, this line being given more completely
(through ten generations, to Noah) in ch. v. The story of Cain {vv. \ — 16)
supplies a striking example of the manner in which the propensity to sin may
be transmitted, in even an aggravated form, from one generation to another :
the disobedience of Adam is followed, in the case of his son, by a terrible out-
burst of self-will, pride, and jealousy, leading to a total and relentless renuncia-
tion of all human ties and affection. The object of vv. 17 — 24 is to sketch in
outline the progress of civilization, and the rise of various arts. The period
was one to which no historical recollections reached back ; and the narrative
furnishes another example (cf. ii. 19 f., 24, iii. 7, 14, 16, 17 — 19, 21) of the
manner in which the Hebrews, like many other nations, sought to fill up the
blank, and explain for themselves the origin of the habits and institutions of
a later day. Thus in this section of the chapter there are explained the
beginnings of city-life, polygamy, music, and metallurgy; in v. 2, also,
the origin of pastoral life and of agriculture seems to be referred to Abel and
Cain respectively ; and in v. 26 the beginning of the public worship of God is
described. These would hardly be all the arts and institutions explained by
Hebrew folk-lore : it is probable therefore tliat the narrator (or compiler)
merely selected a few typical examples sufficient to produce a general picture
of the moral and material progress of early man, as conceived by the Hebrews.
There is no parallel at present known from Babylonian antiquity ; but some-
thing similar was told in Phoenicia (see p. 73). It seems to have been
a collateral aim of the compiler to shew how the line which made so many
advances in material civilization fell yet more under the power of sin, and
developed a spirit of vengeance and thirst for blood : the line of Seth {v. 25 £),
on the other hand, is characterized by the growth of piety.
In parts of tlie narrative, facts or institutions are presupposed (as the
custom of sacrifice, v. 3 f., of blood-revenge, vv. 14, 15, and the increase of
population, vv. 14, 15, 17), of the origin of which nothing is said. The first
two of these omissions need hardly occasion surprise : the customs referred to
might either have been supposed by the narrator to have arisen instinctively,
or have been imported by him unreflectingly into his picture of primitive times
from the associations of his own age. The third omission constitutes a graver
inconsistency, which has led ?ome to infer that the Book of Genesis did not
represent the whole human race as descended from Adam and Eve, but
recognized the existence of * pre- Adamites.' It is true, man undoubtedly
existed upon this globe long before the date which the Book of Genesis
IV. 1-3] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 63
assigns for his creation (p. xxxi) ; but the whole tenor of the narrative shews
that none of tlie wi'iters to whom we owe the early chapters of Genesis were
conscious of the fact : we may be sure, indeed, that, had they been conscious
of it, they would have mentioned it distinctly. The allusions in question must
consequently be explained differently, ]n any case they are inconsistencies of
which the author of the Book in its present form seems to be unconscious ;
though possibly they are also indications of the fact either that the narratives
containing them once formed part of a wider cycle of legend, in which the
existence of other branches of mankind was accounted for, or else (cf. p. 72)
that at least iv. 1 — 16 related originally to a later stage in the history of
mankind than that to which it is now referred.
IV. 1 And the man knew Eve his wife ; and slie conceived, j
and bare Cain, and said, I have ^gotten a man with the help of
the Lord. 2 And again she bare his brother Abel. And Abel
was a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground.
3 And in process of time it came to pass, that Cain brought of
^ Heb. kanah, to get.
IV. 1—16. Tlie Story of Cain and Abel.
1. / have gotten &c. The mother expresses her joy in words
which are so framed as to explain at the same time the name of the
child. ' Cain ' cannot indeed mean gotten (for it cannot be derived
from the verb kdndh), any more than 'Noah,' for instance, can mean
comfort, or ' Moses ' d/rawn out. What we have in these, as in many
similar cases in the OT., are not etymologies, but assonances, i.e. the
name is explained not by the word from which it is actually derived,
but by a word which it resembles in sound. RVm. indicates this by
saying, not that 'Cain' means 'gotten,' but that the Heb. for 'to
get ' is kdndh, a word which, it is obvious, resembles ' Cain.' As a
Heb. word, 'Cain' ('Kayin') might be explained (from the Arabic)
as meaning metal-worker, smith (cf. v. 22) : 'Kenite' (xv. 19) is also,
at least in appearance, a gentile name derived from it (cf p. 72).
2. Abel. Heb. Hebel, which means a breath (Is. Ivii. 13), fig.
of something evanescent, Ps. xxxix. 5 (RVm.). This was no doubt
the meaning which the name suggested to the Hebrews ; but what
its original meaning was, is quite uncertain. Possibly, it is the Ass.
ablu, ' son ' : for other speculations, see EncB. s.v. Abel introduces
pastoral life, Cain agricultural life (such as that to which Adam had
been condemned, iii. 17), both relatively primitive and simple modes of
life\ especially the former, which would naturally be the stage next
following that at which men supported themselves on the spontaneous
produce of the soil, and by fishing and hunting (p. 68).
3. 4. The two brothers bring offerings to Jehovah, each of the
produce of his own toil and care.
^ Not the earliest (above, p. xxxix ff. ; cf. Tyler, Anthrojjology, 206 S., 219 ff.).
64 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [iv. 3-5
the fruit of the ground au offering unto the Lord. 4 And Abel, J
he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat
thereof. And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his
offering: 5 but unto Cain and to his offering he had not
respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell.
of the fruit of the ground... ^ of the firstlings of his flock. Both
firstfruits and firstlings were ancient and common kinds of offering
among other nations as well as among the Hebrews (Ex. xxii. 29, 30,
in the ancient ' Book of the Covenant ') ; being offered, at least in
civilized times, as natural expressions of thankfulness for the fruitful-
ness of the soil and of animals (cf Dt. xii. 6, 7). However, no such
motive is alluded to here ; nor is it one tliat is likely to have operated
in really primitive times'.
an offering. Heb. minhdh, meaning properly a present offered to
conciliate, or retain, tJie good will of a superior (e.g. xxxii. 13, 18,
xHii. 11 ; 2 S. viii. 2) ; of a 'present' offered to Jehovah, here, 1 S.
ii. 17, xxvi. 19, and elsewhere (E,V. usually 'offering'), also used
specifically, in a narrower sense, of the 'meal-offering' (Lev. ii.)^
4. fat. Fat pieces (the Heb. word being plural), a highly-prized
portion of the animal, and so ofiered regularly upon the altar (Lev. i. 8,
iii. 3 f ; in firstlings, Nu. xviii. 17).
The custom of sacrifice is here represented as practised naturally
immediately after the introduction of pastoral and agricultural life,
and as being in each case an acknowledgment to God for His blessing,
and arising out of a spontaneous feeling of gratitude for the gifts of
the earth. On the question whether this has really been the predomi-
nant motive in determining the institution of sacrifice, see DB. s.v.
Saceifice, pp. 330 — 2, 349' (references).
5. fell. Indicating discontent : cf Job xxix. 24 Heb., Jer. iii. 12.
Why were the two offerings regarded thus differently, when each
is described in similar language, and each is manifestly intended as
an expression of reverence and thankfulness ? The ground of the
difference is not stated, and it can only therefore be inferred. But
it can hardly have lain in anything except the different spirit and
temper actuating the two brothers. Cain, it is to be noticed, as soon as
he perceives that his gift has not been accepted, becomes angry and
discontented — in itself a sufficient indication that his frame of mind
was not what it should have been. There must have been in his
purpose some secret flaw which vitiated his offering : it may have
been envy at his brother's better fortune, it may have been some
other thought or feeling inconsistent with * a sacrifice of righteousness,'
i.e. a sacrifice offered with a pure and sincere purpose (Ps. iv. 5). It
seems thus to be at least a collateral aim of the narrator to illustrate
and emphasize the prophetic teaching that it is not the gift, but the
1 Cf. Jevons, Introd. to Hist, of Rel. 223—5 ; Frazer, Golden Bough?, ii. 459.
* See more fully, on the usage of this word, DB. s.v. Offee, Offebing, § 4.
IV. 6-9] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 65
6 And the Lord said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth ? and why J
is thy countenance fallen? 7 If thou doest well, ^shalt thou not
be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin coucheth at the
door : and unto thee ^shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule
over him. 8 And Cain ^told Abel his brother. And it came to
pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against
Abel his brother, and slew him. 9 And the Lord said unto
Cain, Where is Abel thy brother ? And he said, I know not :
^ Or, shall it not be lifted up ? ^ Or, i« its desire, but thou shouldest rule
over it * Heb. said unto. Many ancient authorities have, taid unto Abel
his brother, Let us go into the field,
spirit in which the gift is offered, which determines its value in the
sight of God'. Of. Heb. xi. 4 ; 1 Jn. iii, 12 ; also Jude 11.
6, 7. A Divine warning follows, bidding Cain control his temper,
and hinting at the conseciuences if he fails to do so.
" 7. The margin must be followed. If thou doest well, i.e. hast a
right and sincere purpose, it will shew itself in thy countenance, shall
there not be lifting up? viz. of thy countenance, it will not be down-
cast and sullen, but bright and open : and if thou doest not well, hast
sinister, envious thoughts, sin is then near at hand, couching like some
wild animal at the door, and unto thee is its desire, it is eager to spring
upon and overpower thee : but thou shouldest rule over it, conquer
the rising temptation before it is too strong for thee, and subdue it.
The text is open to suspicion; but as thus understood, it teaches a
profound psychological truth, the danger viz. of harbouring a s alien
and unreasoning discontent : it is a temper which is only too likely
to lead to fatal consequences, and which, therefore, as soon as it begins
to shew itself, should at all costs be checked.
and unto thee &c. The words are identical substantially with
iii. 16'' ; but they are differently apphed.
8. But Cain, heedless of the warning, gives the rein to his sullen
thoughts ; he tempts his brother to go with him into a solitary place
(Dt. xxii. 27), and there attacks and slays him.
told. The Heb. means, not 'told,' but said unto, and the words
said ought to follow. Sam., lxx., Vulg., Pesh., and Ps.-Jon. have
the clause given on RVm., which has no doubt accidentally dropped out
of the Hebrew.
9 — 15. Cain's punishment.
9. Where &c. The question, introducing the judicial inquiry,
as in iii. 9 ; but the answer shews how sin has gained in power. Adam
and Eve only excuse themselves : but 'Cain says falsely that he does not
1 Another view, however, is that there underlies the story some early struggle
between two theories of sacrifice, which ended by the triumph of the theory that
the right offering to be made consisted in the life of an animal.
66 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [iv. 9-14
am I my brother's keeper? 10 And he said, What hast thou 7"
done ? the voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the
ground. 11 And now cursed art thou from the ground, which
hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy
hand ; 12 when thou tiilest the ground, it shall not henceforth
yield unto thee her strength ; a fugitive and a wanderer shalt
thou be in the earth. 13 And Cain said unto the Lord,
^My punishment is greater ^than I can bear. 14 Behold, thou
* Or, Mine iniquity ' Or, than can be forgiven
know where his brother is, and adds defiantly that he is not his
keeper, and consequently is under no obligation to know ' (Knob.).
10 — 12. But the Divine voice refuses to be silenced. It holds
before him his crime, and forthwith pronounces sentence upon him.
10. Hark! (Is. xiii. 4, Hi. 8) thy brother's blood crieth &c.
Blood wrongfully shed was regarded as crying to God for vengeance,
until it had been atoned for : cf. Job xvi. 18 ; Ez. xxiv. 7f.
11. from the ground. From must either denote the direction from
which the curse is to proceed, or mean pregnantly away from : v. 14*
rather supports the latter interpretation. Ground seems here (cf v. 14)
to mean the cultivated soil in contrast to the face of the earth in
general. Cain must leave the cultivated soil on which he has hitherto
prospered, and become a wanderer in wild and unknown regions.
Jier mouth. Cf for the poetical figure Nu. xvi. 32, and (of Sheol)
Is. V. 14. The 'ground,' after having swallowed the gruesome drink
which Cain has provided for it, can no longer bear him, but must cast
him off as accursed.
12. The particulars of the curse. The ground wiU no longer
respond to his toil : so he will ever have to be seeking a new resting-
place, while a guilty conscience will the more increase his restlessness.
That the ground will refuse him its strength is in excess of the curse
pronounced in iii. 17.
strength. I.e. produce (Job xxxi. 39).
a fugitive. More exactly, a totterer (cf the verb in Is. xix. 1),
the word denoting the hesitating, uncertain gait of one not knowing
where to go, or fainting for lack of food, or drunken (Am. iv. 8 ; Ps. cix.
10, cvii. 27 ['stagger']: the renderings 'be moved,' 'wander,' 'be
vagabond,' are all inadequate).
13. 14. Cain, though not penitent, is humbled and alarmed : so
he pleads for a mitigation of the punishment.
13. ^5Mw/.9/?w2e?w^. Lit. iniquity, but including here its consequences,
i.e. its punishment : cf 1 S. xxviii. 10.
than I can bear. RVm. is legitimate philologically ; but the
context {v. 14) speaks only of Cain's punishment.
14, Cain is still pictured as in 'Eden' (y. 16), though not in the
garden : Jehovah's presence is supposed to be confined to the garden
IV. I4-I6] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 67
hast driven me out this day from the face of the ground ; and J
from thy face si all I be hid ; and I shall be a fugitive and a
wanderer in the earth ; and it shall come to pass, that whosobver
findeth me shall slay me. 15 And the Lord said unto him,
Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on
him sevenfold. And the Lord appointed a sign for Cain, lest
any finding him should smite him.
16 And Cain went out from the presence of the Lord, and
dwelt in the land of ^Nod, ^on the east of Eden.
^ That is, WanAering. * Or, in front of
and its precincts ; beyond these limits he will be hidden from His /ace,
and dejirived of the protection which, according to ancient ideas,
proximity to a sanctuary conferred even upon a murderer : he will be a
wanderer over the wide earth ; above all, his guilty imagination brings
before him the vision of the blood-avenger, dogging his steps, and
causing him daily to tremble for his life'. 'Cf. the striking picture
of the supposed murderer of Laius in Soph. Oed. Tyr. 463 — 482 ; and
that of the restlessness of the evil conscience in Job xv. 20 — 24' (W. L.).
It has often been aslced. Who could there have been to slay Cain ?
According to the existing Book of Genesis, it is plain that there could
have been no one. The inconsistency is one of which, however, the
narrator (or compiler) is evidently unconscious. Comp. p. 72.
15. A concession is made to Cain's fears ; and he receives a promise
of immunity from the blood-avenger. But he is not restored to happi-
ness : banished from his relations and from the presence of God, haunted
in his wanderings by an uneasy conscience, Cain remains a lesson and a
spectacle for all time.
Therefore. Viz. because Cain's com.plaint has some force in it. Cf.
the use of the same word in xxx. 15.
sevenfold. By seven of the murderer's family being slain — by Cain's
kinsmen, according to ancient ideas — to atone for his death.
a sign. Viz. for his protection, which, to have the effect intended,
must have been something attaching to his person ; though what it
was is not stated, and it is idle to speculate.
16. from the presence of Jehovah. Regarded as confined to the
garden and its precincts : cf. v. 14 ; also 1 S. xxvi. 19 ; Jon. i. 3.
{From the presence of is more lit. from before, as Gen. xli. 46 al.)
the land of Nod. I.e. of Wandering (cf. ndd, ' wanderer,' w. 12, 14),
a land not geographically definable, but pictured as being on the East
of Eden, in the remoter, vaguer, less-known East even than Eden itself.
^ In early Greece, banishment might be the penalty even for accidental
homicide (as in the case of Patrochis, II. xxiii. 85 ff.) ; cf. the case mentioned by
Doughty, Arabia Deserta (1888;, ii. 293.
5—2
68 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [iv. .7
The narrative of Cain has a typical significance: it iurnishes a typical
example of the manner in which sin gains dominion ovf r a man ; and the
psychological analysis of the process {vv. 7, 8) is very complete. Among the
lessons or truths which the narrative teaches may be instanced : the nature
of temptation, and the manner in which it should be resisted; the conse-
quences to which an unsubdued temper may lead a man ; the gradual steps by
which in the end a deadly crime may be committed ; the need of sincerity of
purpose lest our offering should be rejected ; God's care for the guilty sinner
after he has been punished ; the interdependence upon one another of members
of the human race ; and the duties and obligations which we all owe to each
other. In its general outline the stoi7 of Cain and Abel belonged no doubt
to the cycle of popular beliefs, current in ancient Israel: the narrator has
made it the vehicle of some great moral lessons, designed primarily for the
instruction of his own nation and age, but destined ultimately, through God's
providence, to become the possession of the world at large. Notice how a few
strokes suffice to sketch the picture, and yet how complete and effective, as
a whole, it is.
17 And Cain knew his wife ; and she conceived, and bare j
Enoch : and he builded a city, and called the name of the city,
17 — 24. The growth of civilization, and the origin of what were
taken to be primitive institutions or modes of life, in the line of Cain.
No doubt, the narrator reports faithfully what was currently believed
by the Hebrews, — and perhaps by the Canaanites before them, — about
the beginnings of civilization : but the picture, it must be evident,
cannot be historical. Archaeology shews that 'cutting instruments,'
as well as other implements and utensils, were for long made only of
copper (or bronze), and that the use of iron came in only at a com-
paratively late date: so that it is extremely unlikely that the art of
smelting and forging both should have been discovered by one man.
And the ' Bronze age' was preceded by a ' Stone age,' of very consider-
able duration, during which metals (except gold, for ornaments) were
not in use at all, but for which the narrative of the present chapter
leaves no room. Men, moreover, for long before the domestication of
animals and agriculture {yv. 2, 20) were introduced, lived in a rude
state of culture, as hunters, subsisting on game and fish, and wild fruits
(Dawkins, Early Man in Britain, 172, 244, 246 ; cf above, pp. xxxix —
xli), for wliich likewise there is no room in the narrator's scheme.
It is also highly improbable that cities were built, or musical instru-
ments invented, so soon after man's first appearance upon the earth
as is here represented to have been the case.
17. Whence did Cain take his wife? and who were there to inhabit
the city which he built ? The questions are analogous to the one raised
by V. 14, and must be answered similarly.
Enoch. Heb. Hanokh, which recurs in the line of Seth (v. 18) ;
and occurs also (as that of a Midianite tribe) in xxv. 4, and (as that of
a Reubenite clan) in xlvi. 9. As a Heb. word, it would mean training,
IV. i7-3i] THE BOOK OF GSNESIS 69
after the name of his son, Enoch. 18 And unto Enoch was born J
Irad : and Irad begat Mehujael : and Mehujael begat Methnshael :
and Methushael begat Lamech. 19 And Lamech took unto him
two wives : the name of the one was Adah, and the name of the
other Zillah. 20 And Adah bare Jabal : he was the father of
such as dwell in tents and have, cattle. 21 And his brother's
or dedication. Nothing definite can however be inferred, whether from
this or from most of the following names, respecting their origin or the
ideas which they were intended to convey ; in many cases the meaning
is uncertain ; for we do not hnow what was the vocabulary of the
Semitic language from which they were derived, at the time when they
were formed, or how far, for instance, we may rightly explain them by
Arabic. There is a presumption, from general analogy, that some at
least will be of Babylonian origin : but even so we have no guarantee
that they are in their original form ; in the process of naturalization
in Israel, they may easily have been Hebraized.
18. Mehuyd'el (as a Heb. word) means apparently ' blotted out (vi. 7)
by God.' Lxx. however read ' for 1 (as the Heb. does in clause b), and
vocalize Mair^A, i.e. Mahyiel 'God maketh me alive.'
Methushael. This name is Babylonian in form = mutu-sha-ili, 'man
(i.e. hegeman, Cheyne) of God.'
19. Lamech introduces polygamy.
'Adah — also the name of a 'wife' of Esau (xxxvi. 2) — might mean
(Ass., Arab.) 'the dawn' ; and Zillah (Heb.) 'shadow,' — 'a suggestive
description of a noble chieftainess, whose presence was like a refreshing
and protecting shade. Is. xxxii. 2 ' (Cheyne, EncB. i. 626).
20 — 22. The introduction of three (seemingly) primitive modes of
life, or professions, is referred to Lamech's three sons. The series of
seven names ends by branching into three, just as in ch. v. the series
of ten names does (Shem, Ham, and Japheth). By this ' knot ' in the
genealogical tree, it is indicated (Ewald) that a new and broader
development is about to commence (cf. xi. 26).
20. Ydbdl. The meaning is obscure. DiUm.'s 'wanderer' is very
questionable. The Heb. ydhal (in the causative conj.) is a poet, word
for to hear or lead along in state (Is. xviii. 7, Iv. 12, al.)\ ydbdl is
a poet, word for stream (Is. xxx. 25, xliv. 4). The three similarly
sounding names may be an indication of the artificial character of the
genealogy : Arabic parallels are cited by Lenormant, Origines, i. 192.
The Greeks associated shepherds and musicians : similarly here Yabal
and Yubal are sons of the same mother.
father. In a fig. sense, = originator of the occupations or profes-
sions described.
such as dwell &c. I.e. of nomads, moving about, like the patriarchs,
with flocks and herds (cf xiii. 12, 18 ; Jer. xxxv. 7). The nomadic
mode of life is referred to Yabal as its originator.
70 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [iv. ai-23
name was Jubal : he was the father of all such as handle the J
harp and pipe. 22 And Zillah, she also bare Tubal-cain, H-he
forger of every cutting instrument of ^ brass and iron : and the
sister of Tubal-cain was Naamah. 23 And Lamech said unto
his wives :
* Or, an imtructor of every artificer ' Or, copper and so elsewhere.
21. harp. Heb. Mnnor, perhaps in fact the lyre, a simpler instru-
ment, very popular in antiquity. Comp. the writer's Joel and Amos,
p. 234f.
pij^e. Mentioned with the Mnnor in Job xxi. 12, xxx. 31 ; also
Ps. cl. 4t. _
22. Tubal-cain. I.e. (apparently) ' Tubal of (the individual or the
tribe?) Cain.' The form of name is peculiar. Tubal is perhaps the
eponymous ancestor of Tubal (x. 2), a people living on the NE. of
CiKcia, and famous in the days of Ezekiel (Ez. xxvii. 13) for its 'vessels
of copper' (or 'bronze'). So Lenormant, p. 210, and others.
the forger. Lit. the sharpener. The marg. on these words (=AV.)
may be disregarded.
brass. Bronze, or copper — which, indeed, as Dr Aldis Wright, in
his Bible Word-Book reminds us, was the meaning of 'brass' in Old
English. It is evident, from his referring the working of these metals
to primitive times, that the writer has no knowledge of the long ante-
cedent Stone age.
Na'dmdk. I.e. 'pleasant,' 'gracious.' No doubt mentioned here
as a figure well known to Hebrew folk-lore, of whom (as of most of
the other personages named in this genealogy) a good deal more was
recounted than the narrator has reported. The three professions
referred to are perhaps mentioned as characteristic elements of nomad
life. At any rate, the smiths form even now in Arabia a distinct
caste (Doughty, ii. 656), as they are said to do also all over Africa
(Hoernes, Primitive Man, in the 'Temple Primers,' p. 67).
Those who have visited Florence will recollect the illustrations of
these early arts on Giotto's campanile.
23. 24. The 'Song of the Sword.' Lamech, returning, we may
suppose, from some deed of blood, and brandishing his weapon in
his hand, boasts before his wives — as an Arab chiei^ it is said, wiU
do still — of what he has done ; and expresses his delight at the
means which he now possesses of avenging effectually bodily injuries.
The Song is composed in the usual parallelistic form of Heb. poetry.
23 a, b. A formal introduction, inviting the attention of his-'wives
to what he is about to say (cf Is. xxviii. 23, xxxii. 9).
c, d. Lamech boasts that he has requited a (mere) wound or bruise
(Ex. xxi. 25, where ' stripe ' = ' bruise ' here), inflicted upon him, with
death. — The first margin on line c is possible by Heb. idiom : the
second marg. (=AV.) may be disregarded.
lY. 23-26] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 71
Adah and Zillah, hear my voice ;
Ye wives of Lamech, hearken unto my speech :
For ^I have slain a man ^for wounding me,
And a young man for bruising me :
24 If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold.
Truly Lamech seventy and sevenfold.
25 And Adam knew his wife again ; and she bare a son, and
called his name ^Seth : For, said she, God *liath appointed me
another seed instead of Abel ; for Cain slew him. 26 And to
Seth, to him also there was born a son ; and he called his name
Enosh : then began men to call upon the name of the Lord.
^ Or, I will slay ' Or, to my wounding, and a young man to my hurt
» Heb. Sheth. * Heb. shath.
24. seventy and sevenfold. So terrible will be the vengeance which
his kinsmen will exact. The words give expression to Lamech's sense
of superior security, as compared with Cain (v. 15), on account of the
metal weapons provided for him by his son's invention. The readiness
to shed blood, which had been first manifested by Cain, appears in an
intensified form in Lamech.
25, 26. Two notices from the parallel line of Seth, as given by J ;
preserved here (like v. 29) on account of the particulars contained
in them. The line, as far as Noah, is given completely (from P)
in ch. v. It forms in character a contrast to that of Cain : for Seth
is represented as a substitute for the righteous Abel ; and under Enosh
the public worship of Jehovah is stated to have been introduced (see
also V. 22, 24, vi. 9).
25. hath appointed. The etjrmology is to be understood upon the
same principle as that of * Cain ' in v. 1, Observe that RVm. does not
say that Seth means 'appointed.'
seed. Used instead of son, probably because the writer has in view
the entire line, of which Seth is the ancestor.
26. 'Enosh. In Heb. a poet, word for ' man ' ; in Aramaic (in the
form 'endsh) the usual word for ' man.'
then began &c. The formal and public worship of God is repre-
sented as now beginning.
to call upon. Properly (as always) to call with, i.e. to use the
name in invocations, in the manner of ancient cults, especially at
times of sacrifice : of. xii. 8, xiii. 4, xxi. 33, xxvi. 25.
On the narrative of Cnin and Abel. In the preceding notes this narrative
has been explained in the sense which it most obviously possesses ybr us : it is
another question, which, though it may be touched upon liriafly, it lies beyond
the scope of the present commentary to discuss fully, whether in any respects
the sense originally attached to it was dififereut The allusions in vv. 3, 4 to an
72 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
established system of religious observances, and in w. 14, 15, 17, to an already
existing population on the earth, have been thought by some recent critics
to imply that ' Cain ' is a figure which belonged originally to a much later stage
in the history of mankind than that at which it is here placed ; it has also been
urged that the terms of v. 15 become far more significant if Cain (like
many other of the early figures in Genesis : see on ix. 25 ff., and ch. x.)
represented in fact a. people, in which case v. 15* would be really the boast of a
tribe, who, as the Bedawin of the desert do still, held sacred the duty of blood-
revenge and (in this case) declared that for every slain member of their tribe
they would exact seven lives of the tribe to which the murderer belonged.
The ' sign ' which Jehovah sets upon Cain's person for his protection, is con-
sidered further to have been the tribal mark or badge \ such aa would be at
once recognizable by all who saw it, and which marked out its possessor as
under the protection of the tribal God. Upon this view, the story, in its
original form, was an attempt to explain what, to those who had experienced
the enjoyments of a settled agricultural life, seemed so strange, the restlessness
of the nomadic life, and the excessive development, among some of those who
still adhered to it, of the custom (in itself, of course, a legitimate one, according
to Hebrew ideas) of blood-revenge : these two peculiarities implied that some
kind of curse rested upon the tribe, the curse in its turn implied guilt ; and
the guilt was ' Cain's' murder of his brother (i.e., if ' Cain ' represents a tribe, its
destruction of a neighbouring agricultural tribe, which resulted, however, in its
own perpetual exile from its former home) 2. Speculations of this kind must not
be ruled out of court in an attempt to throw light upon an ancient narrative,
the original sense and connexion of which may well have been lost or obscured:
nevertheless, it must be evident that in pursuing them we are moving upon
uncertain ground. The name Cain (as was remarked on iv. 1) would be
naturally that of the eponymous ancestor of the Kenites ; and in fact it occurs
(in the Heb.) as the name of this tribe in Nu. xxiv. 22 (see RV.), Jud. iv. 11
(RVm.). Hence it is tempting to think, with Stade, that the Kenites are the
tribe referred to : they were neighbours of Israel (cf. on xv. 19), and at least
some of them retained their nomadic habits till a late period of the history
(Jer. XXXV. 7 : see 1 Ch. ii. 55). The existence of some connexion between
' Cain ' (y'\>) and ' ^enite ' {''^p) must be admitted to be possible : but there
do not seem to be any grounds for supposing that the Kenites were con-
spicuous among nomad tribes in general for possessing the characteristics
attributed specially to 'Cain' in Gen. iv. 14, 15 (cf. Noldeke's criticism of
the preceding theory in his art. Amalek, § 7, in the EncB.)\
On the names in ». 17 ffi Respecting these names, nothing material can
* Cf. Cuttings in the Flesh (§§ 5, 6) in the EncB.
^ Cf . Ryle, p. 72 (the story may preserve the recollection of some old collision
between the agricultural and pastoral elements in prehistoric man).
» See further Stade's essay on Cain in the ZATW. 1894, pp. 250—318 (an
abstract in Holzinger, p. 50 f.) ; Gunkel, pp. 41, 42 — 44 ; Cain in the EncB. ; and
on the other side, Dr Worcester, Genesis in the Light of Modem Knowledge (New
York, 1901), pp. 260—70. That Cain and Abel represent two peoples is however
held also by Hommel (Sunday School Times, Dec. 31, 1898), who thinks, from Arabic
analogies, that 'Abel' means shepherd (of. Abkl in EncB.), and Sayce (Exp. Times,
X., 1899, p. 352).
CAIN AND THE CAINITES 73
be added to what has been said in the notes : they are ' the names of legendary
heroes, to whom the origins of civilization, science and art, were popularly
ascribed by the Hebrews' (Ottley, Hist, of the Hebrews, p. 13). There are
also (cf. p. 62) grounds for supposing that the particulars here preserved are
only excerpts from a wider cycle of tradition current in ancient Israel Some
interesting, if not conclusive, speculations respecting the names which are
mentioned, may be found in the art, Cainites in the EncB. (cf. also below,
p. 81) : though no direct Babylonian parallel has as yet been discovered, it
is nevertheless probable, in view of the wide influence exerted by Babylonia
upon early Israel, that they are in some way ultimately connected with
Babylonia (cf. p. 80 f.). On the whole, our judgement upon them may be
expressed in the words of Prof, (now Bishop) Ryle : * Perhaps we should not
be far wrong in regarding these personages as constituting a group of
demigods or heroes, whose names, in the earliest days of Hebrew tradition,
filled up the blank between the creation of man and the age of the Israelite
patriarchs. Such a group would be in accordance with the analogy of the
primitive legends of other races. The removal of every taint of polytheistic
superstition, the presentation of these names as the names of ordinary human
beings, would be' partly a result of their naturalization in Israel itself,
partly 'the work of the Israelite narrator' {Early Narratives of Genesis,
p. 81).
Phoenician parallels. A few words deserve, however, to be added about
the very similar account given by the Phoenicians of the origin of diflFerent
inventions, preserved by Eusebius {Praep. Ec. i. 10), in extracts from Philo
of Byblus, who in his turn quotes from the Phoenician author Sanchoniathon.
The extracts are not always perfectly consistent, and seem to be derived from
different sources; but into these questions it is not necessary here to enter; the
differences do not affect the general character of their contents. They are too
long to cite at length : but a few specimens may be given. Among the early
descendants of the first pair {UpuToyovos and Alcov) were two brothers, Sa/xi}-
fipovfios [= D1"ID ^XDK'] o Koi 'Y\l/^ovpavios, and Ovaaos, of whom 'Yyl^ovpdvios
founded Tyre, and first made huts out of reeds, rushes, and papyrus, while
Ov(X(i>os was the first to make clothing from the skins of animals, and to
venture on the sea upon the trunk of a tree. Many other inventions were
ascribed to a race of six pairs of brothers descended from 'Yi/'oupaVtor.
From ' Ay peiis and 'AXteu?^ came hunting and fishing; from the second pair,
of whom one was called Xpva-ap (? K'^n 'smith,' which is also Phoenician),
the discovery and working of iron, magic and divination, the invention of
various kinds of fishing tackle, and navigation ; from the third iJex^iTrjs
\}- cf. )1i5] and Vrivos Avt6x6<'>v), the making of bricks and roofs ; from the fourth
('Aypoy and 'Aypovrjpos), courts and enclosures to houses, agriculture and
hunting'; from the fifth {"Ahwos and Mayos), village and pastoral life^; from
the sixth {Micrdop ["li^"'P 'equity'] and 2vdvK [PIV 'righteousness']), the use of
^ Toi>s aXelas Kal Aypas eiperas, ^| wi> KXrjd^vai dypevrai Kal dXtetj.
* iK ToiiTuiv dyporai Kal Kvviiyol (cf. 'the father of in Geu. iv. 20'', 21'').
* 6t KaribtL^av Kui/xas Kai noifjivas (cf. Gen. iv. 20'').
74 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
salt*. The antliors of other inventions are also specified; but these examples
will suffice. It is difficult not to think that the Heb. and Phoen. representa-
tions spring from a common Canaanite cycle of tradition, which in its turn
may have derived at least some of its elements from Babylonia.
Indications of two cycles of tradition in J's narrative in Gen. i. — xi. It
is the evident intention of iv. 17 — 24 to describe the beginnings of the civiliza-
tion which existed in the writer's own day : was a knowledge, then, of the arts,
the invention of which is here narrated — and they are probably typical of
many other arts not expressly mentioned''' — preserved by Noah and his house-
hold in the ark? or had all these arts to be rediscovered afterwards? The one
alternative is as improbable as the other, A consideration of this and other
facts presented by the early chapters of Genesis has forced recent critics
(cf. Ryle, p. 79) to the conclusion that the narrative of J in Gen. i. — xi. is
not really homogeneous, but that it consists of two strata — or embodies two
cycles of traditions — one of which either made no mention of a Flood, or, if it
did mention it, did not view it as universal, and regarded the arts and civiliza-
tion of the writer's own time as having been handed down, without break or
interruption, from the remote period indicated in the present chapter. As we
go further, we shall meet with other indications pointing to the same conclu-
sion ^ The passages which may be referred with probability to the stratum of
narrative here referred to are ii. 4^ — iii. 24, iv. 17 — 24, vi. 1 — 4, ix. 20 — 27,
xi. 1 — 9 ; J's story of the Deluge, if this view be correct, will have been added
afterwards, from an independent cycle of tradition.
Chapter V.
The line of Seth from Adam to Noah.
In the form of a genealogy of ten generations, the development of mankind
fi'om Adam to Noah is briefly narrated ; and so the transition is made from
the Creation to the next event of principal importance, the Flood. The
difference in style and manner (except in v. 29) from cli. iv. is strongly
marked (notice, for instance, * God,' not * Jehovah' ; the expressions in vv. 1 — 3
the same as in ch. i.; and the stereotyped form in which the accounts of the
several patriarchs are cast); and shews that the compiler returns hero to the
1 Eus. Praep. Ev. (ed. Heinidien) i. 10, §§ 6—11 : the Greek text of Philo is
also to be found in MuUer's Fragm. Hist. Graec. in. 5C6 f. There is a translation in
Lenormant's Origines de I'histoire^, i. 536 ff. : cf. also Baudissin, Studien zur Sem.
Rel.-gesch. (1876), i. 14 f. It is much to be regretted that the various names have
not been preserved in their original P)ioenician.
"^ The arts of engraving, cutting metals and stones, building, writing, and many
others, are known now, by the actual products remaining to the present day, to have
been practised, and to have reached even a high degree of perfection, both in
Babylonia and in Egypt, at a date long before that assigned in Genesis to the Mood
(cf. pp. xxxii — xxxiv).
> See on vi. 4 and xi. 1 — 9.
V. 1-3] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 75
same source (P) from which he drew i. 1 — ii. 4", only v. 29 being taken by
him from J. Except in vv. 22, 24, 29, the chapter consists of a bare list
of names and numbers, the items stated regularly in each case being the
ago of the patriarch at the birth of his firstborn and at his death, and the
fact that he ' begat sons and daughters.' The aim of the writer is by means
of these particulars to give a picture of the increasing population of the earth,
as also of the duration of the first period of the history, as conceived by him,
and of the longevity which was a current element in the Hebrew conception
of primitive times.
It need hardly be said that longevity, such as is here described, is physio-
logically incompatible with the structure of the hnmau body ; and could only
have been attained under conditions altogether different from those at jjresent
existing, such as we are not warranted in assuming to have existed. The names
are not to be understood as those of real persons ; they serve merely, taken in
conjunction with the statements connected with them, to bring before the
reader a general picture of primitive times as conceived by the narrator. The
attempt has sometimes been made to save the names as those of real persons
by supposing links omitted ; but this supposition, though it may be legitimately
made elsewhere (e.g. in Mt. i.), is excluded here by the terms used, which are
not hmited to the simple words ' begat,' or ' the son of,' but include the age of
the father at the birth of his firstborn, and the number of years which he lived.
It is 'more candid and natural to admit that Israelite tradition, like the
traditions of other races, in dealing with personages living in prehistoric times,
assigned to them abnormally protracted lives ^. Hebrew literature does not, in
this respect, dififer from other literatures. It preserves the prehistoric
traditions. The study of science precludes the possibility of such figures being
literally correct. The comparative study of literature leads us to expect
exaggerated statements in any work incorporating the primitive traditions of
a people' (Ryle, p. 87).
V. 1 This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the P
day that God created man, in the likeness of God made he him ;
2 male and female created he them ; and blessed them, and called
their name ^Adam, in the day when they were created. 3 And
1 Or, Man
V. 1'. of the generations of Adam. As far, viz., as Noah, who
begins a new epoch (of. vi. 9).
1*", 2. A recapitulation of the substance of i. 27, 28, designed for
the purpose of reminding the reader that the multiplication of mankind,
and propagation in them of God's image {v. 3 ff.), was in accordance
with the Divine purpose, as there declared.
2. and Messed them (i. 27), bidding them at the same time increase
and multiply.
called their name man. Not mentioned in eh. i. On the sense of
the expression see on i. 5.
1 a. the references in Jos. Ant. i. 3. 9 ; and Hed. Op. et Dies, 129 L
76 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [v. 3-^0
Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his P
own likeness, after his image ; and called his name Seth : 4 and
the days of Adam after he begat Seth were eight hundred years :
and he begat sons and daughters. 5 And all the days that
Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years : and he died.
6 And Seth lived an hundred and five years, and begat
Enosh : 7 and Seth lived after he begat Enosh eight hundred
and seven years, and begat sons and daughters : 8 and all the
days of Seth were nine hundred and twelve years : and he died.
9 And Enosh lived ninety years, and begat Kenan : 10 and
Enosh lived after he begat Kenan eight hundred and fifteen
years, and begat sons and daughters : 1 1 and all the days of
Enosh were nine hundred and five years : and he died.
12 And Kenan lived seventy years, and begat Mahalalel :
13 and Kenan lived after he begat Mahalalel eight hundred
and forty years, and begat sons and daughters : 14 and all the
days of Kenan were nine hundred and ten years : and he died.
15 And Mahalalel lived sixty and five years, and begat
Jared: 16 and Mahalalel lived after he begat Jared eight
hundred and thirty years, and begat sons and daughters: 17 and
all the days of Mahalalel were eight hundred ninety and five
years : and he died.
18 And Jared lived an hundred sixty and two years, and
begat Enoch : 19 and Jared lived after he begat Enoch eight
hundred years, and begat sons and daughters : 20 and all the
3. Seth being in Adam's image, he is also («. 1) in God's image.
It follows that the image of God is transmitted to Adam's descendants.
On Seth and Enosh, comp, (in J) iv. 25 f.
9. Kenan. The name (Hel). P^P) is etymologically a derivative of
Cain (Heb. PP), and is supposed by some to be a mere variation of it
(cf p. 80). It occurs in the Sabaean inscriptions of S. Arabia (cf. on
X. 28) as the name of a deity {CIS. iv. No. 8).
12. MahdlaVel, as a Heb. word, me&rx^ praise (Pr. xxvii. 21) of God.
15. Jared ( Yered), as a Heb. word, would mean a descending^
18. Enoch. Heb. Hdmkh, as iv. 17.
^ But not (as has been suggested) a 'descendant' (which would be in Heb. an
unidiomatic application of the idea). The ' Book of Jubilees,' — a midrashic para-
phrase of Genesis, in which the history is arranged in periods of 50 years, dating
(Charles) from c. 120 b.o. , — explains the name (iv. 15 ; p. 33, ed. Charles, 1902),
' because in his days the angels descended on the earth' (Gen. vi. 2): see also Enoch
vi. 6, with Charles' note ; and of. PEFQS. 1903, p. 233 f.
V. .0-29] THE BOOK OF GENESIS n
days of Jared were nine hundred sixty and two years : and he P
died.
21 And Enoch lived sixty and five years, and begat Methu-
selah : 22 and Enoch walked with God after he begat Methuselah
three hundred years, and begat sons and daughters : 23 and all
the days of Enoch were three hundred sixty and five years :
24 and Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God
took him.
25 And Methuselah lived an hundred eighty and seven
years, and begat Lamech : 26 and Methuselah lived after he
begat Lamech seven hundred eighty and two years, and begat
sons and daughters : 27 and all the days of Methuselah were
nine hundred sixty and nine years : and he died.
28 And Lamech lived an hundred eighty and two years, and
begat a son : 29 and he called his name Noah, saying, This J
same shall ^comfort us for our work and for the toil of our
hands, ^because of the ground which the Lord hath cursed-
* Heb. nahem, to comfort. ' Or, which cometh from the ground
21. MethusMlah. I.e., as it seems, 'man of Sh^lah,' — the name,
or the corrupted name, of a deity (p. 81). Cf. Methusha'el, iv. 18.
22. walked with God, i.e. in companionship with Him (cf. 1 S. xxv.
15, where the Heb. for 'were conversant' is walked), implying, as its
natural condition, that his manner of life was such as God approved :
hence lxx. iv-qpia-T-qa-f. tw 6tQ (whence Heb. xi. 5). The same expres-
sion is used of Noah, vi. 9 : cf. (with a qualifying adjunct) Mic. vi. 8 ;
Mai. ii. 6 (each time ^^n).
23. On the number 365, see p. 78.
24. he was not. The expression is used of sudden, or inexplicable,
disappearance (Is. xvii. 14 ; Ps. ciii. 16; 1 K. xx. 40; ch. xhi. 13, 36).
took him, viz. on account of his piety, lxx. jxiTiOriKt, whence Heb.
xi. 5. Of. Wisd. iv. 10 — 14. In Babylonian mythology, Xisuthros, the
hero of the Flood, was for the same reason transported, without d3dng,
beyond the waters of death (p. 103). See further, on Enoch, p. 78 f.
28 — 31. Lamech. To judge from v. 29, a character very different
from the Lamech of iv. 19, 23 f. Verse 29 is another excerpt, like the
one in iv. 25, 26, from the hne of Seth, as given by J; notice the name
Jehovah, and the allusions to iii. 17 end.
29. Noah. I.e. rest : the explanation from nahem, to ' comfort,*
depends, like that of Cain from kdndh in iv. 1, on an assonance, not an
etymology.
shall comJ\>rt us from otir work and from the foil of our hands,
(which cometh) from the groti/nd &c. Noah is regarded as mitigating
78 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [v. 3c^3^
30 And Lamech lived after he begat Noah five hundred ninety P
and five years, and begat sons and daughters : 31 and all the
days of Lamech were seven hundred seventy and seven years :
and he died.
32 And Noah was five hundred years old : and Noah begat
Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
iu some way the curse of iii. 17, — viz. (as generally understood) by
becoming, iu virtue of his piety, the founder of a new epoch, in which
the earth is not again to be cursed on man's account (viii. 21). The
persons, however, in whose name (' us ') Lamech speaks, all either died
before the Flood, or perished in it : hence Budde, StaJe, Gunkel, al.,
suppose that the verse is taken from that stratum of J which (p. 74)
took no cognizance of the Flood, and consider that the allusion is to
the refreshment after toil afforded by wine (Ps. civ. 15 ; Pr. xxxi. 6 f ),
the art of making which is in ix. 20 — 27 referred to Noah as its
inventor.
On Enoch. A probable explanation of the ideas associated by the Hebrews
with Enoch has been found by Zimmeru, Enoch was the seventh from Adam;
and the seventh of the antediluvian Babylonian kings, according to Berossus
(see p. 80), was Edoranchus or Euedorachus, who can hardly be diflferent from
Ennieduranki, a legendary king of Sippar, the city sacred to the sun-god
Shamash. According to a recently published ritual tablet, the god called
Enmeduranki to intercourse with himself, gave him the * table of the gods,'
taught him the secrets of heaven and earth, and instructed him in various arts
of divination : the knowledge thus derived he passed on to his son, and he
thus became the mythical ancestor of a hereditary guild of Babylonian diviners.
Enoch may thus be reasonably regarded as a Hebraized Enmeduranki, the
converse with his god being divested of all superstitious adjuncts, and
interpreted in a purely ethical sense. His life of 365 years, — which is much
shorter than that of any of the other patriarchs in the same list, — is the sole
survival of his original character : Enmeduranki being in the service of the
sun-god, the years of Enoch's life are the same in number as the days of the
solar year^.
On account partly, it is probable, of the expression 'walked with God'
(understood in the sense of actual converse), but partly also (especially if he is
rightly identified with Enmeduranki) on the gi'ound of independent tradition
about him, handed down orally among the Hebrews, though not included in
the Book of Genesis, Enoch was supposed iu later ages to have been made the
recipient of superhuman knov^iedge, and in the course of his intercourse with
God to have received revelations as to the nature of heaven and earth, and the
future destinies of men and angels. And so in the apocryphal ' Book of Enoch ' —
which is of composite authorship, but dates mostly from the 2nd and 1st
1 Zimmern, The Bah. and Heb. Genesis, p. 43 ff. ; KAT.^ 533—5 (with a trans-
lation of the ritual tablet referred to), 540 f.
THE SETHITES
79
centuries, B.C. — Enoch is represented as recounting the visions of ju<%ement on
men and angels which he is supposed to have had, as describing how he has
been shewn by an angel the diflfereut places set apart for the righteous and
wicked after death, and has seen the Almighty seated on His throne, and
the Messiah judging the world, as unfolding (in very obscure language) the
' secrets of the heavens ' (i.e. the courses of the heavenly bodies, the principle
of the calendar, the causes of lightnings, wind, dew, &c.), and as foretelling, in
a veiled, allegorical form, the history of Israel to the 2nd century b.o. It is
in accordance with this view of Enoch that he is called in Ecclus. xliv. 16
(Heb. text) an ' example of knowledge (nyil niN) to all generations.' The Book
of Enoch (i. 9, v. 4, xxvii. 2 : of. li. 8) is quoted in Jude 14, 15 ^
On the figures in ch. v. (I) These figures are certainly all artificial ;
though upon what principle they were computed has not as yet been discovered-
It deserves to be mentioned, however, that in the Samaritan text of the
Pentateuch, and in the lxx., the figures differ in many cases from those given
in the Hebrew, the Samaritan in three cases making the father's age at the
birth of his firstborn less than it is in the Heb. text, while the lxx. in several
cases makes it as much as 100 years higher, the general result of these
differences being that the total in the Samaritan is 349 years less than in the
Heb., while in the lxx. it is 606 years more. The following table will make the
details clear, the first column in each case giving the age of each patriarch at
the birth of the next, and the second column giving his age at death : —
Heb.
Sam.
LXX.
1. Adam
130
930
130
930
280
930
2. Seth
105
912
105
912
205
912
3. Enosh
90
905
90
905
190
905
4. Cainan
70
910
70
910
170
910
5. Mahalalel
65
895
65
895
165
895
6. Jared (Yercd)
162
962
62
847
162
962
7. Enoch
65
365
65
365
165
365
8. Methushelah
187
969
67
720
1872
969
9. Lameoh
182
777
53
653
188
753
10. Noah
500
[950]
500
[950]
500
[950]
(Age at Flood)
100
100
100
Total from the Creation)
of man to the Flood j
1656
1307
2262
Thus, while in the Heb. text the date of the Flood is a.m. 1656, in the
Samaritan it is a.m. 1307, and in the lxx. a.m. 2262. Methushelah, in both
the Heb. and the Samaritan text, dies in the year of the Flood : in the lxx.
text he dies six years before it. The figures have evidently, on one side or
the other, been arbitrarily altered. The more original figures are generally
held to be preserved in the Fleb. text ; but Bertheau, Budde, Dillmann, and
1 Cf. Jub. iv. 17; and see further Enoch and Apocalyptic Literatube in DB.
and EncB., and Dr Charles' translation of the Book of Enoch (Oxford, 1893).
' Or, according to many mss., 167.
r
80
THE BOOK OF GENESIS
Holzinger adduce reasons for holding that they have been preserved in the
Samaritan. The question is not of sufficient importance to call for further
discussion here.
(2) In the first ten generations, down to the Flood, the Book of Genesis
(Heb. text) reckoui 1656 years, while the Babylonians (see below) reckoned
432,000 years. Jfow, as the French Assyriologist, Oppert, has ingeniously
shewn, 432,000 years = 86,400 'sosses,' while 1656 years=86,400 weeks (1656 =
72x23; and 23 years being 8395 days + 5 intercalary days = 8400 days = 1200
weeks) ; and heuce Oppert inferred that the two periods rested upon a common
basis, the Hebrews reducing the longer period of the Babylonians, by taking
as their unit the week instead of the ' soss ' of 5 years \
On the names in chaps, iv. and v., and their possible Babylonian origin.
(1) The genealogies of J in iv, 1 — 24, and of P in ch. v., contain many names
which, even when they ai*e not identical, resemble one another remarkably ;
and it has in consequence been often supposed that the two lists are really two
divergent versions of the same original preliistoric tradition. The resemblances
between the two lists will be seen most plainly if they are exhibited in tabular
form : —
Adam Adam
Setb
Enosh
Kain
Enoch -
'Irad '"","--"-■
Mehuya'el -'""*'
Methushael
Lamech
Jabal Jubal Tubal -Kain
1.
Adam.
2.
Seth.
3.
Enosh.
4.
Kenan.
..-5.
Mahalal'el.
6.
Yered.
--7.
Enoch.
8.
Methushelah.
9.
Lamech.
10.
Noah.
Shem Ham Yepheth
It has even been supposed that Seth and Enosh, who now form in J (iv. 25 f )
the head of the second hue of Adam's descendants, stood originally at the head
of the first line in J (between Adam and Kain) : if this conjecture is correct,
the resemblance between the two lists would be still greater than it is now.
However, as we now possess them, the two lists have a different character
impressed upon them.
(2) In P's list there are ten patriarchs before the Flood ; and according to
Berossus, the Babylonians told similarly of ten kings who reigned before the
Flood, and who reigned moreover for the portentous period of 120 ' sars,' or
432.000 years. These are their names, with the number of years that each
reigned, according to Berossus*: —
1. Alorus (10 'ears') 36.000 6.
2. Alaparus (3)^ 10,800 7.
3. Amelon, Almelon, or Amil-
larus (13) 46,800 8.
4. Ammenon (12) 43,200 9.
5. Megalaros, Amegalarus (18) 64,800 10.
Daonus or Daos (10) 36,000
EdoranchusorEvedorachus
(18) 64,800
Amempsinus (10) 36,000
Otiartes or Ardates (8) ... 28,800
Xisuthros (18) 64,800
1 Cf. Marti, EncB. i. 777. See also the Oxford HexaUxich, i. 135, or Oppert's
art. Chkonologt in the Jewish Encyclopaedia, iv. (1903), 66 f.
2 Miiller, Fragm. Hist. Grace, n. 499 f. ; Masp. i. 546, 564 f. ; KAT.^ 531 f.
3 Perhaps, with A for A, the Adapa of p. 53, n. 1 {KAT.^ 531, 538).
THE ANTEDILUYIAN PATRIARCHS 81
Extraordinary knowledge was supposed to have beeu possessed in these
antediluvian times. According to Berossus, there emerged from the Erythraean
Sea (the Persian Gulf), under (probably) Alorus, a strange being, called Oaunes
(not improbably the god Ea), who taught men all kinds of sciences and arts
(writing, city and temple building, legislation, &c.), and introduced civilizing
influences : under the fourth {al. the third), sixth, aud seventh kings, also,
other beings appeared, who explained more fully the teachings of Oaunes
(Miiller, pp. 496 f., 499 f. ; KAT.^ 535—7). And in Assyrian texts there are
allusions to the 'wise men who Uved before the Flood' {KAT} 537 f).
It is considered, now, by Hommcl and Sayce that the names of the Heb.
patriarchs are, at least in some cases, translations or equivalents of the
corresponding Babylonian names i. Thus —
3. Amelon = Babylonian amUu, 'man,' and 3. Enosh = 'man' (on iv. 26).
4. Amnienon = Babylonian ummdnu, 'artifex,' and 4. ^finau (Kain) =
' smith.'
5. Amegalarus, Hommel suggests, may be a corruption of Amilalarus,
i.e. Amii-Aruru 'man of Aruru,' and 5. Mahalal'el may have been originally
Amil-alil, Hebraized afterwards into Mahalal'el, ' praise of EL'
7. Enoch (5S.nokh) appears upon independent grounds (see p. 78) to
correspond to 7. Evedorachus.
8. Amempsinus is (Hommel) a corruption of Amilsinus, i.e. Amil-Sin,
' the man of Sin (the moon-god),' and 8. Methushelah may be (Sayce) a
variation of Mutu-sha-Irkhu, ' man of the moon-god,' or, if the more original
form of the name is Methusha'el, ' the man of God,' this may have taken the
place of 'the man of the moon god.'
10. Xisuthros (the patriarch under whom, according to Berossus, the
Deluge happened) is the Babylonian Hcuis-atra^ otherwise called Ut-
napishtiia^, who, however the diflFerence of name is to be accounted for,
unquestionably corresponds to the Heb. Noah (see p. 103 flF.) : the name of his
father, Otiartes, can be nothing but a corruption of Opartes (TI for n\ i.e.
Vbara-tutu, the father of Ut-napishtim, in the Babylonian narrative of the
Flood (p. 104).
Zimmern (KAT.^ 539 — 43) rejects the suggestions under 5, and does not
mention those of Sayce under 8, though he points out that in both lists the
eighth name is similarly formed, being a compound of ' man ' with what is to
all appearance the name of a deity. On the whole, in spite of the differences
which still remain imexplained in the case of several of the names, there are
suflBcient resemblances between tlie two lists to make it possible to hold, with
Zimmern, that they are at bottom divergent versions of the same original
tradition.
See further, on Gen. iv., v., the learned and interesting discussion by
Lenormant, Les Origines de Vhistoire'^, L 140-— 290.
1 See Hommel, PSBA. 1893, p. 243 ff. ; Sayce, Expos. Times, May, 1899, p. 353.
' So, states Zimmern {KAT.'* 545), it is now clear that this name must be read.
The ideographicahy written hrst syllable was read formerly Shamash-, Sit-, or Par-.
D.
82 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
Chapter VI. 1—4.
The sons of God and the daughters of men.
As men began to multiply, a race of giants arose, through unnatural unions
between the sons of God and the daughters of men, the unlimited development
of which had to be checked by Divine intervention. The narrative is a strange
one. It is introduced abruptly, and it ends abruptly. Certainly, it is often
supposed that the Intention of the writer was to assign a cause for the
corruption of mankind described in w. 5 — 8 : but this is not stated in the text;
jand what the narrative, understood in its natural sense, seems rather intended
[to explain is how it happened that mankind at large came to be tyrannized
lover by a race of giants. Hence Dillraann and other recent commentators are
'doubtless right in supposing that, though the compiler of Genesis may have
intended vv. 1 — 4 as an introduction to vv. 5 — 8, vv. 1 — 4 were written originally
without any reference to the Flood; and that the reappearance of the Nephilim
in Nu. xiii. 33 is an indication that they belong to the same stratum of tradition,
to which iv. 17 — 24 also belongs, and which took no cognizance of a Flood,
destroying absolutely all pre-existing civilization.
That the section belongs to J appears from its general style and phraseology.
It has no connexion with ch. v. (P), — for the expression ' began to multiply '
cannot be understood naturally of the close of a period as long and as prolific
as the one there described. Even with J, however, its connexion is imperfect ;
though a connexion with the end of J's Cainite line (iv. 17 — 24), or even of J's
Sethite line (iv. 25, 26, v. 29), — if, as the remaining fragments seem to indicate,
this in its complete form did not shew such high figures, or imply such a wide
diflfusiou of mankind, as the parallel in P (v. 1 — 28, 30 — 32) does, — is not
perhaps impossible. The narrative is in fact a * torso' (Stade, Gunkel), — the
original position and full intention of which, — for the close, describing the
further history of the giant race referred to, seems missing, not less than a
proper connexion at the beginning, — cannot now be recovered.
The expression ' sons of God ' (or ' of the gods 'y denotes elsewhere (Job i. 6,
ii. 1, xxxviii. 7 : cf, Dan. iii. 25 [RV. : comp. v. 28] ; Ps.xxix. 1, Ixxxix. 6, RVm.)
semi-divine, supra-mundane beings (cf. on iii. 5, 22), such as, when regarded, as
is more usually the case, as agents executing a Divine commission, are called
maTdkhlm or ayyeXot (i.e. ' messengers '). And this, which is also the oldest
interpretation of Gen. vi. 2 (lxx. ol ayyfXoi tov dfov ; Enoch vi. 2 ff. ; Jub. v. 1
(c£ iv. 15); Jude 6, 2 P. ii. 4 [based on Enoch x. 5, 6, 12, 13]), is the only sense
in which the expression can be legitimately understood here. Naturally, how-
ever, when understood literally, as a piece of actual history, this explanation of
the passage was felt in many quarters to occasion difficulty ; and other inter-
pretations became prevalent. (1 ) The Targums, followed by many other Jewish
authorities, understood 'elohlm, — on the basis of a sense which the word is
1 ' Sons of God ' pointing fig. to their derived, yet spiritual nature ; ' sons of
gods^ meaning (cf. 'sons of the prophets ' = members of the guild of prophets)
members of the class of divine beings, to which (cf. on iii. 5) Jehovah Himself also
belongs (so Davidson on Job i. 6 ; Schultz, OT. Theol. ii. 216 [' sous of God ' here
is a mistranslation for ' sons of gods '] ; cf. Cheyne on Ps. xxix. 1).
VI. i-s] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 83
apparently capable of bearing in Ex, xxi. 6, xxii. 8, 9, 1 S. ii. 25, Ps. Ixxxii. l*",
\iz. judges, — as signifying, generally, nobles or po/entates — so that 'sons of the
'elohlm ' would denote youths of the upper classes, while ' daughters of men '
were taken to mean maidens of lower rank ; (2) many Christian expositors, in
both ancient and modern times, have understood by *sons of God' godly men of
the line of Seth, and by ' daughters of men,' worldly women of the line of Cain.
But for neither of these views is there any support in the text: not only do
they rest upon arbitrary interpretations of the words used, but it is incredible
that * men ' in ^J. 2 can be intended in a narrower sense than in ??. 1 ; nor is it
apparent why the intermarriage of two races, each descended from a common
ancestor, should have resulted in a race characterized either by gigantic stature
or (supposing vv. 5 — 8 to be rightly connected with vv. 1 — 4) by abnormal
wickedness. Understood in accordance with the only legitimate canons of
interpretation, the passage can mean only that semi-divine or angelic beings
contracted unions with the daughters of men ; and we must see in it an ancient
Hebrew legend, — or (to use Delitzsch's expression) a piece of 'unassiniilated
mythology,' — the intention of which was to account for the origin of a supposed
race of prehistoric giants, of whom, no doubt (for they were 'men of name'),
Hebrew folk-lore told much more than the compiler of Genesis has deemed
worthy of preservation (cf. Ryle, op. cit. pp. 94, 95). As a rule, the Hebrew
narrators stripped off the mythological colouring of the pieces of folk-lore which
they record ; but in the present instance, it is still discernible. Many races, it
may be recalled, imagined giants as living in the prehistoric past : the Greeks
had their Titans ; the Phoenicians knew of a generation of men ' surpassing in
size and stature' (Bus. Praep. Ev. i. 10. 6) ; the Arabs told of the ' Adites ' and
'Thamudites,' to whom they attributed both the erection of great buildings, and
also deeds of savagery and bloodshed ; and the Israelitish traditions of the con-
quest of Palestine spoke of the men of giant stature, who were dwelling at the
time in different parts of the country (Dt. ii. 10, 11, 21, iii. 11; Jos. xv. 14, al.).
VI. 1 And it came to pass, when men began to nmltiply j
on the face of the ground, and daughters were born unto them,
2 that the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were
fair ; and they took them wives of all that they chose. 3 And
the Lord said, My spirit shall not ^strive with man for ever,
^for that he also is flesh : ^yet shall his days be an hundred and
^ Or, rule in Or, according to many ancient versions, abide in
' Or, in their going astray they are flesh * Or, there/ore
VI. 2. of all that &c. Who-msoever they chose. The expression
seems to imply that they dealt with them exactly as they pleased.
3. A very difficult and uncertain verse. Only three interpretations
need, however, be considered here. (1) RV. The meaning of this is :
' My spirit (regarded as an ethical principle) shall not strive with man
for ever, inasmuch as he also is flesh (i.e. carnal, sensual) ; yet his days
(i.e. his still remaining days, the days of respite before the judgement
comes) shall be 120 years.' The objections to this view are— the rend.
6—2
84 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [vi. 3, 4
twenty years. 4 The ^Nephilim were in the earth in those days, J
and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the
daughters of men, and they bare children to them : the same
were the mighty men which were of old, the men of renown.
1 Or, giants See Num. xiii. 33.
inasmttch as (or for that) implies a late Heb. idiom (Eccl. ii. 16), very
improbable here ; ' flesh in the OT. denotes what is frail, but not
what is sensual ; the sense given to ' his days ' is not a natural one.
(2) PtVm. (implying a slight change of the text) : ' My spirit (regarded
as a vital principle : cf on i. 2) shall not for ever abide [or, be
established] in man ; by reason of their going astray, he is flesh (i.e.
weak, frail: cf Is. xxxi. 3; Ps. Ixxviii. 39); and (i.e. and so, in E,Vm.
paraphrased by therefore) his dnys (i.e. the days of his life — the natural
sense of the expression) shall be 120 years': the operation of God's
life-giving spirit in man is crippled by sin ; and in future the normal
limit of his life shall not exceed 120 years. This interpretation,
whether right absolutely or not, is certainly open to fewer objections
than (1). (3) Ewald, Wellh., Holz., Gunkel : ' My spirit (the divine
spirit common to Jehovah with the ' sons of God ') shall not for ever
abide in man, because he is also flesh (and on this ground alone, there-
fore, not intended to live for ever), and his days (i.e. his life) shall be
120 years' ; the passage, agreeably with its mythological context, being
supposed to express the idea that the union of the (semi-)divine
'spirit' with man {v. 3) would result, contrary to Jehovah's intention,
in man's immortality ; a limit is accordingly imposed by Him upon the
duration of human life. It is wisest to acknowledge the simple truth,
which is that both textually and exegetically the verse is very
uncertain, and that it is impossible to feel any confidence as to its
meaning.
4. The NephiUm. Mentioned also in Nu. xiii. 33 as a giant race
inhabiting part of Canaan at the time of the Exodus, in whose eyes the
spies were ' as grasshoppers.' The etymology, and true meaning, of the
word are unknown ; there have been many conjectures respecting it
(see Di.), but none possessing any real probability. The Nephilim, it
is said, were in the earth both at the time here spoken of and also
afterwards, i.e., no doubt, at the time referred to in Nu. xiii. 33 — if,
indeed, the words — which interrupt the connexion (for the following
when clearly refers to in those days) — were not originally (Budde,
Wellh., Holz., Gunkel) a marginal gloss added by one who recollected
that the Nephilim were mentioned also in this passage of Numbers.
they were &c. This clause characterizes the Nephilim : they were
the ancient men of prowess, renowned in Hebrew folk-lore. Doubtless,
deeds of insolence and daring were told of tliem ; we cannot, unhappily,
particularize more precisely. For later allusions to, or developments of^
what is narrated in vv. 1 — 4, see Wisd. xiv. 6 ; Ecclus. xvi. 7 ; Baruch
iii. 26 — 28 ; 3 Mace. ii. 4 ; Enoch vi.— xvi. ; 2 Pet. ii. 4 ; Jude 6, 7.
THE BOOK OF GENESIS 85
VI. 5— IX. 17.
The history of the Flood.
The narrative here becomes more circumstantial than it has been in
chaps, iv. aud v. ; for the Flood is the first event of crucial importance since
the Creation and tlie beginnings of man upon earth (chaps, i. — iii.), of which
Hebrew tradition told. The Flood marks the end of a past age, and the
beginning of a new one : it is thus an event in which the purposes of God may
be expected to declare themselves with peculiar distinctness ; and it is
accordingly treated as the occasion of a great manifestation both of judgement
(ch. vi.) and of mercy (viii. 15 — ix. 17). The Flood is a judgement upon a
degenerate race : Noah, with his family, is delivered from it on account of his
I'ighteousness ; as humanity starts upon its course afresh, new promises and
new blessings are conferred upon it.
The narrative is one of which the composite structure, as has been often
pointed out^, is particularly evident ; for the compiler, instead of (as in Gen. i.,
for instance) excerpting the entire account from a single source, has interwoven
it out of excerpts taken alternately from J and P, preserving in the process
many duplicates, as well as leaving unaltered many striking differences of
representation and phraseology. The parts belonging to P are vi. 9 — 22,
vii. 6, 11, 13 — 16" (to commanded him), 17* (to upon th^ earth), 18 — 21, 24,
viii. 1, 2* (to stopped), 3^ (from and after)— 5, 13» (to off the earth), 14—19,
ix. 1 — 17 : if these verses are read consecutively, they will be seen to contain
an almost complete narrative of the Flood, followed by the account of a blessing
and covenant concluded with Noah. The verses which remain (except a few
clauses here and there,^ especially in vii. 7 — 9, which are due, probably, to the
compiler) form part of the parallel narrative derived fi'om J, but not preserved
80 completely as that of P, which the compiler has interwoven with it. In
some places the duplicate character of the narrative is plain : thus vi. 9 — 13
is, in substance, identical with vi. 5 — 8 ; and though the directions for the
construction of the ark are naturally given only once, the sequel (vi. 17, 19, 20,
22, P) is similarly repeated in vii. 1 — 5 (other instances are pointed out in the
notes). The most characteristic difference between the two accounts is that
while in P one pair of all animals alike is taken into the ark (vi. 19, 20, vii. 14,
16), in J a distinction is drawn, and one jmir of unclean animals but seven pairs
of clean animals are taken in. Another difference relates to the duration of
the Flood. In P the waters 'prevail' for 150 days; then they gradually
decrease; the entire period of their remaining upon the earth being (vii. 11,
conip. with viii. 14) one year and 11 days' in J they increase for 40 days and
40 nights; then after three times seven days (viii. 8*, 10, 12) they disappear,
^ See, for instauce, as long ago as 1863, the art. Pentateuch by J. J. S. Perowne
(the late Bishop of Worcester), in Smith's DB. i. 770.
» As vi. 7 ('both. ..air'), vii. 7" (after 'in'), &> (after 'fowls'), 23 ('both. ..earth').
3 I.e., as the Hebrews reckoned probably by lunar years, 354 + 11 = 365 day.s, or
one solar year. The lxx., by the reading 27 for 17 in vii. 11, viii. 4, intend no
doubt to express one solar year more directly.
* Seven days being implied here by the 'yet other' of viii. 10: see on v.ui. 10.
86 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [vi. 5-9
the entire duration of the Flood in J being thus 61 days. It is a minor
difference that J attributes the Flood to rain only (vii. 7, 12, viii. 2'>), whereas
P speaks also of the subterranean waters bursting forth (vii. 11, viii. 2").
Among the literary characteristics of the parts belonging to P may be noticed
the careful specification of all details (such as the measurements of the ark, the
animals, and members of Noah's family, to be taken into it, vi. 18, 20, vii. 13,
14, and brought out again, viii. 16, 17, 18, 19), the dates (vii. 6, 11, viii. 4, 5, 13,
14), and the recurring expressions, God (not, as in the other narrative,
Jehovah), all flesh (13 times), destroy (vi. 13, 17, ix. 11, 15 : in J wipe or blot
oat, vi. 7, vii. 4, 23), expire (vi. 17, vii. 21), kind (as in i. 11, 12, 21, 24, 25), vi. 20,
vii. 14, swarm (as in 1. 20, 21), vii. 21, viii. 17, ix. 7. In J, also, comp. shut in
(vii. 16), and smelled (viii. 21), with the expressions noted on p. 36 as character-
istic of ii. 4'' flF. For some further questions connected with the present narrative,
see p. 99 ff.
5 And the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great j
in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his
lieart was only evil continually. 6 And it repented the Lord
that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his
heart. 7 And the Lord said, I will Mestroy man whom I have
created from the face of the ground ; both man, and beast, and
creeping thing, and fowl of the air ; for it repenteth me that I
have made them. 8 But Noah found grace in the eyes of the
Lord.
9 These are the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous P
^ Heb. blot out.
5 — 8. J's introduction to his narrative of the Flood. Mankind
was utterly corrupt : Jehovah saw His purposes with regard to it
frustrated, and determined accordingly to blot it out from the face of
the earth.
5. every imagination &c. The corruption had seized their whole
mind and purpose : it was complete (* only evil,' i.e. nothing, but evil),
and continuous.
6. it repented Jehovah &c. Because, viz., His gracious purposes
for the progress and happiness of humanity seemed ruined by human sin.
and lie was pained to his heart. A strong and expressive
anthropomorphism. Cf. the same verb (in the transitive conjug.) in
Is. Ixiii. 10.
7. destroy. Blot out, as also vii. 4, 23. The word, as remarked
above, is characteristic of the narrative of J.
9 — 12. P's introduction to his narrative of the Flood. The passage
is parallel to vv. 5 — 8 in J.
9. These are &c. The formula regularly used by P at the
commencement of a new section of his narrative : see p. ii.
a righteous man &c. Cf. «. 8 in J. See also Ezek. xiv. 14, 20.
VL9-I5] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 87
man, and ^perfect in his generations : Noah walked with God. P
10 And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
11 And the earth was corrupt before God, and the earth was
filled with violence. 12 And God saw the earth, and, behold, it
was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
13 And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come
before me ; for the earth is filled with violence through them ;
and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth. 14 Make thee
an ark of gopher wood ; ^rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and
shalt pitch it within and without with pitch. 15 And this is
^ Or, blameless ^ Heb, nests.
perfect. I.e. without moral flaw, blameless, guileless : cf., of Job,
Job i. 1 ; also ch. xvii. 1, Ps. xviii. 23, 25, cxix. 1 (RV.), a/., and
perfectness (EVV. usually integrity), Ps. vii. 8, xxvi. 1, 11, al.
in his generations. I.e. among his contemporaries. A different
word in the Heb. from the one rendered generations jnst before (which
is lit. begettings).
walked with God See on v. 22.
10. Repeated, in P's manner, at the beginning of a new section,
from V. 32" ; cf. xi. 27 (see v. 26), xxv. 12" (xvi. 15), 19" (xxi. 3).
12. all flesh. An expression occurring 13 times in the narrative
of the Flood (all P), and denoting sometimes (as here and v. 13) men
alone, sometimes animals alone (vi. 19, vii. 15, 16, viii. 17), sometimes
both (as vi. 17, vii. 21, ix. 11 : so Lev. xvii. 14 ; Nu. xviii. 15, at.).
13 — 17 (P). Noah commanded to construct an ark.
13. Cf. m 6, 7, in J.
is come in before me. I.e. before my mind ; it is resolved upon by me.
14. an ark. Heb. tebdh, a word of Egyptian origin ; used only
(here and in the sequel) of the 'ark' of Noah, and of the 'ark' in
which Moses was laid, Ex. ii. 3, 5.
gopher. Only found here. Probably some kind of resinous tree,
either pine or cypress.
rooms &c. More exactly : (aU) cells (lit. nests) shalt thou make
the ark : it was to consist internally of rows of cells, to contain the
different animals.
pitch. Bitumen ; Heb. kopher (found only here). Ass. kupru,
used repeatedly by Nebuchadnezzar in his descriptions of buildings,
and also occurring in the Babylonian account of the Flood (1. 66 ; see
p. 104). Elsewhere in the OT. 'bitumen' is expressed by hemdr
(xi. 3, xiv. 10 ; Ex. ii. 3) ; it is possible therefore that kopher came
into Heb., with the story, from Babylonia. ' In the second volume of
the History of the Euphrates Expedition, p. 637, Col. Chesney gives a
very interesting account of the simple and rapid manner in which the
people about Tekrit and in the marshes of Lemlum construct large
barges and make them water-tight with bitumen' (Huxley, Collected
Essays, iv. 262). See also EncB. s.v. Bitumen; and c£ on xi. 3.
88 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [vi. 15-w
how thou shalt make it : the length of the ark three hundred P
cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the lieight of it thirty
cubits. 16 A ^ light shalt thou make to the ark, and to a cubit
shalt thou finish it ^upward ; and the door of the ark shalt thou
set in the side thereof; with lower, second, and third stories
shalt thou make it. 17 And I, behold, I do bring the flood of
waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath
of life, from under heaven ; every thing that is in the earth
shall die. 18 But I wiU establish my covenant with thee ; and
thou shalt come into the ark, thou, and thy sons, and thy wife,
and thy sons' wives with thee. 19 And of every living thing of
all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark, to keep
them alive with thee ; they shall be male and female. 20 Of
the fowl after their kind, and of the cattle after their kind, of
^ Or, roof ^ Or, from above
15. The cubit measured probably about 18 inches : so that the
ark, as here described, would be about 450 ft. long, 75 ft. broad, and
45 ft. high.
16. a light. To be pictured, apparently, as a kind of casement
running round the sides of the ark (except where interrupted by the
beams supporting the roof), a little below the roof. The word occurs
only here (though in the dual it is the usual Heb. for noon-day). The
marg. roof is doubtful : it is based upon the meaning of the corre-
sponding word in Arabic, hack.
and to a cubit shalt thou finish it above (or from above). The
words are obscure ; but are generally understood to mean either that
the casement above (i.e. close under the rool) was to be a cubit in
height, or that there was to be the space of a cubit /row above (i.e. from
the roof) to the top of the casement.
17. the fiood. Heb. mabbul, used only of the Deluge of Noah,
Gen. vi. — ix. (12 times), x. 1, 32, xi. 10, and Ps. xxix. 10. The word
(though not itself found in Ass.) may be derived from the Ass. nabdlu,
to destroy : it has no apparent Heb. etymology.
breath. Better, spirit (Heb. ruah) ; not as ii. 7. So vii. 15 ; cf.
Is. xlii. 5 ; Zech. xii. 1.
die. Expire : so vii. 21. An unusual word, and (except in P
[12 times]) entirely poetical [12 times, 8 being in Job]. Of. on xxv. 8.
18 — 22. The command to enter the ark, according to P. With
Noah and his descendants it is God's purpose to establish a new
relationship (designated here by the term covetiant) ; and in trustful
reliance upon the promise thus given, Noah is to enter the ark, taking
with him one pair of every land animal. For the fultilment of the
promise, see ix. 8- — 17.
20. kind (twice). Kinds : see on i. 12. Cattle (not as iv. 20),
and creeping thing, as i. 24 (where see the note), 25, 26.
VI. 20-VII. 4] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 89
every creeping thing of the ground after its kind, two of every p
sort shall come unto thee, to keep them alive. 21 And take
thou unto thee of all food that is eaten, and gatlier it to thee ;
and it shall be for food for thee, and for them. 22 Thus did
Noah ; according to all that God commanded him, so did he.
VII. 1 And the Lord said unto Noah, Come thou and all J
thy house into the ark ; for thee have I seen righteous before
me in this generation. 2 Of every clean beast thou shalt take
to thee seven and seven, the male and his female ; and of the
beasts that are not clean two, the male and his female ; 3 of
the fowl also of the air, seven and seven [, male and female] : to R
keep seed alive upon tlie face of all the earth. 4 For yet seven
days, and I will cause it to rain upon the earth forty days and
forty nights ; and every living thing that I have made will I
22. And Noah did (so) ; according &c. The form of sentence is
characteristic of P; of. Ex. vii. 6, xii. 28, 50 (Heb.), xl. 16 (Heb.);
Nu. i. 54 (Heb.), al (see p. ix, No. 12).
VII. 1 — 5. The command to enter the ark, according to J.
Noah is to enter the ark, taking with him seven pairs of every clean
animal, and one pair of every unclean animal. In the parallel in P
(vi. 19 f.), one pair of every kind is to be taken, and nothing is said of
the distinction between clean and unclean animals.
1. righteous &c. Cf. in P vi. 9.
2. the male and his female (twice). Each and his mate : the Heb.
(though no English reader would suspect the fact) is entirely different
from that rendered 'male and female' in vi. 19, vii. 3, 9, 16. On the
distinction of ' clean ' and ' unclean ' animals see Lev. xi. (P ; |i Dt. xiv.) :
more of the former than of the latter are to be brought in, perhaps
because, in the view of the writer, only 'clean' animals would be
available for Noah and his family for food, and (viii. 20) for sacrifice,
perhaps, also (Knob.), in order that the creatures most useful to man
might increase more rapidly after the Flood.
It is to be noticed that J assumes for the patriarchal age the
Levitical distinction of 'clean' and 'unclean' animals, as he also
speaks of sacrifices offered, and altars built, during the same period
(iv. 3, 4, viii. 20, xii. 9, &c.). P, on the contrary, never attributes
Levitical institutions and distinctions to the pre-Mosaic age ; he regards
all such as creations of the Sinaitic legislation.
3. seven and seven. Viz., as the context and viii. 20 shew, of
'clean' species : the raven (viii. 7) shews that J thought of 'unclean'
species also (see Lev. xi. 15) as included. Perhaps, indeed, we should
read with lxx., ' of fowl also of the air that are clean, seven and seven,
male and female, and offovA that are not clexin, two and two,' &c.
4. eve?'y subsisting thing. The word, whicli is peculiar, is found
90 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [vii. 4-"
^destroy from oflf the face of the ground. 5 And Noah did J
according unto all that the Lord commanded him.
6 And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of P
waters was upon the earth. | 7 And Noah went in, and his J
sons, and his wife, and his sons' wives with him, into the ark,
because of the waters of the flood. 8 Of clean beasts, and of
beasts that are not clean, and of fowls, and of every thing that
creepeth upon the ground, 9 there went in [two and two] unto R
Noah into the ark, [male and female,] as God commanded Noah, r
10 And it came to pass after the seven days, that the waters
of the flood were upon the earth. | 11 In the six hundredth P
year of Noah's life, in the second month, on the seventeenth
day of the month, on the same day were all the fountains of
the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were
1 Heb. hlot out.
only here, v. 23, and Dt. xi. 6. It is entirely dififerent from the
ordinary one rendered 'living thing' in vi. 19, viii. 1, 17, 21.
destroy. Blot out, as vi. 7.
6. Noah's age, at the time of the Flood, according to P.
7 — 9. Entry into the ark according to J (cf. w. 2, 3). The text,
though clearly in the main that of J, seems to have been glossed in
parts by the compiler so as to harmonize with the representation of P
(especially in 'two and two' : see vi. 19, 20).
9. God. Sam., Targ., Vulg. Jehovah; no doubt, rightly,
VII. 10 — VIII. 14. The course of the Flood : its beginning, con-
tinuance, and end.
10. The beginning of the Flood according to J, viz. seven days
after Noah entered the ark.
the seven days. Those mentioned in v. 4.
11. The beginning of the Flood according to P.
the second month. I.e., probably (Gunkel, pp. 133, 134; Konig,
ZDMG. 1906, p. 628), the second mouth of the year according to
which P always reckons, and which began with Abib (Ex. xii. 2,
compared with xiii. 4), = our April. In the Babylonian story, the
flood, according to Berossus, began on the 15th of Daisios (=June).
the great deep. As Am. vii. 4, Ps. xxxvi. 6, Is. h. 10, the
subterranean waters, the ' deep that coucheth beneath ' of xlix. 25, the
source, as the Hebrews supposed, of springs and seas (see on i. 9) : the
'fountains,' leading from these to land and sea, which at ordinary times
flowed only moderately, were cleft asunder (implying some terrestrial
convulsion), so that the waters from underneath burst forth and inun-
dated the earth. Not only this, however, but the windoivs of heaven
(cf. Is. xxiv. 18) were also operied, so that the waters stored up 'above
the firmament ' (see on i. 6) poured down upon the earth as weU.
VII. ii-.o] THE BOOK OF GET^SIS 91
opened. | 12 And the rain was upon the earth forty days and j
forty nights. | 13 In the selfsame day entered Noah, and Shem, p
and Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's wife, and
the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark ; 14 they,
and every beast after its kind, and all the cattle after their
kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth
after its kind, and every fowl after its kind, every bird of every
^sort. 15 And they went in unto Noah into the ark, two and
two of all flesh, wherein is the breath of life. 16 And they —
that went in, went in male and female of all fiesh, as God
commanded him : | and the Lord shut him in. | 17 And J P
the flood was forty days upon the earth ; | and the watei's J
increased, and bare up the ark, and it was lift up above the
earth. ] 18 And the waters prevailed, and increased greatly P
upon the earth ; and the ark went upon the face of the
waters. 19 And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the
earth ; and all the high mountains that were under the whole
heaven were covered. 20 Fifteen cubits upward did the waters
^ Heb. wing.
12, The duration of the Flood according to J.
And there was heavy rain. The word used (nti'j) signifies a hurst
of rain, heavy rain; and is sometimes used (as Cant. ii. 11) of the
heavy rains of the Palestinian winter. Cf. G. A. Smith, HG. 64 ; and
the writer's Joel and Amos, on Am. iv. 7.
13— 16». The entry into the ark according to P (cf. vi. 19, 20).
In J this has been narrated already in vv. 7 — 9.
13. In the selfsame day. Connecting closely with v 11. The
expression in the Heb. is one of those characteristic of P (p. ix, No. 13).
11 kind (4 times). Kinds, as vi. 20.
of every sort. Heb. wing : cf. Ez. xvii. 23 (EVV. wing), xxxix. 4
(EVV. sort, as here) ; also (in the Heb.) Dt. iv. 17 ; Ps. cxlviii. 10.
15. two and two of all flesh. Cf. vi. 19, 20 (P).
breath. Spirit, as vi. 17.
16^ (.J), and Jehovah shut him in. The words must have stood
originally between v. 9 and w. 10, 12 ; for they evidently form the close
of J's account of the entry into the ark.
l?''^ (P). The link connecting (in P) v. 16" with u 18. ' Forty
days' is probably an addition of the compiler, based upon -y. 12 (J).
17^. and the waters increased &c. The progress of the Flood
according to J. The words form the sequel to vv. 10, 12.
18 — 20. The progress of the Flood, told more circumstantially,
according to P.
20. upward. I.e. above 'the high mountains' (i?. 19). The ark
92 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [vii. w-viii. 3
prevail ; and the mountains were covered. 21 And all flesh died P
that moved upon the earth, both fowl, and cattle, and beast,
and every ^creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and
every man : | 22 all in whose nostrils was the breath of the J
spirit of life, of all that was in the dry land, died. 23 ^And
every living thing was ^destroyed which was upon the face of
the ground, both man, and cattle, and creeping thing, and fowl
of the heaven ; and they were ^destroyed fi*om the earth : and
Noah only was left, and they that were with him in the ark. |
24 And the waters prevailed upon the earth an hundred and P
fifty days.
VIII. 1 And God remembered Noah, and every living
thing, and all the cattle that were with him in the ark : and
God made a wind to pass over the earth, and the waters assuaged ;
2 the fomitains also of the deep and tlie windows of heaven
were stopped, | and the rain from heaven was restrained ; 3 and J
the waters returned from off the earth continually : | and after p
^ Or, swarming thing that swarmeth ^ Or, And he destroyed every living
thing » Heb. blotted out.
was apparently regarded as immersed up to half its height (vi. 15) ;
accordingly, when the waters begin to decrease, it can just touch the
summit of an exceptionally high range of mountains, viii. 3^ 4 (the
tops of ordinary mountains emerge only 73 days afterwards, v. 5).
21. Death of all things, according to P.
died. Expired, as vi. 17.
every swarming thing that swarmeth &c. See on i. 20.
22, 23. Death of all things, according to J.
22. in w/iose nostrils was the breath of [the spirit 0/] life. Cf.
ii. 7 (also J). The expression, as it stands, is unexampled, being a
combination of the phrase of J (ii. 7) with that of P (vi. 17, vii. 15).
The bracketed words — in the Heb. one word — are probably a marginal
gloss.
of all that. Whatsoever; cf. vi. 2.
23. And he blotted out (so in correct editions of the Mass. text:
cf. RVm.) every subsisting thing &c. See on vi. 7 and vii. 4.
24. The length of the period during which, according to P, the
waters 'prevailed' {vv. 18 — 20).
VIII. 1, 2* (to stopped), o^. The decrease of the waters, according
to P. With the expressions in v. 2% cf. vii. 11.
1, And God remembered. As xix. 29, xxx. 22 ; Ex. ii. 24 (aU P).
2^ 3*. The decrease of the waters, according to J.
rain. Heavy rain, as vii. 12.
VIII. 3-io] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 93
the end of an hundred and fifty days the waters decreased. P
4 And the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth
day of the month, upon the mountains of Ararat. 5 And the
waters decreased continually until the tenth month : in the
tenth mouth, on the first day of the month, were the tops of the
mountains seen. | 6 And it came to pass at the end of forty days, J
that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made :
7 and he sent forth a raven, and it went forth to and fro, until
the waters were dried up from ofi^ the earth. 8 And he sent
forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated from off
the face of the ground ; 9 but the dove found no rest for the
sole of her foot, and she returned unto him to the ark, for the
waters were on the face of the whole earth : and he put forth
his hand, and took her, and brought her in unto him into the
ark. 10 And he stayed yet other seven days ; and again he
4, 5 (P). The ark lands ; and 73 days afterwards the tops of the
mountains appear.
4. Ararat. A land named also in Is. xxxvii. 38, Jer. li. 27,
the Urartu, so often mentioned by the Assyrian kings from the
9th cent. B.C. onwards, the rugged, mountainous, and wooded region,
forming part of modern Armenia, N. of Lake Van, and embracing the
valley of the Araxes^. The modern Mount Ararat is a particular lofty
peak {c. 17,000ft.) among the 'mountains of Ararat,' for 4000 ft. from
its summit covered with perpetual snow. The mountain which P had
in view, wliether it was the peak now called ' Mount Ararat ' or not,
must in any case have been a lofty one; for, though the waters
decreased continually, it was not until 73 days after the ark rested
upon it, that the tops of ordinary mountains became visible.
6 — 12 (J). Noah sends forth first a raven, and afterwards a dove,
to ascertain whether the waters have abated,
6. And it came to pass at the end of forty days. In the original
context of J, the ' forty days ' referred, no doubt, as in vii. 4, to the
entire period of the Flood, and the clause stood perhaps before
V. 2^ 'and {or that) the heavy rain from heaven was restrained': the
compiler, in combining P and J, has transposed it, and made it refer
to 40 days after the date named in v. 5.
10. yet other seven days. Implying, almost necessarily, that 'seven
days' had been mentioned previously: hence it is probable, as most
1 Not a mountain : there is no ' Mount Ararat ' in the Old Testament.
* See the map and description in Maspero, iii. 52—60 ; and cf. EncB. s.v. The
valley of the Araxes (now the Aran) which runs from W. to SE., a little N.
of Mount Ararat, is nearly 3000 ft. above the sea; the mountains around are
5000 ft. or more ; Lake Van is about 5500 ft. See the fine orographical map ci
Asia in Philips' Imjperial Atlas; and cf. Freshfield, Central Caucasus, p. 155 ff.
94 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [viii. ,o-«,
sent forth the dove out of the ark ; 11 and the dove came in to J
him at eventide ; and, lo, in her mouth ^an olive leaf pluckt off:
so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth.
12 And he stayed yet other seven days ; and sent forth the
dove ; and she returned not again unto him any more, j 13 And P
it came to pass in the six hundred and first year, in the first
month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up
irom off the earth : | and Noah removed the covering of the ark, J
and looked, and, beliold, the face of the ground was dried. I
14 And in the second month, on the seven and twentieth day of P
the month, was the earth dry.
15 And God spake imto Noah, saying, 16 Go forth of the
ark, thou, and thy wife, and thy sons, and thy sons' wives with
thee. 17 Bring forth with thee every living thing that is with
thee of all flesh, both fowl, and cattle, and every creeping thing
that creepeth upon the earth ; that they may breed abundantly
in the earth, and be fruitful, and multiply upon the earth.
18 And Noah went forth, and his sons, and his wife, and his
sons' wives with him : 19 every beast, every creeping thing,
and every fowl, whatsoever moveth upon the earth, after their
families, went forth out of the ark. | 20 And Noah builded an j
altar unto the Lokd; and took of every clean beast, and of
* Or, afresh olive leaf
modern scholars have supposed, that *And he stayed seven days^ (and
sent forth, &c.) have dropped out at the beginning of v. 8.
11. pluckt off. I.e. /reshly-pluckt, OT fresh (RYm.).
13* (P). Continuation of v. 5. The waters are dried up.
13'' (J), 14 (P). The earth itself becomes dry, — according to P,
one year and II days after the Flood began (vii. 11).
15 — 19 (P). Noah is instructed to leave the ark; and does so
accordingly. Both the command and its execution are described
circumstantially, in P's manner (cf. vi. 18 — 20, vii. 13—16).
17. breed abundantly. Swarm (i. 20) : cf., of men, ix. 7.
and be fruitful &c. Cf. i. 22. The words are a renewal of the
command, or permission, there given.
19. after their families. A mark of P's hand (p. ix, No. 14).
20 — 22 (J). Noah, in thankfulness for his deliverance, offers up a
burnt-offering; and Jehovah thereupon expresses His determination
not again to smite all living things, or disturb the course of nature, as
He has done. Cf. Is. liv. 9.
builded an, altar &c. Cf. on vii. 2 (second part of note).
VIII. 20-IX. .] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 95
eveiy clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the altar. J
21 And the Lord smelled the sweet savour ; and the Lord said
in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for
man's ^sake, for that the imagination of man's heart is evil from
his youth ; neither will I again smite any more every thing
living, as I have done. 22 Wliile the earth remaineth, seedtime
and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and
day and night shall not cease. | IX. 1 And God blessed Noah P
and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and
replenish the earth. 2 And the fear of you and the dread of
^ Or, sake; for the
burnt offerings. Or holocausts. Heb. 'oldh, from 'didh, to go up,
denoting a sacrifice of which the whole 'went up' (Is. Ix. 7) upon the
altar, as opposed to those of which portions were eaten by the worshipper
or the priest.
21. the soothing savour (lit. the savour of rest-giving or com-
posure). A common expression in the Levitical terminology (Lev. i. 9,
13, 17, ii. 2, 9, 12, &c.), to express the character, or effect, of a sacrifice
which is favourably accepted. ' Sweet savour ' is a paraphrase, based
upon the lxx. rendering, oaixi] cvwStas. For 'smelled,' cf. 1 S. xxvi. 19.
said to his heart. I.e. to Himself. (Not in, as xvii. 17 al.)
for that. This gives the reason for ' curse ' (' I will not again curse
the ground, as I might do, because,' &c.): the marg. for gives the
reason for 'not curse,' — 'I will not again curse the ground, because,' &c.:
having regard, viz. to man's now innate propensity to evil, God will not
again be moved by men's evil deeds to a judgement such as the Flood
had been, but will exhibit forbearance (Rom. iii. 25), and long-suffering.
The marg. is preferable. The terms expressive of man's sinful pro-
pensity are the same as in vi. 5, but less strongly expressed (without
'every/ ' only,' and 'continually ')\
from his youth. I.e. from the time when the 'knowledge of good
and evil' (ii. 17) comes to be acquired, and evil, too often, gains the
mastery over good.
IX. 1—17 (P). The blessing of Noah (vv. 1 — 7) ; and the covenant
{w. 8 — 17) concluded with him by God.
1 — 7. A blessing given to the new race of men, corresponding to
that bestowed upon the first (i. 28), but enlarged, and adapted to man's
more developed state, by an extension of his rights over the animal
kingdom. At the same time {vv. 4 — 6) two limitations are imposed
upon his too absolute authority,
1. Be fruitful, ...and fill the ea/rth. As i. 28, which see.
1 On the yezer hd-rd', or ' evil propensity' ( = <pp6vri/xa aapKbs), of the later Jewish
theology, derived from this passage, see Aboth ii. 15, iv. 2, with Taj'lor's notes (ed. 2,
pp. 37, 64, 129 f., 148 ff.); Edersheim, Life and Times of Jems, i. 1G7; F. C. Porter
in Bibl, and Sem. Studies by members... of Yale University (New York, 1901), 93 —
156, esp. 108 ff. (witli some criticism of Weher, Altsynag. Theologie, p. 221 ff.).
96 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [ix. c^-g
you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl P
of the air ; with all wherewith the ground Heemeth, and all the
fishes of the sea, mto your hand are they delivered. 3 Every
moving thing that liveth shall be food for you ; as the green
herb have I given you all. 4 But flesh with the life thereof,
which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat. 5 And surely your
blood, the blood of your lives, will I require ; at the hand of
^ Or, creepeth
2. Animals had been subject to man from the beginning (i. 26, 28) ;
they are now to be in dread of him ; they are ' given into ' his ' hand,'
an expression implying (cf. e.g. Lev. xxvi. 25; Dt. xix. 12) that they
are at his disposal, and that he has over them the power of life and .
death. As v. 3 shews, the view of the writer is that hitherto animals
had had nothing to fear from man ; they had not been killed by him
for food, and d fortiori not for other purposes.
3. An extension of the permission granted in i. 29 : animal food is
permitted now, just as vegetable food was permitted then.
green kerb. Green of kerb, as i. 30.
4 — 6. Two limitations upon man's too absolute authority.
4. Only Jlesk witk its soul, (that is,) its blood, ye shall not eat.
Men may eat flesh, but only flesh which no longer has blood in it. As
the blood flows from a wounded animal, so its life ebbs away ; hence
the blood was regarded as the seat of the vital principle, or 'soul'
(Heb. nepkesh) ' ; this, however, was too sacred and mysterious to be
used as human food; it must be ofiered to God before man was at
liberty to partake of the flesh, 1 S. xiv. 32, 34 (cf. W. R. Smith, Rel.
Sem. p. 216 f., ed. 2, p. 234 I ; EiicB. n. 1544). The eating of blood
is repeatedly prohibited in Heb. legislation, as Dt. xii. 16, 23 ('for the
blood is the soul; and thou shait not eat the soul with the flesh*).
Lev. vii. 26 f., xvii. 10 — 14 (v. 11 'the soul of the flesh is in the blood,'
and hence 'the blood atoneth by means of the soul'; v. 14 'for as
regards the soul of all flesh, its blood is with its soul ' (i.e. it contains
its soul), and ' the soul of all flesh is its blood ') ; and abstention from
it became ultimately one of the fundamental principles of Judaism : to
the present day, strict Jews will eat the flesh of such animals only as
have been slaughtered with special precautions for thoroughly draining
the carcases of blood.
5. 6. The second, more important limitation. Man may slay
animals ; but the blood of man himself is not to be shed with impunity,
either by man or by beast. The life of man is to be inviolably sacred.
5. And surely your blood, according to your souls. I.e. the blood
of each individual person, whoever it may be (Del.). Dillm. al. render,
less naturally (see Del.), * (that) of your souls,' i.e. of yourselves (cf. Jer.
xxxvii. 9 RV.), your own blood, in contrast to that of the animals.
^ Cf. Aen. IX. 349 'Purpxoream vomit ille animam.'
IX. 5-1 1] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 97
every beast will I require it : and at the hand of man, even at P
the hand of every man's brother, will I require the life of man.
6 "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be ahed:
for m the nnage of _GQd_maflfiJbie, jmaji. 7 And you, be ye
fruitful, and multiply ; bring forth abundantly in the earth, and
multiply therein.
8 And God spake unto Noah, and to his sons with him,
saying, 9 And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and
with your seed after you ; 10 and with every living creature
that is with you, the fowl, the cattle, and every beast of the
earth with you ; of all that go out of the ark, even every beast
of the earth. 11 And I will establish my covenant with you ;
neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of the
require. Cf. xlii. 22; Ez. xxxiii. 6; Ps. ix. 12.
of every beast. Cf. Ex. xxi. 28 (in the ' Book of the covenant').
life. Properly, soul (as v. 4). Heb. has two words for ' life,' one
(di'Ti) meaning state of life (as in 'the days of his life'), the other
({yDj) meaning the principle of life (as in ' to take one's life '). The
latter signifies properly soul (cf. on i. 20) ; and it is sometimes conducive
to clearness to retain this rendering.
6. It is explained now kow blood shed will be 'required,' viz. by
the death of the murderer. It is not, however,, defined more precisely
by what agency the penalty will be exacted — whether, for instance, as
in primitive communities, by a relative of the murdered man, or, as in
more advanced communities, by the state : the general principle only is
affirmed — one of the great and fundamental principles, on which the
welfare of every community depends, the sanctity of humaniife.
for &c. The ground upon which the punishment of murder is
based. Man bears in himself God's image (v. 3, as well as i. 27); he
therefore who destroys a man does violence to God's image. In other
words, every man is a person, with a rational soul, the image of God's
personality (cf. on i. 27), which must be treated as sacred.
7. The blessing closes with a repetition of the substance of v. 1.
bring forth abundantly. Swarm (i. 20) : of men, as Ex. i. 7 (P).
8 — 17. God's covenant with Noah, concluded in fulfilment of the
promise given in vi. 18, by which he engages no more to destroy all
flesh by a flood. This ' covenant ' is the parallel in P to the promise,
viii. 21 f., in J. Like the promise, it is established not with the
descendants of Shem only, but with all mankind, and indeed (vv. 10,
12, &c.) with the whole animal world.
8 — 11. The teiTBS of the covenant.
10. creature. Heb. soul: see on i. 20. So w. 12, 15, 16.
11. Cf. viii. 21^ 22, in J.
all flesh. Including here animals: see on vi. 12, So vo. 15, 16, 17.
D. 7
98 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [ix. 11-16
flood ; Deither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the P
earth. 12 And God said, This is the token of the covenant
which I make between me and you and every living creature
that is with you, for perpetual generations : 13 ^ I do set ray
bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant
between me and the earth. 14 And it shall come to pass, when
I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the
cloud, 15 and I will remember my covenant, which is between
me and you and every living creature of all flesh ; and the
waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh.
16 And the bow shall be in the cloud ; and I will look upon it,
that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God
and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.
^ Or, I have set
12 — 17. The token of the covenant, the rainbow. A covenant
must have an external sign or token, which may remind the parties to
it of its terms, and also serve as a guarantee of the undertaking given
with it. Cf. xvii. 11, where the 'token' is something to be done by
man ; here it is something appointed by God.
13. / do set. The Heb. perfect tense is ambiguous; and may
express either I have set (so Geneva Version, and RVm.), viz. long ago,
from the beginning (cf. vi. 7 ' have created '), or / have just set, I set
now (cf. V. 3, i. 29, xli. 41, xlviii. 22), or even (the 'perfect of certitude')
/ will set (so Coverdale: cf xxiii. 13 Heb.). The appearance of the
rainbow depends, of course, upon the laws of the refraction and
reflection of light ; and it is incredible that these laws did not exist,
as a fact, till the time of Noah. If therefore the writer means to imply
(what seems to be expressed by RV. text = AV.) that the rainbow was
then first to be seen, he shews simply that he shares the prevalent
ignorance of physical science which was characteristic of the ancient
world in general: if, however, his meaning is rightly expressed by
RVm., then all that is future is and it shall be for a token, &c., and the
writer may have regarded the phaenomenon as occurring before, and
have merely represented it as invested now with a new significance as
the sign or symbol of mercy (cf Ryle, p. 117 f ).
14, 15. when I bring clouds [lit. cloud (with) ctoud, the word
being a collective : ' bring a cloud ' is not strong enough] over the earth,
and the how is seen in the cloud{s), that / will remember, &c. The
text gives an incorrect sense ; for the rainbow is not seen every time
that God 'brings clouds' over the earth.
16. everlasting covenant. An expression frequent in P (xvii. 7,
13, 19; Ex. xxxi. 16; Lev. xxiv. 8; Nu. xviii. 19; cf xxv. 13).
16, 17. The thought of w. 13 — 15 dwelt upon, and in part repeated,
in P's manner, for emphasis (cf xvii. 26, 27).
IX. 17] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 99
17 And God said unto Noah, This is the token of the covenant P
which I have established between me and aU flesh that is upon
the earth.
A suggestive symbolism is here attached to a beautiful, and — especially
for a primitive people — striking natural phaenoraenon. As the rainbow appears,
when a storm is passing by, and the sun, breaking forth from the opposite
direction, casts its gleams over the still clouded sky, it is interpreted as an
emblem, to a religious mind, of God's returning friendliness and g^ace, and
made a symbol of the mercy with which He regards all mankind (cf. Is. liv. 9).
The marvel of the phaenomenon, to people ignorant of the optical laws by
which it was produced, led many ancient nations to seek imaginative or
symbolical explanations of it. Thus, with the Indians, it is the war-bow of
Indra, which he has laid aside after finishing his contest wiih the demons:
in the Iliad it is a ripas nepowoiv avdpumoiv, portending war and storms {11.
XI. 27 f., XVII. 547 — 50), but (personified) it is also the bright and swift
messenger of the gods (ii. 7S6, iii. 121, al.) ; in the Icelandic Edda it is the
bridge, built by the gods, connecting heaven and earth.
The only other Biblical references to the rainbow are Ez. i. 28 ; Rev. iv. 3,
X. 1 (v Ipis) ; cf Ecclus. xhii. 1 1 f., 1. 7. It is not impossible that the representa-
tion found here rests ultimately upon a mythological basis; and that the
rainbow was regarded originally by the Hebrews as Jehovah's war-bow (which
is elsewhere the meaning of Ti^p : cf , as poetically attributed to Jehovah,
Hab. iii. 9 a/.), laid aside as the sign of pacified anger (Wellh. Hist. 352, Holz.,
Gunkel); but perhaps (Riehm, Dillm.) the rainbow is viewed merely as the
emblem of returning favour, and the name is based simply on the similarity of
form.
The Historical CJiaracter of the Deluge.
I. Ha$ there been a Universal Deluge? Until comparatively recent
times, tlie belief in a I>eluge covering the whole world, and destroying all
terrestrial animals and men except those preserved in the ark, was practi-
cally universal among Christians. Not only did this seem to be required by
the words of the narrative (vi. 17, vii. 4, 21—23) ; but the fossil remains of
marine animals, found sometimes even on lofty moantains, and the existence
of traditions of a Flood among nations living in many different parts of the
world, were confidently appealed to as confirmatory of the fact. But the rise,
within the last century, of a science of geology has shewn that the occurrence
of a universal Deluge, since the appearance of man upon the earth, is beyond
the range of physical possibility; while the principles of comparative mythology
shew that the traditions of a Flood current in different parts of the world do
not necessarily perpetuate the memory of a single historical event. (1) If
'all the high hills under the whole heaven' (vii. 19) were covered, there must,
by the most elementary principles of hydrostatics, have been five miles depth
of water over the entii*e globe : whence could this incredible an>ount of water
have come, and whither, when the Flood abated, could it have disappeared ?
7—2
100 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
Even, indeed, though the expression in vii. 19 were taken hyperbolically
(of. Gen. xli. 66, 57 ; Dt. ii. 25 ; 1 K. xviii. 10), or limited to the mountains
known to the writer, the diflBculty would not be materially diminished : it
is clear from viii. 4, 5 that the writer (P) pictured an immense depth of
water upon the earth : and even if only Palestine^ and the mountains (not
the highest) in Armenia were submerged, it must have risen to at least
3000 ft. ; and water standing 3000 ft. above the sea in Palestine or Armenia
implies 3000 ft. of water in every other part of the globe — an amount incredible
in itself, besides involving, quite as fully as five miles of water would do, all the
difficulties mentioned below. No doubt there was a time when hills and
mountains were submerged, and when the remains of marine animals referred
to above were deposited on what was then the bottom of the sea; but, as
geology shews, that was in an age long anterior to the appearance of man
upon the earth, and the period of submergence must have lasted, not for
a single year (P), but for untold centuries (cf. p. 20). (2) Without the
assumption of a stupendous miracle (for which there is not the smallest
warrant in the words of the text), all species of living terrestrial animals
(including many peculiar to distant continents and isFalids, and otliers adapted
only to subsist in the torrid or frigid zone, respectively) could not have been
brought to Noah, or so far tamed as to have refrained from attacking each
other, and to have submitted peaceably to Noah. (3) The number of living
species of terrestrial animals is so great that it is physically impossible that
room could have been found for them in the ark. (4) A universal deluge is
inconsistent with the geographical distribution of existing land animals ; for
diflferent continents and islands have each many species of animals peculiar to
themselves — S. America, for example, has the sloth and the armadillo,
Australia has marsupials, New Zealand strange wingless birds ; but if all land
animals were destroyed at a date — whether c. b.c. 2501, or (lxx.) c. b.o. 3066 —
when these continents and islands were separated from one another sub-
stantially as they are now, how could the representatives of all these species
have found their way back over many thousand miles of land and sea to their
present habitations? (6) If the entire human race, except Noah and his
family, were destroyed at the same date, the widely difierent races, languages,
and civilizations of Babylonia, Egypt, India, China, Australia, America — to say
nothing of other countries — cannot be accounted for : for the races inhabiting
these countries, if they ever lived together in a common home, could not have
developed the differences which they exhibit, unless they had started migrating
from it centuries, and indeed millennia, before either b.c. 2501 or b.o. 3066
(p. XXXV flf.); moreover, in the case of at least Babylonia and Egypt, we possess
monnniental evidence that civilization in these countries existed continuously,
without a break,/ro»i a period long anterior to either of these dates.
Upon these grounds — to which others might be added ^ — the supposition
that the Deluge of Noah was a universal one, is, it is evident, out of the
question, and has indeed been generally abandoned.
1 In which Jerusalem is 2600 ft. and Hebron 3040 ft. above the Medit. Sea.
2 See the excellent discussion of tiiis question by J. J. S. Peiowne in Smith,
DB. art. Noah, pp. 567—71.
THE DELUGE 101
Even, however, the attempt which has been often made to regard the
DeUige as a ' partial ' one, is beset by difficulties. Certainly (see p. 107 f.) there
would be no objection, upon scientific grounds, to the supposition that there
was, about b.o. 2500, an extensive and destructive local inundation in the lower
part of the plain of Babylonia ; but an inundation such as this does not satisfy
the terms of the narrative of Genesis. (1) P, at any rate — for J. does not
state to what height he pictured thevn as rising— describes the waters as rising
at least as high as the * mountains of Ararat ' (viii. 5), the lowest of which are
more than 2600 ft. above the plain of Babylonia. (2) Both F and J speak
repeatedly of every living thing which had been created, including in par-
ticular all mankind, as having been dest^'oyed (vi. 7, viL 4, 23, viii. 21 J;
vi. 17, vii. 21, cf. viii. 11, 15, P). But a flood confined to the plain of
Babylonia would certainly not have destroyed all animals upon the earth :
it is moreover certain — to say nothing of India, China, and other parts — that
long before B.C. 2501 mankind had spread as far as Egypt, and had established
an important civilization there, which obviously could not have been affected
by a flood, however extensive, in Babylonia^ It is manifest that a flood which
would submerge Egypt as well as Babylonia must have risen to at least 2000 ft.
(the height of the elevated country between them), and have thus been in fact
a universal one (which has been shewn to be impossible) ; a flood, on the other
hand, which did less than this is not what the Biblical writers describe, and
would not have accomplished what is represented as having been the entire
raison d^etre of the Flood, the destruction of all mankind. ^yJB,.are forced,
conseg^uently, to the conclusion that thej]lead*j?» 4sscKM)ed.by-th&. Biblical
wxiters^i^ unhistorical. ~
II. F^ood-stories in other nations. It is a remarkable fact that stories of
a flood, which sometimes covers the whole earth, while at other times it
embraces only the country in which the story is current, and from which but
few escaped, are tolil in many different parts of the world. Naturally the same
or similar features often recur in these stories ; but in other respects the
details (which are often grotesque) vary considerably ; and we have no space to
repeat them here^. The principal countries in which these Flood-stories are
found are Greece (Deucalion's deluge), Lithuania, Australia, Hawaii and other
Polynesian islands, Cashrair, Thibet, Kamchatka, different parts of India, and
America (where such stories are particularly numerous) : they are not found
(according to Andree) in northern and central Asia; they are also absent in
Egypt, China, and Japan, and almost absent in other parts of Africa (except
^ Further argument on this point is hardly necessary ; but it may be pointed out
that (as an orographical map of Asia will at once shew) the great alluvial plain of
the Euphrates and the Tigris (which slopes down gradually from an elevation of
500—600 ft. at its N. end, a Uttle E. of Aleppo, to the head of the Persian Gulf,
some 700 miles to the SE.) is hemmed in on all sides, except towards the Persian
Gulf, by elevated ground, and in particular that the wJwle of Syria and Arabia,
from Aleppo in the N. to Aden in the S., has an elevation of more than 2000 ft. ; so
that, even though the volume of water were such that, being driven up the slope by
winds, it covered the entire plain of these two rivers, it could not by any possibility
submerge the neighbouring countries.
* See specimens in the Encycl. Brit. ed. 9, art. Deluqk ; DB. s.v. Flood ;
Worcester, Genesis in the Light of Modern Knowledge, pp. 418 fit., 527 — 551 ; and
esp. the full collection in Andr6e, Die Flutsagen, etlinograj^hisch betiachtet, 1891.
102 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
where they are due to Christian influence). It was once supposed that all
these stories arose from the recollection of a common physical catastrophe;
but this can readily be shewn to be untenable, (1) As was shewn above, upon
indepeudent grounds, there cannot have been any really universal Flood, of
which these stories might have preserved the recollection. (2) Even supposing,
per impossibile, that there had been a universal Flood, it is a well-kuown fact
that savage nations, such as many of those among whom Flood-stories are
current, do not reineuiber anything very long, and certainly have no ancient
nistory : if then they possess no knowledge of events that occurred 100 years
ago, it is in the last degree improbable that they should have preserved the
memory of an event that happened {ex hyp.) more than 4000 years ago. (3) If
the Deluge of Noah were merely a local inundation, confined to the phiin of
Babylonia, though the memory of it might have been retained by some of the
immediate neighbours of the Babylonians, it would be most unlikely for a
knowledge of it to have travelled to nations settled in such distant continents
or islands as Australia, Polynesia, and America (which must, as was pointed
out on p. 100, have been already peopled long before b.o. 2501).
It does not fall within the province of the present work to consider the
question of the origin of these Flood-stories; so it must suffice to remark
briefly that they are due probably to the operation of diflferent causes. Most
frequently, says Mr Woods, the Flood-story is the highly-coloured tradition
of some historical event, or extraordinary natural phaenomenon — for instance,
among island and coastland peoples, of the early settlement of their ancestors
who came in boats across the ocean, of the appearance or disappearance of an
island by a volcanic eruption, or of a tidal wave resulting from an earthquake ;
among inland peoples, of the overflow of a river, the formation or disappearance
of a lake, or the melting of the winter snows. In other cases Flood-stories
appear to have originated in an attempt to account for some otherwise
unexplained fact, as the dispersion of peoples and differences of language, the
red colour of some of the N. American tribes, or the existence of fossil remains
on dry land, and even on hills. Account must also be taken of the tendency of
the human mind, well known to students of anthropology, to construct, under
similar local and mental conditions, similar mythological creations. And those
stories, which in particular details resemble strongly the Biblical narrative, are
open to the suspicion of having had these features introduced into them from
Christian sources, in quite modem times.
It was maintained by the late Professor Prestwich, on the ground of certain
geological indications (especially the so-called ' Rubble Drift '), that long after
the appearance of palaeolithic man, there was a submergence of the crust of the
earth, chiefly in W. Europe, but also in NW. Africa, though extending doubt-
fully as far E. as Palestine, causing a great inundation of the sea, which, though
of shoi-t duration, destroyed a vast amount of animal and some human life, so
that some species of animals (e.g. the iiippopotanms in Sicily) became extinct
in regions which they formerly inhabited ; and he suggests that this inundation
may have accounted for the above-mentioned traditions. As Mr Woods (DB.
n. 23), however, points out, without at all questioning the geological inferences
drawn by Professor Prestwich, had this explanation of the Flood-stories been
correct, it is remarkable that in Europe itself Flood-stories should be com-
THE DELUGE 103
paratively scarce, while they are most frequent in countries such as N. and
Central America, which are far removed from the region supposed to have
been submerged. Even Babylonia, where the most important and graphic
Flood-story originates, is not within the area over which Professor Prestwich
supposes the submergence to have extended ; and it is evident that the inun-
dation postulated by him is something completely different from the Flood of
Noah^
III. The Babylonian narrative of the Flood. There j!an..be no doubt
th^tjtjhe. true origin of the Biblical narrative is to be found in the Babylonian
story of the Flood, which was discovered in 1872 by G. Smith in the Lilirary
of Asshurbanipal at Kouyunjik. That the Babylonians possessed a legend of a
Flood was known before from the outline preserved by Berossus, who states
that Kronos warned Xisuthros, the tenth ante-diluvian king (see p. 80), that
mankind would be destroyed by a flood, and bade him build a huge ship in
which he, with his family and friends, might be saved^. The substantial
accuracy of Berossus' account is confirmed by the cuneiform narrative, though,
naturally, it is at the same time superseded by it. The story forms an episode
in the great Babylonian epic, which narrates the exploits of Gilganiesh, the
hero of Uruk (the Erech of Gen. x. 10), and occupies the eleventh of the twelve
cantos into which the epic is divided. Gilgamesh's ancestor, Ut-napishtira, it
was said, had received the gift of immortality ; and Gilgamesh, anxious to learn
the secret by which he had obtained this boon, resolves to visit him. After
many adventures he reaches the Waters of Death (which are identified with
the ocean encircling the world), and having succeeded in crossing them he sees
Ut-napisiitim, his figure unchanged by age, standing upon the further shore.
In answer to his inquiries, Ut-napishtim describes how in consequence of his
piety he had been preserved from destruction at the time of the great Flood,
and had afterwards been made immortal by Bel.
Ut-napishtim's story occupies more than 200 lines ; and only extracts can
be given here^. He begins (11. 8 — 31) by narrating how the gods, Anu, Bel,
* Sir J. W. Dawson, in his Meeting Place of Geology and History (1894),
extending, as it seems, this theory of Professor Prestwich, speaks very confidently
(pp. 88 f., 130, 148 f., 154 f., 204, 205) of a great submergence, and accompanying
'diluvial catastrophe,' which took place shortly after the close of the glacial period,
and destroyed palaeolithic man, and which is identified by him (pp. 155, 205) with
the Deluge of Noah. An eminent English geologist. Canon T. G. Bonney,
Emeritus Professor of Geology at University College, London, and an ex-President
of the Geological Society, who has examined Sir J. W. Dawson's arguments,
permits me however to say that he considers this identification to be altogether
untenable: he is aware of no evidence shewing that ' a vast region' of either Europe
or Asia was submerged at the age spoken of ; and even supposing that it were so
submerged, the flood thus produced would be many thousand years betore the time
at which, according to the Biblical chronology, the Deluge will have taken place.
He adds that he is acquainted with no geological indications favouring the suppo-
sition that a submergence, embracing certainly Asia, and including in particular
Armenia (the 'mountains of Ararat'), and causing great destruction of animal life,
took place at c. e.g. 2500 or 3000. Cf. his art., Expositor, June, 1903, p. 456 ff.
* See Miiller, Fragm. Hist. Graec. n. 501 f.; or the translations in Lenormaut,
Origines, i. 387—90, iZimmern, Bab. and Heb. Genesis, p. 48 f., or KAT.^ 543 f.
» The text may be read in full in Ball's Light from the East, p. 35 ff. and in
KB. VI. 229 ff., with notes, p. 480 ff. See also the extracts, with valuable discussion,
in Jastrow's Eel. of Bab. and Ass., pp. 493—517 ; and KAT.^ 645 ff.
104 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
Ninib, and Enmigi, had determined to destroy Shurippak, a city described as
•lying on the Euphrates,' by a flood {ahuhii , and how Ea, 'lord of wisdom,'
had warned him to escape by building a great ship : —
23 O man of Shurippak, son of Ubaratutu :
Frame a house, build a ship;
25 Forsake (thy) possessions, seek (to save) life ;
Abandon (thy) goods, and cause (thy) soul to live:
Bring up into the midst of the ship the seed of life of every sort
As for the ship, which thou shalt build,
Let its form be long ;
30 And its breadth and its height shall be of the same measuie.
Upon the deep then launch it
There follows (IL 32 flF.) the excuse which he is to make, if asked by the
men of his place what he is doing, Ut-napishtim then proceeds to relate how
he carried out these instructions : —
67 On the fifth day I began to construct the frame of the ship.
In its hull its sides were 120 cubits high.
And its deck was likewise 120 cubits in breadth :
60 I built on the bow, and fastened all firmly together.
Then I built six decks in it.
So that it was divided into seven storeys.
The interior (of each storey) I divided into nine compartments;
I drove in plugs (to fill up crevices).
65 I looked out a mast, and added all that was needful
Six sars of bitumen {hupru) I spread over it for caulking:
Three sars of naphtha [I took] on board.
When he had finished it, he entered it with all his belongings :—
81 With all that I possessed, I laded it:
With all the silver that I possessed, I laded it;
With all the gold that I possessed, I laded it;
With the seed of life of every kind that I possessed, I laded it.
85 I took on board all my family and my servants;
Cattle of the field, beasts of the field, craftsmen also, all of them,
did I take on board.
Shamash (the sun-god) had appointed the time, (saying,)
'When the lord of the whirlwind sendeth at even a destructive rain,
Enter into thy ship, and close thy door.'
The arrival of the fated day filled Ut-napishtim with alarm : —
93 I feared to look upon the earth :
I entered within the ship, and closed my door.
The storm which began next morning is finely described (11. 97—132).
Ramma,n (' Riramon,' — the storm-god) thundered in heaven; the Anunnaki
brought lightnings ; the waters rose : even the gods were in consternation ;
they took refuge in heaven, 'cowering like dogs' ; and Ishtar, the lady of the
gods, ' cried like a woman in travail ' : —
THE DELUGE 105
128 Six days and nights
Raged wind, deluge (abubu), and storm upon the earth.
130 When the seventh day arrived, the storm and dehige ceased,
Which had fought like a host of men ;
The sea was calm, hurricane and deluge ceased.
I beheld the land, and cried aloud:
For the whole of mankind were turned to clay (titu = Qi\2);
135 Hedged fields had become marshes.
I opened a window, and the light fell upon my face.
The ship grounded on Nisir — a mountain east of the Tigris, across the
Little Zab {KA T.^ 53) — and remained there tor six days : —
146 When the seventh day arrived,
I brought forth a dove, and let it go :
The dove went to and fro ;
As there was no resting-place, it turned back.
150 I brought forth a swallow, and let it go :
The swallow went to and fro ;
As there was no resting-place, it turned back.
I brought forth a raven, and let it go :
The raven went, and saw the decrease of the waters;
165 It ate, it waded, it croaked (?), it turned not back
.After this Ut-napishtim leaves the ark, and, like Noah, offers sacrifice : —
156 Then I sent forth (everything) towards the four winds (of heaven):
I oflFered sacrifice :
I prepared an offering on the summit of the mountain.
I set Adagur-vases, seven by seven.
Underneath them I cast down reeds, cedar-wood, and incensa
160 The gods smelt the savour.
The gods smelt the goodly savour;
The gods gathered like flies over the sacrificer.
Ishtar hereupon reproaches Bel, because, when the gods had intended only
to destroy a single place, Shurippak, he had brought about the destruction of
all mankind (11. 163 — 170). Bel, on the other hand, is incensed with Ea, because,
by enabling Ut-napishtim to escape, he had frustrated his plan ; but is
pacified by Ea's representations (11. 182 flf.)i that, though the sinner may
rightly suffer, it is inconsiderate to destroy all without discrimination.
In the end Bel accepts Ut-napishtim favourably, and takes him and his
wife away to immortality : —
201 He turned to us, he stepped between us, and blessed us, (saying) :
* Hitherto Ut-napishtim has been a (mortal) man, but
Henceforth Ut-napishtim and his wife shall be like unto the gods,
even unto us, and
1 In 1. 196 Ut-napishtim is called Atra-hasis (='very clever'), which, inverted
{Hasis-atra), is the origin of Beiossus' ' Xisuthros.'
106 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
Ut-napishtim shall dwell far away at the mouth of the rivers.'
Then they took me, and far away at the mouth of the rivers they made
me to dwell
It should be added that fragments of two different versions of what is
manifestly the same story have been found : one (12 lines)* containing Ea's
instructions to Atra-hasis about entering the ship ; the other (37 fragmentary
lines) ^, which is of extreme antiquity (the tablet on which it is written being
dated in the reign of Ammi-zaduga, the 4th successor of 5ammurabi,
B.C 1984—1964), representing some god as calling upon Ramman to bring a
flood upon the earth, and Ea as interposing to save Atra-hasis.
Though there are differences in detail, the resemblances with the Biblical
narrative are too numerous and too marked to be due to accident. Thus the
Babylonian narrative agrees with P in that the hero of the Flood is (according
to Berossus) the tenth of the ante-diluvian kings, just as Noah is the tejith from
Adam ; in the fact that instructions are given for making the ark of particular
dimensions and with storeys (though the dimensions are not the same, and in
P the number of storeys is three, not seven), and that it was made water-tight
by bitumen, that the vessel grounds upon a mountain (but Ni§ir, not Ararat) 3,
and that Bel 'blesses' Ut-napishtim (1. 201), as God 'blesses' Noah (Gen. ix. 1)*:
it agrees with J in that the flood is attributed to rain only ; in its shorter
duration (but seven days, not 40), as compared with P (one year), in a prefer-
ence for the number seven (11. 62, 130, 146, 158 ; of. in J, Gen. vii. 2, 3, 4, 10,
viii. 10, 12), in the episode of the dove and the raven (though in the reverse
order, and with a swallow as well), in the sacrifice offered by Ut-napishtim
after leaving the ark, and in the gods ' smelling the goodly savour ' : it agrees
with P and J alike in that Ut-napishtim is warned, like Noah, to take refuge
from the con)ing flood in a sliip, in the fact that all perish except the few who
are saved on account of Ut-napishtim's piety, and that, after the flood is over,
Bel, like Jehovah, promises (implicitly) not again to destroy mankind thus
indiscriminately, and receives Ut-napishtim favourably. The resemblances
with J are on the whole the more striking. Of the difierences, the most con-
sj)icuou8 is the polytheistic colouring of the Babylonian narrative, as compared
with the monotheism of the two Biblical writers ^ It is another noteworthy
feature that in Genesis it is Enoch, not Noah, who is translated without dying.
The Hebrew and the Babylonian narratives have evidently a common
1 See KB. vi. 254—7 ; Sayce, Monuments, 108 f. ; cf. KAT.^ 551.
2 Exp. Times, May, 1898, p. 377 f.; KB. vi. 289—91; cf. KATJ^ 552—4.
' Why in P the ' mountains of Ararat ' appear in place of Nisir must remain
matter of conjecture: possibly, because they were the loftiest known to the
Hebrews; for another conjecture, see EncB. i. 289.
* Whether the rainbow is alluded to (Sayce, pp. 112 [1. 148], 114) in the Bab.
poem (in KB., 1. 164) is very uncertain : see DB. iv. 196''n., and KAT.^ 550 n. 2.
' Prof. Sayce (EHH. 126) also calls attention to points in which the story has
assumed a Palestinian colouring : the ship has become an 'ark,' as was natural in
a country in which there were no great rivers or a Persian Gulf; the period of the
rainfall has been transferred from Sebat ( = Jan. — Feb.), when the winter rains fall
in Babylonia, to the 'second month' (identified by him with Nov.), the time of the
autumn or 'former' rains in Palestine; aud the dove brings back in its mouth a
leaf of the olive, a tree much more characteristic of Palestine than of Babylonia.
THE DELUGE 107
origin. And the Hebrew narrative must be derived from, the Babylonian ;
for not only is the Babylonian story of the Flood much older than (upon any
view of its origin) the Book of Genesis (for, as was shewn above, we have a
version of it dating from c. 1980 B.C.), but, as Zimmern has remarked, the very
essence of the Biblical narrative presupposes a country liable, like Babylonia,
to inundations ; so that it cannot be doubted that the story was ' indigenous in
Babylonia, and transplanted to PalestineV Of course, the Biblical account was
not, any more than the Biblical account of the Creation, transci'ibed directly
from a Babylonian source : but by some channel or other — we can but specu-
late by what (cf. p. 31) — the Babylonian story found its way into Israel ; for
many generations it was tra*ismitted orally, so that details were r.aturally
forgotten or modified ; it assumed, of course, a Hebrew complexion, and was
accommodated to the spirit of Hebrew monotheism ; but its main outline
remained the same : J and P, at different times, cast it into a written form,
each impressing upon it features characteristic of his own point of view and
literary method ; and from the combinatiou of the two texts thus formed, the
present narrative of Genesis has arisen.
In its Hebrew form, the story of the Flood has thus a new character
stamped upon it; and it becomes a symbolical embodiment of ethical and
religious truth. It marks an epoch in the early history of mankind. A
judicial motive is assigned for it : it becomes a judgement upon con-upt and
degenerate mankind^ It thus exemplifies a great principle by which God
deals with both nations and individuals (cf. the application in Mt. xxiv. 37 — 9).
Noah, on the other hand, is the type of a righteous man (cf Heb. xi. 7 ; 1 Pet.
iii. 20 ; 2 Pet. ii. 5), an example of blamelessness and obedience in the midst of
a heedless and perverse genei'ation, a man worthy of the seal of God's approval.
His probity saves, not himself only, but bis family. Rescued from the flood of
waters, he becomes the second father of humanity, and inaugurates for it a
new era. A new and gracious declaration of God's purposes towards man
marks the significance of the occasion : the promise in J (viii. 21 f.), the
blessing and the covenant in P (ix. 1 — 17), are tokens of His good will towards
mankind ; a new principle, the sanctity of human life, is established for the
maintenance and welfare of society. And so humanity starts afresh, with the
sense of God's favour resting upon it, if it will but fulfil faithfully the duties
devolving upon it.
It remains only to consider the possible basis of the Babylonian story.
Delitzsch, Dillmann, Huxley'', Haupt, and Jastrow, following the geologist
Siiss, of Vienna, consider that it is based upon dim recollections of an actual
extraordinary inundation of the lower Euphrates over the plain of Babylonia.
Both the Tigris and the Euphrates, when the snows in the upper basins of the
two rivers melt in spring, regularly overflow their banks, and transform a large
part of the alluvial plain into a vast inland sea : the region is also liable to
earthquakes ; and if, at the height of an inundation, when the waters were
1 Similarly Sayce, EHH. 125.
' This may be indirectly implied in the Babylonian narrative in I. 184 i , but it
certainly is not stated distinctly ; and in 1. 13 f. the destruction of Shurippak seems
attributed simply to the caprice of the gods.
2 Collected Essays, iv. 221, 242 ff. ('Hasisadra's Adventure ').
108 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [ix. i8, 19
further swollen by heavy raias, 'a hurricane from the SB. swept up the
Persian Gulf, driving its shallow waters upon the delta, and dammins? back the
outflow, a catastrophe not unlike I;Tasisadra'8 might have been produced,' and
a vessel might liave been driven up stream, over a continuously flooded country,
till it grounded — not hideed on the summit of Nisir, or on Ararat, but — ' on
one of the low hills between which both the lower and the upper Zab enter the
Assyrian plain ' (Huxley, pp. 247 f., cf. 263, 279). If this view be correct —
and it certainly appears a reasonable one — we must suppose that there was
once an actual extraordinary overflow of the Euphrates, which resulted among
other things in the destruction of Shurippak, that there was a tradition, or
legend, cuiTcut in Babylonia, that some succeeded in efi"ecting their escape in
a great ship, that in the popular imagination the disaster was magnified into a
destruction of all mankind except those who escaped, and also mjrthologically
embellished, that the story further found its way to Palestine, and ultimately,
in the manner indicated above, was incorporated in the Book of Genesis.
Upon this view of the origin of the Biblical narrative, it will be evident that it
is no ' fiction ' of the narrators ; it is a current popular belief, of long standing
in Israel, which they report; and instead of being shocked or startled at the
fact, we should rather marvel at the 'divinely-guided religious feeling and
insight, by which an ancient legend has been made the vehicle of religious and
spiritual truth ^.'
18 And the sons of Noah, that went forth of the ark, were J
Shem, and Ham, and Japheth : and Ham is the father of
Canaan. 19 These three were the sons of Noah : and of these
was the whole earth overspread.
18, 19 (J). A short connecting passage, forming (v. 18*) the close to
J's narrative of the Flood, and (v. 19) the introduction to J's Table of
Nations, preserved in parts of ch. x. Verse IS** is probably an addition
due to the compiler, and intended as an introduction to vv. 20 — 27.
19. of these &c. Better, from these the whok earth (i.e. the
whole population of the earth, as xi. 1) was spread abroad (x. 18).
20 — 27 (J). Jfoah, the vine-grower, and his three sons. Noah appears
here under a new aspect. As in iv. 17 — 24 we learned how Hebrew tradition
accounted for the origin of difi'erent inventions and institutions, so we learn
here, w. 20, 21, how it attributed to Noah the introduction of what we may
suppose to have been a more artificial type of husbandry, as compared with
that implied in iv. 2, and also in particular of the culture of the vine. The
vine and its fruit were highly prized in Palestine (cf. xlix. 1 1 f., and on xxvii.
28) ; and the first discovery of the uses to which its juice might be put, mn.st
have been a notable one in the history of inventions. Here it is ascribed to
Noah, who is coimected (viii. 4) with Armenia ; and Armenia and the E. part
of Pontus are just the region in which the plant api)cars to have heen
1 Woods in DB. ii. 23. Holzinger (p. 88). and Gnnkel (p. 66) also remark upon
the immeasurably higher spiritual feeling displayed by the Biblical narrative, and
on the contrast between the sublime moral dignity of the God of Noab, and the
'genuinely heathen' character and motives displayed by the Babylonian deities.
IX. »o-.5] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 109
indigenous, and from which it spread gradually to other countries. But, with
a keen perception of its liability to abuse, the narrator paints a vivid picture
of the disgrace and misfortune which the enjoyment of the fermented juice of
the vine entailed upon its first cultivator. The scene is a typical one ; and it
stands as a warning of the consequences of excessive indulgence, and of the need
of watchfulness and self-control, even in the use of what is good and innocent
in itself.
20 And Noah began to be an husbandman, and planted a, J
vineyard : 21 and he drank of the wine, and was drunken ; and
he was uncovered within his tent. 22 And Ham, the father of
Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two
brethren without. 23 And Shem and Japheth took a garment,
and laid it upon both their shoulders, and went backward, and
covered the nakedness of their father ; and their faces were
backward, and they saw not their father's nakedness. 24 And
Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his ^youngest son
had done unto him. 25 And he said,
^ Or, younger
20. And Noah, the husbandman, began, cmd planted, &c.
'The title, "the husbandman," here applied to Noah is surprising,
and can only be understood as pointing to a cycle of tradition respect-
ing Noah, in which he figured in that capacity' (Dillm.).
21. Noah, it is implied, was the Jlrst to plant a vineyard, and
manufacture wine: hence he was unacquainted with the effects of
wine, and was not responsible for the state into which it brought him.
22. 23. Ham, in what he did, shewed no modesty, or filial respect;
his two brothers, on the contrary, displayed delicacy of feeling, and
respect for their father. The ' garment ' (simldh) is the large square
mantle, ox plaid, often used for sleeping in (Ex. xxii. 26 f ).
24. youngest. From the order in both J {v. 18) and P (v, 32,
vi. 10, vii. 13, X. 1), it would naturally be inferred that Japheth was
the youngest son of Noah. The writer of w. 20 — 27 must have
followed a different tradition — either one which gave Noah's sons in
the order Shem, Japheth, and Ham, or (see below) one which made
them to be Shem, Japheth, and Canaan. (RVm. is not legitimate.)
25. Deeply moved by what had occurred, and discerning from it
the characters of his sons, Noah in an elevated, impassioned strain,
pronounces upon them a curse and blessing. It was an ancient belief
that a father's curse or blessing was not merely the expression of an
earnestly felt hope or wish, but that it exerted a real power in determin-
ing a child's future; and hence the existing later condition of a tribe
or people is often in the OT. referred to the words supposed to have
been prono\iuced by a patriarchal ancestor upon its progenitor. Cf.
xxvii. 28 f., 39 f, xlviii. 13 — 20; and on ch. xlix.
110 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [ix. .5-^7
Cursed be Canaan ; »
A servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.
26 And he said,
Blessed be the Lord, the God of Shem ;
And let Canaan be %is servant.
27 God enlarge Japheth,
And ^let him dwell in the tents of Shem ;
And let Canaan be ^his servant.
* Or, their * Or, he shall
servant of servants. I.e. the very lowest of servants. Canaan is
here not an individual, but the represeyitatim of tlie Canaanites, the
native races of Canaan, who, if not destroyed, were ultimately sub-
jugated by the Israelites (cf. Jud. i. 28 ff.; 1 K. ix. 20 f): and the
intention of the passage is in reality to account for the enslaved
condition of these races, as the Hebrews knew them. How the
subjection to Japheth ('his brethren': and v. 2T^) is to be explained
is less clear : perhaps it is introduced only as a secondary feature in
the curse; perhaps, however, cases were known to the author of the
blessing in which the Phoenicians, for instance, whether commercially
or politically, had been unable to hold their own by the side of Japhethic
rivals (x. 2 — 4). On the question why Canaan is cursed, when Ham
was the offender, see below.
26, 27, In strong contrast to the curse on Canaan are the blessings
on Shem and Japheth.
26, The knowledge of the true God possessed by the Hebrews
forms the basis of the blessing pronounced upon their ancestor (see
X, 21 ; xi. 10 flf.), Shem; and the form in which the blessing is cast, —
not ' Blessed be Shem,' but ' Blessed be Jehovah, the God of Shem,' —
evinces a warm and lively sense of the privileges which this knowledge
confeiTcd upon those who shared it: it is the happiness of Shem
and his descendants that they 'have Jehovah for their God.'
Ms. Better, their (KVm.), referring to ' his brethren,' v. 25.
27*. The blessing begins this time with a wish suggested by the
name, there being in the Heb. for enlarge an obvious play upon
JajyJieth (cf xlix. 8, 16, 19). May God fuliil the omen of Japheth's
name and grant him width, expausiveuess ! The large extent of
territory inhabited by the nations represented by the sons of Japheth
(x. 2 — 5), their material development, and mental energy, are what is
here alluded to.
God. Not Jehovah (who is reserved for Shem), there being no
knowledge of the God of revelation in Japheth,
27^ Unlike Canaan, with whom Israel is to have no dealings
(Ex. xxiii. 32), may Japheth have free intercourse with the descendants
of Shem, and dwell unhindered in their tents ! The words are a
rclieobiou of the more friendly regard with which religiously-minded
IX. .8, ,9] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 111
28 And Noah lived after the flood three hundred and fifty P
years. 29 And all the days of Noah were nine hundred and
fifty years : and he died.
Israelites viewed the Japhetliites, as compared witli the Canaanites.
They may also include perhaps in germ the thought {which is developed
afterwards more fully by the gi-eat prophets, e.g. Is. ii. 2 — 4) of the
ultimate inclusion of the peoples referred to Japheth as their ancestor
in the spiritual privileges enjoyed by the descendants of Shem.
28, 29. The close of P's account of NoaL The verses resemble
closely in form v. 7 f., 10 f , 13 f , &c.
We may call the worda addressed by Noah to his three sons a prophetical -
interpretation of history. Canaan, Shem, and Japheth are not individuals : I
they are personifications, representing the nationalities of which they were I
the reputed ancestors, and reflecting their respective characters. ' The curse |
of Canaan is the curse pronounced against Israel's greatest foe and con-
stant source of moral temptation ; the sharaelessoess of Ham reflects the
impression produced by the sensuality of the Canaanite upon the minds of the
worshippers of Jehovah ' (Ryle, p. 122 : see e.g. Lev. xviii. 3, 24 — 30; 1 K. xiv.
24). And the curse takes the form of political subjectiou, which is the natural
penalty of long-continued moral degradation, and of the physical enervation which
inevitably accompanies it. The purer religion possessed by the Hebrews is
the thought determining the blessing of Shem. The width of territory and
expansiveness characteristic of the Japhetliites explains the terms used of
Japheth. Thus, taken as a whole, the blessing defines in outline the position
and historical significance of the three great ethnical groups, which were
referred to Noah as their ancestor. It contrasts their differing characters ; and
holds out to each correspondingly ditferent prospects for the future. It thus
interprets the history ' prophetically,' i.e. not predictively, but eliciting from it
the providential purposes of which it is the expression.
There remains the question why Canaan was cursed, when Ham was the
offender. No doubt, the simplest supposition is that Canaan is cursed, bee;: use
among all the * sons ' of Ham (x. 6) the Canaanites were the most intimately
known to the Hebrews, and in intercourse with them displayed in a preeminent
degree the evil traits which had characterized Ham. By recent critics^
however, this explanation has been regarded as unsatisfactory, and the opinion
has gained ground that the naiTative is no longer in its original form : originally,
these critics suppose, the author of the misdeed was Canaan, who may even,
in the oldest form of the tradition, have been treated not as the grandson of Noah,
but as the youngest (cf v. 24) of his sons (as indeed the connexion in vv. 24 — 27,
where he stands by the side of Shem and Japheth, seems still to imply) ; the
compiler, in appending this narrative to the story of the Flood, harmonized it
with the genealogy of Noah's sons which had then gained currency, by inserting
in V. 18 the explanatory gloss 'and Ham is the father of Canaan,' and in v. 22
the words ' Ham the father of ' before * Canaan.' Verses 20—27, in their original
form, will upon this view represent a different stratum of Israeli tish tradition,
1 Wellh., Bud'.le, Holz., Gunkel, al.; cf. Byle, 119—121.
112 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
in which Canaan figured as a son of Noah. And as we are dealing not
with individuals as such, but with individuals as representing nationalities,
there is at least no difficulty (of. on x. 7 Sheba and Dedan, xxii. 21) in
supposing that they may have been differently grouped, and the relations
between them differently defined, by different writers or at different times.
Chapter X.
The Table of Nations.
The object of this Table is partly to shew how the Hebrews supposed the
principal nations known to them to be related to each other, partly to assign
Israel, in particular, its place among them. The chapter falls into the plan of
the compiler of Genesis. The compiler's ultimate goal is the history of the
chosen family ; but at the point when he was about to enter upon this, he was
sensible (in Gunkel's words) 'of the scientific necessity of saying something
about the rise of other nations, of the aesthetic necessity of bringing clearly to
a close the history of primitive undivided mankind, and last, but not least, of the
religious necessity of exhibiting clearly the selection of Israel out of the mass
of nations.' And so, after this chapter, he is able to limit himself exclusively
to the line of Shem (xi. 10 ff.), and shortly afterwards to a particular branch of
the family of Terah (xi. 27 ff.), viz. the family of Abraham.
In relating the nations to each other, each is represented as summed up in
a corresponding eponymous ancestor, these being related to one another as
father, son, brother, &c. The names are in no case to be taken as those of real
individuals ; they just represent peoples. This is clear in many cases from the
names themselves, which are dual (Mizraim), or plural (Ludim, Anamim, &c.)
in form, or names of places (as Tarshish, Zidon, Ophir, &c.), or gentile names
(as the Jebusite, the Amorite, &c.) ; in other cases, from its being contrary to
all analogy for the names of nations to be derived from those of known
individual ancestors. Moreover, the real origin of the nations enumerated
here, belonging in many cases to entirely different racial types, — Semites,
Aryans, ' Hittites,' Egyptians, — must have reached back into a remote
prehistoric age, — far earlier than b.c. 2500, — from which, we may be sure, not
even the dimmest recollections could have been preserved at the time when
the chapter was written. The nations and tribes existed: and imaginary
ancestors were afterwards postulated for the purpose of exhibiting pictorially
the relationship in which they were supposed to stand towards one another.
An exactly parallel instance, though not so fully worked out, is afforded by the
ancient Greeks. The general name of the Greeks was Hellenes, the principal
subdivisions were the Dorians, the Aeolians, the lonians, and the Achaeans ;
and accordingly the Greeks traced their descent from a supposed eponymous
ancestor Hellen, who had three sons Dorus and Aeolus, the supposed ancestors
of the Dorians and Aeolians, and Xuthus, from whose two sons. Ion and Achaeus,
the lonians and Achaeans were respectively supposed to be descended. And so
here, the principal nations known to the Hebrews are represented, through
their corresponding ancestors, as the members of a great family more or less
closely related to each other, as the case may be. The great ethnical groups.
THE BOOK OF GEl^SIS 113
most strongly distinguished from one another in physical type and character,
are represented as the sons of Noah. The primary divisions (i.e. nations), into
which each of these groups falls, appear as the ' sons ' of its representative
ancestor (as Javan, i.e. the Greeks [lonians], the son of Japheth) : subordinate
divisions (i.e. tribes or local settlements) appear as 'grandsons' (as Zidon, 'son'
of Canaan, and ' grandson ' of Ham).
The Table does not include all nations knovra to the Hebrews. Some,
which were more closely connected with the Hebrews than any here mentioned,
as Moab and Ammon, the descendants of Nahor, and of Keturah, the Ishmaelite
tribes, and Bdoui, are intentionally excluded : they find their place at later
stages of the narrative^ Others, as the Rephaim, the 'Anakim, the Zuzim, are,
perhaps, not mentioned, as not being of suflBcient importance : for the omission
of others, it is less easy to suggest satisfactory reasons. Others, again, as the
pre-Semitic Sumerian inhabitants of Babylonia, the negro-races of Africa,
many nations of Europe, the Indian races, the Chinese, and the peoples of
Australia, America, the Pacific Isles, &c., are not mentioned, simply because
the knowledge of the Hebrews did not embrace them. The area included in
the Table extends, speaking broadly, from Armenia on the N. to Ethiopia and
S. Arabia on the S., and from Elam (E. of Babylonia) on the B. to Greece and
the dimly known Tarshish in the W. The knowledge of the more distant
peoples mentioned came probably to the Hebrews in many cases through trade
or war. It is remarkable how many of these, particularly when they belong to
P, agree with those mentioned by Jeremiah and Ezekiel, and in general how
largely the horizon of the Table agrees with the horizon of these prophets :
see the notes on Gomer, Magog, Javan, Tubal, Meshech {v. 1), Ashkonaz,
Togarmah (v. 2), Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim {v. 3), Cush, Put {v. 6), Ra'mah,
Sheba, Dedan (v. 7), Ludim {v. 13), Arvad {v. 18), Elam (v. 22); and compare
especially Ez. xxvii., and xxxviii. 2 — 6, 13, xxxix. l'^.
Upon what principle are the nations included in the Table arranged ?
No doubt, the two writers, whose joint work the Table in its present form is,
both conceived their arrangement to be ethnological, i.e. they supposed the
nations to be really related by blood as they represented them to be ; but
though this was doubtless the case in some instances, in others it is not probable ;
and sometimes linguistic and other facts known to us shew it to be altogether
out of the question : the Canaanites, for instance, had certainly no direct racial
connexion with Egypt, nor the Hittites with 'Canaan,' or with the Amorites,
nor Elam with Shem. Where a blood-relationship cannot be presupposed, the
principle of arrangement, it seems evident, was chiefly geographical, though
sometimes it was historical or political. Thus, the three main divisions,
Japheth, Ham, and Shem, occupy, respectively, on the whole, a northern,
middle, and southern zone. Then, further, the peoples or tribes living in or
near a particular country, whether connected together racially or not, are often
described as descendants of the ancestor representing the country (as the
'sons' of Gomer, o. 3, of Mizraim, v. 13f., and of Canaan, vv. 15 — 18 : see also
1 xix. 30 ff., xxii. 20 ff., xxv. 1 ff., 13 ft., xxxvi.
' On the gradual growth of geographical knowledge among the Hebrews see
further the luminous art. Geogbaphx (Biblical) in the EncB.
a 8
114 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [x. i, »
on cli. xxxvi.). In other instances political or commercial relations have led
probably to peoples being connected genealogically, where no blood-relationship
existed ; as in the cases of Tarshish and Javan (v. 4), and Canaan and Ham
{v. 7). Naturally, our knowledge is often not sufficient to enable us to say, in a
given case, by which of these principles the classification has been determined.
But, after what has been said, it will occasion no surprise to find the same
people classed differently, in different genealogies, compiled by different
writers or at different times (cf. on vv. 7, 23, xxil 21, xxv. 3).
It will thus be evident that the Table of Nations contains no scientific
classification of the races of mankind. Not only this, however ; it also offers
no historically true account of the origin of the races of mankind. It represents
as starting from a single centre, at about B.C. 2500, or (lxx.) 3066, varieties
(Semitic, Aryan, ' Hittite' or Mongolian, and Egyptian) which (in Prof. Sayce's
words) ' the ethnologist is not at present able to trace back to a single original
type ' {Monuments, 120 f.), and which, if (as modern anthropologists also
believe) they ultimately had a common origin, must beyond question have
begun the process of separation and differentiation a great many centuries before
either b.c. 2500, or B.C. 3066. The Table thus offers no sufficient explanation
of the racial differences even of the nations included in it. And there remain
the numerous native races of Africa, B. Asia, Australia, America, &c., referred
to above, which certainly must have been in existence millennia before even
B.C. 3066 (for otherwise the strongly-marked differences of racial character and
language which they exhibit, could not have had time to develop), the origin
of which is not accounted for at all. Cf the Introduction, p. xxxiv ff.
As regards the composition of the chapter, vv. 1 — 7, 20, 22 — 24, 31, 32
belong to P, the rest belongs to J (with probably a later insertion in vv. 16 — 18*).
X. 1 Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah, P
Shem Ham and Japheth : and unto them were sons born after
the flood.
2 The sons of Japheth ; Gomer, and Magog, and Madai, and
Javan, and Tubal, and Meshech, and Tiras. 3 And the sons of
X. 2—5. The 'sons 'of Japheth.
2. Gomer. Mentioned in Ez. xxxviii. 6, by the side of Togarmah
{v. 3, here), among the allies of Gog, of the land of Magog, in the
' uttermost parts of the north,' who is pictured by the prophet as the
leader of an ideal assault of nations against the restored Israel.
LXX. Vafx.€p (in Ez. To/jiep), the Gimirrai, whom Esarhaddon (B.C. 681 — 668)
speaks of having defeated, and who, Asshurbanipal (668 — 625) tells
us {KB. II. 129, 173 — 7), invaded Lydia in the days of Gugu
(i.e. Gyges, the famous king of Lydia, b.c. 687 — 653, Hdt. i. 8 — 14).
Their territory at this time corresponded generally to the later
Cappadocia (which is called in Armenian Gamir). There is little
doubt that they are the same as the Cimmerians (Ki/A/xcpioi, Od. xi. 14,
&c.); and if so, their original home was the country N. of the Euxine,
from which they were expelled by the Scythians (Hdt. 1. 15, 103, iv. 11 f.).
x.i] THE BOOK OF GEl^SIS 115
Magog. In Ez. xxxviii. 2 (with the article), xxxix. 6, a land and
people in the ' uttermost parts of the north,' whose ruler Gog is prince
of 'Rosb, Meshech, and Tubal' and has among his alHes Gomer and
Togarmah. The expedition imagined by the prophet in Ez. xxxviii. — ix.
is no doubt modelled upon the great irruption of the Scythians into Asia
(Hdt. I. 104 — 6), which took place c. 630 b.c, and which is in all
probability alluded to in Jer. iv. 3 — vi. 30 (see especially v. 15 — 17,
vi. 22 f.; of. LOT. 237 f.). And in fact, since Josephus, 'Magog'
has been commonly understood of the Scythians, though the origin of
the name, if this view be correct, is not apparent'.
Mddai. The Medes, often menticned in the OT. from the
8th century B.C. (2 K. xvii. 6, xviii. 11, Is. xxi. 2, xiii. 17 f, al);
and in the Assyrian Inscriptions from the time of Ramman-nirari
(812 — 783 B.C.) onwards, perhaps also (Schrader, Tiele, Sayce) identical
with the Amadai of Shalmaneser II. (b.c. 860 — 825). The home of
the Medes was in the mountainous country E. of Assyria, and SW.
of the Caspian Sea. Their capital city was Egbatana (now Hamaddn).
Ydvdn. The Greeks, or, more exactly, the lonians (in Hom.
'laFoves), i.e. in particular, the Asiatic lonians, who were settled
along the coasts of Lydia and Caria, and whose cities throve
commercially some two centuries earlier than those of the Peloponnesus.
Ydvdn being thus the name under which the Hebrews first became
acquainted with the Greeks (probably through the Phoenicians), it
remained the name by wliich they were always known. They are
mentioned by Sargon {KAT."^ 81). In the OT. they are named
besides, Ez. xxvii. 13 (by the side of Tubal and Meshech, as bringing
slaves and copper into the Tyrian market), 19 (?), Is. Ixvi. 19, Joel iii. 6;
and (the Macedonian Greeks) Zech. ix. 13, Dan. viii. 21, x. 20.
Tubal and Meshech (lxx. Moo-ox). Named similarly together in
Ez. xxvii. 13 (by the side of Yavan, as just noted), xxxii. 26 (in Sheol,
with Egypt, Elam, &c.), xxxviii. 2 and xxxix. 1 (as ruled over by Gog),
and probably (see LXX.) in Is. Ixvi. 19 (beside Yavan, as distant nations).
They are the Tahali and Mushku of the Inscriptions, Tahali being
first mentioned by Tiglath-pileser I. (c. 1100 b.c), and Mushku by
Shalmaneser II. (860 — 825), and both also being mentioned often
subsequently (see KAT."^ ad ioc); and the Moo-xol and TtSaprjuol, whom
Hdt. (ill. 94, vu. 78) also names together as belonging to the 19th
satrapy of Darius. The notices of them in the Assyrian period shew
that their home was then NE. of Cilicia {Hilakku) and E. of Cappadocia
{Gimirraiy; but by the time of Herodotus they had retired further
to the N., to the mountainous region SE. of the Black Sea.
Tiras. Perhaps the Tvpa-rjvoi, a people dwelling anciently on the
N. shores and islands of the Aegean Sea, and much dreaded by the
Greeks as pirates (Hdt. i. 57, Thuc. iv. 109).
1 ilat is the common Assyrian word for 'land'; and hence 'Magog' has been
supposed to be a contraction for Mat-Gog, 'the land of Gog' (Sayce, Monuments,
125 f.), or (Z.fiir Ass. 1901, p. 321) for Mat-Gagaia, 'the land of Gagaia,' a people
mentioned on the Tel el-Amarna tablets (KB. v. 5).
" See the map in KAT.^ (or KATJ'); or the excellent one in EtuiB. s-v. Assybia.
8—2
116 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [x. 3, 4
Gomer ; Ashkenaz, and ^Riphath, and Togarmah. 4 And the P
sons of Javan ; Elishah, and Tarshish, Kittim, and ^Dodaiiim.
^ In 1 Chr. i. 6, Diphath. " In 1 Chr. i, 7, Rodanim,
3. The * sons ' of Gomer.
Ashkenaz. Mentioned in Jer. li. 27 by the side of Ararat (see on
viii. 4) and Minni (the Mannai of the Assjo-ian Inscriptions, SE. of
Lake Van) ; and hence doubtless a people living in that neighbourhood.
Thought by many recent iVssyriologists to be the land of Ashguza,
whose prince is mentioned by Esarhaddon as an ally of the Mannai
(KB. II. 129, 147), and whose people may even be identical with the
^KvOaC (see Masp. iii. 343 ; EncB. s.v.).
Riphath (in 1 Ch. i. 6 Diphath). Quite uncertain : understood by
Josephus to denote the Paphlagonians.
Togarmah. Mentioned in Ez. xxxviii. 6, by the side of Gomer,
as forming part of the hosts of Gog ; and in Ez. xxvii. 14, after Yavan,
Tubal, and Meshech, as supplying horses and mules to the T}Tian
merchants. According to ancient Greek authorities (see Dillm.), the
Armenians. For reasons unknown to us, Ashkenaz, Riphath and
Togarmah must have been regarded as offshoots of the Gimirrai.
4, The ' sons ' of Javan.
Elishah. Cf Ez. xxvii. 7, where it is said that purple-stuffs were
brought to Tyre from the ' isles {or coasts) of Elishah.' The mussel
from which the purple-dye was obtained by the ancients abounded on
the coasts of the Pelopounese, especially Laconia (Hor. Od. ii. 18. 7,
al.); but it is difficult to find a locality there both suitable in itself,
and also one the name of which would be likely to be represented in
Heb. by Elishah : 'EA.Xas, 'HXts, and the AioXcis, which have been
suggested, are all, for one reason or another, unsuitable. Syncellus has
a gloss *E\tcrcra ii ov ^ikcXol ; hence Dillm. thinks of lower Ituly and
Sicily. W. Max Miiller and Jastrow (BB. v. 80'') identify with the
Alashia of the Tel el-Amarna letters (25 — 33), i.e., probably, Cyprus.
Tarshish. The place called by the Greeks Tartessus (Hdt. i. 163,
IV. 152), in Spain, beyond the straits of Gibraltar, near the mouth of
the Guadalquivir, connected commercially with the Phoenicians from
an early date, and known to the Hebrews fi'om the time of Solomon
(1 K. X. 22, &c.). Mentioned in Ez. xxvii. 12 as trading with T3Te in
silver (cf Jer. x. 9), iron, tin, and lead (cf Diod. Sic. v. 35, 38) ; and in
Is. Ixvi. 19, Ps. Lxxii. 10, as a typical distant country.
Kittim. I.e. the Kitians, the people of Kit, or Kiti, as it is
termed in Phoenician inscriptions, the Kition of the Greeks, an important
city in Cyprus, xiovn Larnaka. Cf Is. xxiii. 1 ; Jer. ii. 10 ; Ez. xxvii. 6.
Kition itself, and indeed Cyprus generally, as amongst other things
inscriptions shew, was colonized largely by Phoenicians ; but Greeks
were also numerous in the island, which accounts for the Kitians being
ranked here among the ' sous ' of Javan.
Dodanrm. Sam., lxx., and 1 Ch. i. 7, read, no doubt correctly,
Rodanim^ i.e. the Khodians. Rhodes was aheady known to Homer
X. 5, 6] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 117
5 Of the«e were the ^ isles of the nations divided in their lands, P
every one after his tongue ; after their families, in their nations.
6 And the sons of Ham ; Cush, and Mizraun, and Put, and
^ Or, coastla7ids
(II. II. 654 ff.). The Phoenicians came there at an early date ; it
lay on their direct route towards Greece and the West.
5. 0/ these were the isles of the nations divided [. These are the
sons o/Jap/ieth,] in their lands &c. It is almost certam that the words
enclosed in brackets have accidentally dropped out of the text. The
expression * isles ' (or ' coasts ") cannot be naturally understood of the
localities inhabited by the peoples mentioned in w. 2, 3, whereas it is
used frequently of the islands and coasts of the Mediterranean Sea
(Is. xi. 11; Ez. xxvi. 18, xxvii. 3, 6, 7). The words, 'Of these...
divided,' thus refer solely to v. 4, and state that other islands and
coasts towards the West, besides those mentioned in that verse, were
also peopled by 'sons' of Javan. The restored text has at the same
time the advantage of giving a subscription to the enumeration of the
sons of Japheth, similar to those in w. 20, 31.
isles. Or, coast lauds. The word includes both. Arabic seems to
shew that it means properly a deversorium or station ; so that it would
be a term applied naturally to the many harbours, or resting-places,
afforded by the promontories and islands of the Mediterranean Sea.
^ 6—20. The ' sons ' of Ham. In late Psahns (Ixxviii. 51, cv. 23, 27,
cvi. 22) ' Ham ' is a poetical (collective) designation of the Eg)rptians.
The name is very probably the Egyptian Kam-t, Demotic Kemi, Coptic
KHME or XHMI, the native name of Egypt, from kam, 'black,'
with allusion to its dark-coloured soil (/AcAayyatov, Hdt. II. 12 ;
Wiedemann, Ag. Gesch. 22), as opposed to the bright, yellow sand of
the desert. Here, however, 'Ham' appears as the eponymous ancestor,
not of the Egyptians only, but also of a number of other peoples
connected, or supposed to have been connected, with them.
6. Cush. Egypt. Kash, Kesh, the name of a reddish-brown people
(cf Jer. xiii. 23), often mentioned in the Egyptian inscriptions, dwelling
on the S. of Egypt, their N. border being 24° N. at the First Cataract
(Maspero, i. 488 ff.). Often mentioned in the OT. ; and frequently in
EVV. represented (as already in lxx.) by ' Ethiopians,' ' Ethiopia.'
Mizraim. The standing Heb. name for Egypt, — meaning properly
' the two Mizrs,' with reference probably to Upper and Lower Egypt,
the two districts into which the country naturally fell, and which are
frequently so distinguished in the Inscriptions*. In Lower Egypt
(which corresponded generally to what we call the Delta), the
principal seat of government was Memphis (12 miles S. of Cairo); the
capital of Upper Egypt (consisting of the valley of the Nile, S. of the
1 See Rawl. Hist, of Eg. i. 102 n. ; EncB. u. 1233 ; Enaan, Anc. Eg. 60
(illustration of the curious double crown symbolizing the double country). This
is the general view ; but see W. Max Miiller's objection, EncB. iii. 3161 n.
118 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [x. 6
Delta) was Thebes (280 miles S. of Memphis), the brilliant seat of (in
particular) the 18th, 19th and 20th dynasties. The Ass)nrian name
of Egypt was Mlzri, Mizir, Muzur, or Muzru ; and the singular Mazor
occurs in Is. xix. 6, xxxvii. 25 [=2 K. xix. 24]; Mic. vii. 12.
Put. Named elsewhere, by the side of Cush and either the
Lubim or Lud, as a people supplying contingents to the armies of
Egypt (Nah. iii. 9 ; Jer. xlvi. 9 ; Ez. xxx. 5), Tyre (Ez. xxvii. 10), or Gog
(Ez. xxxviii. 5). Probably the Libyans : Lxx. in Jeremiah and Ezekiel
have Aleves ; and the western part of Lower Egypt (the so-called
Libya Aegypti) is called in Coptic Phaiat.
Canaan. The eponymous ancestor of ' Canaan,' i.e. of the country
inhabited by those (see w. 15 — 19) whom we should now distinguish
as Phoenicians and Canaanites. Greek writers, quoting from Phoenician
sources (see Dillm.), state that Xm was the older name of <I>oiVi^ or
<^oivUrj; and the Laodicea N. of Lebanon is called on coins jy3D3 e»n,
'Laodicea that is in Canaan'.' The name Canaan occurs in
Egj^tian Inscriptions, and (in the form Kinahhi) in the Tel el-Amarna
correspondence. It appears to have denoted originally the low coast-
land of what was afterwards known as Phoenicia and Palestine, — though
both ' Canaan ' and ' Canaanite ' acquired afterwards a more extended
signification. See further the writer's Commentary on Deut., p. 11 f. ;
and Canaa^t in the EncB.
The Phoenicians (and Canaanites) were beyond all question a
Semitic people, and spoke a language closely allied to Hebrew : why
therefore are they classed here among the descendants of Ham?
Different answers have been returned to this question. (1) Religious
antagonism, and a sense of moral and political superiority to a race
whom they felt that they had superseded (see on ix. 25) may have
led the Hebrews to assign the Canaanites to a different stock from
themselves. (2) Tliere was much intercourse in ancient times between
Phoenicia and Egypt (cf Is. xxiii. 3, 5) ; and the marks of Egyptian
influence are strongly impressed upon Phoenician art": a racial con-
nexion may consequently have been supposed to subsist between the
two peoples. (3) Dillm. points out that there was an ancient tradition
(Hdt. I. 1, vn. 89) that the Phoenicians were immigrants from the
parts about the Red Sea ; and supposes that the genealogy ' reflects a
consciousness that the ancestry of the Canaanites was not that of the
Israelites.' Upon the whole, it is most probable that the origin here
assigned to the Phoenicians and Canaanites is due to the joint operation
of (1) and (2)».
1 For instances in the OT. in which Canaan or Canaanite means in particular
Phoenicia or Phoenician, see Is. xxiii. 11 ; Hos. xii. 7 (RVm.) ; Ob. 20.
2 See Perrot and Chipiez, Art in Phoenicia, i. 73, 77, 80, 125, 126 ff., 183—9,
211, 246, 382—4, ii. 5, 6, 10 f., 12, 364, 449'' (ludex) ; Phoenicia in EncB., § 8.
» If (as has been supposed by HaI6vy, Sayce, and Hommel) it were due to a
recollection of the political dependence of Canaan upon Egypt during the 15th
cent. B.C., as attested by the Tel el-Amarna letters, we should, as Dillm. remarks,
have expected Canaan to be represented, not as a brother of Miziaim (implying
equality) but as his son.
x.6-8] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 119
Canaan. 7 And the sons of Cush ; Seba, and Havilah, and P
Sabtah, and Raamah, and Sabteca : and the sons of Raamah ;
Sheba, and Dedan. | 8 And Cush begat Nimrod : he began to J
7. The ' sons ' of Cush. Several of these are Arahian tribes ; and
that there was intercourse between the opposite sides of the Red Sea
is attested, at least for a period later than that here referred to, by
the evidence of language : the (post-Christian) Ge'ez, or ' Ethiopic,'
being obviously a sister language to the languages spoken by the
Sabaeans and Minaeans in the S. of Ambia.
8eha. Mentioned in Ps. Ixxii. 10 (beside ShSba), and in Is. xhii. 3,
xlv. 14 (beside Egypt and Cush); and since Josephus {Ant. ii. 10. 2)
commonly identified with Meroe (about 100 m. N. of the modern
Khartoum). There is however no evidence that Meroe was ever called
Seba ; and it is better (with Di.) to understand by Seba a branch
of the Cushites settled on the W. coast of the Red Sea: Strabo
(xvi. 4. 8, 10) speaks of a Xt/x^v 2a,/3a, and a 2a/3ai ttoXcs tvfuyedijs, on
the Adulitic Gulf, about 15° 45' N. in Spruner's Atlas.
Hav'ildh. This tribe has perhaps left traces of its name in the
ko'Xttos AvakiT-qs, and the 'APaXlrai, on the African coast, a Httle S.
of the Straits of Bab el-Mandeb. The name will appear again among
the Joktanidae (v. 29; cf ii. 11, xxv. 18), seemingly as that of a tribe
in NE. xlrabia: unless, therefore, the two names are entirely uncon-
nected, we must suppose probably that this was a large tribe, part of
which migrated to the E. coast of Africa, carrying its name with it.
Sabtah. Unknown, — unless, indeed, we may think of 2a/3aTa
(Strabo xvi. 4. 2), or Sabota, in Sabaean nuK', capital of the Chatra-
motitae (see on v. 26), which ' had 60 temples, and was an emporium
of the trade in frankincense' (Pliny, BN. vi. § 155, xii. § 63).
Ra'mah. Mentioned with Sh6ba, in Ez. xxvii. 22, as a trading
people, who brought spices, precious stones, and gold, to Tyre. Very
probably the Sabaean Raamah, the 'Pa/A/Aavtrai of Strabo xvi. 4. 24,
N. of the Chatramotitae (on v. 26), in Spruner c. 65° E., 17° 30' N.
Sabtechah. Not identified.
Shebd. Most probably a northern offshoot, or colony, of the
S. Arabian Sheba mentioned in v. 28 (where see the note), which
on account of its being settled near Dedan (cf Ez. xxxviii. 13),
came to be grouped genealogically with it. In xxv. 3 (J), the same
two tribes appear as ' sons ' of Abraham's concubine, Keturah.
Dedan. Mentioned (besides xxv. 3), — mostly as near either Edom
or Tema (see on xxv. 15), some 250 miles SE. of Edom, — in Jer.
xxv. 23, xlix. 8 ; and, as a trading tribe, in Is. xxi. 13 (note Tema in
V. 14), Ez. xxvii. 20, xxxviii. 13. A district Dedan is mentioned several
times in the Sabaean and Minaean inscriptions, and a ruined site
Daiddn by the Arab, geographer YakUt (see references in Dillm. ;
and add Hommel, ART. 239 f.), both seemingly somewhere near
T§ma.
120 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [x. 8-10
be a mighty one in the earth. 9 He was a mighty hunter J
before the Lord : wherefore it is said, Like Nimrod a mighty
hunter before the Lord. 10 And the beginning of his king-
dom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Cahieh, in the
8 — 12. A digression. Origin of the empires of Babylon, and
Assyria.
8. Gush. It is very strange that Ethiopia {v. 6) should be
mentioned as the home of Nimrod, and through him {tv. 10 — 12) of
the civilization of Babylonia and Assyria : and so nearly all recent
Assyriologists — as Friedr. Delitzsch (Faradies, 53 f ), Schrader (KA T."
87 f), Haupt, Hommel, Winckler, Sayce (Monuments, 128) — suppose
that 'Gush' in v. 8 denotes really not the African Gush, but the
Babylonian Kasshu, the Koo-o-atoi of the classical ^Titers (Strabo xi.
13. 6, &c.), a predatory and warlike tribe, dwelling in the wild
mountains of the Zagros in or near Elam, and often mentioned in the
inscriptions, who were so influential in early times that they even
provided Babylon with a Une of kings which continued in power for
576 years (e.g. 1761 — 1186, according to Thureau-Dangin ; similarly
Ungnad and Meyer); and that the identification of this 'Gush' — or, as
it would be better pronounced, 'Gash' — with the 'Gush' of vv. 6, 7 is
due to a misunderstanding on the part of the compiler of the chapter.
Nimrod. Mentioned only once again, Mic. v. 6 (the 'land of
Nimrod ' ; ir Assyria '). See further p. 122 I
a migJdy one. To be understood, apparently, in connexion with
V. 10 : Nimrod's 'might' shewed itself in his power of governing men
and organizing a kingdom.
9. A parenthesis, describing how Nimrod was also, in particular,
'mighty' as a hunter, and explaining a pi'overb which had reference
to this.
before Jehovah. I.e. as He looked upon him, and (it is implied)
had some regard for him. Gf vii. 1, 2 K. v. 1 ; also Jon. iii. 3.
Like Nimrod. This is the proverb : the words following are the
narrator's explanation of its meaning. When the Hebrews wished to
describe a man as being a great hunter, they spoke of him as 'like
Nimrod.'
10. Babel. The Heb. form of the name which, following the
Greeks, we call Babylon. The origin of Babylon is shrouded in
obscurity ; but it must have been a place of great antiquity. The
date of the earliest king of Babylon known to us, Sumu-abi, the founder
of the first dynasty (p. 156 n. 1), was c. 2232—2219 B.C. (see ibid.); but
there is little doubt that the city itself was older.
Erech. Lxx. Opcx; the Babylonian Uruk, now the ruined site
called Warka, on the left bank of the Euphrates, about 100 miles
SE. of Babylon ; the ruins, which shew remains of large and decorated
Ijuildings, and are some 6 miles in circumference, shew that it must have
been an important place. It was a place of greater antiquity than even
X. lo, ii] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 121
land of Shinar. 11 Out of that land ^he went forth into J
Assyria, and builded Nineveh, and Rehoboth-Ir, and Calah,
* Or, went forth Asshur
Babylon is (at present) known to have been : Hilprecht has discovered
recently contemporary inscriptions shewing that Lugalzaggisi made
Erech the capital of Babylonia at (probably) about 4000 B.C.'
Accad. This has for long been well known as the name of a
district, ' the land of Akkad ' in the standing title of the Assyrian
kings ('king of Shumer and Akkad') denoting northern Babylonia;
but a decree of Nebuchadnezzar I. (c. 1150 B.C.) has recently been
found, in which it is mentioned also as the name of a city, though its
site is uncertain, and nothing further is at present known about it.
Calneh. Uncertain : though Delitzsch and Tiele think that it
may be the place usually called Zirlaba or Zarilab, mentioned by
Hammurabi (c. B.C. 2100), and also several times by Sargon (e.g.
KB. II. 53), the characters of which admit, however, of being read
ideographically as Kalunu. From the connexion in which Sargon
mentions Zirlaba, it seems to have been somewhere near Babylon.
Shin'dr. A Hebrew name for Babylonia, recurring xi. 2, xiv. 1, 9,
Jos. vii. 21, Is. xi. 11, Zech. v. 11, Dan. i. 2. The explanation of the
name is uncertain, as nothing exactly corresponding has been found
hitherto in the inscriptions. Some Assyriologists regard it as a
dialectic variation of the Shumer, quoted above : Prof. Sayce connects
it with Sangar, a district a little W. of Nineveh.
11, 12. How Assyria was founded, or, as we might say, colonized,
from Babylonia.
Nineveh. The great capital of Ass3rria, beautified and made famous
by (especially) Sennacherib, Esarhaddon, and Asshurbanipal, on the
left bank of the Tigris, about 250 miles NW. of Babylon. The site of
the ruins is now called Kouyunjik. Nineveh, however, was not the
most ancient capital of Assyria. The original capital of Assyria was
the 'city of Asshur' (cf on ii. 14), about 60 miles S. of Nineveh:
Shalmanetier I. (b.c. 1300) transferred the royal residence from Asshur
to Calah ; but Nineveh is not known to have been made a royal
residence till B.C. 1100, and it was not the permanent capital tiU the
time of Sennacherib. The earliest ruler of Assyria at present [1909]
known, who is styled 'king,' is Ilu-shuuia, c. 2220 B.C.
liehobotk-^Ir. To all appearance, simply two Heb. words meaning
' broad places [see on xix. 2] of a city ' : perhaps (Delitzsch, Paradies,
260 f; Hommel, Gesch. 280) the 'rebit Nina,' or suburbs of Nineveh
on the N. side, which Esarhaddon states that he entered on his
return from one of his expeditions {KB. n. 127, 1. 54; cf. p. 47, 1. 44).
Calah. Shewn by inscriptions found on the spot to have lain in
the fork between the Tigris on the W. and the Upper Zab on the E.,
about 18 miles S. of Nineveh, under the mounds now bearing the name
of Nimrud. Calah was bdilt, as Asshurnasirpal (b.c. 885 — 860) tells
""Rogers, Hist, of Bajf. and As*. (1900), i. 354 f.; cf. EncB. i. 442 f. (§ 47).
122 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [x. n
12 and Resen between Nineveh and Calah (the same is the./
great city).
us {KB. I. 117), by Slialmaneser I. {c. 1300 B.C.). Palaces were erected
here by Asshurnasirpal and many subsequent kings, from the ruins of
which numerous sculptures, bas-reliefs, inscriptions, &c., have been
recovered. Calah, even when it was not actually the capital, was, after
Nineveh, the ' second city of the empire.' The famous Black Obelisk,
which stands now in a conspicuous position in the British Museum,
and mentions the tribute of Jehu, was found at Calah, having been
erected there by Slialmaneser 11. (860 — 825). Cf. Maspero, iii. 44 — 50
(with illustrations).
12. Resen. Stated to have been 'between Nineveh and Calah' ; and
this is virtually all that is known about it : the ruins of Selamiyeh,
about 3 miles N. of Nimrild, would suit the description ; but there
is no monumental evidence that this was the site. The Ri-ish-i-ni,
suggested by Prof. Sayce {Monuments, 152), does not seem to be in a
suitable position ; for, to judge from the terms in which it is mentioned
by Sennacherib {KB. n. 117), it would seem to have been on the north
of Nineveh, and not, therefore, ' between ' Nineveh and Calah.
that (i.e. the four places just mentioned) is tJie great city. Mounds,
marking the sites of ancient buildings, and other signs of a once
abundant population, are numerous about Nineveh ; and it seems that
the four places here named, although in reality some miles apart, were
so connected with one another that they were reckoned, at least by
foreigners, as forming a single great city.
As the preceding notes will have shewn, the Babylonian and Assyrian
monuments illustrate, though not completely, the geographical data contained
in these five verses, but they throw very little light on the historical statements
contained in them, and indeed in details conflict with them seriously. The
two broad facts which the verses express, — viz. that Babylonia was the oldest
seat of civilization in the great plain of the two rivers, and that Nineveh was
(so to say) colonized from it, are indeed in harmony with what we learn from
the monuments : politically as well as in its whole civilization, writing, and
religion, Assyria in early times was dependent upon Babylonia. But these
verses of Genesis connect the foundation of Babylonian civilization and its
extension to Nineveh with a single man, Nimrod; and on Nimrod, the
monuments at present are silent. They do not even associate together, as the
text of Genesis does, the four Babylonian cities on the one hand, and the
four Assyrian cities on the other, or lead us to infer that all were built
approximately at the same time. Nimrod must have been to the Hebrews
(cf. Mic. V. 6) a figure — whether mytliical or historical, we cannot say — with
whom were associated dim recollections of the foundation and extension of
political power in the East, and who, for some reason unknown to us, was
viewed as the representative of old Babylonian power.
As regards the question, who Nimrod was, two theories may be mentioned.
According to Haupt and Sayce, he is JSazi marutlash, one of the later
Kasshite kings (c. 1350 B.O.), who, it is conjectured, may have 'planted his
X. .3] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 123
power so firmly in Palestine as to be remembered iu the proverbial lore of the
country.' This is possible only under the condition that the verses embody a
very confused and inaccurate recollection of the facts. For Nimrod is placed
at the beginning of Babylonian and Assyrian civilization ; but Nazi-maruttash
lived long afterwards : Babylon and Nineveh had both been built centuries
before him, — the Kaashite dj-nasty alone had been established in Babylon for
some 400 years. The other theory (which was first propounded by the late
Mr George Smith) is that Nimrod corresponded, not, of course, in name, but
in personality and character, to Gilgamesh\ the champion of Brech, and hero
of the famous mythological epic, of which the Deluge-story occupies the
11 th canto. In this epic Gilgaraesh is depict od as a mighty hunter who, besides
engaging in successful combat with lions, leopards, and other monsters, delivers
Babylonia by his prowess from the yoke of Elam, and saves Erech'''. And Erech
is just one of the cities of Nimrod's kingdom. Gilgamesh is not known at
present to have borne any name resembling Nimrod ; and so the last-mentioned
theory remains for the present a conjecture ; but it is an attractive and
probable one. It remains a diflBculty that Nimrod should be connected with
the Kasshu ; for both Babylon and Nineveh had been founded long before the
Kasshite dynasty was established in Babylon. Perhaps the name Nimrod
may have first reached Palestine at a time when the long-continued Kasshite
supremacy, as attested by the Tel el-Amarna letters, caused the Kasshu to be
regarded as synonymous with the Babylonians 3.
13 And Mizraim begat Ludim, and Anamim, and Lehabim, J
13, 14. The tribes 'begotten' by Mizraim, Ham's second 'son.'
The verses form evidently the sequel to v. 7.
Ludim. Elsewhere mostly in the sing. Lud, mentioned as archers in
the Egyptian or T3Tian army (Jer. xlvi. 9 ; Ez. xxvii. 10, xxx. 5), usually
by the side of Cush and Put {v. 6), and as a distant people (Is. Ixvi. 19).
Not identified; but doubtless a tribe bordering upon Egypt on the
West, and known to the Hebrews as mercenaries*.
'Anamim. Unidentified. W. Max Midler {Orient. LiU.-zeit. 1902,
p. 471 ff.) conjectures Kenamim, the inhabitants of the S. and largest
Oasis of Knmt (now el-Khargeh, about 120 m. W. of Luxor).
Lehabim. No doubt the same as the Luhim of Nah. iii. 9 ; 2 Ch.
xii. 3, xvi. 8 ; Dan. xi. 43 ; and in all probability the Libyans, properly
so called, whose home would be to the W. of the Put of v. 6.
Naphtuhim. Uncertain. Erman {ZATW. 1890, p. 118 f.) con-
jectures a scribal error for Pathmuhim, the inhabitants of the ' north-
land ' (temki), or the Delta : W. Max Miiller would read Pathnuhim, the
inhabitants of the Oasis of To-ehe, now Farafra.
1 The ideosrapbicaily written name was read formerlv as Izdubar or Gisdubar.
2 See Maspero, i. 573—591.
^ See further an art. by the writer in the Guardian, May 20, 1896.
* Sayce (Monuments, 134 f.) supposes the Ludim to be the Lydians (of Asia
Minor), who (KB. ri. 177) sent mercenaries to assist Psammetichiis (c. 658 B.C.).
But it does not appear that these were of sufficient importance to lead to the sup-
position that the Lydians were 'begotten ' by Egypt (of. Maspero, rii. 424 f., 492).
124 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [x. 13-16
and Naphtuhim, 14 and Pathrusim, and Casluhim (whence J
went forth ^the Philistines), and Caphtorim.
15 And Canaan begat Zidon his firstborn, and Heth ; 16 [and R
^ Heb. Pelishtitn,
14. Pathrusim. The inhabitants of Pathros (Is. xi. 11; Jer. xliv.
1, 15; Ez. xxix. 14, xxx. 14), Egypt. Pa-to-ris, 'the south-laud'
{pa being the Egypt, art., to meaning 'land,' and ris 'south'), i.e. what
we call Upper Egypt.
Casluhim. Unidentified: see doubtful conjectures in Dillm. lxx.
Xaa-/xwvi€t/A, whence Miiller would read Nasamonim (Hdt. iv. 172).
{whence went forth the Philistines). This clause is in all probability
misplaced; and ought to be transposed so as to follow Caphtm-im:
see Am. ix. 7 ; Dt. ii. 23 ; Jer. xlvii. 4,
the Philistines. Mentioned often in the historical books, their
five principal cities being Ekron, Gath, Ashdod, Ashkelon, and Gaza,
in the plain bordering on the Medit. Sea, W. of Judah. They are
very probably (W. M. Miiller, 387—390; Maspero, n. 462—4; Sayce,
Monument!^, 183, 387, and elsewhere) the Purasati of the Egyptian
inscriptions— to judge from the terms in which they are there spoken
of, a plundering people who, coming from the SW. of Asia Minor, and
the islands of the Aegean Sea, in the reign of Ramses III. (c. 1200 B.C.),
swept down upon the SW. of Palestine, and secured a footing there.
The Hebrews, as appears from Am. ix. 7, Dt. ii. 23, Jer. xlvii. 4 — if
not (see above) from the present passage as well — regarded them specifi-
cally as immigrants fi:om ' Caphtor.' See further EncB. s.v.
Caphtorim. The inhabitants of Caphtor (Jer. xlvii. 4), mentioned
also Am. ix. 7; Dt. ii. 23. Caphtor is usually identified with Crete;
notice how in 1 S. xxx. 14, Zeph. ii. 5, Ez. xxv. 16 the Philistines are
eitlier parallel to, or mentioned beside, Krethim (i.e., as it would seem,
'Cretans'). W. Max Miiller, however {Asien u. Ewopa, 344 — 53),
argues strongly in favour of identifying Caphtor with the Eg}^t. Kef to,
which appears to have been the name of a people inhabiting Cilicia and
Cyprus (cf Caphtor in the EncB., where another explanation of Krethim
is also proposed). Whatever place ' Caphtor' may have been, political
relations, subsisting anciently between it and Egypt, no doubt determined
the statement that Mizraim ' begat ' Caphtor.
15 — 19. The places, or peoples, ' begotten ' by Canaan, the
eponymous ancestor (p. 118), both of the Phoenicians, and of the
Canaanites (in the sense in which this term is commonly understood).
15. Zidon. The oldest Phoen. city; hence called here Canaan's
' firstborn.' It was afterwards eclipsed by Tyre ; but the Phoenicians
generally, as if in recollection of its old pre-eminence, continued
stiU to be often spoken of as 'Zidonians' (1 Ki. v. 6, xvi. 31). Tyre,
however, is mentioned, as well as Zidon, in the Tel el-Amarna letters
(B.C. 1400). See further the interesting art. Phoenicia in EncB.
Heth. The great nation of the Hittites, whose home was in the
region N. of Phoenicia, and of the 'land of the Amorites' (see on v. 16),
X. r6, 17] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 125
the Jebusite, and the Amorite, and the Girgasliite ; 17 and the B
two of whose principal cities were Carchemish on the Euphrates, and
Kadesh on the Orontes, and who left traces of their presence, in
sculptures and inscriptions carved unon the rocks, in many parts of
Asia Minor, as far W. as the Karaoel pass, a little E. of Smyrna.
The Hittites are mentioned repeatedly in the Egyptian and Assyrian
inscriptions; and their power and importance may be inferred from
the terms of the treaty — the oldest treaty in existence — concluded with
them by Ramses II., after his expedition into Syria (see Masp. 11. 401 f.).
The Hittite power lasted from c. 1600 to c. 700 B.C., when they were
absorbed into the empire of Assyria. The Hittites, as depicted on
their monuments, have a striking physiognomy and dress : a retreating
forehead and chin, full lips, large nose, high cheek-bones, and the hair
plaited behind in three pig-tails, the type being that of the Mongol,
very unlike either the Semitic or the Aryan type'. The Hittite
inscriptions (still undeciphered) are also peculiar in appearance, and
entirely different from those of either Assyria or Egypt. These Hittites
on the N. of Palestine are alluded to in 1 K. x. 29, xi. 1, 2 K. "vdi. 6;
and offshoots of them appear to have had settlements in the extreme
N. of Canaan (Jud. i. 26, iii. 3 [read Hittite for Hivite]; Josh. xi. 3
[interchange, with lxx., Hittite and Hivite] ; and probably 2 S. xxiv. 6
[see Comm., or the Variorum Bible]): there are also aUusions to them,
which occasion difficulty, as settled in the S. of Canaan (see on
ch. xxiii.). We cannot be sure whether the reference here is to the
great nation in the N., or to the offshoots in the N. of Canaan — the sub-
ordination of ' Heth ' to ' Canaan ' might favour the latter alternative.
16, 17^ Four nations of Canaan.
16. the Jebusite. The name of the tribe which occupied Jerusalem,
and maintained itself there till expelled by David (Josh. xv. 8, 63;
2 S. V. 6— 9)._
the Amwite. The name (under the forms Amo/r, Amurru) occurs
in both the Egypt, and the Ass. inscriptions. In the Tel el-Amarna
letters (b.c. 1400), the 'land of Amurri' is mentioned by the side of
various Phoen. and Syrian towns in such a manner as to shew that it
is simply the name of a canton or district, N. of Canaan, behind
Phoenicia. It was at this time (like the rest of Phoen. and Palestine)
under Egyptian rule ; and its governor Aziri addresses many letters to
Amenophis^ Afterwards, the Amorites appear to have extended them-
selves southwards ; and in the OT. the term is used in two connexions :
(1) Nu. xxi. 13, and often, of the people ruled by Sihon, on the E. of
Jordan; (2) as a general designation of the pre-Israelitish population
of the country W. of Jordan (so esp. in E and Dt. ; but occasionally
also besides: see e.g. ch. xiv. 7, xv. 16, xlviii. 22; Dt. i. 7; Jos. x. 5;
1 S. vii. 14; Am. ii. 9, 10; and cf. the writer's Deuterono/ni/, p. 11 f.). So
1 See, for fuller particulars, Wright's Empire of the Hittites (with numerous
illustrations) ; Maspero, ii. 351 — 9 ; Ball, 95 — 98 ; and Hittites in EncB. and DB.
2 See Petrie, Syria and Egypt from the Tell el Aviarna Utters (1898), pp. 136 f.,
140 f. ; and cf. CANAANiiis (^§ 7 — 11) in the EncB.
126 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [x. 17, .8
Hivite, and the Arkite, and the Sinite ; 18 and the Arvadite, R
and the Zemarite, and the Hamathite :] and afterward were the J
far as we can judge, this population consisted in the main (for there
were no doubt smaller local tribes as well) partly of 'Amorites,'
and partly of ' Canaanites ' (see on v. 18) ; and some winters used the
one, and some the other (cf. on xii. 6), as a general designation of the
pre-Israelitish inhabitants of Palestine',
the Girgashite. A tribe mentioned also five times (ch. xv. 21 ;
Dt. vii. 1 ; Josh. iii. 10, xxiv. 11 ; Neh. ix. 8) in the lists of the peoples
dispossessed by the Israelites (see on xv. 19 — 21); but without any
indication of the locality in which it dwelt.
17*. the Hivite. A petty people mentioned likewise often in the
same lists (Ex. iii. 8, 17, &c.); but also appearing in particular in
Shechem (ch. xxxiv. 2) and Gibeon (Josh, ix. 7, xi. 19), and hence
probably settled in central Palestine.
17^, 18. The inhabitants of five cities — four in northern Phoenicia,
and one (Hamath) N. of that.
17^ the Arkite. "KpKq, now Tel Arha, about 80 miles N. of Zidon,
at the foot of Lebanon, still an important city in the Roman period, the
birthplace of Alexander Severus (a.d. 222 — 235). Both Arka, and the
following Sin and Zemar, are mentioned together by Tiglath-pileser III.
{KB. II. 29, 1. 46) as cities on the sea-coast.
the Sinite. 'Jerome {Quaest. in Gen., ad loc.) states that Sin, as
the name of a once prosperous city, still attached to a site near Arka;
and Breydenbach, in 1483, found a village of Syn about 2 miles from
Nahr Arka' (Dillm.). Ass. Siannu {KB. I.e.).
18*. the Arvadite. Arvad (now Ruad), about 25 miles N. of Arka,
was the most northerly of the great Phoen. towns ; it was built on an
island ('in the midst of the sea,' KB. i. 109), and was always famous
as a maritime state: Tiglath-pileser I. (c. 1100 B.C.), for instance,
embarked on ships of Arvad upon the Great Sea ; see also Ez. xxvii. 8,
11; Hdt. VII. 98, and Strabo xvi. 2. 12 — 14. It is mentioned in the
Tel el-Amarna letters; and also frequently by the Ass. kings. See
further EncB. s.v. ; and a plan, shewing the island, in Masp. 11. 170.
the Zemarite. The city or fortress of ^tfjivpa, 2t'/Aupos (Strabo xvi.
2. 12, &c.), 6 miles S. of Arvad; the name is still preserved in a village
Sumra (Bad. Pal.* 442). This place is mentioned very frequently in
the Tel el-Amarna letters; see Petrie, 157, 183, s.v. Tsumura, Tsumur.
the Hamathite. Hdmdth, on the Orontes, 50 miles ENE. of Arvad,
the later Epiphaneia, now Hamd, often mentioned both in the OT.,
and also in the Egypt, and Ass. inscriptions: in ancient times, the
capital of an independent kingdom (cf. Is. xxxvii. 13; its 'kings' are
also mentioned in the Ass. inscriptions), and still a large place of
1 It may be noticed that 'Amorite' is a racial name (i.e. it denotes a race or
people so called), while 'Canaanite' is a geographical aarue (i.e. it denotes the
people inhabiting the country called 'Cauuan').
X. 18-^0 THE BOOK OF GENESIS 127
families of the Canaanite spread abroad. 19 And the border of J
the Canaanite was from Zidon, as thou goest toward Gerar, unto
Gaza ; as thou goest toward Sodom and Gomorrah and Admah
and Zeboiim, unto Lasha. | 20 These are the sons of Ham, after P
their families, after their tongues, in their lands, in their
nations.
21 And unto Shem, the father of all the children of Eber, J
30,000 inhabitants. The ' entering-in of Hamath ' is often mentioned
(e.g. Am. vi. 14) as the ideal N. limit of Isr. territory, though the
exact place denoted by the expression is uncertain {DB. iv. 269 f )'.
IS**. The families of the 'Canaanite' — here and -y. 19 used evidently
in its narrower and more usual sense, exclusive of the Phoenicians —
increased, and gradually extended themselves over what is now generally
known as ' Canaan ' ; and v. Id defines their S. hmits.
19. The two limits of the Canaanites in the S. are Gaza in the
SW., in the direction of Gerar, and Lesha'* in the SE., in the direction
of Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboiim. Gerar was some distance
SE. of Gaza : on its probable actual site, see on xx. 1. Lesha' is not
mentioned elsewhere ; according to the Targ. Ps.-Jon. and Jerome, it
was the later Callirrhoe, a celebrated bathing resort, with hot springs
(Jos. £J. I. 33. 5), on the E. side of the Dead Sea, near the mouth
of the Wady Zerka Ma'in. Sodom and Gomorrah were in all proba-
bility at the S. end of the Dead Sea (see p. 170 f ). Admah and
Zeboiim, destroyed at the same time as Sodom and Gomorrah, are
mentioned also in ch. xiv. 2, 8, Dt. xxix. 23, Hos. xi. 8.
21 — 31. The sons of Shem. The double introduction (vv. 21, 22)
is a clear indication of the double origin of this section of the chapter :
V. 22 is the introduction to the list of the sons of Shem, exactly
analogous in form to vv. 2, 6; and v. 21 is out of place before it.
Verses 22, 23 belong to P; v. 21 (analogous in form to iv. 26) belongs
to J.
21. all the children of 'Eber. The expression includes, of course,
all the Arabian tribes mentioned vv. 25 — 30, as well as (see xi. 16 — 26)
the descendants of Abraham, i.e. the Israehtes, Ishmaelites, Midianites
(xxv. 2), and Edomites; but no doubt the writer has his own nation
chiefly in view, and the words are intended to bring out the significance
of Shem as the ancestor of the ' Hebrews,' the people who possessed the
knowledge of the true God. 'Eber is simply the supposed eponymous
ancestor of the Hebrews, the first letter in the original being the same
in both words : see further on xi. 14.
* It is probable that vv. 16 — 18* (to Hamathite) are an addition to the original
text of J, inserted by one who thought the list of names imperfect : notice (1) that
V. 16 anticipates v. 18'' ; (2) that the five peoples named in vv. l?*" — 18' dwelt
North of Sidon, and are consequently not included in the terms of v. 19; and
(3) that and afterward in v. 18 connects better with v. 15 end than with vv. 16 — 18*.
' Laiha' is the ' pausal ' form : the name itself would be L6slui\
128 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [x. ii, «
Hhe elder brother of Japlieth, to him also were children bom. | J
22 The sons of Shem ; Elam, and Asshur, and Arpachsliad, and P
^ Or, the brother of Japheth the elder
the elder brother of Japheth. The words are added in order to
preclude the idea that, because named last, Shem was therefore the
youngest.
22. Mam. A land and people E. of Babylonia, and NE. of the
Persian Gulf, of which the capital was Susa (Heb. Shushan), on the
Eulaeus : in Ass. Mama, Elamma, or (with the fem. term.) Elamtu.
This people early developed a flourishing and many-sided civiUzation :
at a remote period (? 3800 B.C.), — though not before they had invented
a system of writing, — they were subjugated by Sargon of Agadfe ; and
the early Elamite princes (many of whose names have recently been
recovered) style themselves patesi's ('priest-kings,' or 'viceroys'),
shewing that they were dependent upon Babylonia. Asshurbanipal
tells us that an Elamite king, Kudur-nanchundi, 1635 years before
himself (= B.C. 2280), invaded Babylonia, and pillaged many temples ;
and not long after we find Elamite rulers firmly established in S. Baby-
lonia, till their power was broken by Hammurabi (below, p. 156 f) and
his successor Samsu-iluna (b.c. 2087 — 2050)\ In later times Elam is
mentioned repeatedly both in the Ass. inscriptions and in the OT.
(ch. xiv. I; Is. xi. 11, xxi. 2, xxii. 6; Ez. xxxii. 24, al.). Racially, the
Elamites were entirely distinct from the Semites, their language, for
instance, being agglutinative and belonging to a different family: their
geographical proximity to Assyria is no doubt the reason why they are
here included among the ' sons ' of Shem.
Asshur. The great nation of the Assyrians (in Heb. Asshur) : see
on V. 11. The Assyrians were a Semitic people, their language belong-
ing obviously to the same family as Hebrew, Phoenician, Aramaic,
Arabic, and Ethiopic.
Atyachshad. A name still not satisfactorily explained. It is very
commonly understood of 'AppaTraxtrts (Ptol. vi. 1. 2), a mountainous
district on the Upper Zab, N. of Nineveh (about 37° 30' N.), in the
Ass. inscriptions Arrapha (Paradies, 124 £), now Albdk ; but this
explanation leaves the -shad unexplained. It is, on the whole, more
probable that the name is intended as that of the supposed ancestor of
the Kasdim (EVV. ' Chaldaeans '), the people who, living originally in
the 'sea-land,' on the lower course of the Euphrates, spread afterwards
inland, and in the 7 — 6 cent. B.C. became the ruling caste in Babylonia
(see more fully on xi. 31)^^. See further v. 24, and on xi. 10.
1 See Scheil, Textes Elamites-Semitiquei (1900), pp. ix. — xii. ; or the account of
M. de Morgan's excavations in 1897 — 1899, by St Chad Boscawen, in the Asiatic
Quarterly Review , Oct. 1901, p. 380 ff.; liing in King and Hall'« Eiiifpt and Western
Asia in thf Light of Recent Discoveries (1907), pp. 221—229, 229—233 (on the
' Proto-Elamite ' system of writing), 234 — 246; Meyer, Gesch. d. Altertums^, i. ii.
(1909), pp. 408—410, 541—544, 551— 55(), 557 f., 563 top.
" Prof. Sayce offers conjectures on the name in the Exp. Times, Nov. 1901,
p. G5f., Feb. 1907, p. 232.
X. «, 23] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 129
Lud, and Aram. 23 And the sons of Aram ; Uz, and Hiil, and P
Lud must, it seems, be the Lydians of Asia Minor, of whom
Herodotus (i. 6 — 94) has much to say, and who first emerge into
history c. 740 B.C. (Maspero, ni. 336 — 341); though why they should
be mentioned between Arpachshad and Aram, or, indeed, reckoned to
Shem at all, is by no means apparent. Hdt., however (i. 7), mentions
a legend connecting the ancestors of the Mermnadae with ' Ninus, son
of Belus ' ; and it is possible that the civilization of Lydia may, in ways
not at present capable of being more precisely determined, have been
related to that of Assyria ; and that this fact may be the explanation
of the appearance of the name here*.
Aram. The great Aramaean, or Syrian', people, spread widely
over the region NE. .of Palestine, as far as Mesopotamia — special
branches being designated by special names, as 'Aram of the Two
Rivers,' 'Aram of Damascus,' 'Aram of Zobah' (ch. xxiv. 10; 2 S. viii.
5, X. 6). The most important and powerful of the Aramaean (Syrian)
kingdoms in OT. times was that of Damascus, of which we read so
often during the period of the Kings. From the 8 th cent. B.C., if not
from an earlier date, Aramaean influence extended itself considerably
in different directions: weights with their value stamped upon them
in Aramaic shew that it was used as the language of commerce in
Nineveh; Is. xxxvi. 11 shews that in B.C. 701 it was also the language
of diplomacy: inscriptions, in different x\ramaic dialects, found at
Zinjirli, near Aleppo (of the age of Isaiah), in Eg5rpt (c. 480 B.C., and
later), and of somewhat later dates at Palmyra, Tema (see on xxv. 15),
and El-'Ola (the Nabataean inscriptions of NW. Arabia) testify to the
wide diffusion of Aramaic around Palestine; after the Exile, the Jews
gradually acquired the use of Aramaic from their neighbours, so that
parts of Ezra and Daniel are actually written in an Aramaic dialect,
while other books belonging to the same period (as Jonah, Chronicles,
Esther, the Heb. parts of Daniel, Ecclesiastes, and late Psalms) shew
the clearest indications of its influence.
23. Four branches of Aram are here specified, which were, pre-
sumably, of some note at the time when the genealogy was drawn up,
though now three out of the four are virtually unknown.
'tlz. Best known as the people of Job's fatherland (Job i. 1); as
may be inferred from Lam. iv. 21, also, settled not very far from Edom.
Jer. xxv. 20 (MT.) mentions kings of the land of 'Uz: see also Gen.
xxii. 21, xxxvi. 28. Hul and Gether are both unknown. Mash is
perhaps connected with the Mons Masius, to MaVtov opos (Strabo xi.
14. 2), N. of Nisibis, a range which separates Armenia from Mesopotamia
(Paradies, 259). In Ass., mat Mash, the ' land of Mash,' is the name
of the great Syro- Arabian desert, ' a land of thirst and faintness, where
1 Sayce {Mon. 146, cf. 95, 105) would read Nod (cf, iv. 16) for Lud, supposing
•Nod' to represent the Manda, or nomad tribes (cf. on xiv. 1), of the Inscriptions,
The identification of Nod with Manda is, however, itself anything but probable.
2 Syria, Syrian, in the OT. is in the Heb. always 'Ardm, 'Arammi (Aramaean),
D. 9
130 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [x. 23-29
Gether, and Mash. | 24 And Arpachshad ^begat Shelah ; and P «>
Shelah begat Eber. 25 And unto Eber were bom two sons :
the name of the one was ^Peleg ; for in his days was the earth
divided ; and his brother's name was Joktan. 26 And Joktan
begat Almodad, and Sheleph, and Hazarmaveth, and Jerah ;
27 and Hadoram, and Uzal, and Diklah ; 28 and ^Obal, and
Abimael, and Sheba ; 29 and Ophir, and Havilah, and Jobab :
^ The Sept. reads, hegat Cainan, and Cainan begat Shelah. " That is. Division.
» In 1 Chr. i. 22, Ebal.
no beast of the field is, and no bird builds its nest,' as Asshurbanipal
describes it (ibid. 242 ; KB. ii. 221); but it is hazardous, with Sayce
{JSap. Times, Mar. 1897, p. 258), to derive the name of a people from this.
24 — 30. The compiler here resumes his excerpts from J.
24. With RVm. cf. Luke iii. 36.
25. divided. The word is susceptible of different interpretations;
but it seems most likely that 'earth' is meant in the sense oi population
of the earth (cf. xi. 1); and that the 'division' referred to is the
dispersion of ix. 19, x. 32, xi. 9. Cf. the same Heb. word in Ps. Iv. 9.
Palgu is however in Ass. a 'canal' (cf. peleg, 'water-course,' in Ps.
i. 3) ; and hence Sayce {I.e.) supposes the reference to be to the
'division' of Babylonia into canals under Hammurabi (p. 156 w.).
26 — 30. Thirteen tribes descended from Yoktan. Several of these
cannot be identified, at least with any certainty ; but it is clear that in
general tribes dwelling in different parts of Arabia are meant.
26. Almodad. Uncertain : see DB.
Sheleph. Perhaps one of the many places of the name Salf which
(according to Glaser, p. 425) still exist in the S. of Arabia between
Yemen and Hadramaut^
Hazarmaveth. Mentioned in the Sabaean inscriptions, now Hadror
maut, a district in S. Arabia, a little E. of Aden : the XaTpayu-wTiTat of
Strabo (xvi. 4. 2), one of the four chief tribes which, according to the
Greek geographer, inhabited S. Arabia.
Yerah, and {v. 27) Hadoram and Diklah, are all unidentified.
27. Uzal. According to Arab tradition (see CIS. iv. i. p. 2), the
old name of San'4 (as it has been called, since its occupation by the
Abyssinians in the 6th cent, a.d.), the capital of Yemen. Ez. xxvii. 19
(RVm.) speaks of iron being brought from Uzal; and the steel of San '4
is said to be sfcill in high repute {DB. i. 135).
28. *Ohal. 'Abil is said to be at the present day the name of a
district and of several localities in Yemen.
Abimael. Not iden+'flc;d: the name is however one of genuine
Sabaean type.
Shebd. This is seemingly the main body, a colony or offshoot
of which in the N. is named in v. 7. Sheba is often mentioned in the
' SaXairvvol in Ptol. vi. 7. 23 seems to be a textual error for KaXairrjvoi,
X. 19, 3o] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 131
all these were the sons of Joktan. 30 And their dwelling was J
from Mesha, as thou goest toward Sephar, the ^mountain of the
^ Or, hill country
OT. as a distant and wealthy people, famed for its gold, precious
stones, and perfumes, esp. frankincense (see on v. 30), which were
exported to Palestine, Phoenicia, and other countries (1 K. x. 1, 2, 10;
Jer. vi. 20^; Ez. xxvii. 22, xxxviii. 13; Is. Ix. 6; Ps. Ixxii. 10; cf Job
vi. 19, and the description in Strabo xvi. 4. 19). The ancient
geographers state that the Sabaeans dwelt in the SW. of Arabia, and
that their capital was Mariaba or Saba (about 200 miles N. of the
modern Aden). Sabaean inscriptions have been discovered recently- in
great numbers ; and they shew that the Sabaeans were a settled and
civilized nation, possessing an organized government, with cities,
temples, public buildings, &c. (see DB. i. 133 f , and s.v. Sheba).
29. Ophir. A land from which, in Solomon's time, the fleet of
Hiram and Solomon brought once in three years gold, precious stones,
sandal-wood (probably), silver, ivory, apes, and peacocks (1 K. ix. 28,
X. 11, 22^; cf xxii. 48), and the gold of which is in the OT. proverbial
for its fineness (Ps. xlv. 9 ; Is. xiii. 12, al.). Much has been written
upon Ophir, and many attempts have been made to identify it (see DB.
or EncB. s.v.) : but nothing more definite can be stated about it than
that it was perhaps Abliira at the mouth of the Indus, perhaps some
sea-port on the E. or SE. coast of Arabia, which served as an emporium
for the products of India ^, but of which the name has now dis-
appeared*.
Havlldh. In all probability, different from the Havilah of v. 7,
but the same as the Havilah of ii. 11, and xxv. 18, the terms of which
imply that it was in the opposite direction to Shur ' in front of Egypt,'
i.e. in NE. Arabia. Di. compares the XavXaratot of Strabo (xvi. 4. 2),
and a place Huwaila in Bahrein, on the Persian Gulf
30. ^ The Hmits, from N. to S. , of the country occupied by the
Joktanidae.
Mesha. Very probably (Di.), with only a change of points, to be
read as Massa (xxv. 14), the name of a N. Arabian tribe, about halfway
between the Gulf of 'Akaba and the Persian Gulf.
^ Comp. Aen. i. 416 ceutumque Sahaeo Ture calent arae; G. ii. 117 Solis est
turea virga Sabaeis (both already quoted by Jerome).
2 1 K. ix. 28, X. 11 make it probable that Ophir, though not actually named,
was the destination of the 'navy of Tarshish,' — i.e. (cf. our 'East Indiaman') a
fleet of large merchant-vessels, fit for long voyages, — mentioned in this verse.
3 The Heb. words for ' apes ' and ' peacocks ' are not Semitic, but Indian.
* Ophir might, in the abstract, be either the Arabian coast of the Persian Gulf,
or Dhofar (see p. 132, on v. 30) ; but the positive arguments adduced by Glaser
(Shizze der Gesch. u. Geogr. Arab, ii., 1890, pp. 353 f., 357 f., 368—73, 377 f.,
380—3) in favour of the former view, and by Prof. A. H. Keane {The Gold of Ophir,
1901, pp. 75 ft., 194—6) in favour of the latter view, are anything but conclusive.
On Carl Peters' identification with the region between the Zambesi and the Sabi
(in which there were anciently extensive gold- workings), see the Addenda.
9—2
132 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [x. 30-3*
east. I 31 These are the sons of Shem, after their families, after ^'' J
their tongues, in their lands, after their nations.
32 These are the families of the sons of Noah, after their
generations, in their nations : and of these were the nations
divided in the earth after the flood.
Sephdr. Probably (though the sibilant does not correspond as it
ought to do) Daphdr (or Dhofdr), a town and plain on the S. coast of
Arabia (54° E.)', situated beneath a lofty mountain, and well adapted
to form a landmark {DB. s.v.).
unto the mountain (or hill country) of the east. Probably the great
frankincense mountains, which extend some distance beyond Daphar
towards the East". Cf. EncB. iv. 4370, 5148.
31, 32. Subscriptions, in P's manner, to w. 22 — 30 (cf. w, 5, 20),
and to the whole chapter, respectively.
Chapter XI. 1 — 9.
The Tower of Babel.
As in previous sections of J, the origin of various existing customs and
institutions is explained, so here the explanation is given of the diversity of
languages, and of the distribution of mankind into peoples speaking different
languages and inhabitinj' different parts of the earth. Almost as soon as men
began to reflect, differences of language must have impressed them as sometliing
calling for explanation : not only were they remarkable in themselves, but they
also formed a great barrier to free intercourse, and accentuated national
interests and antagonisms (cf. the dread and aversion expressed for men
speaking an imintelligible language, in Is. xxviii. 11, xxxiii. 19; Dt. xxviii. 49;
Jer. V. 15; Ps. cxiv. 1)^. 'The story of the Tower of Babel suppUed to such
primitive questionings an answer suited to the comprehension of a primitive
time... Just as Greek fable told of the giants who strove to scale Olympus, so
Semitic legend told of the impious act by which the sons of men sought to raise
themselves to the dwelling-place of God, and erect an enduring symbol of
human unity to be seen from every side' (Ryle, pp. 128, 131), and how Jehovah
interposed to frustrate their purpose, and brought upon them the very dispersal
which they had sought to avoid.
From a critical point of view the narrative presents diflBculties : for, though
it belongs manifestly to J, it is not easy to harmonize with other representations
' The XawKpapa of Ptol., and Sapphar of Pliny (see Spruner's Atlas).
* Bent, Southern Arabia (1900), pp. 89, 91, 234 f., 241 f., 245, 252—4, 270 f.
3 And contrast the pictures drawn by the prophets, of the future harmony of
nations, in the fear and worship of the One God, Is. ii. 2 — 4, xix. 18, 23 — 25,
Zeph. iii. 9; and the thought of the universality of Christianity, as expressed
symbolically in Acts ii, 5 — 11.
THE BOOK OF GENESIS 133
of the same source. It seems to be out of connexion with the parts of J in
ch. X.' : for there the dispersion of mankind appears as the result of a natural
process of migration, here it is the penalty for misdirected ambition; and
Babel (Babylon), the building of which is here interrupted, is in x. 10
represented as already built. It connects also very imperfectly with the close
of J's narrative of the Flood ; for though the incident which it describes is
placed shortly after the Flood, the men who gather together and build the
city seem to be considerably more numerous (cf. the terms of v. 1) than the
members of the single family of Noah. In all probability (Dillm.) the story
originally grew up without reference to the Flood, or the derivation of mankind
from the three sons of Noah, and it has been imperfectly accommodated to the
narratives in chs. ix. and x. : perhaps, indeed, Wellh. and others are right in
conjecturing that originally it belonged to the same cycle of tradition as
iv. 17 — 24, in which (see p. 74) the continuity of human history seems not to
have been interrupted by a Flood, and that it formed part of the sequel to
iv. 24.
That the narrative can contain no scientific or historically true account of
the origin of different languages, is apparent from many indications. In the
first place, if it is in its right position, it can be demonstrated to rest upon
unhistorical assumptions : for the Bibhcal date of the Flood (see the Introd. § 2)
is B.O. 2501, or (lxx.) b.c. 3066; and, so far from the whole earth being at either
B.O. 2501 or B.O. 3066 'of one language and of one (set of) words,' numerous
inscriptions are in existence dating considerably earher even than b.c. 3066,
written in three distinct languages, the pre-Semitic Sumerian (or ' Accadiau '),
the Semitic Babylonian, and Egyptian. But even if Wellh. 's supposition that
the narrative relates really to an earher stage of the history of mankind, bo
accepted, it would be not less difficult to regard it as historical. For (1) the
narrative, while explaining ostensibly the diversity of languages, offers no
explanation of the diversity of races. And yet diversity of language,—
meaning here by the expression not the relatively subordinate differences
which are always characteristic of languages developed from a common
parent-tongue, but those more radical differences relating alike to grannnar,
structure, and roots, which shew that the languages exhibiting them cannot be
referred to a common origin, — is dependent upon diversity of race. It is of
course true that cases occur in which a people brought into contact with a
people of another race have adopted their language ; but, speaking generally,
radically different languages are characteristic of different races, or (if tliis
word be used in its widest sense) of subdivisions of races, or sub-races, which,
in virtue of the faculty of creating language distinctive of man, have created
them for purposes of intercommunication and to satisfy their social in-
stincts^. Differences of race, in other words, are more primary in man than
^ In the parts of ch. x. which belong to P, distinct languages, as well as distinct
nations, are already spoken of {vv. 5, 20, 31). No doubt their existence is also
implied in J; but it is not expressly afl&rmed.
2 'The idioms of mankind have had many independent starting-points' (Sayce,
Introd. to the Science of Lang., 1880, ii. 323). The number of separate families of
speech, now existing in the world, which cannot be connected with one another,
approaches 100: see ibid. ii. 32 — 64.
134 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xi. i, i
diflForences of language^, and have first to be accounted for. (2) Not only,
however, are differences of race left entirely unexplained in the Biblical
narrative; but (comp. above, p. 114) the great races into which mankind ia
divided must have migrated into their present homes, and had their existing
character stamped upon them, at an age vastly earlier than that which the
chronology of Genesis permits, — even upon Wellh.'8 view of the original place
of xi. 1 — 9, — for the dispersion of mankind. The antiquity of man, and the
wide distribution of man, with strongly marked racial differences, are two great
outstanding facts, which the Biblical narrative, — whether here or elsewhere in
Genesis, — not only fails to account for, but does not even leave room for 2,
The narrative thus contains simply the answer which Hebrew folk-lore
gave to the question which differences of language directly suggested. In
reality differences of language are the result, not the cause, of the diffusion of
mankind over the globe. At the same time, the explanation is so worded as
to convey, like the other early narratives of Genesis, spiritijal lessons. Though
the conception of Deity is naive, and even, perhaps {v. 7), imperfectly disengaged
from polytheism, the narrative nevertheless emphasizes Jehovah's supremacy
over the world ; it teaches how the self-exaltation of man is checked by God ;
and it shews how the distribution of mankind into nations, and diversity of
language, are elements in His providential plan for the development and
progress of humanity.
The Fathers and many subsequent scholars, including some even in the
last century, believed Hebrew to be the primitive language of mankind. The
rise of a science of comparative philology has shewn this to be completely out
of the question 3, if only because, when compared with the other Semitic
languages, Hebrew exhibits elements of decay, and Arabic is, in many respects,
an older and more primitive language. But, unless all analogy is deceptive,
the language of the primitive men must have been of a far more simple,
undeveloped form than any of the existing Semitic languages*. As need
hardly be remarked, what the primitive language of mankind was, is unknown.
XI. 1 And the whole earth was of one language and J'
of one ^speech. 2 And it came to pass, as they journeyed
1 Heb. lip. ^ Heb. words.
XI. 1. was of one langtiage, and of one (set of) words. I.e.
had one language (viewed as a whole), and used the same individual
expressions. For the idiom, use of lip (E,Vm.), cf w. 6, 7 (twice), 9,
Is. xix. 18, xxxiii. 19 (Heb.). On the statement itself, see above.
2, The writer pictures these early men as moving nomadically
(cf the note on xii. 9) from spot to spot, till at last they found a plain
on which they settled.
^ Cf . Sayce, Races of the OT. p. 37 f. : 'Diversity of race is older than diversity
of language.'
2 See further the Introductioa, pp. xxxi — xlii. .
8 Comp. Max Miiller, Lectures on the Science of Lang,, 1st series, Leot. IV. (ed.
1864, p. 132 ff.).
* Comp. A. H. Keane, Ethnology (1901), pp. 197, 198, 206 f.
XL 2-5] THE BOOK OF GEITESIS 135
^east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar ; and they J
dwelt there. 3 And they said one to another, Go to, let us
make brick, and burn them throughly. And they had brick for
stone, and ^slime had they for mortar. 4 And they said. Go to,
let us build us a city, and a to'vver, whose top may reach
unto heaven, and let us make us a name ; lest we be scattered
abroad upon the face of the whole earth. 5 And the Lord
* Or, in the east * That is, bitmnen.
eastwards (xiii. 11), or (RVm.) in the east. ^ Viz. of Palestine
(cf. ii. 8). The exprossion is a vague one ; and it is idle to speculate,
especially in view of the uncertainty, mentioned above, as to the
original context of the narrative, whence the writer may have sup-
posed mankind to have started.
a plain. The fx-iya TreStov, in which, according to Hdt. (l 178),
Babylon lay.
Shin'dr. I.e. Babylonia; see on x. 10.
3. In Palestine stone was abundant, and used for all buildings
of any pretensions; in Babylonia it was unknown, and brick (as the
excavations abundantly shew) was the regular building-material, burnt
bricks, cemented together by bitumen, being generally used for the
outer parts of a building, and sun-dried bricks, laid in coarse clay,
for the interior. See more fully Rawlinson, A?ic. Monarchies*, i. 71 —
74 ; and, for an illustration of an ancient brick house at Ur, Maspero,
I. 746'. The verse was evidently written by one to whom great build-
ings constructed with brick and bitumen were unfamiliar.
slime. Bitumen (lxx. do-e^aXros); Heb. hemdr{xiv. 10; Ex. ii. 3t),
apparently the genuine native word for the foreign kopher in vi. 14.
4. a tower (with) its top in heaven. The expression is probably
meant here, not hyperbolically (Dt. i. 28), but Uterally, 'heaven'
(cf. on i. 6) being regarded as an actual vault, which might be reached
(cf. Is. xiv, 13 f.), at least by a bold effort. The coincidence may be
accidental ; but it may be worth mentioning that the Bab. and Ass.
kings pride themselves upon the height of their temples, and boast
of having made their tops as high as heaven (Jastrow, Religion of
Bah. and Ass. p. 613, citing KB. i. 43, 1. 102 f., m. 2, p. 5, 1. 38 of
Coll.: cf. EncB.l. 411, w. 3).
make us a name. Make ourselves famous, and secure our names
against oblivion. The expression, as Is. Ixiii. 12, 14; Jer. xxxii. 20, al.;
for the motive, comp. 2 S. xviii. 18 ; Is. Ivi. 5.
lest &c. The city, and its famous tower, were to form a centre and
raUjdug-point, which would hold mankind together.
1 The bitumen was obtained anciently from the springs at Hit, on the
Euphrates, about 150 miles above Babylon, where it is still abundant (Hdt. i. 179,
with Rawl.'s note: Layard, Nineveh and its remains, ii. 46 f., describes also the
springs near Kal'at Sherkat [above, on ii. 14], on the Tigris). Cf. on vi. 14.
136 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xi. 5-9
came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of J
men builded. 6 And the Lord said. Behold, they are one
people, and they have all one language ; and this is what they
begin to do : and now nothing will be withholden from them,
which they pm-pose to do. 7 Go to, let us go down, and there
confound their language, that they may not understand one
another's speech. 8 So the Lord scattered them abroad from
thence upon the face of all the earth : and they left off to build
the city. 9 Therefore was the name of it called Babel ; because
the Lord did there ^confound the language of all the earth :
and from thence did the Lord scatter them abroad upon the
face of all the earth.
^ Heb. halal, to confound.
5. came down. Cf. v. 7 ; Ex. iii. 8.
to see &c. For the anthropomorphism, cf. xviii. 21 ; also v. 7, below.
6, 7. It seems probable, from the terms of v. 7 ('let us go down'),
that words after v. 5 have been omitted ; and that the narrative
originally told how Jehovah returned to His lofty abode, and addressed
the words which now follow as w. 6, 7 to the inferior divine beings
there, His heavenly counsellors or associates.
6. If this great work is the beginning of their ambition, what will
be the end of it ? nothing soon will be beyond their reach. The thought,
tacitly underlying the verse, is that they may in some way make them-
selves the rivals of the Deity, and even become too powerful for Him ;
a danger such as tliis must be averted betimes (cf iii. 22). The
narrative, it must be remembered, embodies a rudimentary, child-like
conception of Deity.
7. let us go down. The plural — unless, indeed, it is here the
survival of an originally polytheistic representation (cf the last note
but one) — is to be explained as in iii. 5, 22. The use in i. 26, Is. vi. 8
is different.
9. Babel. I.e. Babylon (see on x. 10). The etymology given
here is, however, known now to be incorrect ; for the name is wi-itten
in the inscriptions in a manner which shews clearly that it signifies
' gate of God ' (Bdb-Il), and that it cannot be derived from the Heb.
bdlal, to mix, confuse. It is simply a popular etjonology, which lent
itself conveniently to the purpose which the narrator had in hand.
No Babylonian parallel to the preceding narrative has as yet been dis-
coveredl Indeed, though it evidently presupposes a knowledge of Babylon,
^ There are no sufficient grounds for the supposition that the confusion of
tongues is referred to in the fragmentary inscription translated by G. Smith, Chald.
Gen. p. 160 ff., and mentioned by Sayce, Hon. p. 153 ; for the meanings of the two
crucial words, rendered 'strong place' and 'speech,' are both extremely doubtful.
See the note in DB. iv. 793* ; and add King, Tablets oj Creation, pp. 219, 220.
THE BOOK OF GENESIS 137
it does not seem itself to be of Babylonian origin : if any Babylonian legend
lies at the basis of it, it must have been strongly Hebraized. As Gunkel has
remarked, the narrative reflects the impression which Babylon would make
upon a foreigner, rather than that which it would make upon a native : the
unfavourable light in which the foundation of Babel (i.e. Babylon) is repre-
sented, the idea that the erection of what {ex hyp.) can harJly have been
anything but a Babylonian zikkurat (or pyramidal temple- tower) ^ was inter-
rupted by {ex hyp.) a Babylonian deity, the mention, as of something unusual,
of brick and bitumen as building-materials, and the false etymology of the
name ' Babel,' are all features not likely to have originated in Babylonia. It
does however seem a not improbable conjecture (Ewald, Schrader, Dillm.)
that some gigantic tower-Uke building in Babylon, which had either been left
unfinished, or fallen into disrepair, gave rise to the story. The tower in
question has been supposed by some to be the celebrated zikkurat of B-zida,
the great temple of Nebo in Borsipjia (a city 8 or 9 miles from Babylon
on the SW.), the ruined remains of which form the huge pyramidal mound now
called Birs Nhnroud. This zikkurat, remarkably enough, Nebuchadnezzar
states had been built partially by a former king, but not completed : its ' head,'
or top, had not been set up ; it had also fallen into disrepair ; and Neb.
restored it^. Others regard it as an objection to this identification that
E-zida was not actually in Babylon ; and prefer to think of the zikkurat
of B-sagil,-the famous and ancient temple of Marduk in Babylon itself, the
site of which was discovered in 1900, in the course of the excavations organized
by the German Orient-Gesellschnft, under the mound of 'Amran^. Schrader
does not decide between ll-zida and E-sagil : Dillra. thinks E-sagil the more
likely, but leaves it open whether, after all, the Heb. legend may not have
referred to some half-ruined ancient building in Babylon, not otherwise known
to us. The high antiquity of Babylon, the fact that it was the chief centre of
a region in which the Hebrews placed the cradle of the human race, and the
further fact that it was always a great meeting-place for men of many nations
(cf. Is. xiii. 14, xlvii. 15), would lead it not unnaturally to be regarded as the
point from which mankind dispersed over the earth.
XI. 10—26.
The genealogy of the Shemites, from Shem to Terali.
A section derived from P, as is evident from the stereotyped style, which
closely resembles that of ch. v. Like that chapter, it bridges over an interval,
about which there was nothing special to record, by a genealogy, the design oi
^ A zikkurat (from zukkuru, to elevate) is a massive pyramidal tower, ascending
in stage-like terraces, with a temple at the top. See Jastrow, Eel. of Bab. and Ass.
pp. 615—622 ; and cf. Hdt. i. 181.
2 The inscription is translated in KAT.^ p. 124 f. ; KB. in. 2, pp. 53, 55. Of
course, however, Gen. xi. 1 — 9 is some centuries earlier than Nebuchadnezzar.
* See Weissbach, Das Stadtbild von Babylon (1904), p. 21, and the plan, p. 13;
or Lan-;don's art. on the topography of ancient Babylon in the Expositor, July,
19 y. For a view of Birs Nimroud, see Smith, DB. i, 159 ("i. 320). The mound of
'Amran is marked on the map ibid. i. 153 (•^i. 317), or in EncB. i. 415 — 6; but the
plan of the city in Smith is antiquated.
138 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xi. ro-15
which is to convey an idea of the length and general character of the period.
In the ages assigned to the several patriarchs, it will be noticed that those in
vv. 18 — 26 are lower than those in vv. 10 — 17, while all are considerably lower
than those of the patriarchs (except Enoch) mentioned in ch. v. : it is thus the
theory of the author that the normal years of human life gradually diminished
during these two prehistoric periods. The number of years embraced in the
entire period from the Flood to the birth of Abraham is 290, or, according to
the Lxx., 1070 (the ages of six at the birth of their firstborn being 100 years
more than in the Heb., and there being besides 50 extra years for Nahor, and
the 130 of Cainan). The Sam. text gives 940 years for the* entire period. In
this case (cf. p. 79) it is generally allowed that the Heb. preserves the original
figures. They are less extravagant than the figures in ch. v. ; and though the
entire lifetimes assigned to the various patriarchs are out of the question, the
age of each at the birth of the next might, in itself, be historical. Whence
the names are derived, must remain undetermined. Some of them seem to be
personal names abstracted from the names of tribes or places^ ; and the same
may be the case with the rest. Verses 12 — 17 (Shelah, 'Eber, Peleg) are parallel
to X. 24, 25 in J, just as v. 3—8 (?) are parallel to iv. 25, 26 (J).
10 These are the generations of Shem. Shem was an hundred P
years old, and begat Arpachshad two years after the flood:
11 and Shem lived after he begat Arpachshad five hundred
years, and begat sons and daughters.
12 And Arpachshad lived five and thirty years, and begat
Shelah : 13 and Arpachshad lived after he begat Shelah four
hundred and three years, and begat sons and daughters.
14 And Shelah lived thirty years, and begat Eber ; 16 and
10. Arpachshad. See on x. 22. 'Its position here at the head
of the genealogy shews that this land was a primitive seat of those
mentioned afterwards, and consequently of the Terahites' (Dillm.).
12, 13. Shelah. The lxx. read Kainan for Shelah in w. 12, 13;
and then insert two verses stating that Kainan lived 130 years and
begat Shelah, and lived afterwards 330 years. Cf x. 24 RVm.
14. ^Ebe^'. The eponymous ancestor of the Hebrews. The word
'eher signities the otlier side, across; and so the name Hebrew C"!??^,
— in form a gentile name, denoting the inhabitant of a country, or the
member of a tribe) is usually explained as denoting those who have
come from 'eber ha-ndhdr (see Jos. xxiv. 2, 3, 14, 15), or 'the other side
of the River' (the Euphrates), i.e. from Haran {v. 31) in Aram-naharaim,
the home of Nahor (xxiv. 10) and Abraham (xxiv. 4, 7, comp. with 10).
It is however possible that Stade, Wellh., Kautzsch, and others are
right in explaining it as signifying those who have come from 'the
other side' of the Jordan, supposing it to have been first given to
1 As happens eometimes in the case of Arabian genealogies {EncB. n. 1660).
XI. 15-"] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 139
Shelah lived after he begat Eber four hundi^ed and three years, P
and begat sons and daughters.
16 And Eber lived four and thirty years, and begat Peleg :
17 and Eber lived after he begat Peleg four hundred and thirty
years, and begat sons and daughters.
18 And Peleg lived thirty years, and begat Reu : 19 and
Peleg lived after he begat Reu two hundred and nine years, and
begat sons and daughters.
20 And Reu lived two and thirty years, and begat Serug :
21 and Reu lived after he begat Serug two hundred and seven
years, and begat sons and daughters.
Israel by the Canaanites, after they had entered Palestine'. It is
a peculiarity of the name Hebrew that (like that of the ' Greeks,' for
instance) it is not the normal native name, but is, all but exclusively,
either placed in the mouth of foreigners (as xxxix. 14), or used
by Israelites for the purpose of distinguishing pointedly Abraham
or his descendants from foreigners (as xiv. 13, xl. 15, xhii. 32;
Jon. i. 9 : cf Ex. i. 15, 16, ii. 6, 7, v. 3, xxi. 2)'.
16. Peleg. Cf on x. 25.
20. Serug. Certainly connected with Seruj, a district and city,
mentioned aheady, in the form Sarugi, in the 'Assyrian Domesday
Book,' or description of holdings about Haran in the 7th cent. B.C.,
published by G. H. W. Johns (1901), pp. 29, 43, 48, 68 (33, 45, 50);
and well known to Arabic and Syriac writers of the middle ages ;
in Mesopotamia ('Aram-Naharaim,' xxiv. 10), about 38 miles W. of
Haran {v. 31), and 30 miles SW. of Urhoi (Edessa). See Sachau,
Meise in Syr. u. Mesop. 1883, pp. 181—3, and the 2nd Map at the
end. Sayce adopts the same view (Exp. Times, Feb. 1907, p. 233).
^ Why 'Eber is not the immediate, but the sixth ancestor of Abraham, and why
many other tribes besides the Hebrews are reckoned as his descendants (see on
X. 21), must remain matter of conjecture: no doubt the Heb. genealogists were
guided partly by facts, partly by theories, respecting the movements and mutual
relations of the tribes mentioned by them, with which we are unacquainted. It
may be (cf. Konig, Lehrgeb. i. 19, 21) that, though the Israelites were Kar' i^oxvf
'Hebrews,' it was remembered that the land 'across ' the Euphrates had been for a
long time the resting-place of Abraham's ancestors, and that many other tribes
(Peleg, Keu, &c. as well as the Yoktanidae, x. 26 ff.) had migrated from it.
* The theory of Hommel {Anc. Heb. Trad. 324 — 7, and elsewhere : see also
EncB. Eber, and DB. ii. 326) that Ehir ndri ( = the Bibl. 'eber ha-ndhdr) was the
name originally given by the Babylonians to the region about Ur (see on v. 31) on
the other (i.e. the western) side of the Euphrates, that accordingly Abraham and his
forefathers were known to the Babylonians as 'Hebrews' (in the sense of 'inhabi-
tants of this ebir nari'), that Abraham and his descendants carried this foreign
name about with them for many centuries, till finally it reappeared in the OT. in
the applications explained above, is in itself most improbable, besides resting,
from the first stage to the last, upon a basis of pure hypothesis.
140 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xi. ■^^-^l
22 And Seriig lived thirty years, and begat Nahor : 23 and P
Sevug lived after he begat Nahor two hundred years, and begat
sons and daughters.
24 And Nahor lived nine and twenty years, and begat Terah :
25 and Nahor lived after he begat Terah an hundred and
nineteen years, and begat sons and daughters.
26 And Terah lived seventy years, and begat Abram, Nahor,
and Haran.
22. Nahor. ' Once the name of a people of considerable import-
ance ' (Dillm.) : cf. on v. 29. The name is perhaps preserved in
Til-Nahiri, a place near Sarugi (Johns, op. cit. p. 71). Cf. Sayce, I.e.
XI. 27—32.
The family history of Terah,
A short account of the history of Terah, stating what was necessary as an
introduction to the liistory of his son, Abraham, chaps, xii. — xxv. 10. Verses
27, 31, 32 belong to P, vv. 28—30 to J.
27 Now these are the generations of Terah. Terah begat p
Abram, Nahor, and Haran ; and Haran begat Lot. | 28 And J
Haran died in the presence of his father Terah in the land of
his nativity, in Ur of the Chaldees. 29 And Abram and Nahor
took them wives : the name of Abram's wife was Sarai ; and the
name of Nahor's wife, Milcah, the daughter of Haran, the father
of Milcah, and the father of Iscah. 30 And Sarai was barren ;
she had no child. | 31 And Terah took Abram his son, and Lot P
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
28. in the presence of his father. I.e. while his father was yet
alive. So Num. iii. 4.
in Ur of the Chaldees. See on r. 31 : the words are here very
possibly a harmonistic addition — the land of Haran's and Abram's
' nativity ' being in J Aram-Naharaim (see p. 142).
29. Nahor marries Milcah, his niece (cf. xxii. 20—23) : comp.
Abraham's marriage with his half-sister, xx. 12. Perhaps, however,
Dillm. is right in supposing that in this case the ' marriage ' signihes
really the amalgamation of communities.
31. and they went forth with them. ^Vho went with whom ?
Read probably, with lxx., Sam., and Vulg., and he brought them forth
(DJ^X N^'i for D?N' -INV'l).
XL 31, 3^] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 141
Ur of the Chaldees, to go into the land of Canaan ; and they P
came unto Haran, and dwelt there. 32 And the days of Terah
were two hundred and five years : and Terah died in Haran.
Ur. Now, as inscriptions found on the spot shew, el-Mukayyar^
(often written incorrectly Mugheir), 6 miles S. of the Euphrates, on its
right bank, and 125 miles from its present mouth. Mukayyar consists
of a collection of low mounds, forming an oval about 1000 yds. long
by 800 yds. broad, which conceal the ruins of the ancient city. Ur
(Ass. Uru) was an important city long before Babylon. Two of its
early kings, Ur-bau, and his son Dungi (c. 2800 B.C.), have left many
monuments of themselves — engraved cylinders and other works of art,
besides numerous buildings, not only in Ur itself, but also in the sur-
rounding towns. The position of Ur made it important commercially.
The Euphrates anciently flowed almost by its gates, and formed a
channel of communication with Upper Syria; while it was connected
by caravan-routes with Southern Syria and with Arabia. Its tutelary
deity was the Moon-god, Sin ; the zikkurat of Sin, built by Ur-bau,
Nabu-na'id (B.C. 555 — 538), upon cylinders found on the spot, teUs us
that he restored. See further Maspero, i. 561, 563 (Map), 612—19,
629 — 31 {zikkurat, with views); Ball, Light from the East, 62 — 64.
of the Chaldees (^Qh. Kasdim), This is no Babylonian designation
of Ur; and must be an addition of Palestinian origin (Sayce, Monu-
ments, 158 f ). Kasdim is the Heb. form of the Bab. and Ass. Kaldu
('Chaldaeans'), a tribe named often in the inscriptions from B.C. 880;
their home at that time was in Lower Babylonia (the Persian Gulf is
called the * sea of the land of Kaldii ') ; afterwards, as they increased
in power, they gradually advanced inland : in 721 Merodach-baladan,
'king of the land of Kaldft,' made himself for twelve years king of
Babylon; and ultimately, under Nabopolassar (625 — 605) and Nebu-
chadnezzar (604 — 561) the Kaldii became the ruling caste in Babylonia.
*Ur Kasdim' is mentioned besides in v. 28, xv. 7, Neh. ix. 7.
unto Haran (with the hard H, Lxx. Xappav, quite different from
the Haran, with the soft //, of vv. 26, 31*). Ass., Syr. and Arab.
Harrdn, Gk. Kdppai; in ancient times an important place, situated
about 550 miles NW. of Ur, on the left bank of the Belildi, a tributary
which flows into the Euphrates from the N., at about 60 miles from the
confluence, and of course on the 'other side' of the Euphrates from
Palestine (cf on v. 14). At present, nothing remains of the ancient
city but a long range of mounds and the ruins of a castle; but it
is often mentioned in the Ass. inscriptions, and also by writers of
the classical and mediaeval period. Harrdnu is a common Ass.
word meaning way; and the place, it has been supposed, received its
name on account of the commercial and strategical importance of its
position : it lay at the point where the principal route from Nineveh
^ I.e. the bituminated — so called from the bitumen, with which its walls are
cemented (cf. ou xi. 3; and see Kawiinson, Anc. Monarchies*, i. 16 f., 76—9).
142 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
to Carchemish was met by the road from Damascus (on its trade,
cf. Ez. xxvii. 23). Like Ur, Haran was also an ancient and celebrated
seat of the worship of the Moon-god, who was known in N. Syria as
Baal-Harran, or 'Lord of Harran^'; Nabu-na'id, who restored his temple
there, tells us that Sin had had his dwelling at Harran from remote
days {KB. rn. 2, 97). See farther DB. and EncB. s.v.; Mez, Gesch. der
Stadt Harran, 1892.
32. Sam. for 205 has 145, making Abram's departure from
Haran (xii. 5'') take place in the year of Terah's death (xi. 26, and
xii. 4^*). The same figure appears to be presupposed in Acts vii. 4*.
Two traditions seem to have been current respecting the original home
of the ancestors of the Hebrews. According to xi. 31 (cf. «?. 28, xv. 7) their
original homo was Ur, in South Babylonia. There exists however a group
of passages in Gen., which not only connect consistently Abraham's near
relations with Haran, in Aram-Naharaim, far away from S. Babylonia (without
any suggestion of their having migrated thither from elsewhere), but imply
also that it was Abraham's own native place as well (notice the expressions in
xii. 1 and xxiv. 4, 7, where v. 10 shews that Haran is refeiTed to; cf, also Josh,
xxiv. 2, 3). The tradition connecting Abraham with Haran is that which
predominates in J ; and if it might be supposed that the words ' in Ur of the
Chaldees' in xi. 2S, and the verse xv. 7, were additions to the original J,
J would follow consistently the same representation. P (xi. 31) harmonizes
the two traditions, by representing Abraham's residence in Haran as the
result of a migration from Ur, But even in P itself the names in xi. 10 — 27
seem to point to Mesopotamia as the home of Abraham's ancestors. The two
traditions cannot therefore be said to be represented consistently, the one
by J, and the other by P. What the source of the tradition connecting
Abraham with Ur may have been we do not know : of course it will not have
been first promulgated by P, but must have been current when he wrote.
Its correctness we are not at present in a position, from external evidence,
either to affirm or to deny. Contract-tablets, and other contemporary inscrip-
tions, recently discovered, bear witness to the fact that in, or even before, the
age of Abraham persons bearing Hebrew (or Canaanitish) names resided in
Babylonia, and shew that intercourse between Babylonia and the West was
more active than was once supposed to be the case' ; but nothing sufficiently
direct has at present [June, 1909] been discovered to prove definitely that the
ancestors of the Hebrews had once their home in Ur,
^ The title occurs in an inscription from Zinjirli, near Aleppo [above, p. 129] :
see G. A. Cooke, Text-book of North- Semitic Inscriptions (1903), p. 182.
2 Ussher, in order to harmonize the Heb. text with Acts vii. 4, interpolates
60 years in v. 26 (see the note in editions of the AV. with marg. references), giving
the verse the impossible meaning, 'And Terah lived 70 years; and [60 years
afterwards] begat Abram, Nahor, and Haran.'
3 At Sippar, about 80 miles NNW. of Babylon, there seems indeed to have
been an 'Amorite quarter,' which (though of course Abraham was no Amorite)
testifies to communication between Babylonia and the West (see Sayce, Batylonians
and Assyrians, 1900, p. 187 ff.; Pinches, The OT. in the light of the records of Ass.
and Bab., p. 169 f.).
TEE BOOK OF GENESIS 143
PART II. THE HISTORY OF THE PATRIARCHS.
CHAPTERS XIL— L.
"With ch. xii. the second part of the Book of Genesis begins, the history of
the patriarchs. Hebrew tradition told how the ancestors of the nation had,
under Divine guidance, migrated from the distant East into Canaan, had
sojourned in different parts of the land, had entered into various relations,
friendly or unfriendly, as the case might be, with the native inhabitants, and had
in the end, in the persons of Jacob and his 12 sons, gone down into Egypt ;
and the narration of all these events occupies the second part of the Book.
The places which the patriarchs principally visit — Shechem, Bethel, Hebron,
Beer-sheba, Becr-lahai-roi — are those which in later times were regarded as
sanctuaries; and the origin of their sanctity is here explained: it is deduced
from incidents in the lives of the patriarchs. It is a plausible conjecture that
stories of the patriarchs were attached to the sanctuaries which it was believed
that they had visited ; and that these were written down and arranged by the
different writers, especially the two earlier ones, J and E, whose narratives,
excerpted and adjusted by a later compiler, form the bulk of the existing
Book of Genesis. The substance of the narrative is, no doubt, historical;
though the characters and experiences seem to be idealized (cf p. Iviii ff.).
We cannot, for instance, suppose that we have, so to say, a photographic
record of all that was said or done : however difficult it may be to estimate
the strength of memory and of oral tradition in these patriarchal times, when
the conditions were so different from our own, it is scarcely possible that the
recollection of such miuutiae as are here often recorded should have been
transmitted unaltered during the many centuries that intervened between the
time at which the patriarchs lived, and that at which their biographies were
ultimately committed to writing. The idea (which nevertheless has been
seriously suggested) that the patriarchs carried about with them libraries
of burnt bricks, upon which, in Babylonian fashion, they recorded their
experiences, is an ingenious one ; but it has absolutely nothing to support it,
and cannot therefore be made the basis of an argument for establishing the
autobiogTaphical character of the patriarchal narratives. The outline of these
narratives, we may confidently hold, was supplied by tradition ; but in the
details something at any rate will be due to the historical imagination of the
narrators, who filled in what tradition handed down to them with picturesque
circumstance and colloquy, and at the same time breathed into the whole
the same deep and warm religious spirit by which they were inspired
themselves.
144 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xn. 1-3
Chapter XII.
Abram's migration into Canaan. The jvrst of the promises.
Sarah's adventure in Egypt.
Since Noah, the line of Shem (xi. 10 ff.) has been that in which the know-
ledge of the true God has been perpetuated; and now, in the person of
Abram, this knowledge reaches a higher stage: Abram is the recipient of
fuller and more distinct revelations of God ; and though not uniformly fault-
less, becomes nevertheless an example of faith and obedience in the midst of
heathen neighbours (cf. Dean Church, The Discipline of the Christian
Character, chap. L). Verses 1—4% 6—20, belong \xi i ; vv. 4", 5 to P.
XII. 1 Now the Lord said unto Abram, Get thee out of J
thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house,
unto the land that I will shew thee : 2 and I will make of thee
a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great ;
and be thou a blessing : 3 and I will bless them that bless thee,
XII. 1. And Jehovah said &c. The words state the sequel of
xi. 31^ the country which Abram is commanded to leave being not
Ur, but Haran. 'God's voice is to be thought of not as something
external, but as heard within Abram's inmost soul' (Del.).
thy country... thy Mndred &c. 'The expressions are accumulated
in order to shew that God made no small demand of him when He
required him to sever his family ties and wander forth into an unknown
land ' (DiUm.). Cf Heb. xi. 8 f
2 f The promise. The promises (and blessings) contained in
Gen. form two series (J and P). The series in J (or occasionally E)
consists of iii. 15 (the ' Protevangelium ') ; viii. 21 f (Noah); xii. 2 f, 7,
xiii. 14 — 17, XV. 5, 18 — 21, xviii. 18, xxii. 15 — 18 (all addressed to
Abraham); xxvi. 2—5, 24 (Isaac); xxv. 23, xxvii. 27—9, xxviii. 13 —
15, xlvi. 3 i. (Jacob); xlix. 10 (Judah): that in P consists of i. 28—30
(Adam); ix. 1—17 (Noah); xvii. 2, 6—8 (Abraham), cf 20 (Ishmael);
xxviii. 3 f , XXXV. 11 f , cf xlviii. 3 f (Jacob). These two series deserve
to be carefully studied and compared : each (esp. in the promises ad-
dressed to the patriarchs) will then be found to have features pecuhar
to itself, and distinguisliing it from the other (cf on xvii. 2, 6 — 8).
2, a blessing. I.e., according to a Hebrew idiom (cf Ps. ex. 3
RVm.) the impersonation of blessing, most blessed. Comp. Ps. xxi. 6
(see RVm.); Is. xix. 24 (see v. 25); Zech. viii. 13.
3. a7id I will bless &c. Cf xxvii. 29; Nu. xxiv. 9. Abram will
become indirectly a source of blessedness to others: so favoured by
God will he be that those who are friendly towards him will be blessed
with prosperity, while those who are unfriendly will be visited with
misfortune.
XII. 3-5] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 145
and liim that curseth thee will I curse : and in thee shall all the J
families of the earth be blessed. 4 So Abram went, as the Lord
had spoken unto him ; and Lot went with him : | and Abram was P
seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran.
5 And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother's son,
and all their substance that they had gathered, and the souls
that they had gotten in Haran ; and they went forth to go into
the land of Canaan ; and into the land of Canaan they came. |
and through tJiee shall... he blessed. If this rend, is correct, the
passage will express an early phase of the great doctrine developed
afterwards more fully by the prophets (e.g. Is. ii. 2 f., xix. 23 — 5), and
point to the ultimate extension of the religious privileges enjoyed by
Abraham and his descendants to the Gentiles. The expression in the
Heb. is the same in xviii. 18, xxviii. 14; in all these passages the
conjugation of the Heb. verb being the Niphal, which may have either
a reflexive or a passive sense (G.-K. § 51'^'^'''). There are, however, two
other passages, xxii. 18, xxvi. 4, in which, though otherwise similar,
the conj. is the Hithpael, the sense of which is undoubtedly reflexive
('bless themselves'); and most modern scholars (including Ges., Del.,
Dillm., and Riehm, Mess. Proph. Edinb. 1891, p. 97 f.) consider that
the two passages of which the sense is clear should determine the
interpretation of the three in which the sense is ambiguous, and render
therefore (here, xviii. 18, and xxviii, 14, as well as xxii. 18, xxvi. 4)
* bless themselves by thee,' i.e. in blessing themselves will use thy name
as a type of happiness (see, in illustration of this usage, the notes on
xxii. 18 and xlviii. 20), wish for themselves the blessings (including the
rehgious privileges), recognized as the special possession of Abraham
(or, in xxviii. 14, of his descendants): cf. Is. Ixi. 9^ Ixv. 23\ Thus
upon the first interpretation the words declare that the blessings of
which Israel is to become the organ and channel are to be communi-
cated ultimately to the world ; upon the second, they imply that these
same blessings will 'attract the regard of aU peoples, and awaken in
them the longing to participate in them' (cf. Is. ii. 3; xlii. 4''; Zech.
viii. 23): in either case, therefore, the thought remains, in the wider
sense of the term, a Messianic one. Cf. Gal. iii. 8 (though the
quotation here is taken more directly from ch. xviii. 18).
4** (from and Abram), 5 (P). More detailed particulars, in P's
manner, of Abram's migration from Haran into Canaan. The most
1 Dillm. asks, Why should less be said of the seed of Abraham (which, ex hyp.,
is the direct medium of the transmission of the blessings to the Gentiles) than of
Abraham himself, as would be the case if, in xii. 3, xviii. 18, the verb were rendered
be blessed, while in xxii. 18, xxvi. 4 it is rendered bless themselves 1 On the other
hand, it might be urged (cf. the writer's Sermons on the OT. p. 54) that the
difference of conjugation created a presumption of a difference of meaning : we are
not, however, sure that the writer is in all five cases the same, and the difference of
conjugation may be due to a difference of author. (The Niph. of 'j'la occurs only in
the three passages in question.)
D, 10
146 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xii. 6
6 And Abram passed through the land unto the place of J
Shechem, unto the ^oak of Moreh. And the Canaanite was
^ Or, terebinth
probable route for a traveller journeying from Haran to Canaan would
be to cross the Euphrates by the great ford at Carchemish' (60 miles
W. of Haran), then to turn S. past Hamath and Damascus; and after
this, either, crossing one of the S. spurs of Hermon, in the neighbour-
hood of the modern Baniyas, to enter Canaan from the N. on the
W. side of the waters of Merom, or striking down into the Jordan-
valley, to travel along it, on the E. side of the stream, until he reached
the ford of ed-Damiyeh (25 miles N. of the Dead Sea), crossing which,
as Jacob did afterwards, and turning up to the NW., he would soon
reach Shechem, in the centre of the land.
souls. I.e. persons (p. ix, No. 19), here denoting slaves (cf xxxvi. 6).
6. place. The word means here very probably sacred place : cf.
xxviii. 16 ; Dt. xii. 2, 3; 1 S. vii. 16 lxx. ; Jer. vii. 12. The correspond-
ing Arabic word makdm is used similarly (cf Conder, TW. 304 f ).
Shechem. Afterwards an important town in the hill-country of
Ephraim, lying in a fertile, well-watered vale, between Ebal and
Gerizim (see a view in Smith, DB. s.v.), just 30 miles N. of Jerusalem,
and 5 miles SE. of Samaria. After its destruction in the wars of
Vespasian, Shechem was rebuilt under the name of Flavia Neapolis,
whence its modern name of Ndblus. For notices of Shechem in later
books, illustrating both its rehgious and political importance, see Jos.
XX. 7, xxiv. 1, 25, 26, 32 (Gen. xxxiii. 18—20); Jud. ix., xxi. 19;
1 K. xii. 1, 25 ; Ps. Ix. 6 : comp. also Gen, xxxv. 4, and on xlviii. 22.
unto the directing terebinth (or, terebinth of (the) director).
An oracular tree. Moreh is the ptcp. of hordh, the word used regularly
of the authoritative direction given by priests (e.g. Dt. xxxiii. 10;
Mic. iii. 11: RV. usu. teach), and the verb from which tordh, 'law'
(prop, direction), is derived (see DB. iii. 64 f). No doubt the reference
is to a sacred tree, supposed by the ancient Canaanites to give oracles,
and attended by priests, who interpreted its answers to those who
came to consult it. ' Oracles and omens from trees, and at tree-
sanctuaries, are of the commonest among all races, and are derived
in very various ways, either from observation of phaenomena comiected
with the trees themselves (such as the rustlings of their leaves), or from
ordinary processes of divination performed in the presence of the sacred
objects' The terebinth {'eh'm) must have been one of those mentioned
1 Maspero, ii. 145.
« W. R. Smith, Rel. of the Semites, p. 178 (ed. 2, p. 195). Tree-worship was
often practised by the heathen Semites {ib. p. 169 ff., ed. 2, p. 185 &.). Even to
this day Palestine abounds in trees, especially oaks, supposed to be ' inhabited,' or
haunted by (spirits (jinn) ; and the superstitious peasants suspend rags upon them
as tokens of homage (Thomson, L. and B. n. 104, 171 f., 222, 474).
For trees which, to judge from the connexion in which they are mentioned,
were probably regarded as sacred, see Gen. xiii. 18 (xviii. 1), xxi. 33, xxxv. 4, 8 ;
XII. 6-8] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 147
then in the land. 7 And the Lord appeared unto Abram, and J
said, Unto thy seed will I give this land : and there builded he
an altar unto the Lord, who appeared unto him. 8 And he
also in Dt. xi. 30 (if, indeed, we should not read there, with Sam., lxx.,
the sing. ' terebinth ') ; very probably, too, it is the same as the one
called in Jud. ix. 37 the * Soothsayers' terebinth ' (D'3:yD \^^-> if not
also (though this is less certain) the same as the ^elah of Gen. xxxv. 4,
and the ^allah of Jos. xxiv. 26 ' in Jehovah's sanctuary ' at Shechem.
terebinth. There are five similar Hjb. words — 'el [only in the pi.
^elim\, 'eldh, 'elon, 'alldh (only Jos. xxiv. 26), and 'allon — the difiference
between which depends in part only upon the punctuation, and the
special sense of each of which is not perfectly certain : Geseuius, after
a careful survey of the data, arrived at the conclusion, which has been
largely accepted by subsequent scholars, that 'el, 'eldh, 'elon denoted
properly the terebinth, and 'alldh, 'allun the oak^. The terebinth
(or turpentine-tree) in general appearance resembles the oak (though
it grows usually alone, not in clumps or forests) ; and both trees are
still common in Palestine*.
And the Canaanite &c. The remark is made in view of v. 7 : the
land promised there to Abram's seed was not at the time ownerless ;
it was, in fact, in the possession of those very Canaanites, who were
afterwards to be dispossessed by Abram's descendants. The term
' Canaanite ' is used by J, like ' Amorite ' by E, as a general designation
of the pre-Israelitish inhabitants of the country (see on x. 15, p. 125 f.;
and cf. xiii. 7, xxiv. 3, 1. 11).
7. The promise of the land is here for the first time given ex-
plicitly: in vv. 1 — 3 it is at most implied. Comp. afterwards xiii. 15,
17, XV. 18, xxvi. 3, xxviii. 13; and in P xvii. 8, xxxv. 12 (xlviii. 4).
builded he an altar. The building of an altar is the standing
religious observance of patriarchal times, not only on a special occasion,
as viii. 20 (Noah), xxii. 9, or after a theophany, as here, xxvi. 25, and
xxxv. 1, 7, but also independently, v. 8, xiii. 18, xxxiii. 20 (but see
the note); cf Ex. xvii. 15. The place thus marked by the theophany,
and the altar, is very probably identical with the 'sanctuary,' or sacred
place, at Shechem, mentioned in Josh. xxiv. 26, the original conse-
cration of which is here referred to Abram.
8. Abram next moved southwards to a spot between Bethel
and 'Ai, where in like manner he 'built an altar,' and also invoked
solemnly Jehovah's name (see on iv. 26). On Bethel, the modern
Jos. xxiv. 26 ; Jud. vi. 11, 19 (cf. 24), ix. 6, 37 ; 1 S. xxii. 6, xxxi. 13. Comp. also
the frequent allusions to idolatrous rites celebrated beside trees (e.g. Dt. xii. 2; Is.
i. 29, Ivii. 5 ; Hos. iv. 13). See further Nature Worship, §§ 2, 3, iu EncB. ; and
R. B. Taylor on ' Traces of Tree-Worship in the OT.,' in the Exp. Times, June 1903,
p. 407 ff. The Heb. words for 'terebinth' are quite possibly derived from 'el, ' God.'
1 Hence RV. has always for 'eldh and 'elon, and for 'elim in Is. i. 29, 'terebinth,'
either in the margin or (Is. vi. 13 ; Hos. iv. 13j in the text.
2 Tristram, NHB. pp. 367—371, 400 f.
10—2
148 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xii. 8, 9
removed from thence unto the mountain on the east of Beth-el, J
and pitched his tent, having Beth-el on the west, and Ai on the
east : and there he builded an altar unto the Lord, and called
upon the name of the Lord. 9 And Abram journeyed, going on
still tovrard the ^ South.
^ Heb. Negeb, the soathern tract of Judah.
Beitin, 10 miles N. of Jerusalem, see more fully on xxviii. 12. 'Ai
is very probably the present Haiydn, a ruined site 2|- miles ESE. of
Beitin, with a deep ravine on the N. (Jos. viii. 11), and with a hill
between it and Beitin, from which (cf xiii. 10) the Jordan -valley and
N. end of the Dead Sea are plainly visible (Rob. BR. 11. 575 ;
PEFM. n. 373, m. 31—35 ; cf. Conder, Tent Work, 253 f., and Ai in
EncB. and DB.).
the mountain. See on xiii. 10.
the, west. Lit. the sea. The ' sea ' (i.e. the Mediterranean Sea) is in
Heb. the regular expression for the West. Its use in the Pent, is an
indication that this was written by men who had lived long enough in
Palestine for the ' sea ' to have come to be used in this sense. Cf
W. R. Smith, OT. in the Jewish Church, 323 ('326).
9. journeyed, viz. by stages, as is customary in the East. The
word used means properly to pluck up (sc. the pegs of the tent), i.e. to
move tent or camp : it thus becomes the standing word for to journey
(xiii. 11, XX. 1; Ex. xii. 37, &c.).
toward the South. Or, the Negeb, — the word (meaning properly the
dry land'') being used in a teclmical geographical sense (as is indicated
by RVm.) of a particular district of Judah, intermediate in elevation,
and also in character {DB. or EncB. s.v. Neqbb; HG. 278—286),
between the ' hill country ' (Jos. xv. 48) around Hebron, &c., and the
wilderness et-Tih, N. of the Sinaitic peninsula. The Negeb began on
the N. a little S. of Dhaheriyeh (prob. the ancient Debir), 10 miles NNE.
of Beer-sheba, and it seems to have extended as far S. as Kadesh (xiv.
7). The cities situated in the Negeb are enumerated in Jos. xv. 21 —
32. When used in the technical sense here explained, 'south' is in
RV. regularly printed with a capital S (e.g. Dt. 1. 7; Jer. xiii. 19).
10 — 20. This narrative represents Abram in a new light. Anxious lest
his personal safety should be indirectly endangered by his wife's beauty, he
manifests a want of candour which, when discovered, not only brings him
into difficulties which might easily have proved more serious than, happily,
they actually were, but also subjects him to a humiliating rebuke on the part
of the Pharaoh. Untruthfulness and dissimulation are extremely common
faults in the East ; and it would be manifestly unjust to measure Abram by a
Christian standard : nevertlieless, the narrator is clearly conscious that he fell
below the standard which he iniglit have been expected to attain, and contrasts
him unfavourably with the upright and straightforward heathen king. Cf. the
similar narratives, xx., xxvi. 6 — 11.
1 The root is not in use in Heb., but it is common in Aramaic.
XII. IO-I3] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 149
10 And there was a famine in the land : and Abram went J
down into Egypt to sojourn there ; for the famine was sore in
the land, 11 And it came to pass, when he was come near to
enter into Egypt, that he said unto Sarai his wife, Behold now,
I know that thou art a fair woman to look upon : 12 and it shall
come to pass, when the Egyptians shall see thee, that they shall
say, This is his wife : and they will kill me, but they will save
thee alive. 13 Say, I pray thee, thou art my sister: that it may
be well with me for thy sake, and that my soul may live because
10. There bein^ no artificial irrigation in Palestine, and the
country being largely dependent for its fertility upon the annual
rainfall, a famine was no unfrequent occurrence in it (cf Am. iv. 6, 7,
and elsewhere) : on the other hand, the yearly rise of the Nile, which
secured the fertility of Egypt, rarely failed; so that Egypt was the
country to which, when there was a famine in Canaan, the inhabitants
would naturally turn (cf. xxvi. 1, xlii. 1 f.).
went down. Viz. from the high ground of Canaan — the expression
regularly used of one journeying from Canaan into Egypt (e.g. xhv. 21);
as conversely ' come (or go) up ' is said as regularly of a journey in the
opposite direction (e.g. xiii. 1, xliv. 17, 24).
to sojourn there. I.e. to stay tliere temporarily — the regular mean-
ing of the word (Is. Hi. 4 ; cf on ch. xv. 13).
11. From xii. 4, compared with xvii. 17, it appears that Sarai was
at this time at least 65 years of age; and it has often been wondered
why Abram should have been in alarm on the ground stated, and why
the Pharaoh should have been attracted by her beauty. The solution
of the difficulty is to be found in the fact that the statements about
Sarai's age belong to a different document (P) from the one (J) which
narrates the visit to Eg)rpt: the author of the latter evidently pictured
Sarai as still a comparatively young woman. There are other chrono-
logical discreoancies in Gen., which are to be similarly explained
(cf on xxi. 15, xxiv. 67, xxxv. 8, and pp. 262, 365 n., 368, 398).
13. my sister. The statement was true, but not the whole truth
(see XX. 12): so that it was a prevarication on Abram's part; a fact of
vital importance on the question at issue was purposely concealed, and
a false impression was thereby created.
that it may he well with me for thy sal-e. That I may be treated
with friendliness, for the sake of my fair sister.
my soul. The ' soul,' in Heb. psychology, is the seat of feeling and
emotion; hence in poetry, or choice prose, 'my (thy, his, &c.) soul'
becomes a pathetic periphrasis for the personal pron., — ofteu, indeed,
in poetry interchanging with it in the parallel clause. See xxvii. 4,
19, 25, 31 (by the side of the pron. in vv. 7, 10); Nu. xxiii. 10 (RVm.);
Jud. xvi. 30 Heb.; Is. i. 14, xlii. 1, Iv. 3, Ixi. 10, Ixvi. 3, &c.
150 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xii. 13-17
of thee. 14 And it came to pass, that, when Abram was come J
into Egypt, the Egyptians beheld the woman that she was very
fair. 15 And the princes of Pharaoh saw her, and praised her
to Pharaoh : and the woman was taken into Pharaoh's house.
16 And he entreated Abram well for her sake : and he had
sheep, and oxen, and he-asses, and menservants, and maid-
servants, and she-asses, and camels. 17 And the Lord plagued
Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarai
15. Pharaoh. The official, not the personal, designation of the
Egyptian king. The word is the hieroglyphic Pr-'o, which means
properly the Great House, and in inscriptions of the ' Old Kingdom '
(1 — 11 dynasties) denotes simply the royal house or estate, but after-
wards— something in the manner of the ' Subhme Porte ' — became
gradually a title of the monarch himself, and finally (in the 22nd and
following djTiasties) was prefixed to the king's personal name (as in
' Pharaoh Necho '). See the lucid exposition of the history of the term
by Mr F. LI. Griffith, in the DB. s.v. Pharaoh. There is nothing in
the present narrative to indicate what 'Pharaoh' is here meant; but if,
on account of xiv. 1 (p. 156), Abram is assigned rightly to c. 2300 B.C.
it will have been one of the rulers of the 12th (Brugsch, Budge, Hist,
of Eg. in., ch. i.), or 13th (Petrie, Hist, of Eg. i. 206) dynasty.
was taken into Pharaoh's house — or palace; in accordance with the
custom of Eastern princes of arbitrarily selecting beautiful women to
be added to their harems. Polygamy was not the rule in Egypt ; but
wealthy Egyptians, and especially the Pharaohs, often had two or more
wives: see Erman, Life in Ancient Egypt, 74 — 6, 142, 151 — 3.
16. entreated. I.e. treated : an archaism. So Ex. v. 22, al.
and he had. I.e. and he came to have, received. The presents
are given for the sake of his supposed sister: Abram, by accepting
them, thus places himself in a false position. The animals mentioned
appear elsewhere also, along with slaves, as forming the chief wealth of
the nomadic patriarchs: cf xxiv. 35, xxxii. 14 f; also Jobi. 3, xlii. 12.
The mention of camels has been supposed to be an anachronism ; for
the camel was not used or bred in ancient Egypt, nor does it appear
'in any inscription or painting before the Greek period' (Erman, p. 493 :
cf. W. Max Miiller, EncB. 634 ; Sayce, EHH 169): they would how-
ever be a very natural gift for a nomad sheikh, and they might have
been readily procured for the purpose from traders (ci. xxxvii. 25).
mens&rvants and maidservants. I.e. male and female slaves. See
Jer. xxxiv. 9, 10, 11 his (Heb. as vv. 9, 10): cf ch. xx. 14, xxiv. 35.
17. A mysterious sickness fell upon Pharaoh and his house, which,
it must be assumed, aroused suspicions, and so led to inquiries which
resulted in the discovery of the truth.
* See examples of its use, similar to those in Gen., in the 'Tale of the Two
Brothers' (see on ch. xxxix., p. 336) in Petrie's Egyp. Tales, n. 53 — 64.
xiL i7-x: II. 6] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 151
Abram's wife. 18 And Pharaoh called Abram, and said, "What J
is this that thou hast done unto me ? why didst thou not teU me
that she was thy wife? 19 Why saidst thou, She is my sister?
so that I took her to be my wife : now therefore behold thy
wife, take her, and go thy way. 20 And Pharaoh gave men
charge concerning him : and they brought him on the way, and
his wife, and all that he had.
Chapter XIII.
Abram^s return into Canaan; and Lot's separation from him.
XIII. 1 And Abram went up out of Egypt, he, and his J
wife, and all that he had, and Lot with him, into the South.
2 And Abram was very rich in cattle, in silver, and in gold.
3 And he went on his journeys fi'om the South even to Beth-el,
unto the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between
Beth-el and Ai ; 4 unto the place of the altar, which he had made
there at the first : and there Abram called on the name of the
Lord. 5 And Lot also, which went with Abram, had flocks,
and herds, and tents. | 6 And the land was not able to bear P
plagued .. .with plagues {TrXriyaC), Properly struck... with strokes
(Dt. xvii. 8), — of severe sickness, as 1 K. viii. 37, Ps. xxxviii. 11.
18, 19. Pharaoh, displeased, rebukes Abram for his prevarication;
and bids him, with some peremptoriness, take his wife with him and
depart.
20. gave men clmrge concerning him. Or, appointed men over Mm ;
i.e. assigned him an escort, to accompany him to the frontier.
brought him on the way. Lit. sent him on: cf xviii. 16; and irpo-
TrifiTTiiv Acts XV. 3, xxi. 5.
XIII. 1 — 5. Abram returns to the place where he had built the
altar near Bethel (xii. 8).
1. the South. See on xii. 9.
2. The narrator draws a picture of the wealth and importance of
Abram. Cf xxiv. 35.
3. on his journeys. Rather, by his stages (lit. pluckings up: cf. on
xii. 9 ; and see Ex. xvii. 1 ; Nu. xxxiii. 1, 2, RVm.). But the word
'journey' (Fr. journee) seems in these passages to be used in its old
etymological sense of ' a day's travel.'
6 — 13. Lot separates himself from Abram.
6. P's account of the cause of the separation : there was not
sufficient pastme for their united flocks. Cf xxxvi. 7 (also P),
152 THE BOOK OF GENESIS ^xiii. 6-10
them, that they might dwell together : for their substance was P
great, so that they could not dwell together. | 7 And there was J
a strife between the herdmen of Abram's cattle and the herdmen
of Lot's cattle : and the Canaanite and the Perizzite dwelled
then in the land. 8 And Abram said unto Lot, Let there be no
strife, I pray thee, between me and thee, and between my
herdmen and thy herdmen ; for we are brethren. 9 Is not the
whole land before thee ? separate thyself, I pray thee, from me :
if thou wilt take the left hand, then I Avill go to the right ; or if
thou take the right hand, then I will go to the left. 10 And
Lot lifted up his eyes, and beheld all the ^ Plain of Jordan, that
^ Or, Circle
where a similar reason is assigned for the separation of Esau from
Jacob. The verse was in its original context followed immediately by
7. J's account of the cause of the separation of Abram and Lot : dis-
putes arising between their respective herdmen (of xxi. 25, xxvi. 20 ff.).
Perizzite, So, together with ' Canaanite,' xxxiv. 30, Jud. i. 4, 5 ;
alone, Josh. xvii. 15; and in the lists of nations dispossessed by Israel,
ch. XV. 20, Ex. iii. 8, 17, Dt, vii. 1, al. To judge from the first-named
passages, the Perizzites were a people of central Palestine ; but more is
not definitely known about them. It is thought by some (Sayce, Races
of the OT. 120; Moore, Judges, p. 17) that the word is not the name
of a tribe at all, but that it is connected with perdzl, ' country-folk,
peasantry' (Dt, iii. 5; 1 S. vi, 18), and denoted the village population
of Canaan, tiie fellakin, or labourers on the soil.
8, 9. Such disputes between relations are unseemly; so Abram
proposes a separation, and though he is the elder, generously offers his
nephew the first choice.
8. brethren. I.e. near relatives: cf xiv. 14, 16, xxiv. 27, xxix. 12.
10. There is a 'conspicuous hill,' a little E. of Betliel (cf. on xii. 8),
commanding a wide prospect, upon or near which the narrator may
have pictured Lot and Abram as standing. * To the East there rises
in the foreground the jagged range of the hills above Jericho ; in the
distance the dark wall of Moab; between them lies the wide valley of
the Jordan, its course marked by the track of tropical forest growth
[the 'pride of Jordan' of Jer. xii. 5, xlix. 19 = 1. 44, Zech. xi. 3], in
which its rushing stream is enveloped ' ; while on the S. and W. appear
the bleak hills of Judah (Stanley, S. and P. 218).
the Oval 0/ Jordan (Heb. Kikkdr, a 'round'). The KikJcdr was the
specific name of the basin consisting of the lower and broader part of
the Jordan-valley (beginning about 25 miles N. of the Dead Sea), and
including apparently (see p. 170 f) the Dead Sea itself, and the
1 See however the following footuote.
XIII. io-h] the book of genesis 153
it was well watered every where, before the Lord destroyed J'
Sodom and Gomorrah, like the garden of the Lord, like the
land of Egypt, as thou goest unto Zoar. 11 So Lot chose him
aU the Plain of Jordan ; and Lot journeyed east : | and they P
separated themselves the one from the other. 12 Abram
dwelled in the land of Canaan, and Lot dwelled in the cities of
the Plain, | and moved his tent as far as Sodom. 13 Now the J
men of Sodom were wicked and sinners against the Lord
exceedingly. 14 And the Lord said unto Abram, after that
small plain at its S. end {v. 12, xix. 17, 25, 28, 29; Dt. xxxiv. 3;
2 S. xviii. 23); the 'Kikkdr of the Jordan' (here, v. 11, and 1 K. vii. 46)
being in particular the part including the lower course of the Jordan
(see further DB. s.v. Plain, 4). The Jordan- valley, once (see p. 168)
a sea-bottom, contains large patches of salt and barren soil; but in
some parts, esp. about Jericho (where anciently there were beautiful
palm-groves), and along the banks of the river (cf. the last note), it is
extremely fertile, and produces exuberant vegetation (see HG. 483 f ,
487, 489); and the writer, it seems, pictured it as having been still
more fertile than it was in his own day, before Sodom and Gomorrah
had been destroyed (xix. 24 — 28).
well watered. Especially about Jericho, and across the Jordan,
where numerous streams, descending into the Kikkcir, form hues of
verdure along the mountain sides. Ezek. (xvi. 48 f ) attributes the
sin of Sodom to its ease of living and material prosperity.
like the garden of Jehovah (Is. li. 3). I.e. the garden of Eden, —
v/ell-irrigated, and a type of fertility (cf on ii. 8).
like the land of Egypt. Also irrigated by a river, and celebrated
for the fertility of its soil.
as thou goest unto Zo'ar, near the SE. corner of the Dead Sea (see
p. 170). The words connect with well watered every where, and define
the S. limit of the area once, as the writer supposes, thus well-watered
and fertile'. But possibly Zo'an (Pesh.) should be read, the name of
the well-known city (Tanis) in the NE. of the Delta.
11. Such a fair prospect was more than Lot was able to resist : so
heedless of the prior claim possessed by his uncle, and heedless also of
the character of those whom he would thereby have Hving around him
{v. 13), he chose for himself the Kikkdr of Jordan.
13. The verse is intended partly to shew Lot's indifference, partly
to prepare for ch. xix., and partly also to illustrate the providence
which preserved Abram from association with such men.
14 — 17, The reward of Abram's unselfishness. Being now left
alone in the land, he receives a new and empliatic repetition of the
^ This verse, and v. 12'> (cf. xiv. 3), read, it must be admitted, as if the writer,
though he did not (p. 170) think of the cities of the Kikkdr as submerged, neverthe-
less pictured the Dead Sea as non-existent at this time. Cf. Guukel, p. 159 f.
164 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xiii. 14-18
Lot was separated from him, Lift up now thine eyes, and look J
from the place where thou art, northward and southward and
eastward and westward : 15 for all the land which thou seest,
to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever. 16 And I will
make thy seed as the dust of the earth : so that if a man can
number the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be
numbered. 17 Arise, walk through the land in the length of it
and in the breadth of it ; for unto thee will I give it. 18 And
Abram moved his tent, and came and dwelt by the ^oaks of
Mamre, which are in Hebron, and built there an altar unto the
Lord.
^ Or, terebinthg
promises previously given (xii. 2, 7), and is encouraged (v. 17) to move
about freely in the country destinea to become ultimately the possession
of his descendants.
In Gal. iii. 16 this passage, — or the similar one, xvii. 8, — is referred
to by St Paul as shewing that the promises given to Abram (the
' land ' being interpreted in a spiritual sense) were fulfilled in Christ.
On the argument of the apostle (in which ' seeds ' is shewn by post-Bibl.
Jewish usage to signify not contemporary, but successive generations),
see thp present writer's note in the Expositor, Jan. 1889, p. 18 fi".
16. as the dust of the earth. So xxviii. 14. Of. the comparison to
the stars, xv. 5, xxii. 17, xxvi. 4, and to the sand, xxii. 17, xxxii. 12,
18. Abram now moves southwards, as far as Hebron, on the high-
ground (or 'hill country') of Judah (Jos. xv. 48 — 60, — Hebron is
3040 ft. above the Medit. Sea), 19 miles SSW. of Jerusalem.
th£, terebinths (xii. 6) of Mamre. So xviii. 1 (J); and xiv. 13
(where, as in xiv. 24, ]\'Iamre appears as the name of a local sheikh or
chief, the owner of the terebinths): 'Mamre' also occurs (in P) in
descriptions of the cave of Machpelah, which is said to be ' in front of
Mamre,' xxiii. 17, 19 (where Mamre is identified with Hebron), xxv. 9,
xlix. 30, 1. 13. The site has not been identified; though if the present
mosque (p. 228) is really built over the cave of Machpelah, and if ' in
front of has its usual topographical sense of 'East of,' it will have
been not far W. of the present mosque. From Josephus' time (see BJ.
IV. 9. 7) to the present day, terebinths or oaks, called by the name of
Abraham, have been shewn at difi"erent spots near Hebron (see a view
of the present ' Oak of Abraham ' in L. and B. i. 283) ; but none has
any real claim to mark the authentic site of the ancient ' Mamre ' (see
further particulars in the writer's art. Mamre in DB.y.
1 Sozomen {HE. ii. 4), in speaking of the 'Abraham's Oak' of Constantine's
time (two miles N. of Hebron), adds that it was regarded as sacred, sacrifices being
offered beside it, and libations and other offerings being cast into a well close by,
until these obssrvauces were suppressed by Constantino as superstitious. Cf. Eus.
Vita Const, in. 53.
THE BOOK OF GENESIS 155
in Hebron. Afterwards an important city of Judah : according to
Jos, XV. 13 f. taken by Caleb; and for 7| years the seat of David's
kingdom (2 S. ii. 1 — 4, v. 1 — 5): 2 S. xv. 7, 12, also, shew that it
was the seat of a sanctuary. It is now a ' long stone town,' stretching
from NW. to SE. 'on the W. slope of a bare terraced hill.' Its modern
name is el-Halil, 'the friend,' abbreviated from 'the town of the friend
of God,' the name (see Is. xli. 8; 2 Ch. xx. 7; Jas. ii. 23) by which
Abraham is known among Mohammedans (Kor. iv. 124). C£ on xxiii. 2.
'By thus separating from Abram, and voluntarily quitting Canaan, Lot
resigns his claim to it, and the later territorial relations of Moab and Ammon
(xix. 30 — 38), and Israel, are prefigured. At the same time, by the departure
of Lot, Abram becomes the central figure of the following narrative. The
incident is, further, narrated in such a way as to afford a fresh illustration of
Abram's spiritual greatness, in his self-denying and peace-loving disposition,
and at the same time of God's providential care for him ' (Dillm.).
Chapter XIV.
Expedition of Chedorla'omer and his allies against the cities
of the Kikkdr. Abram's rescue of Lot. The episode of
Melchizedek.
Abram appears here in a new character, not merely as a patriarch having
peaceful dealings with the natives of Palestine, but as a warrior, defeating with
a handful of followers a combination of powerful kings from the East. The
aim of the narrative is evidently to magnify Abram : he ' defeats kings, he is
blessed by a king, he will not take from a king even as much as a shoe-latchet^':
he is, moreover, disinterested, independent, and highmiuded. The style and
phraseology of the chapter shew that it does not belong to either J, E, or P,
but that it is taken from some independent source (hence .S*S'= special source) :
it has some affinities with P, but they are not sufficiently marked to justify its
being attributed to him: the general style and literary character of the
narrative suggest, however, that it is not of earlier date than the age of Ezekiel
and the exile (cf. p. xvi). The archaeological learning, implied in vv. 6, 7, if
not also in vv. 1 — 3, 8, 9, recalls the antiquarian notices in Dt. ii. 10 — 12, 20 —
23, iii. 9, 11, 13^ 14. The peculiarities of the narrative, its contrast with the
representations of J and E, and certain improbabilities which have been
supposed to attach to it, have led many to treat it as unhistorical : this question
will be bettor considered, after the chapter has been studied in detail, and the
bearing of recent archaeological discovery upon it has been estimated.
The following is, in brief^ the light which has been thrown by recent dis-
coveries upon the names of the four kings from the East, mentioned in v. 1.
1 Contrast the very different spirit and motives, with which he receives
presents in xii. 16.
' See more fully, on some points, the writer's article in the Guardian, March 11,
1896.
150 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
1. AmrapheJ., king of Shin^ar. SViin'ar, we already know (see on x. 10),
is a Hebrew name of Babylonia. No name 'Amraphcr has been touiul as yet
in the Inscriptions ; but tliere is a reasonable probability that it is a corrupt,
representation of Hammurabi, the name of the 6th king of the first dynasty of
Babylon of which we have information ^ Hammurabi reigned for 43 years ^, —
according to Thureau-Dangin and Ungnad, b.o. 2130 — 2088^: as his own
inscriptions testify, he was a powerful and successful ruler, who, by his skill in
organizing and consolidating the resources of his country, and his victories
over its rival, Elam, laid the foundation of its future greatness*. In one of his
inscriptions he is called ' adda [' father,' i.e. ruler] of Martu' or the West
Land, an expression commonly denoting Syria, Phoenicia, and Palestine, and
implying, consequently, if it has the same meaning here, that he claimed to
rule as far as the Mediterranean Sea (cf. Masp. ii. 38 n.).
2, Arioch, king of Ellasar. In all probability Eriagu or Eriaku\ king
of Larsa, now Senkereh, about midway between Babylon and the mouth of
the Euphrates, whose name is mentioned in many inscriptions, dating from his
own time, and who was contemporary with Hammurabi. His inscriptions
shew that he was not only king of Larsa, but also that he owned Ur (xi. 28),
Lagash (now Telloh), and Nippur, and obeyed the decisions of the god of
Eridu (p. 52 n.), Ea; so we must picture him as ruUng over a considerable part
of S. Babylonia. Further, Eriaku is said to be the sou of ' Kudurmabuk, adda
of YamutbaL' Kudurmabuk, now, is not a Babylonian, but an Elamitish
name, — Elam being (x. 22) the mountfiinous region across the Tigris, E. of
Babylonia; and Yamutbal is shewn by other notices to have been a province in
the E. part of S. Babylonia, bordering on Elam, and at this time under Elamite
dominion. It thus appears that at the time in question the Elamite power had
obtained a footing in S. Babylonia : Kudurmabuk, we may suppose, ruled him-
self in Yamutbal, and, supported by him, his son, Eriaku, maintained himself
in Larsa and the surrounding parts of S. Babylonia. Eriaku's father, Kudur-
1 For a list of the 11 kings of this dynasty, see the Addenda (on p. 156).
2 See the nearly contemporary chronological register of part of this dynasty,
first published by L. W. King, in his Letters and hiscriptions of Hammurabi, iii.
(translations), 1900, pp. Ivi. — Ixxi., 212 — 253: cf. Pinches, OT. in the light of the
records (&c. 211 ff.
' The date b.c. depends in part upon statements made by later kings : as these
are not in all cases perfectly consistent, other scholars arrive at somewhat different
dates for Hammurabi, as 2198—2155 (Poebel, Z.fiir Ass. 1908, p. 175), or 1958—
1916 (Ed. Meyer, Gesch. des Altertums^, i. ii., 190J, p. 341). But all earlier dates,
such as those given formerly bj^ Sayce, Johns, and others, have become anticjuated
since the publication in 1907 of the newer material contained in L. W. King's
Chronicles concerning early Babi/lonian Kings : see further in the Addenda.
* See particulars of his reign in Maspero, ii. 39 — 44, or the Introd. to King,
Letters, He constructed among other things a system of canals in Babylonia.
In 1901, also, a very interesting code of laws promulgated by him, was discovered,
coutaining remarkable parallels to several of the civil and criminal laws found
in Ex. xxi. — xxiii.. Lev. xx., and Deut. xii. — xxvi. : see Johns, DB. v. 584 — 612;
and S. A. Cook, The Laws of Moses and the Code of Hammurabi (1903).
5 Eriagu, or Eriaku, is the Sumerian equivalent of the Semitic 'Arad-sin,' the
name by which this king is usuall}' kLown. The old identification with Rim-sin, —
which depended on the doubtful assumption that this name could be read Eriaku, —
is now given up. See further particulars in the Addenda.
INTRODUCTION TO CHAPTER XIV 157
mabuk, also receives the same title ^ adda of Martu,' which is given to
Hammurabi ; he appears therefore to have claimed the same kind of authority
over Syria and the West which was claimed by Hammurabi.
Eventually, however, the Elamite rule in S. Babylonia was brought to an
end, Hammurabi (as another inscription states) defeating both Eriaku and his
father Kudurmtibuk, and, in his Slst year, adding Yamutbal to his domain ^
It may be conjectured that it was after this victory, which secured Ham-
murabi's supremacy over the whole of Babylonia, that he assumed the title of
' adda of Martu,' quoted above.
3. Chedorla'^drner, king of Elam. Elam (x. 22) has been long known as
an important coomtry, with a very ancient civilization, repeatedly mentioned in
the inscriptions ; Chedorla'omer also was clearly a genuine Elamite name, — for
Kudur (meaning perhaps ' sei-vant ') was known to occur in other proper names
belonging to Elam, and La'omer, or, as it might be pronounced, Lagomer (lxx.
Aoyofifiop), is the name of an Elamite deity, mentioned by Asshurbanipal {KB. ii.
205), — but until lately no independent mention of it had been found. In 1892,
however, Mr T. G. Pinches''' discovered in the British Museum three inscribed
tablets, containing a name, which, though the pronunciation of the middle
part is not certain, has been read conjecturally Kudurlach{1)gumal, or
(Hommel) Kudurdugmal, and so regarded as corresponding to the Hob.
Chedorla'omer. Other Assyriologists, however, hold that the facts do not
justify this identification ^j so that, at best, it must be considered doubtful.
The tablets are of very late date (c. 300 b.c.), and are written also in a florid,
poetical style, so that they have not the value of contemporary records : at the
same time it is not unreasonable to suppose that they are based upon more
ancient materials, and preserve the memory of genuine historical facts. The
tablets are much mutilated in parts, but their general gist is clear: they
describe how Kudurlachgumal invaded Babylonia \vith his troops, plundering
its cities and temples, and exercising sovereignty in Babylon itself. A couple
of extracts may be quoted —
(1) The gods.. .in their faithful counsel to Kudurlachgumal, king of Elam,
said (?), * Descend,' and the thing that unto them was good [they performed,
and] he exercised sovereignty in Babylon, [and] placed [his throne ?] in Babylon,
the city of the kiuij of the gods, Marduk Dur-sir-ilani, the son of
Eri-ekua, who [had carried off?] the spoil, sat [on] the throne of dominion.
(2) Who is Kudurlachgu[mal], the maker of the evils ? He has assembled
also the Umman-manda [see on v. 1, below] ; he has laid in ruins.
If, however, Kudurlachgumal is rightly identified with Chedorla'omer, the
Eri-ekua mentioned here can hardly be difi'ereut from the Eriaku, king of
Larsa, referred to above. The inscriptions do not explain the relative positions
of Kudurlachgumal and Kudurmabuk, Eriaku's father; but it may be con-
jectured that Kudurlachgumal (as king of Elam) was over-lord of Kudurmabuk,
the adda of Yamutbal, and of his son Eriaku, king of Larsa. Kudurlach-
gumal's victories in Babylonia will naturally have preceded Hammurabi's final
1 See King, p. Ixvii., and the ancient chronicle, p. 237, or Pinches, p. 212.
a Trans. Vict. Inst. xxix. 45 ff. ; OT. in the light &c. 223 ff.
3 King, Letters of Hammurahi, i. (1898), liv. — lvi. (see an abstract of his
argument in the Addenda); Ball, p. 70; Zimraern, KAT.^ 486.
158 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xiv. i, a
and successful eflFort to shake oflF the Elamite supremacy, and bring to an end
the kingdom of Eriaku. The expedition narrated in the present chapter, if
historical, must also be assigned to the same period : Kudurlachgumal, it
must be assumed, in virtue of the supremacy exercised by him over Babylonia,
obliged Hammurabi to take part with him in his campaign ^
4. Tidied, king of Goiim. A * Tudchula, son of Gazza,' is mentioned in one
of the three inscriptions found by Mr Pinches, as spoiling and plundering ; the
mutilated condition of the tablet does not permit anything more definite to be
said of him'.
XIV. 1 And it came to pass in the days of Amraphel king SS
of Shinar, Arioch king of EUasar, Chedorlaomer king of Elam,
and Tidal king of ^ Goiim, 2 that they made war with Bera king
of Sodom, and with Birsha king of Gomorrah, Shinab king of
^ Or, nations
1 — 4. The five kings of the cities of the KihJcdr (xiii. 10) revolt
against Chedorla'omer.
1. On the kings mentioned in this verse, see the Introd. above.
Goiim. The ordinary Heb. word for ' nations ' (so AV.) ; as this,
however, seems to yield no satisfactory sense, RV. understands the
word as a proper name. No people Goiim is, however, otherwise
known ; and hence Sir H. Kawlinson's conjecture has been widely
accepted, that Goiim is a corruption of Gutim, the Guti of the inscrip-
tions, a people living E. of the Little Zab, corresponding to the E. part
of the present Kurdistan. Professor Sayce, however, suggests that
Goiim may be retained in its usual sense of * nations,' and understood
of the Umma7i-manda, or ' hordes ' of northern peoples, who are men-
tioned from time to time in the inscriptions as invading Assyria, and
who, on one of the tablets quoted above (p. 157), are also said to have
been gathered together by Kudurlachgumal.
2. Of the kings named in this verse, nothing is known beyond
what is stated in the present chapter. Bera' and Birsha' may be
intended by the writer to suggest the meanings with evil Q^"}^) and
with wickedness {^'^'1}), respectively.
Shin'db. For the name, Friedr. Delitzsch {Paradies, 294) compares
Sanibu, the name of an Ammonite king mentioned by Tiglath-
pileser III. (KAT.' p. 257).
1 Chedorla'omer is evidently the leader of the expedition in Gen. xiv. (vv. 4, 5).
* Mr King (Lc. p. liii.), and Mr Ball (p. 70) question also the identifications of
Eri-Skua, and Tudchula: in particular, Mr King observes, neither Eriekua nor
Tudchula is in the inscriptions styled 'king.' See also KAT.^ 367.
The mention of Chedorla'omer {'Kudur-Iuggamar,' 'Kudur-Laghghamar') quoted
by Hommel, AHT. 173—180 (cf. 165, 195), and Sayce, EHH. pp. 12 n., '27, is
admitted to rest upon a false reading of Dr Scheil's (see Sayce, in the Exp. Timet,
Mar. 1899, p. 267, Ball, p. 68; and more fully King, I.e. p. xxv. ff.): the reading
Kudur-Laghghamar, in Sayce, EHH. 26—8, falls through on the same ground. In
Hommel's treatment of Gen. xiv. in AHT. p. 147 £E., there is much that is very
arbitrary and hypothetical.
XIV. 2-5] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 169
Admah, and Shemeber king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela SS
(the same is Zoar). 3 All these ^joined together in the vale of
Siddim (the same is the Salt Sea). 4 Twelve years they served
Chedorlaomer, and in the thirteenth year they rebelled. 5 And
in the fourteenth year came Chedorlaomer, and the kings that
were with him, and smote the Rephaim in Ashteroth-karnaim,
* Oi, joined themselves together against
Admah and Zeboiim are mentioned also in x. 19, and (as destroyed,
like Sodom and Gomorrah) Dt. xxix. 23, Hos. xi. 8.
Bela'. The name is found only here and v. 8^ Tlie five cities
here mentioned are in Wisd. x. 6 called the ' Pentapolis ' : they were
situated, in all probability, at the extreme S. end of the Dead Sea
(see p. 170 f ).
3. All these (the kings mentioned in v. 1) joined together in.
More exactly, joined together (and came) unto, i.e. came as allies unto.
the vale of Siddim. Mentioned only in this chapter. It is identi-
fied here with the Dead Sea, — a statement which can be correct, only if
the reference is to the southern part of the Sea, which is very much
shallower than the northern part, and where in Abram's time there
may have been dry land (cf pp. 169, 171).
the Salt Sea. One of the Biblical names of what we know as the
Dead Sea, so called on account of its excessive saltness, — ordinary sea-
water containing about 6 per cent, of salts, whereas the water of the
Dead Sea contains more than four times as much (about 24 '50 per
cent.). Its saltness is due to the character of the soil about it : saline
springs flow into it, and at its SW. end there is a ridge of cliffs, some
600 feet high, and five miles long, composed entirely of rock-salt (cf.
p. 169). The name recurs Nu. xxxiv. 3, Dt. iii. 17, Jos. iii. 16, al.
4. rebelled. No doubt, by refusing the customary annual tribute.
Cf 2 K. xviii. 7, xxiv. 1, 20.
5—9. The march of Chedorla'omer and his allies. It may be pre-
sumed that, following the usual route from Babylonia to Palestine, they
would m.arch up along the Euphrates to Carchemish ; and, crossing the
river there (cf on xii. 4), would turn southwards, and, passing Damascus,
come down upon the places mentioned on the E. of Jordan. In
describing these places the writer uses the names of prehistoric peoples
who, according to tradition, had been their original inhabitants.
the Rephaim. A giant aboriginal race, reputed to have once in-
habited parts of Palestine, from whom certain place-names are derived,
and whose descendants — or reputed descendants— are alluded to in
historical times. Thus there was a 'vale {'emek) of Rephaim ' SW. of
1 Hommel's attempted identilication (AHT. 195—8) with a city (?) of uncertain
site, mentioned in Ass. under the name Malkd, Margu, &c., has been shewn by
Mr Johns {Expositor, Aug. 1898, pp. 158—60) to rest 'upon a series of misunder-
standings.
160 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xiv. 5, 6
and the Zuzim in Ham, and the Emim in ^Shaveh-kiriathaim, SS
6 and the Hoiites in their mount Seir, unto El-paran, which is by
^ Or, the plain of Kiriathaim
Jerusalem (Jos. xv. 8, al.); in 2 S. xxi. 16, 18, 20, 22, various
doughty warriors of Gath are described as * sons of the Kapha ' (' the
Kapha' being meant collectively = 'the Rephaim'); and in Dt. iii. II,
Og, king of Bashan — ^just the region here referred to (see the next
note) — is stated to have been 'of the remnant of the Rephaim.'
' Ashteroth-karnaim. Probably Tell 'Askterd, a hill, with remains
of ancient walls, in the region of the ancient Bashan, about 21 m. E. ol
the Sea of Galilee. See further DB., or EncB., s.v. Ashtaroth.
Zuzim. Probably the same as the Zamzummim, according to the
archaeological note Dt. ii. 20, 21", the Ammonite name of a giant
people, the original inhabitants of the region NE. of the Dead Sea,
afterwards occupied by the Ammonites. See further DB. s.v.
in Ham. Not mentioned elsewhere, but conjectured (from the
context) to have been the ancient name of the Ammonite capital
Rabbath-Ammon (2 S. xii. 26, al.\ 25 m. NE. of the upper end of the
Dead Sea.
the Emim. According to Dt. ii. 10 f., the Moabite name of a giant
people, the original inhabitants of the territory E. of the Dead Sea,
afterwards occupied by the Moabites.
Shavek-kiriathaim, or the plain of Kiriathaim. Kiriathaim (Jos.
xiii. 19, Jer. xlviii. 1, al.) is probably the modern Kure'ydt, 10 m. N. of
the Arnon and 10 m. E. of the Dead Sea.
6. the fforites. The original inhabitants of Seir (xxxvi. 8, and
frequently), the mountainous country S. of the Dead Sea, and E. of the
great gorge now called the Wddy el-'Ardbah, occupied afterwards by
the Edomites. See Dt. ii. 12, 22, and on ch. xxxvi.
* El-paran. I.e. 'El (lxx. the terebinth : cf. on xii. 6) of Paran,
most probably identical with the place elsewhere called (with the fern,
term.) 'Elath {kikad), or 'Eloth (Dt. ii. 8, 1 K. ix. 26, al), the later
well-known and important harbour at the head of the Gulf of 'Akabah
(also, from the classical name of Elath, AiAava, called the Aelanitic
Gul/y.
The site of Paran (1 K. xi. 18) is unknown : it may be inferred
from the present passage that it was somewhere near Elath. The
wilderness will be naturally the one bordering on Elath, called else-
where the 'wilderness of Paran' (ch. xxi. 21, al.), the bare and elevated
plateau of limestone, now called et-Tih, bounded on the E. by the N.
end of the Gulf of 'Akabah and the 'Arabah, and stretching out west-
wards to the present isthmus of Suez.
1 Elath has always been celebrated for its date-palms (cf. Strabo, xvi. 776); and
hence perhaps its name (for 'el, 'eldh, may in Sem. dialects other than Heb. have
denoted, like the Aram, 'ildn, a large tree generally: cf. Ex. xv. 27).
XIV. 6, 7] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 161
the wilderness. 7 And they returned, and came to En-mishpat SS
(the same is Kadesh), and smote all the ^country of the
Amalekites, and also the Amorites, that dwelt in Hazazon-tamar.
1 Ueh. field.
7. returned. Better, turned back, making viz. the sharp angle
necessary for one arriving at Elath from the NE. (perhaps down the
steep Wddy el-'Ithm, Rob. I. 174) in order to go on to Kadesh (70 m.
W. of N. from Elath). The route from Elath to Kadesh would involve
an ascent of 1500 ft. up one of the wedys on the W. of the 'Arabah
(Rob. I. 174 f., 186 f), in order to reach the wilderness of Paran, on
which Kadesh lay (Nu. xiii. 26).
^En-Mishpat. I.e. Spring of judgement ; a sacred fountain, — its
other name, Kadesh, signifies consecrated, sacred, — at whicli, as at an
oracle or sanctuary, contending parties, it may be supposed, sought
authoritative settlement of their disputes \
Kadesh. The site, for long entirely lost, was identified by the
Rev. J. Rowlands, in 1842, with 'Ain-Kadish, a spring issuing forth in
a wady, at the foot of a low range of limestone hills, about 50 m. S. of
Beer-sheba, and forming a little oasis of shrubs and flowers in the midst
of the arid stone-covered desert of et-Tih. The site was afterwards
lost again, till it was re-discovered by Dr Trumbull in 1881 {Kadesh-
barnea, 1884, pp. 238 — 75). There is an interesting account of *Ain-
Kadish, with photographs and plan, in the Biblical World (Chicago),
May, 1901, p. 327 ft'.
country. \At. field: cf. xxxii. 3, xxxvi. 35, Jud. v. 4, Ru. i. 1.
the * Amalekites, A predatory tribe, whose home was in and about
(Nu. xiii. 29, xiv. 25, 43, 45) the desert et-Tih, just referred to, and
who in general character very much resembled the modern Bedawin
who range over the same region. They are described as opposing the
Israelites, upon their attempting to enter the peninsula of Sinai
TEx. xvii. 8 — 16) ; and were afterwards severely smitten by Saul
(1 S. XV.), though not exterminated (1 S. xxx.). Cf. on xxxvi. 12.
the Amorites. See on x. 16. The term is used here, as in xv. 16,
xlviii. 22, Nu. xiii. 29 &c., in its vaguer sense, of the pre-Isr. population
of Canaan generally.
in Hazazon-tamar. Identified in 2 Ch. xx. 2 with 'En-gedi, which
is situated, in an almost inaccessible position, high up on the cliff's at
the mouth (N. side) of the deep gorge of the Wadij Ghar (also called
the WMy Kelh), which runs down into the Dead Sea, at about the
middle of its W. shore. The roads from Jerusalem and Carmel (S. of
Hebron) converge on the rough and desert table-land above this wady,
at about a mile fr'om the sea, and 2,000 ft. above it : the path thence
' descends by zigzags, often at the steepest angle practicable for horses,
^ On sacred springs among the Semites, see Rel. Sem. 127 f., 151—168 ^ 134 f.,
166 — 184). Springing, or, as tbe Hebrews termed it (cf. on xxvi. 19), 'living*
water, suggested the presence of a living agent, or spirit.
D 11
162 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xiv. 8-10
8 And there went out the king of Sodom, and the king of SS
Gomorrah, and the king of Admah, and the king of Zeboiim,
and the king of Bela (the same is Zoar) ; and they set the battle
in array against thera in the vale of Siddim ; 9 against Chedor-
laomer king of Elani, and Tidal king of Goiim, and Amraphel
king of Shinar, and Arioch king of Ellasar ; four kings against
the five. 10 Now the vale of Siddim was full of ^ slime pits ;
* That is, bitumen pits.
and is carried partly along ledges or shelves on the perpendicular face
of the cliff, and then down the almost equally steep debris' (R,ob.
I. 503). At a point 1,340 ft. down^ and 610 ft. above the sea, the
' spring ' of *En-gedi bursts out from under a great boulder ; and a
jungle of canes and other vegetation marks the line along which the
stream dashes down to the sea below. There are traces of the ancient
village (Euseb. Onom. 254) a little below the spring. At the foot of
the descent there is a small, shingly plain, with some scanty shrubs
growing on it. There is no passage along the shore northwards, except
by clambering or wading round promontories'; there is, however, a
rough path to the S., followed by Tristram ^ and forming apparently
the route along which the Moabites and Ammonites made au imroad
into Judah in the days of Jehoshaphat (2 Ch. xx. 2)'.
Knob, and Holz., however, thinking 'En-gedi to be too far to the
N., would identify Hazazon-tamar with Thamara (? the Tamar of
Ez. xlvii. 19, xlviii. 28), a village on the road between Elath and
Hebron (Onorrt.. 210, cf 85), — now. perhaps (Rob. 11. 202*), Kurnub,
about 20 m. WSW. of the S. end of the Dead Sea, If this identifica-
tion be correct, Chedorla'omer would certainly have reached his goal
(v. 3) by an easier and more probable route*.
8 — 12. Defeat of the kings of the Pentapolis in the vale of Siddim,
and the capture of Lot.
8, 9. The list of names is repeated, in order to impress the reader
with the greatness of the occasion : it was a conflict of kings against
kings.
10. full 0/ bitumen wells. The petroleum' oozed out from holes
in the ground, which proved fatal to the retreating army. Such wells
are not known now in the neighbourhood of the Dead Sea : but the
> Tristram, Land of Israel, 252, 274, 278; Kob. i. 606.
2 Ibid. pp. 296—8, 810—16.
» See fuitlier HG. i!o9— 72 ; PEFM. in. 384—6.
* Though the. identiiication rests upon a doubtful reading: see Lagarde's text
of the Onoin., and Expos. Times, xii. (1901), 288, .?36.
" 'Tamar' however means h palm-tree; and Cheyne (EncB. 1977) asks, CouM
palms ever have grown at Kurnub? For palms at Bn-gedi, see Ecclus. xxiv. 14
[EncB. 1293, on the reading), and Jos. Ant. ix. 1. 2.
* Bitumen is petroleum (whicli arises from the decomposition of ve^^'etable and
animal matter under water), hardened by evaporation and oxidization (Dawson^
Ei'ypt a'lid Syria, p. 117 f.).
XIV. ro-is] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 163
and the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled, and they fell there, SS
and they that remained fled to the mountain. 11 And they
took all the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah, and all their
victuals, and went their way. 12 And they took Lot, Abram's
brother's son, who dwelt in Sodom, and his goods, and departed.
13 And there came one that had escaped, and told Abram the
Hebrew : now he dwelt by the ^ oaks of Mamre the Amorite,
brother of Eshcol, and brother of Aner ; and these were con-
federate with Abram. 14 And wlien Abram heard that his
brother was taken captive, he led forth his trained men, born in
his house, three hundred and eighteen, and pursued as far as
Dan. 15 And he divided himself against them by night, he and
his servants, and smote them, and pursued them unto Hobah,
1 Or, terebinths
strata about it are rich in bituminous matter ; the ancients state that
masses of bitumen were often found floating upon it (whence it was
called by Josephus and others the ' Asphaltic Lake'); and after earth-
quakes similar masses still appear.
and they fell there. I.e. the people, not the kings (see v. 17).
the mountain. The mountains of Moab, on the E. side of the sea.
13 — 16. Abram's rescue of Lot.
13. the Hebrew. See on xi. 14.
the terebinths of Mamre. See xiii. 18. As was remarked in the
note there, Mamre, here and «. 24, appears as the name of a person.
Eshcol. In Nu. xiii. 23 f., the name of a wady, near Hebron ; and
said also there to have been so named from the 'cluster' of grapes
which the spies cut in it.
14. brother. I.e. kinsman : so v. 16. Cf. on xiii. 8.
led forth. The Heb. word, meaning properly to empty (xiii. 35), is
used of drawing out a sword from its sheath (Ex. xv. 9, al.) : so, if the
text is sound, the meaning here seems to be drew out rapidly and in
full numbers.
born in his house. I.e. slaves born and brought up in his household,
opp. to those who had been purciiaseU (cf. xvii. ]2, 13, 23, 27); and
as such regarded as specially attached and trustworthy (Dillm.).
Dan. In the far N. of Canaan, near the foot of Hermon, now Tell
el-Kadi. At the time in question, it would however be called Laish
(Josh. xix. 47), or lieshem (.Jud. xviii. 29) : it only received the name
of Dan after its capture by a band of Danites, as narrated in Jud. xviii.
(more briefly. Josh. xix. 47).
15. divided himself &c. I.e. divided his men into bands, which
fell on the enemy by night from different directions, and so surprised
them. Cf. the same stratagem, Jud. vii. 16 ff., 1 S. xi. 11.
Hobah. Prob. Hoba, a place about 50 m. N. of Damascus, and
11—2
164 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xiv. 15-18
which is on the ^left hand of Damascus. 16 And he brought SS
back all the goods, and also brought again his brother Lot, and
his goods, and the women also, and the people. 17 And the
king of Sodom went out to meet him, after his return from the
slaughter of Chedorlaomer and the kings that were with him, at
the vale of Shaveh (the same is the King's Vale). 18 And
Melchizedek king of Salem brought forth bread and wine:
1 Or, north
consequently some 100 m. from Dan. For ' left ' in the sense of North,
see Ez. xvi. 46 ; and comp. the ' right-hand ' in the sense of the South,
Ps. Ixxxix. 12, and frequently. The Hebrews, in fixing the quarters of
the heavens, turned always to the East (cf. on xv. 19, xvi. 12).
17, The king of Sodom comes out to welcome Abram back, and to
receive the rescued captives.
from the slaughter of. Lit. from smiting (as v. 15), — implying
a defeat, and, it may be, a severe one (2 Sam. viii. 13), but not neces-
sarily the actual 'slaughter' of the persons named.
the King's Vale (pp^). Mentioned in 2 S. xviii. 18 (RV., unfortu-
nately, ' dale' for the same Heb.), as the place in which the childless
Absalom reared a memorial for himself that his name might not be
forgotten. Probably some spot near Jerusalem (according to Jos.
Ant. vn. 10. 3, two stadia from it), but not identified.
18—20. The episode of Melchizedek.
18. Melchizedek. To the Hebrews the name doubtless suggested
the meaning 'king of righteousness' (Heb. vii. 2), or 'my king is
righteousness ' : but Zedek was probably in fact the name of a Phoen.
deity (cf. the n. pr. Adoni-zedek, 'my lord is Zedek,' Josh. x. 1 [cf.
Adonijah, 'my lord is Jah'l; and the Phoen. name Zedek-i^ielek [cf.
Elimelech], 'Zedek is king';; and it is quite possible that the name
originally meant ' my king is Zedek.'
Salem. Intended probably (Gunkel) as an archaic name for Jeru-
salem, though it is found elsewhere in tins sense only Ps. Ixxvi. 2, and
though the Tel el-Amarna letters shew that Jerusalem was already
called Uru-salim, c. 1400 B.C. Melchizedek was no doubt a figure
handed down by tradition ; and the intention of the passage seems to
be to represent him as the forerunner and prototype of the Isr.
monarchy, and Isr. priesthood, both of which had afterwards their
principal seat at Jerusalem, and at the same time as a representative
of the true religion, to whom Abram, Israel's most illustrious ancestor,
already paid tithes. In Josh. x. 1 fi". a king of Jerusalem has the
name Adoni-zedek, which is a compound similar in form to Mel-
chizedek'.
^ The identificMtion of Salem with Jerusalem is as old as Jos., Ant. i. 10. 2.
Jerome's identification with the Salim of John iii. 23, now Sal'tm, 2 m. W. of the
Jordan, and 6 m. S. of Scythopolis (Bethshean), has little to recommend it.
XIV. i8-2o] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 166
and he was priest of ^God Most Hi|?h. 19 And he blessed him, SS
and said, Blessed be Abram of ^God Most High, ^ possessor of
heaven and earth : 20 and blessed be ^God Most High, which
^ Heb. El Elyon. * Or, jnaker
bread and wine. As refreshment for Abram's men. Bread and
water would have beeu sufficient (Dt. xxiii. 4) ; but Melchizedek wished
to honour Abram, Nothing is said about a sacrifice (cf. Westcott,
Hebrews, p. 201 w.). _ _
^ God Most High. Heb. 'El 'Elyon 'El ('God') was often distin-
guished by different epithets, bringing out different a-spects of the
Divine nature, as in 'El Shaddai (xvii. 1), * God Everlasting' (xxi.
33), ' God of Bethel ' (xxxv. 7) ; and so the Canaanite has here his
'El 'Eli/07i^. The name may be actually that of an ancient Canaanite
deity''; but it may also have been merely chosen by the narrator as
a name which on the one hand would not be unsuitable for a Canaanite
to use, and on the other hand was capable of being referred to Jehovah*,
and so fell in with his evident desire to represent Melchizedek as
a worshipper of the true God. To suppose, however, even upon the
former alternative, that a knowledge of the true God really existed in
the Canaanite city, would be against analogy : rather, in that case,
'El 'Elyon will have been a Canaanite deity, whom his worshippers
recognized as the highest, in opposition to other, inferior deities, and
who could consequently be the more readily identified with Jehovah.
19, 20. Melchizedek blesses Abram in the name of his God ; and
praises his God for Abram's successes. The blessing is semi-poetical in
style, and unusual words are employed.
19. possessor. Better, producer, or, as we should probably say,
author. The word means properly to acquire, — usually by buying
1 The attachment of special epithets to the names of deities was common in the
ancient world: Zeus, Athene, &c. appear often with local or other epithets; and
among Semitic peoples we have, for instance, Baal of Pe'or, Baal of the covenant
(Jud. viii. 33), and in inscriptions Baal of Lebanon, Baal of Heaven, &c.
2 Ace. to Philo of Byblus {ap. Euseb. Praep. Ev. i. 10, g§ 11, 12) there was in
the Phoen. theogony a certain 'EXtoOi' xaXoi/^nei/oj "X^iaros, 'father of heaven and
earth,' who was slain in an encounter with wild beasts, and afterwards divinized.
This euhemeristic legend may at least be taken as evidence that 'Elyon was a
divine title among the Phoenicians; but it does not, unfortunately, tell us anything
definite about the antiquity of the title. In inscriptions of the Graeco-Eoman
period, chiefly from parts of Greece, the Bosporus, Asia Minor, Palmyra, and
Phoenicia (cf. EncB. i. 70), the title ^£6s (or ZeiJs) iixf/iffroi frequently occurs; but
Schiirer (who has collected and discussed the passages in an interesting study on
•The Jews and the communities of o-e/Si^evot Oibv \j\j/i<Trov in the Bosporus,' in the
Sitzuntjsberichte of the Berlin Academy, 1897, p. 200 ff.) has made it probable that
these are mostly the expression of a monotheistic tendency prevalent at the time,
and due, at least in part, to Jewish influence. It is thus doubtful whether
even the Phoen. examples rest upon genuine native usage, though in view of
the statement of Philo there is some presumption that this is the case (cf. Schiirer,
p. 214 n.).
^ 'Elyon is a common poet, title of Jehovah in the OT.; e.g. Nu. xziv. 16,
Ps. xviii. 13.
1G6 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xiv. ^0-14
hath delivered thine enemies into thy hand. And he gave him S/^i
a tenth of all. 21 And the king of Sodom said unto Abram,
Give me the persons, and take the goods to thyself. 22 And
Abram said to the king of Sodom, I have lift up mine hand unto
the Lord, ^God Most High, ^ possessor of heaven and earth,
23 that I will not take a thread nor a shoelatchet nor aught
that is thine, lest thou shouldest say, I have made Abram rich :
24 ^save only that which the young men have eaten, and the
1 Ileb. El Elyon. * Or, maJier
' Or, let there be nothing for me; only that (ftc.
(Gen. XXV. 10, and often), but also in other ways : applied to God, it
denotes Him as the author — here and v. 22 of nature, Dt. xxxii. 6 of
Israel's national existence, Ps. cxxxix. 13 of the human frame, Pr. viii.
22 of the personified Wisdom [all].
20. delivered. Found elsewhere only Hos. xi. 8, Pr. iv. 9, and to
be restored in Is. bciv. 7 (see RVm.).
a tenth of all. I.e. of all the booty (cf Heb. vii, 4). The custom
of pajdng tithes to a priesthood or sanctuary was widely diffused in
antiquity. The later Heb. law exacted tithe only on the produce of
the soil, and on cattle : but among other nations it was exacted on
many other sources of revenue ; among the Greeks, for instance, we read
of tithe being paid on spoil taken in war, on gains made in trade, on
confiscated property, &c., not less than on the annual crops. The
temples in Babylonia, at least in the time of Nebuchadnezzar and his
successors, were largely supported by eshru, or tithe (Sayce, Patr.
Pal. 175). In his payment of tithe to the priest, not less than in his
receiving the blessing from him, Abram becomes a pattern to the
Israelites of a later day (cf on xxviii. 22),
21 — 24. Resumption of the narrative begun in t). 17, but inter-
rupted by the episode described in vv. 18 — 20. Abram, as captor,
would have a claim to the whole of the booty : the king of Sodom
proposes a compromise. But Abram firmly declines to accept anything :
he had not made war for his own aggrandisement, and he will lay him-
self under no semblance of obligation to the king of Sodom. He only
(v. 24) makes a reservation on behalf of his servants and allies.
22. Abram swears by Melchizedek's God, whom the narrator, — or,
more probably, perhaps, a later glossator (for 'Jehovah' is omitted in
LXX., Pesh.), — identifies here with Jehovah.
/ lift up (viz. now, at the present moment) mine hand. I.e. /
swear. To ' hft up the hand ' is the gesture of a person taking an oath,
implying that he appeals to God as a witness to the truth of his atfiima-
tion : so (with ^Vi for nnn) Ex. vi. 8, Nu. xiv. 30, Ps. cvi. 26 RV.
(from Ez. xx. 23 : misrendered in PBV.), al. (esp. Ez.).
23. shoelatchet. Sandal-thong, fig. of something insignificant.
24. Abram asks only that his servants may be allowed what they
XIV. n] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 167
portion of the men which went with me ; Aner, Eshcol, and SS
Mamre, let them take their portion.
have eaten of the recovered provisions (w. 11, 16), and that his three
allies may have the usual share of the spoil.
save &c. Not at all! (lit. Apart from me, — deprecating : exactly
so xli. 16) (give me) only that which &c. — It is mentioned here for the
first time that Abram's three allies {v. 13) had accompanied him.
On Melchizedek. In Ps. ex. (which is addressed to an Israelitish king)
Melchizedek is referred to ('Thou art a priest for ever after the manner^ of
Melchizedek,' i.e. priest and king ahke) as a type, consecrated by antiquity, to
which the ideal king of Israel, ruling upon the same spot, must conform :
Melchizedek was priest as well as king, and the ideal king of Israel must be
priest as well as king likewise. In the NT. the wricer of the Epistle to the
Hebrews quotes both Gen. xiv. and Ps. ex. in his proof of the priesthood of
Christ, In Heb. v. 6, 10, vi. 20, Ps. ex. 4 is quoted to shew that a priesthood
such as that of Melchizedek is promised to the ideal king ; vii. 1 — 3 enumerates
the points in which Melchizedek is typical of Christ (in his name and title, in
his priesthood being not represented as in any way dependent upon his priestly
descent, or as being interrupted by his death) ; vii. 4 — 10 it is shewn (by refer-
ence to Gen. xiv.) how Melchizedek was superior to both Abraham and Levi ;
vii. 11 — 28 it is shewn (by reference to Ps. ex.) in what respects the priesthood
which he typified (i.e. Christ's) was superior to the Levitical priesthood. In
his treatment of the narrative in Gen. xiv. it is to be observed, as Bp Westcott
has pointed out {Hebrews, p. 199 f.), that the writer of the Epistle adopts an
ideal interpretation : he ' interprets the Scriptural picture of Melchizedek, and
does not attempt to realize the historical person of Melchizedek '; he does not
imply that tliat was true of him literally as a living man (e.g. 'without father,
without mother,' having no 'end of life') which is suggested in the ideal inter-
pretation which he gives: in other words it is 'the Biblical record of
Melchizedek, and not Melchizedek himself,' which is taken by him as a type of
Christ. — The bread and wine brought forth by Melchizedek for the refresh-
ment of Abram and his men have, from Clem. Alex.^ onwards, been very
commonly regarded in the Christian Church as typical of the spiritual refresh-
ment afforded by the Eucharist.
No mention of Melchizedek has as yet been found in the inscriptions. The
Tel el-Amarna tablets mention Uru-sahin (Jerusalem), antl they include six
letters from its governdr, Abdi-hiba, to Anienophis IV.^ The general purport
of these letters is to ask help from the Egyptian court : Abdi-hiba is beset by
foes ; he has been traduced to his Egyptian sovereign ; and unless help is
speedily forthcoming, the province under his rule will be lost to Egypt. In the
course of his letters he uses an expression, which has been supposed by Prof.
Sayce to illustrate the position assigned to Melchizedek in Gen. xiv., 'They
^ Not ' order,' as though an ' order' of priesthood were referred to.
2 Strom. IV "25, § 161 e/s t^'ttov fvxa.pt.o'Tla';.
» Winckler, KB. v. Nos. 17'.'— 181, 1S2»+ 185 + 1821- [see Knudzton's El-Amarna
Tnfeln, 1908, No. 289], 183—4 ; Ball, Liijht from the East, pp. 89—93.
168 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
slander me before the kingr, my lord, (saying,) " Abdi hiba has revolted against
the king his lord ! " Beliold, as for me, neither my father nor my mother set
me in this place : the arm of the mighty king (^Winckler, Ball : the mighty arm
of the king] established me in [lit. caused me to enter] my father's house ;
wherefore then should / do evil to the king my lord'?' This 'mighty king,'
now, is supposed by Prof. Sayce to be Abdi-hiba's god : and so it is inferred
that he was both priest and king, like Melchizedek. But, to say nothing of
the fact that testimony respecting Abdi-hiba, c. 1400 b.c., is of virtually no
value respecting Melchizedek, who (if Amraphel be Hammurabi) must have
lived some 700 years previously, there is no justification whatever for the
inference itself: the letters of Abdi-hiba do not afford the smallest ground for
the supposition that he was either 'priest' or 'king' in Jerusalem ; and the
context shews (as Jastrow, Ball, and other Assyriologists do not doubt) that
the ' mighty king' is simply Amenophis IV. himself; Abdi-hiba pleads that, as
he owes his position not to his birth, but to the pleasure of the king, he is not
likely to have rebelled against him. Another passage of the same letters is
supposed by Pro£ Sayce to contain the name of a god ' Salim,' who is declared
to be identical with the ' God Most High ' of Gen. xiv. ; but no other Assyriolo-
gist recognizes a god Salim in the passage at alP. The letters of Abdi-lilba
are of great interest, as shewing that already in B.C. 1400 Jerusalem was a
stronghold and an important place in Canaan : but they contain absolutely
nothing which has any bearing on Melchizedek ; and everything which Prof.
Sayce has inferred from them on the subject will be found, if examined, to be
destitute of solid foundation 3.
The Vale ofSiddim and the Dead Sea. The probable site of the Cities of
the Kikkdr. It is impossible to discuss the question of the site of the Cities of
the Plain without giving some account of the geological character of the Dead
Sea and of the surrounding .'strata. The Dead Sea is about 46 miles long by
10 broad : it lies at the S. end of the deep trough or depression through which
the Jordan flows, its surface being 1,292 ft. below the Mediterranean Sea, and
some 3,900 ft. below Jerusalem. This deep trough, called in ancient times the
'Arabah [Dt. L 1 RVm.], and now el-Ghor [i.e. 'the Hollow'], consists of a
great ' fault ' or fracture in the earth's crust, formed originally in the Tertiary
period, when Palestine was first elevated above the sea: in the fissure a
portion of the ocean was imprisoned, and so, in ages long before the appear-
ance of man upon the earth, there was a great inland sea extending from Lake
Huleh (usually identified with the waters of Merom) to the Dead Sea, the
deposits from which are still clearly visible in the mounds and ridges of grey
mai"l found in many parts of the Jordan-valley, especially about Jericho, and
1 Monuments, p. 175; Patr. Pal. p. 72 f.; and elsewhere (cf. EHH. 28 f.). See
"Winckler, No. 179. 6 — 15, Ball, p. 89. The words ' Neither my father nor my
mother' &c., recur also in Nos. 180. 25—28, and 181. 13—15 (Ball, p. \)1 bis).
- The words in No. 183. 14, 15, rendered by Professor Sayce (Patr. Pal. 144)
•the city of the mountain of Jerusalem, the city of the temple of the god Ninip
(whose) name (there is) Salim,' are rendered by Ziramern, Winckler, Kimdzton, and
Ball (p. 93), 'a city of the territory of Jerusalem, whose name is Beth-Ninip.'
* See further an art. by the writer in the Guardian, Apr. 8, 1896, with the refer-
ences. Mr Finches, OT. in the light &c. Bubstautially agrees (pp. 233 — 6, 239 f.).
THE VALE OF SIDDIM AND THE DEAD SEA 169
in the terraces or beaches of gravel rising one above anofher on the shores of
the Dead Sea. In process of time, however, changes of climate tf>ok place ;
the rain-fall decreased ; and consequently the surface of this great lake fell, till
ultimately all that remained of it was the Lake Huleh (7 ft. above the Medit.
Sea), and the Lake of Gennesareth (682 ft. below it) in the N., and the Dead
Sea in the S., with the Jordan connecting them. The Dead Sea itself consists
further of two parts, the N. part (N. of the peninsula on the E., called el-
Lisdn, or the 'Tongue') forming a great bowl, which in its deepest part
reaches 1,300 ft. below the surface, but the S. part (S. of el-Lisdn), being very
much shallower, varying in fact from 12 to 3 ft. in depth, and being in places
sometimes fordable. This S. part is sometimes for distinctness called the
Lagoon.
On tlie E. and W. sides the hills descend pretty steeply, occasionally to the
water's edge, though usually there is a jjiece of shingly beach, of varying width,
covered often with boulders, or pieces of drift-wood, and presenting a desolate
appearance, except at the few spots where freshwater springs produce patches
of grass and allow trees to grow \ Hot saline and sulphur springs discharge
themselves into the sea at different points along the coast At the SW. end
there is the remarkable range of salt cliflfs, the Jebel Usdum ('mountain of
Sodom '), mentioned above (on v. 3) : this is of course a deposit dating from the
time when the water was many hundred feet higher than it is at present, and
there was the great inland sea spoken of above.
At the North end of the Dead Sea there is first a shingly beach, slightly
above the level of the water, then others, 30 and 100 feet above it, all of course
marking former limits of the Sea ; then, 300 ft. above the water, ' flat shelves
of marl with steep slopes much worn by water action.' These marl beds were
deposited originally by the ancient inland sea ; they extend up the Jordan-valley
for about 4 miles, the entire soil as far N. as Jericho being a white-crusted salt
mud, upon which no vegetation will grow.
At the South end of the Sea there is a large flat, called es-Sehkha^, some
6 miles broad and 10 miles long, bounded for the N. half of its W. side by the
Jebel Usdum, and consisting of ' fine sandy mud,' brought down by the wadys on
the SW. and S., and mingled with drainings from the Jebel Usdum : it is entirely
destitute of vegetation, and in its N. part so marshy as to be impassable with
safety : there are indications that at times — perhaps annually — the sea over-
flows it. At the South-east comer of the Sea, however, beyond the Wady
Ghurundel, the character of the soil changes: the ground is higher; an
abundant supply of fresh water is provided by the Wady el-Ahsa, flowing down
from the SE. ; and the consequence is that here there is a small oasis, some
6 miles long by 1 — 3 broad, covered with shrubs and verdure, and cultivable
for wheat, &c. From the high and smooth sandstone range, rising up behind
it, this oasis is called the Ghor es-Safiyeh ('the Hollow of the smooth cliflF').
There is also a similar wooded area to the N. of the Ghor es-Safiyeh, behind
the promontory el-Lisan.
The level of the water in the Sea naturally varies according to the season of
^ These are indicated very clearly in the map in Tristram's Land of Israel.
* The word ' Sebkha' means salt and watery ground.
170 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
the year : as the lines of drift-wood on the shores shew, it is at times higher by
15 ft. or more than at others. During recent years, also, there appears to have
been a general rise in the level of the water {PEFQuSt. 1902, pp. 159, 164,
167).
The commonly-accepted site of the cities of the Kikkdr has been at the
South end of the Dead Sea ; but Mr (afterwards Sir G.) Grove (in Smith's DB.)
and other recent English travellers have adduced arguments tending to shew
that they were at its North end. We have no space here to state the argu-
ments on each side fully; and must refer for particulars to the art. Zoar
in DB.
It can hardly be doubted that the ordinary view is the right one. Especially
it is noticeable that Zo'ar, which is mentioned several times in the OT., is always
spoken of as a Modbite town (Is. xv. 5, Jer. xlviii. 34), and not claimed as an
IsraeHte, or (Josh. xiii. 15 — 21) Reubenite town, as it naturally would be if it
lay at the N. end of the Sea : moreover, there actually was, in post-Biblical
times, at the S. end of the Dead Sea, a well-known place, Zoor or Zoara,
which Josepims treats as a matter of course as identical with the Biblical Zo'ar
{Ant. I. 11. 4; BJ. IV. 8. 4), and which is repeatedly mentioned by mediaeval
Arabic writers, under the names Zughar, Zughar &c., as an important station
on the caravan-route between Elath and Jericho. Wetzstein (in Delitzsch's
Genesis'^, 566 — 70) has made it probable that the site of this Zoara or Zughar
was in the GM)r es-Sdfiyeh, at the SE. corner of the Dead Sea (of. on xix. 22).
And Ezekiel (xvi. 46) speaks of Sodom as being on the right (i.e. the South) of
Jerusalem (Samaria being on its ' left,' or North), which also implies that he
did not picture it at the N. end of the Sea (which is due R of Jerusalem).
Where, however, were the other cities of the Kikkdr and the 'Vale of
Siddim ' ? It may be inferred from xix. 20 ff. that the other cities formed
a group situated apart from Zo'ar, though at no great distance from it ; and
the 'Vale of Siddim,' though it is nowhere either said or implied that the
cities were in it, will hardly have been far from them. The old idea that the
cities were submerged is of course out of the question : not only does geology
shew that tlie Dead Sea existed many ages before the time of Abraham, but
the Bible never alludes to tbem as submerged : on the contrary it speaks of
their site as salt and barren soil (Dt. xxix. 23, Zeph. ii. 9), or implies that it
was an uninhabited desert region (Is. xiii. 19 f.; Jer. xlix. 18 = 1. 40)^ If, now,
the words in v. 3, that is the Salt Sea, are by the writer of the chapter, and are
to be taken in their most obvious sense, as implying tliat the plain on which
the two armies met was what was afterwards the Dead Sea, they give an
impossible site, and at once stamp the description of the battle as unhistorical;
for, as has just been remarked, the Dead Sea existed not only in Abraham's
time, but long before it It is, however, possible ia) that the words quoted
are an incorrect gloss by a later hand : in this case it is open to us to find
another site for the ' Vale of Siddim,' and it might, for instance, have been the
barren plain mentioned above (p. 169) at the N. end of the Dead Sea.
Gender^, in support of this view, states that the Arab, sidd (properly barrier,
1 Gf. also Wisd. x. 7, Jos. BJ. iv. 8. 4 {Ke.KaviJ.ivri irci<ra).
* Tent Work, p. 208; of. 210, 219, 267.
SITE OF THE CITIES OF THE PLAIN 171
obstruction, dam, from sadda, to stop or close up [Gen. ii. 21 Saad.]) ' is used
in a peculiar sense by the Arabs of the Jordan-valley, as meaning " cliffs " or
banks of marl, such as exist along the S. edge of the plains of Jericho ' (above,
p. 169). It is, however, precarious to explain a Heb. name of 2,600 or more
years ago from a local Arabic usage of the present day; nor can the Vale
of Siddim be reasonably supposed to have been separated from Zo'ar (which,
as we have seen, there are cogent grounds for placing at the SB. corner of the
Dead Sea) by the entire length of the Dead Sea, with practically no passage
aloijg either shore. But (6) it is also possible that even though the words,
that is the Salt Sea, are from the hand of the author of the chapter, he may
have meant them to refer only to the shallow ^Sl part of the Dead Sea (see
above). And it seems, in fact, to be at least geologically possible^, — more
cannot be said, — that what is now this part of the Dead Sea was, in the
time of Abram, dry ground, and the morass es-Sebkha fertile soil (like
the present Ghor es-Safiyeh, mentioned above) ; but that an earthquake
took place, which caused a subsidence of the ground, and overthrew all the
cities except Zo'ar; the Vale of Siddim was covered by the S. part of the Dead
Sea, and the site of the four cities became the present saline morass, es-Sebkha.
On the historical character of tJte narrative. This is a question which
has been much debated during recent years. On the one hand, it has been
alleged that the improbabilities attaching to the narrative are so great that it
is impossible to regard it as historical : on the other hand, it has been main-
tained, especially by Prof Sayce, that ' the historical character of Chedorla-
'omer's campaign has been amply vindicated' by the inscriptions 2. Let us
endeavour, as well as we can, to estimate what is adduced in support of each of
these alternatives.
The following are the principal improT labilities alleged. (1) If the object of
the expedition was, as is stated, the reduction of the rebels in the Pentapolis,
why did not the four kings, when they reached, for instance, the neighbourhood
of Kerak, descend at once into the Vale of Siddim, — whether by the Wady
Kerak (up which Tristram went, in the contrary direction, from the Ghor
es-Safiyeh^), or by one of the easier descents S. of the Wady el-Ahsa*, — instead
of taking the circuitous and often difficult route past Edom to 'Akabah, then
turning back, and climbing up 1,500ft. on to the 'great and terrible wilder-
ness,' et-Tih, to Kadesh, after this crossing the rough and mountainous country
of southern and central Judah to 'En-gedi, and finally, after making the steep
and all but impracticable descent here (see on v. 7), turning back southwards,
along the shore of the Dead Sea, to reach the Vale of Siddim'? Is this a
probable, or indeed a possible route for an army with horses, chariots, and the
^ See SiDBiM, Vale of, in DB.; and cf. Blanckenhorn's brochure, Da* Tote
Meer, 1898, p. 41 f.
* Monuments, p. 171 ; and often to the same effect elsewhere.
' Land of Moab, p. 55 £f.
* Wetzstein in Delitzsch, Genesis*, p. 566 top.
^ If the cities were at the N. end of the Sea, the route would be more circuitous,
and at least equally difiScult, on account of the route from En-gedi, — whether
inland, over a succession of steep wadys (Rob. i. 526 — 32), or along the shore, by
wading or clambering round promontories (above, p. 162).
172 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
usual impedimenta, which may he reasonably supposed to have formed part of
it? (2) The names in ». 13 are suspicious : Mamre and Eshcol are elsewhere
the names oi places (see the notes). (3) How could 318 men, — and the number
is expressly fixed, — attack and rout an entire army, recovering all the spoil
they had taken, and pursuing it moreover over one of the S. spurs of Hermon,
for some 100 miles, to Hobah ? (4) If v. 3 is to be taken in the plain sense of
the words, the narrative must be unhistorical ; for the Dead Sea, it is certain,
existed ages before Abraham.
In these objections we are dealing to a certain extent with unknovra magni-
tudes. They certainly constitute improbabilities ; whether they are sufficient
to stamp the expedition as impossible is more than we can say. As regards (1),
the route taken by Chedorla'omer, though not the most obvious one, may have
been dictated by motives which are not mentioned : whether it was impossible
for an army can hardly be determined by one who has not traversed personally
the regions in question : it may, however, be remembered that the Assyrian
kings often speak of leading their armies into difficult and impassable moun-
tainous countries (e.g. KB. i. 61, 77, 81) ; and Chedorla'omer might have left
his chariots at the top of the descent of En-gedi, and taken only his foot-
soldiers down into the plain ^. As regards (3), it must be allowed that the
naiTative, as it stands, contains elements which are not credible. It is,
however, a serious mistake to imagine that we have, either here or else-
where in Genesis, the report of an eye-witness : the account, if it rests
really upon a basis of fact, will have been handed down by tradition ; and
tradition, as is its wont, may have modified the original account, and
exaggerated, or distorted, some of its particulars : so that what is now
represented as having been a defeat of the four kings by Abram, and a long
pursuit, may have been in reality nothing more than a surprise of their rear-
guard, with a recovery of the captives and some of the spoil. And of course
other details in the narrative as well may have been modified in the course of
oral transmission. The case is one in which, in spite of improbabilities attach-
ing to details, the outUne of the narrative may still be historical As regards
(4), see the note ad loc, and the remarks above, p. 170 f.
On the other hand, monumental evidence that the narrative is historical is
at present [June, 1909] entirely lacking. The terms in which Prof. Sayce and
others have spoken of it are altogether unwarranted by the facts ^. It is not
difficult to sum up what the monuments have taught us respecting Gen. xiv.
Of the four kings mentioned in ». 1, who were previously but mere names, they
have, we may reasonably hold, brought two, Amraphel and Arioch, into the
light of history, and have told us many interesting particulars about tiiem. In
three late inscriptions (3 cent B.C.), mention is also made of a king who is
perhaps identical with Chedorla'omer, and possibly of Tid'al as well : the
*Eri-ekua' of these inscriptions map also be the^riaku of Larsa' of the older
inscriptions (i.e. the Arioch of Gen. xiv. 1). The older inscriptions shew that
1 If Hazazon-tamar be Kurnub (on v. 7), the difiaculties connected with
*En-gedi would disappear ; for from Kurnub there would be a direct descent to the
S. end of the Dead Sea by the Wady Miihauwat (see G. A. Smith's large map).
2 See the excellent criticism of Q. B. Gray, Expositor, May, 1898, pp. 342 ff.
THE EXPEDITION OF CHEDORLA'OMER 173
Amraphel and Arioch were contemporary, and that they reigned over the
countries assigned to them in Gen. xiv.; the three late inscriptions shew also
that Kudurlacbgumal (if we may so read the name) was king of Elam, and {if
Bri-§kua = Eriaku) that he was also a contemporary of Arioch and Amraphel.
These facts may be taken as evidence that at least the names 'Amraphel'
and * Arioch,' possibly also * Chedoi'la'omer,' and ' Tid'al,' were derived by
the narrator from some trustworthy source, in which, further, they may have
been mentioned together. In addition to this, the monuments bear witness to
the fact that several rulers of Babylonia, as well as one Elamite ruler (p. 157),
claimed authority over the ' West land,' and that Sargon of Agad^ (c. 3800 b.o.)
actually subjugated 'the land of Amurri' (the Amorites) on the N. of Canaan ^ :
they have shewn consequently that an invasion of Palestine and neighbouring
countries on the part of a ruler from the far East was, in the abstract, within
the military possibilities of the age. They have not shewn more than this.
They make no mention of the particular expedition into Canaan, which forms
the principal subject of Gen. xiv. ; and they name neitlier Abraham, nor
Melchizedek, nor any one of the five Canaanite kings {v. 2) against whom the
expedition was directed. Obviously, the monuments cannot ' corroborate ' the
account of an expedition which they do not mention, or even by implication
presuppose. The improbabilities mentioned above may naturally be estimated
differently by different minds ; but, whatever their weight, they are not
neutralized by the inscriptions at present known I The campaign described in
Gen. xiv., though particular details are improbable, may in outline be historical :
but the evidence that it was so is for the present confined to that which is
supplied by the Biblical narrative itself 3. [See further the Addenda.]
Chapters XV.— XXII.
The trials of Abram's faith.
* Hitherto Abram has been the recipient of promises and blessings ; and all
seems ready for the moment when he may be installed as the head of a new
covenant, and receive the promised seed. But now various delays, hindrances,
and disappointments intervene, in overcoming which evidence is given both of
the strength of his faith, and also of the providence continually watching over
^ *In the year in which Sargon conquered the land of the Amurri' is the date
given on a contemporary contract-tablet: see Hogarth's Auth. and Arch. p. 40.
^ It ought also not to be forgotten that the site of the Vale of Siddim is only a
possible one: we do not know that the S. part of the Dead Sea was dry land in
Abraham's time.
' The view of those who regard the narrative as a comparatively late 'Midrash'
(see on this term LOT. 497, ed. 7, 529) is perhaps best exhibited by Gunkel,
esp. p. 262 ff. Upon this view (stated briefly), it springs from an age which loved
to represent Jews as playing an important part in relation to the empires of the
world, and which produced somewhat later the narratives of Esther, Daniel, and
Judiih : the names of the four kings in v. 1, if not also their expedition into Canaan,
and the figure of Melchizedek as well, embody historical reminiscences ; but the
narrative as a whole is intended simply as an imaginative picture of Abram's
greatness, — his surprising success in a military enterprise, the spirit of independ-
ence and high moral feeling by which he was actuated, and the respect which he
commanded among the princes of Palestine.
174 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xv. r, «
him. Thus the following narratives exhibit, under different aspects, Abram's
moral education and probation, until at last the perfect man of God, the hero
of faith, who is to serve as a pattern to all coming generations, stands fully
portrayed before us. The point about which Abram's trials mainly centre is
the attainment and possession of a bodily heir, who should found the covenant-
race. The very first section, ch. xv., introduces the theme' (adapted in
substance from Dillm.).
Chapter XV.
Tlie promise of an heir to Abram.
The promises of xii. 2, xiii. 15 f., being in appearance futile, on acount of
Abram's childlessness, he here receives two special assurances {vv. 1 — 6, 7 — 21)
that he will have a son and heir, and that a seed sprung from him will inherit
the promised land. The narrative shews indications of not being homo-
geneous ; and though the criteria are (in pai ts) indecisive, so that no generally-
accepted analysis has been effected, it can hardly be doubted that we have here
for the first time traces of the sourcC; parallel, and often very similar, to J,
called ' E,' which has been discussed in the Introd. p. xi. ff. Verses 6 — 11, 17,
18, it is generally agreed, belong to J. Perhaps, ou the whole, the analysis
shewn in the text may be adopted : most critics, however, are of opinion that
vv. 12 — 16, 19 — 21 are expansions due to the compiler of JE.
XV. 1 After these things the word of the Lord came unto E
Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram : I am thy shield,
^and thy exceeding great reward. 2 And Abram said, 0 Lord
^ Or, thy reward shall be exceeding great
XV. 1 — 6. The first assurance.
1. After these things. A loose formula of connexion : xxii. 1, 20,
jEXxix. 7, xl. 1, xlviii. 1.
the v)ord of Jehovah came unto. So v. 4, but not elsewhere in the
Hex. It is an expression frequently used of a prophetic revelation
(e.g. 2 S. vii. 4, and often in Jer., Ezek.) ; and its use here agrees with
the representation in 2lx. 7 (where Abram is called a prophet).
in a vision. A common form of prophetic intuition : Nu. xxiv.
4, 16 ; Is. xxi. 2, &c. Cf. the writer's Joel and Amos, pp. 126, 200 i.
Fmr not. The promise attaches to Abram's presumed state of
anxiety with regard to the future.
shield. Fig. of defence, as Dt. xxxiii. 29, and often in the Psalms
(iii. 3, xviii. 2, 30, xxviii. 7, &c.).
thy reward shall be exceeding great. The reward, viz., for obey-
ing my call.
2. After such a promise, the thought of Abram's childlessness
comes home to him with special force : hence his question here.
XV. .-5] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 175
^GoD, what wilt thou give me, seeing I ^go childless, and he that E
shall be possessor of my house is ^Dammesek Eliezer? | 3 And j
Abram said, Behold, to me thou hast given no seed : and,
lo, one born in my house is mine heir. 4 And, behold, the
word of the Lord came unto him, saying, This man shall not be
tliine heir ; but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels
shall be thine heir. | 5 And he brought hira forth abroad, and E
said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be
able to tell them : and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be. |
^ Heb. Jehovah, as in other places where God is put in capitals.
2 Or, go hence * The Chaldee and Syriac have, Eliezer the Damatcene.
Lord Jehovah. So v. 8 : elsewhere in Gen. — Sam. only Dt. iii. 24,
ix. 26 ; Josh. vii. 7 ; Jud. vi. 22, xvi. 28 ; 2 S. vii. 18, 19, 20, 28, 29.
Extremely common in Ezek., and not unfrequent in the other prophets.
go hence (R,Vm.). To 'go' in Heb. sometimes has the force of go
away, vanish (Job vii. 9), depart (from life) ; so e.g. Ps. xxxix. 13
(where, as here, the Heb. is simply go). Cf. the corresponding Arab.
halaka, to perish, lxx. a7roXvo//at: cf. Nu. xx. 29 j Tob. iii. 6, 13;
Luke ii. 29.
and he &c. The Heb. is very peculiar : lit. * and the son of the
possession (= the possessor) of my house is Dammdsek (the usu. Heb.
for Damascus) of Eliezer,' the meaning (if the text be sound) being that,
Damascus being the home of his servant Eliezer, his property, if he died
childless, would pass into the possession of that town. This, however,
is a thought not very likely to be expressed : the word for ' possession,'
also {meshek, — supposed to be chosen for the sake of the assonance with
DammeseJf), occurs only here, and is suspicious. There seems to be
some corruption in the text. Targ., Syr. (see RVm.), 'EHezer the
Damascene,' is some improvement, but the corruption which it presup-
poses (^-iiyo-in nry>!?N, or ^^i^r^'^'o ntySx, changed into nry^'px pi>'D"i) is
not very probable.
3. The verse repeats tlie substance of v. 2, and reads as though it
were introduced from a parallel narrative.
one born in my house. Lit. a son of my house (Ec. ii. 7 Heb.) ;
i.e. a member of my household, a dependent. The Heb. is different
from that in xiv. 14. Lot, it wiU be remembered, has separated him-
self from Abram (ch. xiii.).
4. The reply to the complaint of «. 3.
he that shall come forth &c. Cf 2 S. vii. 12, xvi. 11.
5. The starry sky at night is at once a striking evidence of the
Divine power (Is. xl. 26, Ps. viii. 3), and an effective example of what
is (practically) innumerable (cf xxii. 17, xxvi. 4).
tell (tAfice^. An archaism for count, as 1 K. viii. 5, 2 K. xii. 10, Ps.
xxii. 17, xlviii. 12, Ivi. 8, cxlvii. 4. Cf Milton, L Alkgro, ' And every
shepherd tells his tale,' &c. (see Jer. xxxiii. 13).
176 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xv.6-ii
6 And he believed in the Lord ; and he counted it to him for J
righteousness. 7 And he said unto him, I am the Lord that
brought thee out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give thee this land
to inherit it. 8 And he said, 0 Lord God, whereby shall I know
that I shall inherit it? 9 And he said unto him. Take me an
heifer of three years old, and a she-goat of three years old, and
a ram of three years old, and a turtledove, and a young pigeon.
10 And he took hira all these, and divided them in the midst,
and laid each half over against the other : but the birds divided
he not. 11 And the birds of prey came down upon the carcases,
6. Abram's faitli. Against appearances he trusts in God, sur-
renders himself to Him. in full confidence that He will fulfil His
promise. Cf. Ex. xiv. 31 , Nu. xiv. 11, xx. 12.
and he counted it (i.e. his trust) to him for righteousness. For
Abram there was no 'law': hence nis 'righteousness' was not that
which consisted in obeying it (Dt. vi. 25, xxiv. 13), but was devotion to,
and trust in, God, of a more general kind. For the expression, cf.
Ps. cvi. 31 ; and on the passage itself, see esp. Rom. iv. 3, 9, 22 (where
it is quoted by S. Paul in his proof that righteousness is dependent not
on the works of the law, but on faith), Gal. iii. 6, Jas. ii. 23 : cf. also
the quotation in 1 Mace. ii. 52. On quotations of the passage in Philo,
and also, more generally, on the importance attached to the faith of
Abraham in the Rabbinical Schools, see the Excursus in Lightfoot's
Galatians^'^, p. 158 if. ; and Sanday-Headlam, Romans, pp. 101, 104;
Thackeray, St Paul a?id Contemp. Jewish Thought (1900), p. 91 flf.
7 — 19. The second assurance, sealed solemnly by a covenant.
That the occasion is distinct from the one narrated in vv. 1 — 6 appears
from the fact that that was at night {v. 5), while this was shortly before
sunset {v. 17).
7. See xi. 28, xii. 7, xiii. 15.
8. In reply, Abram asks for some sign or proof by which he may
know that he will inherit it. Cf. Jud. vi. 17 ; 2 K. xx. 8,
9 — 11, 17. The promise is ratified by a covenant, in which the con-
tracting parties pass between the divided victims, each thereby symbol-
izing that, in case he breaks the terms agreed to, he is willing to be
parted asunder in like manner. Cf. the common Heb. expression 'to
cut a covenant' (like opma tc/xvciv, and 'foedus icere'), v. 18, al. ; II. in.
298 — 301, and the impressive formula in Liv. I. 24. The ceremony
described is not a sacrifice (for there is no altar), but a sacred and solemn
act. Nevertheless it is a kind of type of the later sacrificial usage : for
the animals prescribed are all such as are allowed in the later Lev. law,
the birds not being divided (v. 10) on the analogy of Lev. i. 17.
9. of three years old. Perhaps (Dillm.) because three was a sacred
number, usual in solemn affirmations, imprecations, &c.
11. The birds of prey, threatening to interrupt the conclusion of
XV. 1I-I6] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 177
and Abram drove them away*. 12 And when the sun was going j
down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram ; and, lo, an horror of great
darkness fell upon him. 13 And he said unto Abram, Know of
a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not
theirs, and shall serve them ; and they shall afflict them four
hundred years ; 14 and also that nation, whom they shall serve,
will I judge : and afterward shall they come out with gi-eat
substance. 15 But thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace ; thou
shalt be buried in a good old age. 16 And in the fourth
generation they shall come hither again : for the iniquity of the
the covenant, would be an omen of evil, as when (Ewald, Hist. i. 330)
the harpies sought to carry off the sacrifices (^Aen. iii. 225 ft'.), and
might foresliadow the efforts which the Egyptians, for instance, would
make with the object of frustrating the Divine plan : but Abram, by
driving them away, signified how all such efforts would prove abortive.
12 — 16. A parenthesis, or digression {y. 17 being the real sequel
to vv. 9 — 11), containing an interpretation of the evil omen of -u. 11.
Though the promise will eventually be fulfilled, hindrances will inter-
vene which will long postpone its fulfilment ; and a presentiment to
this effect reaches Abram in a vision.
12. a deep sleep. As ii. 21. Mentioned here, as in Job xxxiii. 15,
as a state in which one may become conscious of a vision.
an horror, a great darkness. Preparatory to the dark announce-
ment of V. 13.
13. a stranger. Cf. Ex. xxii, 21. Soj ounier would be a better
rendering, a temporary resident being what is intended. The cognate
verb is rendered sojourn, xlvii. 4, Dt. xxvi. 5, Is. Hi. 4 (all of Israel in
Egypt), and generally.
Is, 14. The allusions to the bondage in Egypt, to the plagues by
which it was terminated ('will 1 judge'), and to the Exodus, are
obvious. See e.g. Ex. i. 11, 12, xii. 35 I, 38.
13. four hundred years. The figure agrees substantially with that
given by P (430 years) in Ex. xii. 40 (RV.), 41, for the sojourn in
Egypt. C£ ». 16 ; and see further the Introd. p. xxix i.
15. But no misfortune will touch Abram himself.
go to thy fathers. I.e. join them in Sheol (see on xxxvii. 35 ; and
cf. xlvii. 30).
a good old age. Ch. xxv. 8 (P) ; Jud. viii. 32 ; 1 Ch. xxix. 28 t.
16. in the fourth generation. This statement agrees with the pas-
sages (P) which assign only four generations from Joseph to Moses (Ex.
vi. 16 — 20, Nu. xxvi. 5 — 9), or five to Joshua (Jos. vii. 1). If the v. is
by the same writer as v. 13, he must, in accordance with the traditional
ages of the patriarchs, have reckoned a ' generation ' at 100 years.
they shall return hither. Viz. to Canaan : the measure of the
Amorite's iniquity being not }et full (cf. 1 Th. ii. 16), he cannot for
D. 12
178 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xv. 16-18
Amorite is not yet full. 17 And i1>4;ame to pass, that, when the j
sun went down, and it was dark,'1i)ehold a smoking furnace, and
a flaming torch that passed between these pieces. 18 In that
day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy
seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the
the present be driven out. ' Amorite,' as xiv. 7 (where see the note).
On the moral corruption of the pre-Isr. population of Canaan, cf.
xiii. 13, xviii. 20 ff., xix. 1 ff., 2 K. xxi. 11 ; and on the behef that it
was the ground of their expulsion by Israel, Lev. xviii. 24 f., 28,
XX. 22 flf., 1 K. xiv. 24, xxi. 26, 2 K. xvi. 3, xvii. 8, xxi. 2.
17. The sequel to ■». 11 : the sign by which the covenant is ratified.
a smoking furnace (tannur). I.e. a portable earthenware stove,
such as is used stiU in the East for baking bread, about 3 ft. high, of
the shape of a truncated cone, and heated by the burning embers being
placed in it at the bottom. See EncB. i. col. 605 (c) ; BB. i. 318* ;
Whitehouse, Primer of Heh. Antiquities, p. 73 (with illustration).
The stove, with smoke and flames issuing from the top, symbolized
Jehovah : by passing between the divided pieces, it signified the ratifi-
cation on His part of the terms of the covenant. The ritual is no
doubt that by which a solemn covenant was actually ratified in ancient
Israel : comp. esp. Jer. xxxiv. 18 f.
A covenant is a compact or agreement, concluded under solemn
religious sanctions, and implying mutual undertakings and obligations.
The covenant most often referred to in the OT. is that concluded
between Jehovah and Israel at Sinai (Ex. xxiv.) : Jehovah promises
that, if Israel observes its terms, He will bestow certain specified
blessings (Ex. xxiii. 22 flf.). In references to the covenant, the stress
lies, according to the context and purpose of the writer, either on the
Divine promise (e.g. Dt. iv. 31), or the human obligation (e.g. Dt.
iv. 23). Here the stress lies upon the former, the promise of the grant
of Canaan to Abram's descendants.
18 — 21. The terms of the covenant, on Jehovah's part, i.e. the
promise of the land.
18. tlie riner of Egypt. This can be only the Nile, or, at least, the
easternmost (Pelusiac) arm of it, which can also, it seems, only be
meant by the ' Shihor in front of Eg}'pt,' assigned in Josh. xiii. 3 (cf.
1 Ch. xiii. 5) as the SW. border of Israel's territory. The usual SW.
limit is the ' Wady (nahal) of Egypt ' (Nu. xxxiv. 5, Jos. xv. 4, 47,
1 K. viii. 65 (= 2 Ch. vi'i. 8), Is. xxvii. 12), called by the Greeks the
Rhinokorura, now the Wady el-*Arlsh, 'which, with its deep water-
course (only filled after heavy rains), starts from about the centre of
the Sin. peninsula (near the Jebel et-Tib), and, after running N. and
NW., finally reaches the sea at the Eg3^tian fort and town of el-'Arish'
{EncB. 1249), 45 m. SW. of Gaza. The Pelusiac mouth of the Nile is
some 80 m. W. of the mouth of the Wady el-'Arish : so (unless nakal
should be read for n'har) the present passage must, hke Josh. xiii. 3
(late Deuteronomic), and 1 Ch. xiii. 5 [no || in Sam.], contain a hyper-
bolical representation of the limits of Isr. territory in this direction.
XV. i8-.i] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 179
great river, the river Euphrates : 19 the Kertite, and the J
Kenizzite, and the Kadmonite, 20 and the Hittite, and the
Perizzite, and the Rephaim, 21 and the Amorite, and the
Canaanite, and the Girgashite, and the Jebnsite.
the great river, the river Euphrates. So Dt. i. 7, Jos. i. 4. Cf. on
xxxi. 21. The Euphrates, as the E. limit of Isr. territory, is an id'al.
limit, reached actually only once, in the palmy days of Solomon (1 K.
iv. 21 ; cf. Ps. Ixxx. 11), but promised also elsewhere (Ex. xxiii. 31,
Dt. i. 7, xi. 24, Jos. i. 4 ; cf. Ps. Ixxxix. 25), and forming the basis
of the ideal hopes, or pictures of the future, in Is. xxvii. 12, Zech. ix. 10,
Ps. Ixxii. 8.
19 — 21. Such enumerations of Canaanite peoples, to be dispos-
sessed by Israel, are very common in JE and Dt. (Ex. iii. 8, 17, xiii. 5,
xxiii. 23, xxxi v. 11, Dt. vii. 1, xx. 17, Jos. iii. 10, ix. 1, xi. 3, xii. 8,
xxiv. 11), but usually only 5 or 6, or at most 7 (Dt. vii. 1 : see the
writer's note on this passage), are enumerated : here there are 10.
19. the Kenite and the Kenizzite. These seem intended to repre-
sent the tribes of the Negeb (xii. 9). The Kenites fin the S. of Judah :
1 S. xxvii, 10, XXX. 29) are associated with the Amalekites (cf. Nu.
xxiv. 20, 21 f.), and were probably a branch of them ; but while the
Amalekites were hostile to Israel, the Kenites were frieudly (1 S.
XV. 6). Their absorption in Judah seems to be what is alluded to in the
present passage. The Kenizzites were a tribe of which a branch was
settled in Edom (ch. xxxvi. 11), and a branch in Judah ; for Caleb,
a Kenizzite (Jos. xiv 6, 14 ; cf. Jud. i. 13), is also the eponymous
ancestor of an important Judahite clan (1 Ch. ii. 9 [read Caleb for
Chelubai], 42 — 49). Like the Kenites, the Kenizzites were thus a tribe
originally of foreign origin, but afterwards absorbed in Israel ',
the Kadmonite. Only here. The name means those of the front (or
east); and probably, like the ^VnS kedem' (see on xxix. 1), denotes the
inhabitants of some part of the Sjnrian desert, E. of Canaan.
20. the Hittite. It is hardly possible to say where the ' Hittites '
mentioned either here or in the similar lists (Ex. iii. 8, 17, &c.) were
pictured by the authors of these lists as located. The reference cannot
be to the great nation whose home was N. of Phoenicia and the Lebanon
(see on x. 15) ; for this was never conquered by the Israelites. The
reference may have been originally to a branch settled within Isr. terri-
tory, in the extreme N. of Canaan (see ibid.) ; but a belief seems
gradually to have grown up, — though how far it corresponded to
historical fact it is difficult to say, — that there were once Hittites in
the more southerly ' hiU-country ' of Canaan (see Nu. xiii. 29, — J or E),
and even in Hebron (see p. 228 ff.) ; and it is possible that this may
be the view expressed in these enumerations.
the Perizzite, and the Rephaim. See on xiii. 7, and xiv. 5.
21. See on x. 16, 19.
1 See further Moore, Judges, pp. ao i., 34 f.; Noldeke, EricB. s.v, Amalek, § 6,
and Kenaz.
12—2
180 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xvi. i, ,
Chapter XVI.
The birth of Ishmael.
The narrative contained in this chapter describes the circumstances
attending the birth of Ishmael, mentioning various facts connected with it
such as would interest the Israelites of a later day. It is chiefly important,
\. partly as marking a stage in Abram's probation, and partly as explaining the
. national characteristics of a group of tribes (xxv. 12 — 18) well known to the
Hebrews, which, while related to them, nevertheless lived in separation from
tbem, and had a strongly marked character of their own. Verses 1% 3,
15, 16, belong to P ; the rest of the chapter belongs to J.
XVI. 1 Now Sarai Abram's wife bare him no children : P
1 and she had an handmaid, an Egyptian, whose name was Hagar. J
2 And Sarai said unto Abram, Behold now, the Lord hath
restrained me from bearing ; go in, I pray thee, unto my
handmaid ; it may be that I shall ^obtain children by her. And
^ Heb. he builded by her.
XVI. 1 — 3. Sarai, being long barren, in accordance with the
manners of the age (of. xxx. 3, 9 ; also xxii. 24, xxxvi. 12, Ex. xxi. 7, 8),
gives Abram her female slave, Hagar, in the hope tl lat she may obtain
children through her, whom she may adopt, and reckon as her o^\ti.
1. a7i handmaid. I.e. a female slave : of. on xii. 16 (where the
same word is rendered 'maidservant'). Hagar was more particularly
Sarai's own possession (cf xxix. 24, 29). Comp. Lane, Mod. Egypt.^
I. 233 : * Some wives have female slaves who are their own property,
generally purchased for them, or presented to them, before their
marriage. These cannot be the husband's concubines, without their
mistress's permission, wliich is sometimes granted (as it was in the case
of Hagar); but very seldom.' Cf the note in the Addenda.
an Egyptian. So v. 3 (P), xxi. 9 (E). Ishmael's wife was also an
Egyptian (xxi. 21). Some connexion must have been recognized as
^^xisting between the Ishmaelite tribes and Egypt. Sir R. F. Burton
remarked upon the Egyptian pliysioguomy of some of the Bedawi clans
of Sinai observable at the present day {I)B. ii. 504* n. §) '.
2, it may be that I shall be built up from her. So xxx. 3 ; the
family being represented under the figure of a house (cf. Dt. xxv. 9 ;
Ru. i. 11).
1 It is difficult to think that a N. Arabian 'land of Musri' (see EticB. MizaAiM,
§25) can be meant (cf. on this subject Budge, Hist, of Egypt, 1902, vi. pp. x— xxx).
The name 'Hagar' may stand in some relation to that of the nomadic tribe of
Hugarites (or Hagarenes), on the E. of Gilead, I Ch. v. 10, xxvii. 31; Ps. Ixxxiii. 6
(cl'. EncB. Haqaii, § 2). In Arabic, it may be added, the corresponding verb
signifies to fee (cf. Hejra, of the era marked by the 'flight' of Mohammed).
XVI. .-8j THE BOOK OF GENESIS 181
Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai. | 3 And Sarai Abram's .7 P
wife took Hagar the Egyptian, her handmaid, after Abram had
dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave her to Abram
her husband to be his wife. | 4 And he went in unto Hagar, and J
she conceived : and when she saw that she had conceived, her
mistress was despised in her eyes. 5 And Sarai said unto
Abram, My wrong be upon thee : I gave my handmaid into thy
bosom ; and when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised
in her eyes : the Lord judge between me and thee. 6 But
Abram said unto Sarai, Behold, thy maid is in thy hand ; do to
her that which is good in tliine eyes. And Sarai dealt hardly
with her, and she fled fi-om her face. 7 And the angel of the
Lord found her by a fountain of water in the wilderness, by the
fountain in the way to Shur. 8 And he said, Hagar, Sarai's
3. The verse is parallel in substance to v. 2: the regard to
chronology shewn in it is in P's manner (cf. v. 16, xvii. 1 &c.).
4—6. ' The flight of Hagar.
4. And he went m &c. The direct continuation of v. 2 end.
despised. Cf 1 S. i. 6f (where 'rival' nieaxis /ellow-iei/e). Barren-,
ness is still viewed with contempt in the East. Cf. Lane, I.e. p. 232 :
if a man's chief wife be barren, and an inferior (either wife or slave)
bear him a child, it commonly results that the latter woman becomes
his favourite, and that the chief wife or mistress is ' despised in her
eyes,'
5. Sarai shews herself both imperious and unreasoning : she had
herself persuaded Abram to take Hagar, but because he does not im-
mediately interfere to stop Hagar's reproaches, she passionately and
unjustly lays the blame for them upon him.
3Ii/ wrong. Le. the wrong done to me by Hagar : may the re-
sponsibility for it rest upon thee !
judge. And, it is implied, punish thee for tolerating Hagar, and
help me to my right. Cf. Jud, xi. 27 ; 1 S. xxiv. 12, 15.
6. Abram replies that Hagar is Sarai's slave, not his ; and she
must deal with her.
dealt hardly; viz. by treating her harshly, and imposing heavy
work upon her. It is the word commonly rendered afflict (e.g. xv. 13).
7 — 12. Hagar is met by the angel and reassured : her son will
become the ancestor of a great people. The narrative, like xxi.,
16 — 19, illustrates beau tif idly the Divine regard for the forlorn and
desolate soul.
7. She fled naturally in the direction of her home.
the fountain &c. Doubtless some well-known watering-place on the
caravan-route leading from Hebron into Egypt. Cf on v. 14.
Shur, A name of doubtful origin and meaning (see DB. Shur),
182 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xvi. 8-i»
handmaid, whence earnest thou ? and whither goest thou ? And J
she said, I flee from the face of my mistress Sarai. 9 And the
angel of the Lord said unto her, Return to thy mistress, and
submit thyself under her hands. 10 And the angel of the Lord
said unto her, I will greatly multiply thy seed, that it shall not
be numbered for multitude. 11 And the angel of the Lord
said uuto her. Behold, thou art >vith child, and shalt bear a son ;
and thou shalt call his name ^Ishmael, because the Lord hath
heard thy afliiction. 12 And he shall be as a wild-ass among
men : his hand shall he against every man, and every man's
hand against him ; aud he shall dwell ^in the presence of all
^ That is, God heareth. ' Or, over against Or, to the east of
but certainly denoting the region bordering upon Egypt on the NE.,
along wliat is now the Isthmus of Suez. It is mentioned also ch. xx. 1,
XXV. 18 (where it is said to be 'in front of Bgypt,' i.e. East of it : so
1 S. XV. 7), Ex. XV. 22 (where the Israelites after crossing the Red Sea
enter the ' wilderness of Shur '), and 1 S. xxvii. 8.
9—12. The angel addresses to her three words : he (1) bids her
return to her mistress and 'humble herself under her hands, v. 9;
(2) encourages her to take this step, by the promise of a numerous
seed, •w. 10 ; and (3) fixes in anticipation the name and character of
her future son, vv. 11, 12.
/' 11. Ishmael. I.e. God heareth, — or better, perhaps (Gray, Heb.
Proper Names, p. 218), 3Iai/ God hear!
thy affliction. In the Heb., cognate with the verb rendered ' dealt
hardly ' in v. 6.
12. he shall he a wild-ass of a man. The wild-ass is a wild,
untameable animal, whose home is the open plain : see Job xxxix. 5 — 8 ;
Hos. viii. 9 (where render, ' being alone for himself,' i.e. going his own
way wilfully). Islimael (of. on ix. 25 — 7) is the impersonation of the
tribes reputed to be his descendants ; and the writer draws, in a few
touches, a true and characteristic description of the Bedawin, — the
men of the hadw, or 'open plain,' — as we should now term them,
then, as still, the free and independent sons of the desert, owning no
authority save that of their own chief, reckless of hfe, treacherous
towards strangers, ever ready for war or pillage'.
in the face of (or in front of) all his brethren shall he dwell.
The expression used means commonly in Heb. on the East of (as
1 K. xi. 7 : cf. on xiii. 18, xiv. 15); and it is true that, speaking
generally, the home of the Ishmaehte tribes was on the E. of Israel
1 The Ishmaelites must not however be identified with the modern Bedawin :
the Ishmaelites (see xxv. 12 — 16) consisted of 12 definite tribes; and all that what
is said above is intended to affirm is a general similarity in mode of life and
aliaracter.
XVI. 12-16] THE BOOK OF GSII^SIS 183
his brethren. 13 And she called the name of the Lord that spake J
unto her, ^Thou art ^a God that seeth: for she said, Have I even
here looked after him that seeth me? 14 Wherefore the well was
called ^Beer-lahai-roi; behold, it is between Kadesh and Bered. |
15 And Hagar bare Abram a son: and Abram called the name of P
his son, which Hagar bare, Ishmael. 16 And Abram was fourscore
and six years old, when Hagar bare Ishmael to Abram.
^ Or, Thou God seest me * Heb. El roi, that is, God of seeing.
* That is, The well of the living one who seeth me.
and Edom (see on xxv. 12 — 18). Dillm. al. think, however, that hostility
or detiance is intended: cf. the same Heb. in Job i. 11, vi. 28, xxi. 31.
13, 14. Explanation of the name of the place at which this
happened.
13. a God of seeing. In accordance with what was said on xiv. 18,
Jehovah is here distinguished under a particular attribute, and venerated
specially as a God of 'seeing,' i.e. as a God who sees all things and
manifests His providence accordingly. RVm. (= AV.) is not a possible
rendering of the existing (j)ointed) text.
Have I even &c. The words (assuming the text to be correct) can
only be explained in this way : Have I liere also (in the desert, a place
which, in times when the manifestations of Deity were regarded as
limited to particular spots, might have been supposed to be beyond
the reach of God's providence) seen after him that saw me ? i.e. He saw
her ; she did not see Him, but only ' saw after ' Him, saw Him, as He
left her (cf Is. xxxvii. 22 Heb.), and then perceived that the all-seeing
God, in the person of His angel, had been present there (so Dillm.) \
14. Beer-lakai-ro'i. Explained (as usually understood) in RVm.
See, however, the footnote.
between Kadesh and Bered. For Kadesh, see on xiv. 7. Bered is
not mentioned elsewhere, and has not been identified. For Beer-lahai-
roi (also xxiv. 62, xxv. 11) a site has been plausibly suggested at 'Ain
Muweilek, a station with several wells on the caravan-route from Egypt
to Syria (cf on v. 7), 12 m. WNW. of 'Ain Kadish (xiv. 7), and 50 m.
SW. of Beersheba, at the SE. foot of a range of hills, the Jebel Muweileh
(Rowlands, in Williams' Holy City, ii. 489 ff. ; Trumbull, Kadesh-
barnea, 64 ; Palmer, Desert of the Ex. n, 354 — 6 ; EncB. s.v.).
15. 16. Account, from P, of the birth of Ishmael, and of the age
of Abram at the time.
^ The sense thus obtained is however not very naturally expressed ; nor does it
contain any explanation of 'the living one' in the name of the well, v. 14. A
conjectural restoration by Wellh. {Hist, p. 326), obtained by supplying letters
supposed to have accidentally dropped out, is therefore worthy of mention: 'Have
I even seen [God, and lived] after [my] seeing?' (i.e. D^nbti for qSi. TINI inserted
before nnS, and >tt<-| for \sn(, with allusion to the belief (xxxii. 30) that no one
could 'see God and live.' If this restoration be accepted, 'a God of seeing' must be
interpreted in the sense of 'a God who is seen'; and the name of the weU will mean
'He that seeth me liveth."
184 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
The angd of Jehovah, — or, in B (xxi. 17, xxxi. 11), of God, — is a self-
matiifestation of Jehovah : he identifies himself with Him (xxxi. 13, cf. 11 ;
Ex. iii. 6, cf. 2), speaks and acts with His authority (Gen. xvi. 10, xxi. 19,
cf. 17, xviii., xxii. 12, 15 f.), and is spoken of as God or Jehovah by others
(Gen. xvi. 13, xlviii. 15 f. ; Jud. vi. 14, cf. 12, xiii. 21 f. ; Hos. xii. 4, 5). On the
other hwi'l, be is also distinguished from Jehovah (Gen. xvi. 11, xix. 13, 21, 24 ;
Nu. xxii. 31), 'the mere manifestation of Jehovah creating a distinction be-
tween the angel and Jehovah, though the identity remains. The form of
manifestation is, so to speak, something unreal (Dt. iv. 12, 15), a condescension
for the purpose of assuring those to whom it is granted that Jehovah in
His fulness is present with them. As the manifestation called the angel of
Jehovah occurred chiefly in redemptive history, older theologians regarded it
as an adumbration or premonition of the incarnation of the Second Person
of the Trinity. This idea was just, in so far as the angel was a manifestation
of Jfliovah on the earth in a human form, and in so far as such temporary
manifestations might seem the prelude to a permanent redemptive self-
revelation in this form (Mai. iii. 1, 2); but it was to go beyond the OT.,
or at any rate beyond the understanding of OT. writers, to found on the
manifestation distinctions in the Godhead. The only distinction impUed is
that between Jehovah, and Jehovah in manifestation' (A. B. Davidson, in
DB. 8.V. Angel, p. 94^). Cf. Ex. xxiii. 20, 21 (where ' name ' = fulness of
revealed nature) ; Is. Ixiii. 9 (where the ' angel of his presence ' means the
angel in whom God's face or presence [Dt. iv. 37] is reveaJed). See further
Oehler, OT. Theol. §§ 59, 60 ; Schultz, OT. Theol n. 218—23 (a temporary but
full revelation of Jehovah's being).
Chapter XVII.
Tlie institution of Circumcision.
Thirteen j-ears after Ishmael's birth, God appears to Abram, promises
him a numerous posterity assures him that he and his seed will inherit the
land of Canaan, and declares that He will conclude a covenant with him for
all time, according to which He will be his God and the God of his descendants,
vr. 1 — 8. Circumcision is instituted as the sign of this covenant, vv. 9 — 14.
Abram's name is to be in future Abraham, and Sarai's Sarah. Ishmael will
become a great nation ; but Sarah's own son will be the heir of the promises,
vv. 15 — 22. Abraham circumcises all the males of his household, vv. 23 — 27.
The chapter is derived entirely from P, the phraseology and style of which
it displays markedly throughout It is longer than most of the recent excerpts
from P, on account of the importance of the subject-matter, resembling in this
respect the accounts, from the same source, of the Creation and the Flood. It
marks, in the economy of P, the nest important stage to the blessing and
covenant of ix. 1 — 17, and introduces a new phase in the development of the
Divine plan. The covenant, it may be noticed, is not simply (as in ch. xv.) a
solemn promise, but implies the establishment of a reciprocal relationship, in
which obligations are undertaken on both sides.
XVII. i-s] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 185
XVII. 1 And when Abram was ninety years old and nine, P
the Lord appeared to Abram, and said unto him, I am ^God
Almighty ; walk before me, and be thou perfect. 2 And I will
make my covenant between me and thee, and will multiply thee
exceedingly. 3 And Abram fell on his face : and God talked
with him, saying, 4 As for me, behold, my covenant is with thee,
and thou shalt be the father of a multitude of nations. 5 Neither
shall thy name any more be called Abram, but thy name shall
be Abraham ; for the father of a iiuiltitude of nations have
1 Heb. El Shaddai.
XVII. 1 — 8. The promise to Abram.
1. God Almighty. Heb. 'El Shaddai, — according to P, the charac-
teristic patriarchal name of God, the name '.Jehovah' (Yahweh) not
being known till the age of Moses (Gen. xxviii. 3, xxxv, 11, xlviii. 3 ;
and esp. Ex. vi, 3). The same view was perhaps shared by the author
of the book of Job, who lays his scene in the patriarchal age, and
throughout the dialogue represents his characters as saying Shaddai
('Jehovah' only once, xii. 9)'. The origin and real meaning of Shaddai
are both doubtful : see the Excursus at the end of the volume.
walk before me, and be perfect, — or hlam<'Jess (vi. 9). The condition
which Abram is called upon to fulfil ; not, as in the later Levitical law,
obedience to a multitude of particular observances, but simply the
duty of leading generally a righteous and holy life. To ' walk before '
any one is to live and move openly before him (IS. xii. 2) ; esp. in
such a way as (a) to deserve, and {b) to enjoy, his approval and favour.
Here the thought of {a) predominates, the meaning being to comport
oneself in a mamier pleasing in God's sight (so xxiv. 40, xlviii. 15
[lxx. €vap«Tru.v ivavriov] ; cf. Is. xxxviii. 3) ; for {b) see 1 S. ii. 30, and
(with reference to God) Ps. Ivi. 13, cxvi. 9 [shall, not wilt\.
2. Upon this condition {v. 1^) God grants his covenant; and
promises, at first quite generally, to multiply greatly his posterity.
3. fell on his face. An expression of respect towards men
TRu. ii. 10 ; 2 S. ix. 6, xiv. 22), and of reverence towards God
{v. 17, Nu. xiv. 5, Jud. xiii. 20, and fi-equently).
4—8. The promise stated in greater detail.
5. Abram (contracted from Abiram) means 'the father [a divine
title] is exalted": Abraham has no meaning in Heb., nor is any
meaning apparent from the cognate languages. The name is explained
here simply by an assonance (see on iv. 1) : Abraham is supposed to
have been suggested by the Heb. hdmdn, 'multitude.' Cf Rom. iv. 16 f,
where the second part of the verse is interpreted in a spiritual sense.
1 Elsewhere 'El Shaddai occiira Gen. xliii. 14 (E), xlix. 25 (see the note),
Ez. X. 5; Shaddai alone is also found, aa a poet, name of God, in Nu. xxiv. 4, IG
(in Balaam's prophecies), Ez. i. 24, Is. xiii. 6= Joel i. 15, Ps. Ixviii. 14, xci. 1;
31 times in the dialogue of Job; and in the semi-poetical sentences, Ru. i. 20, 21.
* On names compounded with Ab, Abi, see EncB. i. 9 — 11, ni. 3287 — 9.
186 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xvii. 5-8
I made thee. 6 And I will make tliee exceeding fruitful, and P
1 will make nations of thee, and kings shall come out of thee.
7 And I will establish my covenant between me and thee and
thy seed after thee throughout their generations for an ever-
lasting covenant, to be a God unto thee and to thy seed after
thee. 8 And I will give unto thee, and to thy seed after
thee, the land of thy sojournings, all the land of Canaan,
for an everlasting possession ; and I will be their God.
6 — 8. The promise should be compared with the others in P, viz.
xxviii. 3 — 4, xxxv. 11 — 12, xlviii. 3 — 4, Ex. vi, 2 — 8, when the features
both in phraseology and in contents which distinguish it from the
promises in J (see on xii. 2 f ) will become apparent.
6, make tJm... fruitful. Cf. v. 20, xxviii. 3, xlviii, 4.
nations. So vr. 4, 5, 16, xxxv. 11 ; cf 'company of peoples,' xxviii. 3,
xxxv. 11, xlviii. 4; Islimaelites and Edomites being included. In J
and E the promise is only of a single nation : xii. 2, xviii. 18, xlvi. 3.
kings. So v. 16, xxxv. 11. Another feature pecuhar to the promises
of P. The allusion is to the kings of Israel and Edom (xxxvi. 31).
7, establish my covenant. As vi. 18, ix. 9, 11, 17 (all P). See p. x.
and thy seed after thee (twice). So vv. 8, 9, 10, 19, and elsewhere
in P, See the Introduction, p. viii. No. 11.
throughout their generations. So ^w. 9, 12, Ex. xii. 14, 17, 42, and
often in P. See ibid. p. ix, No. 20.
everlasting covenant. Cf vv. 13, 19 ; and on ix. 16.
to be a God unto thee &c. This is the central feature in the co-
venant: 'El Shaddai will be a God to Abraham and his seed, i.e. He will
be on the one hand the object of their worship and veneration, and on
the other hand, also, their lord, their leader, their protector, and their
benefactor. The promise is found frequently in P and H (Ex, vi, 7,
xxix. 45 ; Lev. xi. 45, xxii. 33, xxv. 38, xxvi. 12, 45 ; Nu, xv, 41 :
elsewhere in the Hexateuch only Dt. xxix. 13, cf xxvi, 17) : it is also
a characteristic thought of Jer. (vii. 23, xi. 4, xxiv. 7, xxx. 22, xxxi. 1, 33),
and Ez. (xi. 20, xiv. 11, xxxiv. 24, xxxvi. 28, xxxvii. 23, 27) ; see also
2 S. vii. 24 (= 1 Ch. xvii. 22), Zech. viii. 8 (not elsewhere). The cor-
relative ' and they shall be to me a people,' i,e, belong to Me as loyal
subjects, enjoying My protection, and acting worthily of it, is found in
most of the passages quoted from Jer. and Ez., and occasionaUy besides,
but not in P or H, except Lev. xxvi, 12 (cf Ex, vi. 7).
8, the land of thy sojournings. The land in which thou dwellest
as a ger, a temporary resident, or 'sojourner' (cf on xv, 13). So xxviii, 4,
xxxvi. 7, xxxvii. 1, xlvii. 9 ; Ex. vi. 4 (all P). Cf p. ix. No. 21.
all the land of Canaan. Promised here in P for the first time.
everlasting possession, as xlviii. 4, Lev. xxv. 34. The word for
' possession ' (ntriks) is one that is very common in P, and occurs but
rarely elsewhere : see p. ix, No. 22,
XVII. 9-14] THE BOOK OF GEITESIS 187
9 And God said unto Abraham, And as for thee, thou shalt keep P
my covenant, thou, and thy seed after thee throughout their
generations. 10 This is my covenant, which ye shall keep,
between me and you and thy seed after thee ; every male
among you shall be circumcised. 11 And ye shall be circum-
cised in the flesh of your foreskin ; and it shall be a token of a
covenant betwixt me and you. 12 And he that is eight days
old shall be circumcised among you, every male throughout
your generations, he that is born in the house, or bought with
money of any stranger, which is not of thy seed. 13 He that is
born in thy house, and he that is bought with thy money, must
needs be circumcised : and my covenant shall be in your flesh
for an everlasting covenant. 14 And the uncircumcised male
who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin, that soul
shall be cut ofi" from his people ; he hath broken my covenant.
9—14. The 'token' (ix. 12, 13, 17), or external mark, of the
covenant : circumcision (v. 10 f ), to be performed (v. 12) on the
eighth day after birth upon all males, including (v. 13) slaves, whether
born in servitude, or purchased from without.
12. eight days old. A regulation, ever afterwards religiously
observed by the Jews : cf. xxi. 4; Lev. xii. 3 ; Luke i. 59, ii. 21; PhiL
iii. 5.
born in the house. See on xiv. 14.
bought with money. Verse 13 ; Ex. xii. 44 (where it is laid down
that a slave must be circumcised before he can eat the passover).
stranger. Foreigner (as Lev. xxii. 25 RV.), which, indeed, though
the fact has now become obscured, is the real meaning of 'stranger'
(Lat. extraneus: cf. on 'strange,' xxxv. 2). So v. 27; Ex. xii. 43 (RV.
alien) ; Ps. xviii. 44, 45 ; Is. Ivi. 3, 6, al.
14. shall he cut off from its father's kin. A formula, with shght
variations (as from Israel, from his people, &c.), very common in P*,
the penalty defined by it being prescribed usually for neglect of some
ceremonial observance, and only occasionally (as Lev. xviii. 29,
^ Two distinct Heb. words, with different meanings, are unfortunately repre-
sented in EVV. by 'stranger': one {ger) signifying sojourner, temporary resident
(see on v. 8 and xv. 13), the other {ben nekdr, or 7iokri) signifying foreigner (cf. on
xxxi. 15). See Stkanger in DB.
' From {the midst of) his (or its) father's kin, Gen. xvii. 14, Ex. xxx. 33, 38,
xxxi. 14, Lev. vii. 20, 21, 25, 27, xvii. 9, xix. 8, xxiii. 29, Nu. ix. 13 ; from the midst
of his (their) people, Lev. xvii. 4, xviii. 29, xx. 18, Nu. xv. 30, and with the first
pers. I will cut off. Lev. xvii. 10, xx. 3, 5, 6, Ez. xiv, 8 (cf. Lev. xxiii. 30 / will
destroy); from Israel, Ex. xii. 15, Nu. 'xix. 13; from the congregation of Israel,
Ex. xii. 19 ; from the midst oj the assembly, Nu. xix. 20; from before me. Lev. xxii. 3;
be cut off (absolutely), Lev. xvii. 14, Nu. xv. 31, with before the eyes of the children
of their people, Lev. xx. 17.
188 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xvii. .5-.0
15 And God said unto Abraham, As for Sarai thy wife, thou P
shalt not call her name Sarai, but ^ Sarah shall her name be.
16 And I will bless her, and moreover I will give thee a son of
her : yea, I will bless her, and she shall be a mother of nations ;
kings of peoples shall be of her. 17 Then Abraham fell upon
his face, and laughed, and said in his heart. Shall a child be
born unto him that is an hundred years old ? and shall Sarah,
that is ninety years old, bear? 18 And Abraham said unto
God, Oh that Ishmael might live before thee I 19 And God said,
Nay, but Sarah thy wife shall bear thee a son ; and thou shalt
call his name ^ Isaac : and I will establish my covenant with him
for an everlasting covenant for his seed after him. 20 And as
for Ishmael, I have heard thee : behold, I have blessed him, and
* That is, Vrincest. * From the Heb. word meaning to laugh.
XX. 3, 5, 6 ; Nu. xv. 30) for some moral ofTence, or idolatry. It has
been questioned whether death or excommunication is intended by the
expression: Ex. xxxi. 14 would point to the former; but even if this be
the intention of the expression, it is to be understood, probably, as a
strong affirmation of Divine disapproval, rather than as prescribing a
penalty to be actually enforced.
father's kin. The word, though it resembles the ordinary Heb.
word for ' a people,* is plural : as it is impossible to speak of a man's
'peoples,' the word must, when it is so used, have some different
meaning; and this is shewn by Arabic' to he father s kin. For another
formula of P's, in which the same expression occurs, see on xxv. 8.
15 — 21. The promise repeated with reference to Sarai. Ishmael
will become a great nation ; but the covenant will be established with
Isaac.
15. Sarah means 'princess'; the meaning of Sarai is obscure.
That given by some older commentators, 'my princess,' is philologically
impossible. It is thought by some modern scholars (see DB. s.v.) to
be an older form of Sarah, formed with the less usual fern. term. -ay.
16. she shall become nations. Cf. on v. 6.
17. and laughed, in incredulity. Abraham cannot believe it, and
still rests his hopes upon Ishmael, on whose behalf he now («. 18)
proceeds to utter a prayer.
18. before thee. I.e. under thy eye and care : cf IIos. vi. 2 ; also
Jer. XXX. 20 ; Is. Hii. 2.
19. The answer adheres to what was said before (v. 16). The
name Isaac ('he laughs') is manifestly suggested by the laughed of
V. 17.
20. / have heard thee. With a play on ' Ishmael ' (see xvi. 11).
* ^Am=\ioih patruus and patruelis.
XVII. .o-nj THE BOOK OF GEISESIS 189
will make him fniitfiil, and will multiply him exceedingly ; P
twelve princes shall he beget, and I will make him a great
nation. 21 But my covenant will I establish with Isaac, M'hich
Sarah shall bear unto thee at this set time in the next year,
22 And he left off talking with him, and God went up fi-om
Abraham. 23 And Abraham took Ishmael his son, and all that
were born in his house, and all that were bought with his
money, every male among the men of Abraham's house, and
circumcised the flesh of their foreskin in the selfsame day, as
God had said unto him. 24 And Abraham was ninety years old
and nine, when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin.
25 And Ishmael his son was thirteen years old, when he was
circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin. 26 In the selfsame day
was Abraham circumcised, and Ishmael his son. 27 And all the
men of his house, those born in the house, and those bought
with money of the stranger, were circumcised with liim.
twelve princes. See xxv. 13 — 16.
22 — 27. Abraham circumcises all the males of his hovisoliold. The
account is given with the circumstantial detail and repetition whicli P
loves : notice both the expressions m vv. 23, 24^ 25** repeated from
w. 11% 13 : and vv. 26, 27, repeating the substa.uce of v. 23.
22. went up from. Cf. xxxv. 13.
23, 26. in the selfsame day. See on vii. 13.
25. The circumcision of Ishmael at the age of 13 is probably
intended as an explanation of the corresponding custom among the
Islimaelite tribes. Circumcision has for long been practised by the
'Arabs' ; but it is commonly performed among them at a much later
age than was customary with the Jews ; the age varies in different
places from 3 — 4 years to 13 — 15 years (see references in Dillm., and
DB. n. 504** j and add Doughty, Arabia Deserta, i. 340 f. [3 years],
391 f.).
Circumcision.
Circumcision is not, as is sometimes supposed, a rite peculiar to the Jews.
It was, and still is, widely practised in different parts of the world. lu ancient
times we hear of it especially as usual in Egypt (Hdt. ii. 36, 37 ; Philo ii. 210 ;
cf. Josh. V. 9, where ' the reproach of Egypt ' implies that the Egyptians were
circumcised), where indeed (Ebers, Aeg. u. die Bb. Moseys, p. 283) the monu-
ments afford evidence that it was practised as early as the period of the
4th dynasty (3998—3721 B.O., Petrie), and whence Herodotus declares (iL 104)
that the custom spread to the Ethiopians, the Phoenicians, and the ' Syrians
of Palestine' (i.e. the Jews). Jer. ix. 26 shews also that it was practised by
the Edomites, Ammonites, Moabites, and certain Arab tribe? ; indeed, from
the tact of the Philistines being so pointedly rcierred to as ' micircumcised,*
190 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
it may be inferred that most of Israel's neighbours were circumcised like
themselves. The practice was an ancient one among the Arabs ; and it is
referred to in the Kor'aii as an established custom. The Babylonians and
Assyrians appear to have been the principal Semitic peoples who did not
practise it. It is possible that, as Dillm. and Nowack suppose, the peoples of
N. Africa and Asia who practised the rite adopted it from the Egyptians ; but
it appears in so many other parts of the world, that it must at any rate in
these cases have originated independently ; it is practised, for instance, among
the Mandingos, Gallas, Falashas, Bechuanas, and other African tribes, in
Madagascar, in many parts of Australia, in the New Hebrides, New Caledonia
and the Fiji Islands, and among several of the native tribes of America.
Stade, in his Essay on the subject {ZATW. 1886, p. 135 ff.), has quoted
particulars shewing that in most of these cases the rite was performed some-
times at the age of 7 — 10^, but more often at the approach of puberty, and
usually with preliminary rites of separation, the youths to be circumcised
being isolated for some time previously from the rest of their tribe in places
set apart for the purpose'. A practice so widely diffused must rest on some
general principle ; and the idea which appears generally to underlie it is that
it is a rite of initiation into manhood : by it the grown-up youth is formally
admitted among the men of his tribe, receives permission to marry, and is
invested with the full civil and religious rights of his tribe. It is a tribal
badge, and as such possesses both a civil and a religious significance*.
In Israel, the two distinctive characteristics of circumcision are (1) its
being performed in infancy ; (2) the religious ideas associated vrith it. To
take (2) first: the idea of membership in the nation is absorbed in that of
consecration and dedication to Jehovah : the religious point of view supersedes
the civil or pijlitical : circumcision becomes the external condition and seal of
admission into the rehgious privileges of the nation (cf Ex. xii. 44, 48 [P]), the
first condition of membership in it, as a religious community. (1) The age was
fixed at 8 days. This was probably a consequence of (2) : when the religious
point of view superseded the secular or civil, it would be natural for the child
to be dedicated as early as possible to the God who was to be his protector
through life. At the same time a humanitarian motive may have cooperated .
for the operation is nmch less serious whei\ performed upon an infant than
when performed upon one more or less grown up.
Thus circumcision, like sacrifice and other institutions of Israel's religion,
^ This was also the age at which it was performed in Egypt, as is clear from
the representation in Ebers, I.e. p. 280, or Guthe's Bibelworterbucfi (1903), p. 14.
2 See in Spencer and Gillen's Native Tribes of Central Australia (1899),
pp. 212 — 386, a detailed account of the very curious and elaborate initiation cere-
monies, including as important items circumcision (p. 218 fif.), and 'sub-incisiou'
(p. 251 S.), which must be undergone by every youth in Central Australia before he
can be regarded as a full member of hia tribe or be allowed to marry (p. 264).
8 So in Madagascar a man who is uncircumcised can become neither a soldier
nor a citizen ; and in Loango the rite must be completed before a man can obtain
a wife. It is remarkable that the Heb. word for father-in-law (hdtheii) is derived
from a root which signifies in Arabic to circumcise: it thus seems to have meant
originally circumciser, and to indicate that in primitive times circumcision was
among the Hebrews a general preliminary of marriage. Comp. Ex. iv. 25, as
explaiued in EncB. s.v. §§ 2, 6 (col. 830, 832); Eel. Sevi. 310 (=^328)
XVIII..] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 191
was a rite common to Israel with other nations, but stamped in Israel with
special associations and a special significance ^
The national contempt for men uncircunicised is apparent from the manner
in which the Philistines are spoken of, 2 S. i. 20 al.
The prophets began to spiritualize the idea, and to teach that the external
mark should be the concomitant of a corresponding frame of mind; they
accordingly enjoined the duty of circumcising the heart (Dt. x. 16, xxx. 6 :
cf Rom. ii. 29, also Col. ii. 11), or removing its foreskin (Jer. iv. 4); and they
characterized the ear (Jer. vi. 10), or heart (Jer. ix. 26 ; Ez. xhv. 7, 9 ; Lev. xxvi.
41), which was closed in, and so impervious to godly influences and impressions,
as * uucircumcised ' (cf. Acts vii. 51).
In the early church it became a pressing question of principle whether or
not the Jewish ordinance of circumcision should be imposed upon Gentile
converts : on the manner in which the Apostles viewed the rite, and upon
their attitude towards this question, see Acts xv. 1 — 29, xxi. 21 ; Rom. ii. 25 —
iv. 12; 1 Cor. vil 19 ; Gal. v. 2—12, vL 12—16 ; Phil. iii. 3 ; Col. iiL 11.
Chapters XVTII., XIX.
Visit of the angels to Abraham and Lot. The destruction
of Sodom and Gomorrah. Origin of the nations of Moah
and Ammon.
One of the most graphically and finely written narratives in the OT.
Except in xix. 29 (P), the author is throughout J, whose characteristics — ease
and picturesqueuess of style, grace and delicacy of expression, and naive
anthropomorphisms — it conspicuously displays. Abraham is attractively de-
picted : he is dignified, courteous, high-minded, generous, a man whom
accordingly God deems worthy of His confidence, visiting hira as one friend
visits another, bestowing upon him promises, and disclosing to him His
purposes : a strong contrast to the weak and timid Lot, and still more so to
the profligate inhabitants of the cities of the Kikkdr. The promise in
xviii. 10 — 15 is in reality not a subsequent one to that narrated in ch. xvii. (P),
but a parallel account of the same promise given by a different hand (J) ;
xviii. 10 — 15 is clearly written without reference to xvii. 15 — 19, and the
writer is evidently not conscious that an announcement of the same kind has
already been given.
XVIII. 1 And the Lord appeared unto him by the ^oaks J
of Mamre, as he sat in the tent door in the heat of the day ;
^ Or, terebinths
XVIII. 1 — 15. Visit of the three angels to Abraham, and promise
of a son to Sarah.
1. the terebinths of Mamre. The sacred grove at Hebron . see
on xiii. 18.
1 Ex. iv. 25 f., Josh. v. 2 ff. are thought by many to be alternative popular ex-
planationa of the introduction of the rite into Israel: see EncB. s.\ . § 2.
192 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xviii. i-s
2 and he lift up his eyes and looked, and, lo, three men stood J
over against him : and when he saw them, he ran to meet them
from the tent door, and bowed himself to the earth, and said,
3 ^My lord, if now I have found favour in thy sight, pass not
away, I pray thee, from thy servant : 4 let now a little water be
fetched, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree :
5 and I will fetch a morsel of bread, and comfort ye your heart,
1 Or, O hard.
door. Heb. opening, i.e. entrance. So v. 10, and regularly in this
expression.
2 — 5. Abraham's ready and courteous hospitality. The descrip-
tion, says Lane {Mod. EgJ" i. 364), 'presents a perfect picture of the
manner in which a modein Bedawee sheikh receives travellers arriving
at his encampment. He immediately orders his wife or women to
make bread, slaughters a sheep or other animal and dresses it in haste ;
and bringing milk and any other provisions that he may have at hand,
with the bread and the meat that he has dressed, sets them before his
guests ; if they are persons of high rank he also stands by them wliile
they eat.'
2. hawed himself to the earth. The Eastern mode of respectful
salutation: xxxiii. 3, xlii. 6; Ru. ii. 10, al.
3. My lord. This is probably right, the word being a title of
courtesy (as xxiii. 6, 11), and one of the strangers, distinguished in
some way from the other two, being addressed. The Massorites,
however, point (as w. 27, 30 — 32) Addndi ('Lord': so RVm.), the
form used when Jehovah is intended, implying thereby that Abraham
recognizes Him from the beginning. But My Im-d is preferable :
Abraham would scarcely have presumed to offer food and di'ink to one
whom he recognized as Jehovah (on Jud. xiii. 15, see v. 16''); a||d the
words in v. 5, ' after tliat ye shall pass on,' shew that he regardea the
three men as ordinary travellers. The disclosure who they are is
made only gradually, vv. 10, 13, 17 — 22 (of. Jud. vi. 12 ff., 22, xiii. 6,
10, 16^ 2l'>).
4. and wash your feet. An attention paid regularly in the East
to one arriving from a journey (xix. 2, xxiv. 32, xliii. 24; cf Rob.
n. 229 f ), and gi-ateful, if not necessary, in a country in which the
feet are protected only by sandals,
and recline yourselves, in preparation for the meal.
5. a morsel of bread. A modest description of the sumptuous
repast which is coming.
comfort. Support'. Exactly so Jud. xix. 5, 8: cf Ps. civ. 15,
' bread that supporteth man's heart.' But ' comfort ' in Old EngUsh (as
Wright, Bible Word-Book, s.v., shews) meant to strengtlien (late Lat.
i Heb. nyp, whence iTJiyD, iu post-Bibl. Hib. &/eait.
XVIII. 5-9] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 193
after that ye shall pass on : ^forasmuch as ye are come to your J
servant. And they said, So do, as thou hast said. 6 And
Abraham hastened into the tent unto Sarah, and said, Make
ready quickly three measures of fine meal, knead it, and make
cakes. 7 And Abraham ran unto the herd, and fetched a calf
tender and good, and gave it unto the servant ; and he hasted
to dress it. 8 And he took butter, and milk, and the calf which
he had dressed, and set it before them ; and he stood by them
under the tree, and they did eat. 9 And they said unto him,
Where is Sarah thy wife? And he said, Behold, in the tent.
* Or, for therefore
confortare'. so Vulg. here), and only gra/lually acquired the modern
sense of conmW. On the idiom, use of 'for therefore' (RVm.) with
the force oi forasmuch as (so xix. 8, xxxiii. 10 al.) see Lex. p. 475^
6. three measures. Three sS'ahs (so also, for the colourless
•measure,' 1 S. xxv. 18; 1 K. xviii. 32; 2 K. vii. 1 ; Mt. xiii. 33 [(rdrov]),
which were equal to one ephah, or about 8 gallons, — a large quantity,
perhaps (notice the terms of Mt. I.e.) the usual amount of a daily
baking (cf the 'ephah' of Jud. vi. 19).
cakes. Rolls, — baked rapidly by being placed upon the 'hot
stones' (1 K. xix. 6 RVm.), — i.e. stones heated by a fire having been
made upon them, — and covered with the hot ashes, lxx. iyKpv(t>iai;
Vulg. panes subcinericii".
7. Flesh is rarely eaten in the East: the 'calf tender and good'
is an indication of Abraham's sense of the distinction of his guests
(cf. L. and B. n. 436; in the one vol. ed., 1898 &c., p. 363).
8. butter. Curdled milk, or (as it is now called in Syria and
Arabia) leben, still esteemed by the natives as a grateful and refreshing
bevd#tge, and just such as would be offered to a traveller or (Jud. v.
25 ; 2 S. xvii. 29) thirsty fugitive. That ' butter' is not meant is appa-
rent, if only from the fact that hem'dh was a liquid (.Job xx. 17). In an
Arab's tent there hangs a semily, or 'sour-milk skin': the fresh milk
is brought in foaming; it is poured into the semily; the portion ad-
hering to the inner surface of the skin from a former occasion serves
as a ferment; and after a few minutes' shaking the leben is ready
(Doughty, Arabia Deserta, 1888, i. 221, 263, n. 235, 304, 658; cf.
Palmer, Desert of the Exodus, ii. 488 ; EncB. s.v. Milk).
stood by them (Jud, iii. 19). To see that his guests received
every attention. The same custom prevails still {L. and B. i. 308 f.).
cmd they did eat. Contrast Jud. xiii. 16 ; also Tob. xii. 19.
^ Wy cliff e (1380) has 'that comforteth me' for r^ ivdvva/j.oDvTl /xe, Phil. iv. 13;
and 'comfort' in PBV. of Ps. sxvii. 16, xli. 3, cxix. 28 has the same meaning: see
the writer's Parallel Psalter, p. 46i^ f.
* Cf. EncB. 604 ; and Rob. i. 485 ' the women in some of the t«nts [n ;ar Engedi]
were kneading bread, and baking it in thin cakes in the emberg.'
D. 13
194 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xviii. ia-i6
10 And he said, I will certainly return unto thee when the J
season ^cometh round ; and, lo, Sarah thy wife shall have a son.
And Sarah heard in the tent door, which was behind him.
11 Now Abraham and Sarah were old, and well stricken in age;
it had ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women.
12 And Sarah laughed within herself, saying. After I am waxed
old shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also ? 13 And the
Lord said unto Abraham, Wherefore did Sarah laugh, saying,
Shall I of a surety bear a child, which am old ? 14 Is any thing
too ^hard for the Lord? At the set time I will return unto
thee, when the season ^cometh round, and Sarah shall have a
son. 15 Then Sarah denied, saying, I laughed not ; for she was
afraid. And he said, Nay ; but thou didst laugh.
16 And the men rose up from thence, and looked toward
Sodom : and Abraham went with them to bring them on the
1 Heb. Uveth, or, reviveth. ^ Or, wonderful
10. when the season cometh rov/nd. I.e. a year hence. So v. 14;
2 K. iv. 16, 17. The Heb. is peculiar, lit. at the time living (or re-
viving), i.e. when the time revives next year.
11. well stricken in age. I.e. advanced in age (A.S. strican, Mid.
Eng. striken, to proceed, advance : see the Bible Word-Book, or Skeat,
Etym. Diet.). Heb. entered into days (lxx. Trpo^e/S-qKOTa ij/xepiav; cf.
Luke i. 7). So xxiv. 1 al.
12. laughed. In incredulity, as Abraham in xvii. 17. The passage
gives evidently J's explanation of the name ' Isaac,' as xvii. 17
gives P's.
waxed old. Worn out, worn away, as a garment falling to
pieces, Dt. viii. 4 (Heb. 'wore not away yrom upon thee'); Is. 1. 9,
li. 6; Ps. cii. 27. 'Wax old' (both here and elsewhere) is a very in-
adequate rend, of the Heb.
also. This word should be omitted. The Heb. is 'and my lord
is old' = my lord being old.
13. old. The Heb. here is the ordinary word for ' old.'
14. hard. The idea of the Heb. is separate from the ordinary,
exceptional. What is exceptional may be simply wonderfid (Ex. iii. 20 ;
2 S. i. 26, and frequently); or, from a different point of view, some-
thing difficult, whether to unravel (Dt. xvii. 8), to understand (Job
xlii. 3), or (as here and Jer. xxxii. 17, 27) to effect. Cf. Lk. i. 37
(aSuvarr^o-ei, as LXX. here). — With this section generally, comp. Heb.
xi. 11 f.
16 — 22. Jehovah communicates to Abraham His purpose of de-
stroying Sodom and Gomorrah. This disclosure to Abraham of His
secret counsel is a singular mark of Jehovah's regard iox him, based
{v. 18 f ) upon the unique position which Abraham holds, partly as the
XVIII. 16-19] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 195
way. 17 And the Lord said, Shall I hide jfrom Abraham that J
which I do ; 18 seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great
and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be
blessed in him? 19 For I have ^ known him, to the end that he
may command his childi-en and his household after him, that
they may keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judge-
ment ; to the end that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that
* See Amos iii. 2.
depository of a blessing for all nations, partly as having been chosen
by God to found a house whose members should all study to follow
after righteousness, so that it might well be of importance for the
difference between God's treatment of righteousness and unrighteous-
ness to be clearly apprehended. The disclosure moreover affords
occasion {viv. 23 — 33) for a signal illustration both of the noble and
generous impulses by which Abraham is actuated, and also of the
value in God's eyes of righteousness, and of His readiness to pardon
(Ez. xxxiii. 11), if only He can do so consistently with justice.
16. looked out toward Sodom. From some spot in the 'hill-
country' of Judah rJosh. xv. 48 — 60), which afforded the necessary
prospect, — perhaps (Rob. BR. i. 489 — 91) from the elevated village
of Beni Na'im, 3 miles E. of Hebron, where the Dead Sea, 18 miles
off, can be discerned through gaps in the hills, and the mountains
of Moab beyond it are distinctly visible. The situation of Beni
Na'im suits Jerome's description {Ep. 86 [ed. Vail. 108], § 11) of the
height visited by Paula as the traditional site of the spot here in
question, Caplmr Barucha, or the 'Village of Blessing.'
to bring them on the way. Le. to escort them on their departure :
cf. xii. 20.
17. said, viz. in His heart (i.e. to Himself), a frequent use of 'say'
in Heb., e.g. xx. 11, 1 S. xx. 26 (EVV. 'thought'), Ex. xiii. 17.
Shall I hide &c. Cf , of the prophets. Am. iii. 7.
18. 19. The motives prompting this disclosure to Abraham, viz.
his high significance in the rehgious history of mankind (cf the
remarks above, on w. 16 — 22).
18. shall he blessed through him. As xii. 3, where see the note.
19. known. In a practical sense, = noticed, regarded, cared for.
So Ps. i. 6, xxxvii. 18 at. ; and esp. (oi Israel) Am. iii. 2, Hos. xiii. 5.
to the end tluit &c. In order that ne may be the founder of a house
or family, and ultimately of a people, in which the knowledge of God
may be perpetuated, and in which the principles of true religion may
be known and obeyed. An important passage, shewing what the aim
and purpose of God's revelation to Abraham was. (The rend, of AV.
here is altogether incorrect.)
to the end that Jehovah &c. Abraham's thus ' commanding his
children and household after him' is the condition of Jehovah's fulfill-
ing the promises given to him.
13—2
196 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xviii. i^-h
which he hath spoken of him. 20 And the Lord said, ^Because J
the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and ^because their sin
is very grievous ; 21 I will go down now, and see whether they
have done altogether according to the cry of it, which is come
unto me ; and if not, I will know. 22 And the men turned
from thence, and went toward Sodom : but Abraham stood yet
before the Lord. 23 And Abraham drew near, and said, Wilt
thou consume the righteous with the wicked ? 24 Peradventure
there be fifty righteous within the city : wilt thou consume and
not spare the place for the fifty righteous that are therein?
25 That be far from thee to do after this manner, to slay the
righteous with the wicked, that so the righteous should be as
the wicked ; that be far from thee : shall not the Judge of all
^ Or, Verily
20. the cry of Sodom, i.e. the cry about Sodom, ascending to
heaven (v. 21) and calling for vengeance. On RVm. Verily (Keil,
Dillm., Holz. al.), see G.-K. § 148^ Lea;, p. 472^ e.
21. go down. Viz. into the part of the 'Ardbah (see p. 168), at
the S. end of the Dead Sea (4300 ft. below Hebron), in which the guilty
cities were. For the anthropomorphism, cf. xi. 5, 7.
which is come unto me. Cf Ex. ii. 23, iii. 9; 1 S. ix. 16; Jas. v. 4.
22. Two of the three 'men' proceed on their way to Sodom
(xix. 1); the third is Jehovah.
stood .. .before. The attitude of one interceding (Jer. xv. 1).
23 — 33. Abraham's intercession. The patriarch's keen sense of
justice recoils at the thought of the innocent perishing with the guilty,
and this by the decree of an all-righteous Judge. The vision of Lot,
who, though thoughtless, was not steeped in guilt, rises before him;
others, not less righteous (2 Pet. ii. 8), might be there likewise : he
is moved to compassion, and takes upon himself to intercede. With the
greatest diffidence and humility he prefers his petition : emboldened by
success, he repeats it, until at length he receives the gracious assurance
that the presence of ten righteous men in Sodom shall save the city
(cf Jer. V. 1). And so the truth is established that the God of justice
is also a God of mercy (cf. Ex. xxxiv. 6, 7). The passage is a striking
witness to the deeply-planted human instinct, which requires justice
in God, — an instinct which frequently finds expression in the OT.,
notablj' so in Job's passionate protests against His apparent injustice.
23. drew near. Cf. Heb. x. 22.
consii/me. Sweep away: so v. 24, xix. 15, 17; Nu. xvi. 26.
25. That be far from thee: Lit. ad profanum (sit) tibi! a, common
Heb. formula of deprecation or repudiation : often in EVV. rendered
God forbid (e.g. ch. xliv. 1). lxx. usually /otTySa/Aws (cf. Actsx. 14, xi. 8),
firj yevoiTo (Rom. iii. 4 &c.), or tAews /U.01 (cf. Mt. xvi. 22).
xvin 7S-XIX. i] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 197
the earth do right ? 26 And the Lord said, If I find in Sodom J
fifty righteous within the city, then I will spare all the place for
their sake. 27 And Abraham answered and said, Behold now,
I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord, which am but
dust and ashes : 28 peradventure there shall lack five of the
fifty righteous : wilt thou destroy all the city for lack of five ?
And he said, I wiU not destroy it, if I find there forty and five.
29 And he spake unto him yet again, and said, Peradventure
there shall be forty found there. And he said, I wiU not do it
for the forty's sake. 30 And he said, Oh let not the Lord be
angry, and I will speak : peiadventure there shall thirty be
found there. And he said, I will not do it, if I find thirty there.
31 And he said. Behold now, I have taken upon me to speak
unto the Lord : peradventure there shall be twenty found there.
And he said, I will not destroy it for the twenty's sake.
32 And he said. Oh let not the Lord be angry, and I wiU speak
yet but this once : peradventure ten shaU be found there. And
he said, I will not destroy it for the ten's sake. 33 And the
Lord went his way, as soon as he had left communing with
Abraham : and Abraham returned unto his place.
XIX. 1 And the two angels came to Sodom at even ; and
Lot sat in the gate of Sodom : and Lot saw them, and rose up
right. The Heb. is more pointed and forcible than the English:
* shall not the judge of all the earth do judgement ? ' — do what the
title which He bears implies. 'Judgement,' in the sense of just judge-
ment, or ' right ' (in a forensic sense), as frequently.
27. dust and ashes. Cf. Ecclus. x. 9, xvii. 32.
33. communing with. Speaking to, exactly as m. 27, 29, &c.
'Commune,' wherever it occurs in either OT. or NT., is simply an
archaism meaning to converse or confer, and stands for ordinary Heb.
and Gk words meaning to speak or talk. Its retention in 22 isolated
passages of RV. (as Ex. xxv. 22, xxxi. 18 ; Luke xxii. 4 : in AV. 28
times) is a signal example of what Bp Lightfoot has well described
as 'artificial distinctions created' {On a Fresh Revision of the English
NT. p. 33 fi".).
his place. I.e. Mamre, v. 1 (cf. «. 16).
XIX. 1 — 17. Two of the three angels visit Sodom, and convey
Lot out of the doomed city.
1. tite two angels. See xviii. 22.
in the gate. I.e. the gate-way (including the passage under the
city wall, with seats arranged on each side), — a common place of
meeting in the East, for conversation or business, including even the
198 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xix. i-s
to meet them ; and he bowed himself with his face to the earth ; J
2 and he said, Behold now, my lords, turn aside, I pray you,
into your servant's house, and tarry all night, and wash your
feet, and ye shall rise up early, and go on your way. And they
said, Nay ; but we will abide in the street all night. 3 And he
urged them greatly ; and they turned in unto him, and entered
into his house ; and he made them a feast, and did bake
unleavened bread, and they did eat. 4 But before they lay
down, the men of the city, even the men of Sodom, compassed
the house round, both young and old, all the people fi*om every
quarter ; 5 and they called unto Lot, and said unto him, "Where
are the men which came in to thee this night ? bring them out
unto us, that we may know them. 6 And Lot went out unto
them to the door, and shut the door after him. 7 And he said,
I pray you, my brethren, do not so wickedly. 8 Behold now,
I have two daughters which have not known man ; let me,
I pray you, bring them out unto you, and do ye to them as is
good in your eyes: only unto these men do nothing; ^forasmuch
^ Or, for therefore
administration of justice. See e.g. Ru. iv. 1 ff,, 11; Dt. xxi. 19, xxv.
7; Job V. 4; Is. xxix. 21; Am. v. 10, 12, 15; Ps. cxxvii. 5; and cf.
BB. Gate.
rose up &c. To entertain a stranger, esp. a distinguished one, is
in Eastern countries accounted an honour; and Lot rises up first in
order to secure the privilege for himself. Cf. Job xxxi. 32.
2. Abraham (ch. xviii.) dwells in a 'tent'; but Lot, dwelling in
a city, has a 'house,' with a 'door' and 'roof {m. 6, 8, &c.).
the street. Tlie broad-place, or square, — such as was usual in
an Eastern city: see in AV. Jer. v. 1, and in RV. 2 S. xxi. 12 (marg.);
Is. XV. 3 ; Ezr. x. 9 ; Neh. viii. 1 ; often, unfortunately, misrendered
street, and so confused with something entirely different: so, for
instance, here and Jud. xix. 15, 17, 20; Am. v. 16; Jer. ix. 21; Is.
lix. 14 a/.
3. a feast. He was not, it seems, less liberal in his hospitality
than his uncle (xviii. 6 ff.).
unleavened cakes. A kind of biscuit, which could be baked
rapidly (Jud. vi. 19—21; 1 S. xxviii. 24; cf Ex. xii. 39), still the
ordinary food of the Bedawin. Cf. L. and B. iii. 219 f
4'>. Emphasis is laid on the fact that all took part in this shame-
less attack : none attempted to conceal his purpose (Is. iii. 9). Cf
Jud. xix. 22 ff.
8. forasmuch as &c. As still in Arabia, the guest is inviolable,
and must be protected at all hazards, esp. if he has eaten or drunk
XIX. 8-15] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 199
as they are come under the shadow of my roof. 9 And they J
said, Stand back. And they said, This one fellow came in to
sojourn, and he will needs be a judge : now will we deal worse
with thee, than with them. And they pressed sore upon the
man, even Lot, and drew near to break the door. 10 But the
men put forth their hand, and brought Lot into the house to
them, and shut to the door. 11 And they smote the men that
were at the door of the house with blindness, both small and
great : so that they wearied themselves to find the door.
12 And the men said unto Lot, Hast thou here any besides?
son in law, and thy sons, and thy daughters, and whomsoever
thou hast in the city ; bring them out of the place : 13 for we
will destroy this place, because the cry of them is waxen great
before the Lord ; and the Lord hath sent us to destroy it.
14 And Lot went out, and spake unto his sons in law, which
^married his daughters, and said, Up, get you out of this place ;
for the Lord wiU destroy the city. But he seemed unto his
sons in law as one that mocked. 15 And when the morning
arose, then the angels hastened Lot, saying. Arise, take thy wife,
and thy two daughters which are here ; lest thou be consumed
^ Or, were to marry
with his host: though even to touch the tent-ropes, imploring pro-
tection, ia sufficient. But the duties of a host ought not to be
placed above those of a father: and Lot, obliged to act quickly in
a trying situation, made this mistake, — For RVm. cf. on xviii. 5.
9. They resent his interference: a mere sojourner, they say, will
fain make himself judge over them.
11. hlindness. Not the usual word, and found otherwise only
2 K. vi. 18; though in what respects the 'blindness' denoted by it
differed from ordinary blindness is uncertain. LXX. (both times) dopaa-ia.
12 — 16. The object of the visit (xviii. 21) has been attained : the
guilt of the city is manifest ; and its doom consequently fixed. The
angels therefore urge Lot to lose no time in quitting it, taking with
him all those belonging to him.
13. hath sent us. The two angels here distinguish themselves
clearly from Jehovah. Cf. p. 183 f.
14. which married. The Heb. is the participle ('the takers of),
which admits of either interpretation (lxx. tous eiXrj(f}6Tas; Vulg. qui
accepturi erant). On the whole, the marg. is the more probable.
mocked. Rather, sported ot jested; cf. on xxi. 9.
15. which are here. As opposed to the prospective sons-in-law,
who (v. 14) were not in Lot's house.
200 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xix. is-«
in the ^iniquity of the city. 16 But he lingered ; and the men J"
laid hold upon his hand, and upon the hand of his wife, and
upon the hand of his two daughters ; the Lord being merciful
unto him : and they brought him forth, and set him without the
city. 17 And it came to pass, when they had broug-ht them
forth abroad, that he said. Escape for thy life ; look not behind
thee, neither stay thou in all the ^ Plain; escape to the mountain,
lest thou be consumed. 18 And Lot said unto them, Oh, not
so, ^my lord : 19 behold now, thy servant hath found grace in
thy sight, and thou hast magnified thy mercy, which thou hast
shewed unto me in saving my life ; and I cannot escape to the
mountain, lest *evil overtake me, and I die : 20 behold now,
this city is near to flee unto, and it is a little one : Oh, let me
escape thither, (is it not a little one ?) and my soul sliall live.
^ Or, punishment * See ch. xiii. 10. ' Or, 0 Lord * Or, the evil
consumed. Swept away (xviii. 23), viz. with the others. So v. 17.
iniquity. On the marg. punishment, cf. on iv. 13.
16. Lot is still reluctant to leave his 'house,' and the city which
he had made his home: so the angels, tender to his weakness, and
aware of Jehovah's 'pity' for him, lead him by the hand, and set him
outside the city.
17. Directions for his further flight.
he said. One of the angels is now spokesman, as in xviii. 10 (cf
the sing. pron. in xix. 19*, 21, 22).
look not behind thee, — whether to be tempted back, or to watch
with curious eye the fate of the city.
neither stay thou in all the Kikkar, in spite of its attractiveness :
see on xiii. 10.
the mountain. Or, mountainous country, viz. of the later Moab,
as xiv. 10. So V. 30.
18 — 22. Lot escapes to Zo'ar. The mountains are too distant
for Lot's faith, or strength of purpose: so fearing he will not be able
to reach them in time, he asks to be allowed to take refuge in a city
nearer at hand, wliich, being a 'little' one, might contain less wickedness
than the other cities, and be more easily spared. The object of this part
of the narrative is evidently to explain the origin of the name Zo^ar.
18. my lord. There is the same uncertainty as in xviii. 3. The
Massorites understand Jehovah (so RVm.); EW. recognize only an
ordinary title of courtesy. Jehovah is not so distinctly present in
either of the two angels in ch. xix. as He is in at least one of the three
in ch. xviii. (comp. xix. 1 with xviii. 22, and see xix. 13 end)
19. lest the evil overtake me, i.e. the coming catastrophe: 'evil,'
as e.g. Am. iii. 6.
20. my soul. See on xii. 13.
XIX. .1-27] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 201
21 And he said unto him, See, I have accepted thee concerning J
this thing also, that I will not overthrow the city of which thou
hast spoken. 22 Haste thee, escape thither ; for I cannot do
any thing till thou be come thither. Therefore the name of the
city was called ^Zoar. 23 The sun was risen upon the earth
when Lot came unto Zoar. 24 Then the Lord rained upon
Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out
of heaven ; 25 and he overthrew those cities, and all the Plain,
and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which gi'ew upon
the ground. 26 But his wife looked back from behind him, and
she became a pillar of salt. 27 And Abraham gat up early in
1 That is, Little, ver. 20, See ch. xiv. 8.
22. Zo'wr. Mentioned also (besides xiii. 10, xiv. 2, S') Dt. xxxiv. 3,
and (as a Moabite city) Is. xv. 5, Jer. xlviii. 34; and situated in all
probability in, or very near, the small oasis called the Ghor es-Safiiieh,
at the SE. comer of the Dead Sea (see p. 170, or, more fully, DB. s.v.).
24 — 28. The destruction of Sodom and GomoiTah.
24. brimstone and fire. Most probably in an eruption of petro-
leum: see p. 202; and cf Ps. xi. 6; Ez. xxxviii. 22; Job xviii. 15.
25. overthrew. I.e. turned upside do\vn : the verb used regularly
of the destruction of these cities, vv. 21, 29; Dt. xxix. 23; Jer. xx. 16;
Lam. iv. 6; and so the cognate subst. 'overthrow,' «. 29; Am. iv. 11;
Dt. xxix. 23; Is. xiii. 19; Jer. xlix. 18 = 1. 40; cf Is. i. 7 RVm.'
26. a pillar of salt. At the SW. end of the Dead Sea is the
singular formation called the Jebel Usdum, the 'mountain of Sodom,'
a range of cliffs 5 m. long, and 600 ft. high, consisting of crystallized
rock-salt, — once (see p. 168) part of the bed of the ancient Salt Sea, —
'covered with a capping of chalky limestone and gypsum. It has a
strangely dislocated, shattered appearance ; and from the face of it gi-eat
fragments are occasionally detached by the action of the rains, and ap-
pear as "pillars of salt" advanced in front of the general mass' (Smith,
DB. ni. 1180). Such pillars, or pinnacles, have often been noticed
by travellers; and it is probable that one, conspicuous in antiquity,
gave rise to the belief expressed in the present verse. Writers of
a later age often felt satisfied that they could identify the pillar
referred to (cf Wisd. x. 7; Jos, Ant. i. 11. 4; DB. ni. 152); but
during the rainy season such pillars are constantly in process of
formation and destruction ; so that it is doubtful how far any particular
one would be permanent*.
The conduct of Lot and of his wife here is in harmony with Lot's
own spirit as shewn in ch, xiii. Our Lord, n a memorable passage
1 Where 'strangers' contains an allusion to the people of these cities, even if
'Sodom' ought not to be read for it (DTD for D"1|).
* Palmer {Desert of the Ex. ii. 478 — 80) also descrioes a tall isolated needle of
rock, bearing a curious resemblance to an Arab woman with a child on her chouldera
(see frontispiece to vol. i.), called 'Lot's wife,' at the edge of a plateau, on the East
side of the Dead Sea, 1000 ft. above it, just opposite to En-gecii (see Map, p. 471).
202 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xix. .8, 29
the morning to the place where he had stood before the Lord : J
28 and he looked toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward all
the land of the Plain, and beheld, and, lo, the smoke of the
land went up as the smoke of a furnace.
29 And it came to pass, when God destroyed the cities of P
the Plain, that God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of
the midst of the overthrow, when he overthrew the cities in the
which Lot dwelt.
(Lk. xvii. 32), refers to Lot's wife for the sake of the moral lessons
deducible from the narrative about her. Lot's wife is the type of
those who, in whatever age, 'look back' with regretful longings upon
possessions and enjoyments which are inconsistent with the salvation
offered to them ; and so our Lord points His disciples to what is re-
lated of her, when inculcating indifference to all worldly interests, as
the attitude with which the advent of the Son of man should be met.
27. to the place &c. See xviii. 16, 22,
28. smoke (twice). Steam, — cognate with the word denoting
incense, and with the verb used often (Lev. i. 9, &c.) of a sacrifice, and
rendered in EW. 'burn,' but meaning really 'turn into sweet smoke
(jivicrri)' Not the ordinary word for 'smoke.'
furnace. Kiln, — as for lime or pottery. So Ex. ix. 8, 10, xix. 18t.
Not the portable ' stove' of xv. 17.
29. A summary statement from P (cf. xxv. 19, 20, xli. 46) of what
has been described in detail by J in vv. 1 — 28.
On the site of the destroyed cities, enough has been already said (p. 170 f.) ;
they stood most probably on or near the saline morass uow known as esSebkha,
at the S. end of the Dead Sea. It is a plausible suggestion^ that the physical
cause of their destruction was an eruption of petroleum, occasioned by an
earthquake (cf. 'overthrow,' v. 21). Such eruptions arise from the existence of
reservoirs of compressed inflammable gases, by the side of the petroleum, at a
considerable depth below the surface : if from any cause, such as an earthquake,
a fissure is opened through the overlying strata, the gas escapes, carrying the
petroleum with it ; the fluid mass readily ignites, whether through lightning or
(Blanckenhorn, p. 58) spontaneously ; and it then rains down in burning
showers, while a dense smoke towers up into the air^. All the conditions for
^ Tristram, Land of Israel, 353 f. ; Sir J. W. Dawson, Egypt and Syria (in
•By-paths of Bible knowledge'), p. 129 f. (cf. HG. 508 f.); Blanckenhorn, ZDPV.
1896, p. 58, 1898, p. 78.
^ Sir J. W. Dawson (p. 125 f.) mentions how once, in an oil district in Canada,
a borehole struck a reservoir of compressed gas, which at once rushed upwards
carrying the petroleum v.iih it: it almost immediately ignited; the dense smoke
rose high into the air, throwing down burning bitumen all around, and a space of
15 acres was speedily enveloped in flame. Cf. also Blanok. p. 58. A volcanic
eruption is less probable geologically : Diener, who assumes one (Mitth. der k. k.
geogr. Gesellsch. zu Wien, 1897, p. 18 fif.), presses the expression 'out of heaven'
unnecessarily. See Blanckenhorn's criticism, ZDPV. 1898, pp. 77 — So.
DESTKUCTION OF SODOM AND GOMORRAH 203
such an eruption are present in the region of the Dead Sea. The strata about
it, esp, at the SW. end, abound in bituminous matter: after earthquakes,
bitumen is often found floating on the water : sulphur springs, and sulphur
deposits, are also frequent around the Dead Sea (of. Brimstone in DB., and
Tristram's description of the Wady Muhauwat, p. 351), so that the mention of
brimstone in v. 24 (cf. Dt, xxix. 23) is quite intelligible. To the same earth-
quake might also be due the subsidence of the ' Vale of Siddim' (p. l7l).
The present writer has adopted, in the preceding notes, the view which
seems to him to be the most probable explanation of the narrative in Gen. xix.,
viz. that the destruction of the four cities was a real event, happening in
Abraham's time. At the same time, the truth must be frankly admitted tliat
the narrative was committed to writing, — for the first time, so far as we
know, — 1000 years or more after the events which it purports to describe; and
hence the possibility must be faced that it is in fact a legend, intended
primarily to account for the desolate and stricken appearance of parts of the
shores of the Dead Sea, but at the same time infused with an ethical motive,
and told here for the sake of the moral lessons which it conveys. This view is
put forward, with ability and moderation, in an article by Professor Cheyne, in
the New World (Boston, U.S.A.) for June, 1892. In this article, Prof. Cheyne
collects examples of legends, current in Arabia and elsewhere, of cities or
villages, either submerged or otherwise destroyed, often on account of the
inhospitality, or other moral shortcoming, of their inhabitants, the particular
method of destruction assumed being usually such as was suggested by the
natural features of the place in question ^ On the other hand it must be
remembered that such an incident might also be a real occurrence, and that
analogies of the kind quoted, however numerous, are not in themselves
sufiBcient to shew the Biblical narrative to be unhistoricaL
30 — 38. Origin of the Moabites and Ammonites, as told by Hebrew folk-
lore. Naturally this narrative is not to be understood as a record of actual
fact : as little is it, on the other hand, to be regarded as a malicious invention
of the narrator; the narrator has simply reported a current belief, based
partly upon a popular etymology of the two names, partly upon the feelings
with which Israel viewed the two nations here in question. There was much
rivalry and hostility between Israel and these two peoples (see e.g. Dt. xxiii. 3 f..
Is. xvi. 6, Jer. xlviii. 26, Bz. xxv. 3, 6, Zeph. ii. 8 — 10); it is also (Dillm.) a not
improbable inference from the present passage that incestuous marriages, such
as were viewed in Israel with abhorrence, were in vogue among them; and
these feelings are reflected in the discreditable story of their origin which the
narrator has here preserved. ' It was the coarse humour of the people, which
thus put into words its aversion to Moab and Ammon ' (Dillm.).
1 • Thus a place on the Lake of Thun is said to have been destroyed because a
dwarf was refused hospitality during a storm by all the inhabitants except an aged
couple who dwelt in a miserable cottage.' See also Doughty, Arab. Des, i. 95 f. (a
legend to account for the desertion of the once important commercial town El-Hijr:
its inhabitants, the idolatrous Thamudites, sought to slay the prophet Salih sent to
them by God; cf. Kor. vii. 71 — 6, xv. 80 — 4); Wetzstein's notes in Del.'s Job, on
XV. 28, xxxi. 32 ; Cheyne in the EncB. iv. 4670 f. ; and cf. the Greek story of
Philemon and Baucis (Ov. Met, viu. 616 ff.).
204 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xix. 30-38
30 And Lot went up out of Zoar, and dwelt in the mountain, J
and his two daughters with him ; for he feared to dweD in Zoar :
and he dwelt in a cave, he and his two daughters. 31 And the
firstborn said unto the younger, Our father is old, and there is
not a man in the earth to come in unto us after the manner of
all the earth : 32 come, let us make our father drink wine, and
we will lie with him, that we may preserve seed of our father.
33 And they made their father drink wine that night : and the
firstborn went in, and lay with her father ; and he knew not
when she lay down, nor when she arose. 34 And it came to
pass on the morrow, that the firstborn said unto the younger,
Behold, I lay yesternight with my father : let us make him
drink wine this night also ; and go thou in, and lie with him,
that we may preserve seed of our father. 35 And they made
their father drink wine that night also : and the younger arose,
and lay with him ; and he knew not when she lay down, nor when
she arose. 36 Thus were both the daughters of Lot with child
by their father. 37 And the firstborn bare a son, and called
his name Moab : the same is the father of the Moabites unto
this day. 38 And the younger, she also bare a son, and called
his name Ben-ammi : the same is the father of the children of
Ammon unto this day.
30. went up. From the plain in which Zo'ar lay, to the mountainous
country above it, occupied in later times by the Moabites.
he feared &c. Dreading, viz., lest, after all, in spite of the promise,
V. 21, a similar fate should overtake it.
in a cave. There is some evidence that the habit of dwelling in
caves has prevailed even in modern times in the neighbourhood
(Buckingham, Travels in Syria, 1825, pp. 61 — 63, 87).
31. there is not &c. As the sole survivors of an accursed city,
aU men will shrink from us.
37. Moab. As though this were the same as Me-ab, and meant
'from a father' (see vv. 32 end, 34 end, 36 \of, by, are both lit./rom]).
38. Ben-*ammi. I.e. 'son of my people,' — or rather, perhaps
(xvii. 14), ' of my father's kinsman,' his father being his mother's near
relation \
If it were the case that incestuous marriages were not unusual
1 The occurrence of 'Am, 'paternal uncle,' 'kinsman on one's father's side' (see
on xvii. 14), in several proper names, makes it probable that in a connexion like the
present 'my father's kinsman' is in reality the name (or title) of a deity (see EncB.
B.V. AmUI).
XX. i] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 205
in Moab and Ammon, the particular form assumed by the legend
would be easier to account for'.
The only other mention of Lot in the OT. is in the expression
'children of Lot,' Dt. ii. 9, 19, Ps. Ixxxiii. 8.
Lot is in character a strong contrast to Abraham. He is selfish, weak, and
worldly: he thinks of himself before his uncle, and chooses, for the sake of
luxury and ease, to dwell in the midst of temptation. Relatively, indeed, he
was ' righteous ' (2 P. ii. 7, 8) ; his personal character was without reproach ;
and he was deemed worthy by God of a special deliverance. But, though his
'righteous soul' was 'vexed (f^aa-avlCfro) L-oia day to day' by the 'lawless
deeds ' which he saw around him, he had not strength of purpose to quit his
evil surroundings, and even betrothed his daughters to natives of the sinful
city. When ultimately he left Sodom, it was vvith manifest reluctance, and
only after his daughters had become (if we may follow the representation of the
narrator in xix. 31 ff.) depraved by contact with vice. He brought temptations,
and also troubles, upon himself, — and the man who once was rich in 'flocks and
herds and tents ' (xiii. 5) was, as the result of his own actions, stripped of his
possessions, and reduced to living penuriously in a cave. Lot is one of the
many rvnoi i^jxcov in the OT.; and his history is a lesson of the danger of
thinking too exclusively of worldly advantage and present ease.
Chapter XX.
SaraWs adiienture at tJie Court of Gcrar,
This chapter contains the first continuous excerpt (cf. on ch. xv.) from the
source ' B,' respecting which see the Introd. p. xi f. In general outline the
narrative is very similar to that of xii. 10 — 20 (Abram and Sarai in Egypt),
and xxvi. 6 — 11 (Isaac and Rebekah at Gerar). The repetition u remarkable,
especially as in each case the excuse is the same, that the wife is a sister. It is
diflScult to avoid suspecting that the three narratives are variations of the
same fundamental theme, a story told popularly of the patriarchs and
attributed sometimes (as reported by J and E respectively) to difierent
occasions in the life of Abraham, and once also to an occasion in the life
of Isaac. Cf. on xxvi. 6 — 11.
XX. 1 And Abraham journeyed from thence toward the E
land of the South, and dwelt between Kadesh and Shur ; and he
XX. 1. the South. The Negeb : see on xii. 9.
between Kadesh and Shur. See on xiv. 7 and xvi. 7.
1 Palmer, Desert of the Ex. ii. 478, remarks on the rather curious fact that
bint, 'daughter,' is in the country occupied formerly by Moab almost invariably
used for 'wife.'
206 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xx. i-6
sojourned in Gerar. 2 And Abraham said of Sarah his wife, E
She is my sister : and Abimelech king of Gerar sent, and took
Sarah. 3 But God came to Abimelech in a di'eam of the night,
and said to him. Behold, thou art but a dead man, because of
the woman which thou hast taken ; for she is a man's wife.
4 Now Abimelech had not come near her : and he said, Lord,
wilt thou slay even a righteous nation ? 5 Said he not himself
unto me, She is my sister ? and she, even she herself said, He is
my brother : in the integrity of my heart and the innocency of
my hands have I done this. 6 And God said unto him in the
Gerar. Ace. to Euseb. (Onom. 240) 25 Roman miles S. of Eleu-
theropolis (Beit-Jibrin), and hence often identified with a ruined site
Umm el-Jerdr, on a hill-top {PEFM. m. 389 f.), 6 m. S. of Gaza,
and 30 m. S. of Beit-Jibrin. It is however doubtful whether this name
is anything but a modern one, meaning Place of water-pots, from the
heaps of broken pottery about it (cf. L. and J5. 1. 197 f.) ; and a glance at
the map wiU shew that, unless the clause 'and sojourned in Gerar' im-
plies a complete change of locality as compared with ' dwelt between
Kadesh and Shur,' Umm el-Jerar is much too far to the N., and could
not with the utmost licence of interpretation be described as ' between'
Kadesh and Shur. It is very possible, therefore, that TrumbuU
{Kadesh- Barnea, 62 f ), Guthe, and others, are right in identif)dng
Gerar with the Wudy Jerur, about 13 m. W. and SW. of Kadesh,
which leads down through the Wady esh-Sheraif into the Wady el-
'Arlsh (see Palmer, Desert of the Exodus, n. 349 f., 353 f., and Map),
and is exactly in the required situation \
2. Cf. xii. 13, 19.
Abimelech. The name means 'Melech is father' [or *my father']:
cf Abijah, ' Jah is father.' Phoeu. proper names shew that there was an
old Canaanitish deity called Milk [in Heb. Melech-. Molech is also the
same word] ' king' ; and Abimilki is the name of the Egyptian governor
of Tyre in the Tel el-Amarna letters (b.c. 1400).
3. came... in a dream. E, it has been noticed, often speaks of
God as 'coming' or speaking in a dream: v. 6, xxxi. 11, 24, xlvi. 2;
Nu. xxii. 9, 20 (cf Nu. xii. 6; also the notes on ch. xxi. 12, xxii. 1).
4. 5. Abimelech appeals to Jehovah's righteousness (cf Abra-
ham's appeal in xviii. 23 ff.) : he had acted quite unsuspectmgly and
innocently.
5. integrity. Lit. perfectness (cf on vi. 9), with the coUat. idea
of sincerity, Pr. xxviii. 6, 18 [read crooked for perverse"], or unsuspi-
ciousness, simplicity (2 S. xv. 11; 1 K. xxii. 34 [see RVm.]).
the innocency of my hands. Cf. Ps. xxiv. 4 (Heb.), xxvi. 6, Lxxiii. 13.
* A site nearer Gaza does however suit better ch. x. 19, and 2 Ch. xiv. 13
(cf. V. 10) ; and it is possible that there were two Gerars {EneB. a. v.).
XX. 6-1 1] THE BOOK OF GEi^SIS 207
dream, Yea, I know that in the integrity of thy heart thou hast E
done this, and I also withheld thee from sinning against me :
therefore suffered I thee not to touch her, 7 Now therefore
restore the man's wife ; for he is a prophet, and he shall pray
for thee, and thou shalt live : and if thou restore her not, know
thou that thou shalt surely die, thou, and all that are thine.
8 And Abimelech rose early in the morning, and called all his
servants, and told all these things in their ears : and the men
were sore afraid. 9 Then Abimelech called Abraham, and said
unto him, What hast thou done unto us? and wherein have
I sinned against thee, that thou hast brought on me and on my
kingdom a great sin ? thou hast done deeds unto me that ought
not to be done. 10 And Abimelech said unto Abraham, What
sawest thou, that thou hast done this thing? 11 And Abraham
6. withheld. By means viz. of some sickness: cf. v. 17.
7. a prophet. The title is applied to Abraham, — as it seems (see
1 S. ix. 9), by an anachronism, — here only (cf. Ps. cv. 15, of the patri-
archs generally), though in effect he appears invested with the
privileges of a prophet in xv. 1, 4, xviii. 17. The term designates
him as one standing in a special relation to Jehovah (Am. iii, 7), and
as such, one whose rights may not be infringed with impunity, and
whose intercession, also, is likely to be efficacious with God.
pray. The Heb. word, both here and generally in the OT., signifies
properly to make oneself a mediator^ to intercede; and this meaning
is often perceptible from the connexion in which it is used: e.g. Num.
xi. 2, xxi. 7 ; Dt. ix. 20, 26 ; Job xlii. 8, 10.
live. Or recover (Is. xxxix. 9) : see on v. 6.
and all that are thine. The doctrine of individual responsibility
was only gradually developed; and hence among ancient peoples the
family of a guilty person was often punished with him. Of Nu. xvi.
32 f. ; Josh. vii. 24 f ; Dan. vi. 24; and contrast Dt. xxiv. 16, and the
teaching of Ezek. xviii. See further Mozley, Lectures on the OT.
p. 87 fif., where it is shewn how this defective sense of justice had
its root in a defective sense of individuality, or of the rights of the
individual, as such; and Gray, The Divine Discipline of Israel, 77 ff.
9. Abimelech rebukes Abraham, as Pharaoh had done (xii. 18 f ),
but in stronger tenns; and is represented as holding up to the
patriarch a higher standard of moral obligation than that which he
had himself observed. Gomp. Gray, p. 49 f
10. A further point : what reason had Abraham for so acting ?
sawest. I.e. hadst in view: what was thy object in making this
false statement?
11. He defends, and {v. 12 f) excuses himself.
208 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xx. 11-16
said, Because I thought, Surely the fear of God is not in this E
place ; and they will slay me for my wife's sake. 12 And more-
over she is indeed my sister, the daughter of my father, but not
the daughter of my mother ; and she became my wife : 13 and
it came to pass, when God caused me to wander fi-om my father's
house, that I said unto her. This is thy kindness which thou
shalt shew unto me ; at every place whither we shall come, say
of me. He is my brother. 14 And Abimelech took sheep and
oxen, and menservants and womenservants, and gave them unto
Abraham, and restored him Sarah his wife. 15 And Abimelech
said, Behold, my land is before thee : dwell where it pleaseth
thee. 16 And unto Sarah he said, Behold, I have given thy
the fear of God is not &c. The popxilation is represented as heathen,
and as regardless, consequently, of the sanctity of human life.
12. Marriages with half-sisters (by the same father) were forbidden
by the later law (Lev. xviii. 9, 11, xx. 17; Dt. xxvii. 22; cf Ez. xxii.
11), but they occurred among the Canaauites (W. R. Smith, Kinship
and Marriage in ancient Arabia, 162 f), and other ancient nations;
and 2 S. xiii. IS** implies that they were regarded as permissible in
Israel in the age of David. But of course even this excuse does not
save Abraham's statement from being an equivocation.
13. A further excuse : it has been Abraham's general practice to
speak of Sarah as his sister.
caused me to wander. The verb is plural, — perhaps, in conversation
with a heathen, from accommodation to a polytheistic point of view
(cf. 1 S. iv. 8). 'Eldhlm, even when used of the true God, is occasion-
ally construed with a plural, for reasons which cannot always be
definitely assigned : see, with a pi. verb, ch. xxxv. 7 ; Ex. xxii. 9 ; 2 S.
vii. 23; with a pi. ptcp. Ps. Iviii. 11; and, with an adj. (here probably
the 'plural of majesty': seep. 14), Josh, xxiv, 19; and five times in
the expression 'living God,' Dt. v. 26 [Heb. 23]; 1 S. xvii. 26, 36;
Jer. X. 10, xxiii. 36. Cf. G.-K. §§ 124^ 145'. (On ch. xxxi. 53, see
the note.)
14. Cf xii. 16, where, however, the gifts are given before the
discovery of Abraham's true relation to Sarah : here, they are given
as compensation to an injured husband, whose explanation Abimelech
accepts, and whose good will, for the reasons mentioned in v. 7, he is
anxious to secure.
15. He oifers him now to remain in his land. Contrast xii. 20.
16. Abimelech feels that, however inadvertently, he has done
Sarah a wrong, which her friends and attendants may resent: so he
gives her 'brother' a handsome additional present specially on her
behalf, which may shew them that he acknowledges the wrong, and
XX. 16-xxL 3] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 209
brother a thousand pieces of silver: behold, Mt is for thee a.i:
covering of the eyes to all that are with thee ; and ^in respect
of all thou art righted. 17 And Abraham prayed unto God:
and God healed Abimelech, and his wife, and his maidservants ;
and they bare children. 18 For the Lord had fast closed up
all the wombs of the house of Abimelech, because of Sarah
Abraham's wife. ^^
^ Or, he ^ ' Or, before all men
induce them consequently to overlook it. Lxx., Sam. read, more easily,
'for thee... «no?/cr all,' &c.
pieces. It is better to supply shekels, — a princely gift, equivalent
to some £135 — 140 (see on xxiii. 14 f.).
a covering of the eyes, making them blind to what has occurred. For
the figure, cf. (though the expressions are not the same) xxxii. 20 (see
note); Ex. xxiii. 8; 1 S. xii. 3; Job ix. 24. The marg. 'he' may
be disregarded: the explanation suggested by ch. xxiv. 65 (cited in
reference Bibles) is far-fetched and improbable.
and before all (men) thou art righted. This rend, is preferable
to that of the text (see Is. xxx. 8 Heb.); but the clause is very
probably connipt. If it is con-ect, the meaning apparently is that
Sarah will be publicly vindicated (Job xiii. 15 Heb.) from any imputa-
tions which might have been cast upon her.
17. Abraham now intercedes {v. 7) on Abimelech's behalf.
maidservants. I.e. female slaves. The Heb. word (nox) is the same
that is rendered bondwoman in xxi. 10, 12, 13.
Chapter XXL
The birth of Isaac, and expulsion of Ishma^l. The treaty
between Abimelech and Abraham; and the origin of the
name Beer-sheba.
XXI. 1 And the Lord visited Sarah as he had said, | andt/P
the Lord did unto Sarah as he had spoken. | 2 And Sarah J
conceived, and bare Abraham a son in his old age, | at the set P
time of which God had spoken to him. 3 And Abraham called
XXI. 1—7. The birth of Isaac.
IV See xviii. 10—14 (J).
visited, — viz. with favour and blessing (1. 24 ; Ex. iii. 16 ; Ps. Ixxx. 14,
al.; Luke i. 68); specially as here, 1 S. ii. 21.
l^ See xvii. 16, 21 (P).
2^. at the set time &c. See xvii. 21 (P); though the same ex-
pression occurs also in xviii. 14 (J). — Cf. Heb. xi. 11 £
D. 14
210 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxi. 3-9
the name of his son that was bom unto him, whom Sarah bare P
to him, Isaac. 4 And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when
he was eight days old, as God had commanded him. 5 And
Abraham was an hundred years old, when his son Isaac was
born unto him. | 6 And Sarah said, God hath ^made me to E
laugh ; every one that heareth will laugh with me. 7 And
she said. Who would have said unto Abraham, that Sarah should
give children suck ? for I have borne him a son in his old age.
8 And the child grew, and was weaned : and Abraham made
a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned. 9 And Sarah
saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, which she had borne unto
' Or, prepared laughter for me
3 — 5 (P). The naming and the circumcision, in accordance with
xvii. 12, 19 (P); the specification of age, as xvii. 1, 24, and often
in P (see the Introd. p. xxvi f.).
6. hath prepared laughter for me. E's explanation of the
name 'Isaac' (see xvii. 17 in P; xviii. 12 in J), from the laugh of
good-natured surprise with which others will greet the news that Sarah
had given birth to a child.
with me. On account of me, — not in mockery, but good-
naturedly.
7. said. The word (millel) is Aramaic (e.g. Dan. vi. 21); and
is found otherwise in Heb. only in poetry (Ps. cvi. 2; Job viii. 2,
xxxiii. 3t).
8 — 21, The expulsion of Ishmael.
8. was weaned. Weaning is still observed in the East as the
occasion of a family feast. The child might be at the time as much
as three (2 Mace. vii. 27) or four (Russell, Aleppo, 1794, i. 303, cited
by Knob.) years old: 1 S. i. 22, 24, 25, ii. 11 (Samuel, when weaned,
left alone with Eh) seems to imply that he might even be older.
9. mocking. The word used — the intensive form of that from
which 'Isaac' is derived — has certainly tliis sense when followed by
the prep. 2 {at or against), xxxix. 14, 27 ; but it is doubtful whether it
has it when used absolutely (see xix. 14, xxvi. 8; Ex. xxxii. 6; Jud.
xvi. 25); hence the marg. playing or sporting (lxx. Trai^ovTa, adding
fiera IcraaK tou vlov avrf}^', Vulg. ludentem cum Isaac filio suo), which
is preferred by most moderns ^ The meaning in the latter case will
* The later Jews attached strange Haggadahs to this word pHVP. B- Akiba
(c. 50 — 135 A.D.), on account of its use in xxxix. 14, 27, supposed it to refer to
Ishmael's unchastity, B. Ishmael, on account of Ex. xxxii. 6, to his idolatry, other
Eabbis, on account of pnb' in 2 S. ii. 14, Pr. xxvi. 14, to attempts made by him
to shoot his brother: there were also other stories current among the later Jews
respecting his insolence towards Isaac (see references in DB. n. 503''). St Paul, in
Gal. iv. 29 (iSluKev), appears to follow some of these Haggadahs (cf. St John
Thackeray, T/ie Relation of St Paul to contemporary Jetcish thought, 1900, p. 212 f.).
XXI. 9-14] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 211
Abraham, ^mocking. 10 Wherefore she said unto Abraham, E
Cast out this bondwoman and her son : for the son of this
bondwoman shall not be heir with my son, even with Isaac.
11 And the thing was very grievous in Abraham's sight on
account of his son. 12 And God said unto Abraham, Let it not
be gi'ievous in thy sight because of the lad, and because of thy
bondwoman ; in all that Sarah saith unto thee, hearken unto
her voice ; for in Isaac shall thy seed be called. 13 And also of
the son of the bondwoman will I make a nation, because he is
thy seed. 14 And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and
took bread and a ^bottle of water, and gave it unto Hagar,
^ Or, playing * Or, skin
be (as already explained in Jubilees xvii. 4) tliat the sight of Ishmael,
'playing and dancing' (on his age, as pictured by this narrator, see
on V. 15), and 'Abraham rejoicing with gieat joy,' aroused Sarah's
maternal jealousy.
10. As in xvi. 5, Sarah appeals to her husband, and with some
peremptoriness, demands the expulsion of both Ishmael and his slave-
mother. On the use made of this narrative in Gal. iv. 21 — v. 1, see
p. 213.
11. Ishmael had evidently won his father's affection, and it is
painful to him to part with him.
12. *But what a woman's jealousy impels Sarah to wish, is for
other reasons in accordance with God's will' (Di.); and Abraham,
when satisfied of this, sacrifices his fatherly feelings, and resigns him-
self to the loss of his son {v. 14).
said. As may be inferred from 'rose early' mv. 14, in a dream
(of on XX. 3).
for in Isaac shall seed be called to thee (so lxx. and Eom. ix. 7,
Heb. xi. 18). I.e. in Isaac's line shall be descended those who will
bear thy name, and be called thy genuine seed, and inherit, conse-
quently, the promises. Cf in P xvii. 21 ; the point is one on which
the diiferent sources would naturally agree. The words are quoted in
Rom. ix. 7 by St Paul, for the purpose of shewing that the inheritance
of the promise was not a necessary privilege of physical descent : there
were some among Abraham's ofi'spring who did not inherit it.
13. It is a further encouragement to Abraham that national
greatness is in store elsewhere for Ishmael also (cf. xvi. 10 in J;
xvii. 20 in P).
14. Abraham obeys at once; and next morning sends Ishmael
away with his mother, giving them a modicum of provision to support
them on their journey.
bottle. Skin (lxx. ao-xos). The skin of a goat, or other animal, —
here perhaps a kid, — such as is stiU used generally in the East for
14—2
212 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxi. 14-^0
putting it on her shoulder, and the child, and sent her away : g
and she departed, and wandered in the wilderness of Beer-sheba.
15 And the water in the bottle was spent, and she cast the child
under one of the shrubs. 16 And she went, and sat her down
over against him a good way off, as it were a bowshot : for she
said. Let me not look upon the death of the child. And she sat
over against him, and lift up her voice, and wept. 17 And God
heard the voice of the lad ; and the angel of God called to
Hagar out of heaven, and said unto her, What aileth thee,
Hagar ? fear not ; for God hath heard the voice of the lad where
he is. 18 Arise, lift up the lad, and hold him in thine hand ;
for I will make him a great nation. 19 And God opened her
eyes, and she saw a well of water ; and she went, and filled the
bottle with water, and gave the lad drink. 20 And God was
carrying water, and which would contain a good deal more than what
we should call a 'bottle' (see Bottle in DB. or EncB.).
the wilderness of Beer-sheba. Beer-sheba, 28 m. SW. of Hebron,
may be said to be the centre of the Negeb (xii. 9) : it lies itself (see
G. A. Smith's large Map) near the top of a broad Wady running down
to the Medit. Sea, with high ground both N. and S. of it. On the S.
the hills are mostly barren: but as Beer-sheba itself is approached
they are more and more covered with grass, and about it there is rich
pasturage, though very apt in dry seasons to be parched and desolate
(Rob. I. 203 f.; Tiistram, 366; Palmer, 11. 387—9; EG. 280, 285).
15. cast. The word clearly implies that Ishmael was being carried
by his mother, although according to xvi. 16, xxi. 5, 8, he must have
been at least 15 years old. The inconsistency is similar to the one
in xii. 11, and must be similarly explained: xvi. 16, xxi. 5, the passages
which fix the age of Ishmael, belong to P, whereas the present narrative
belongs to E, who took a different view of the chronology, and pictured
Ishmael as still an infant (cf. the Introd. § 2).
under one of the shrubs (ii. 5). Perhaps a rothem, or broom-tree,
such as Elijah, one day's journey S. of Beer-sheba, lay down under
(1 K. xix. 4 f.). The rothem is still abundant in the same parts; and
Ilobinson's Arab servants would often * sit or sleep under a bush of it
to protect them from the sun' {BR. i. 203).
17. heard (twice). The word is evidently chosen with allusion to
the name Ishmael: cf, xvi. 11 (Jl xvii. 20 (P); and the threefold
allusion to the meaning of 'Isaac, noted on v. 6. The Divine care
for the lonely and the distressed is again exemplified; cf. xvi. 7 ff.
out of heaven. As xxii. 11.
18. a great nation. Cf. v. 13; and see on xxv. 12 — 18.
19. opened her eyes. I.e. enabled her to perceive what was hidden
from her before. Cf. on iii. 7 ; and Lk. xxi v. 31.
XXI. .o-«] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 213
with the lad, and he grew ; and he dwelt in the wilderness, and E
^became an archer. 21 And he dwelt in the wilderness of
Paran : and his mother took him a wife out of the land of
Egypt.
* Or, became, as he grew vjp, an archer
20. was ivith the lad. Cf. v. 22, xxvi. 3, 24, 28, xxviii. 15, 20,
xxxi. 3, 5, XXXV. 3, xxxix. 2, 3, 21, 23, xlviii. 21 ; Ex. iii. 12, al.
became an archer. This is probably the sense of what the author
originally wrote; though the existing text, as pointed, must be ren-
dered as in RVm. Several of the Ishmaelite tribes, e.g. Kedar and
the Ituraeans (see on xxv. 13, 15), were distinguished as archers; and
their ancestor is dehneated accordingly.
21. the wilderness of Paran. See on xiv. 6.
his mother &c. To procure a wife for a son being an affair of the
parents : cf xxiv. 3 f , xxxi v. 4.
out of the land of Egypt. I.e. out of his mother's own country
(«. 9, xvi. 1).
The nan*ative explains how it was that the Ishmaelite tribes came to be
separated from the Israelites, and acquired a character of their own (xvi. 12).
It at the same time marks a stage in the trials of Abraham's faitL Abraham
has to give up a son who is dear to him ; his hopes are in consequence tlie
more centred upon Isaac ; and the reader is better prepared to realize the
severity of the trial imposed upon him in ch. xxii.
The history of Ishmael and Isaac is in Gal. if. 21 — v. 1 expounded allegori-
cally for the purpose of shewing to those Judaizing Christians, who desired to
continue ' under the law,' that even the * law ' itself did not contemplate the
absolute finality of Jewish ordinances. In the history of the patriarchal
family, in the rivalry between Ishmael bom in bondage and Isaac born in
freedom, and in the triumph of the latter, St Paul sees foresliadowed the
conflict and the issue in the history of the nascent Church, the defeat of the
spirit which clung to carnal ordinances, and the triumph of the spirit of freedom,
which had the faith and the insight to perceive that such ordinances must
pass away. Naturally the Apostle's allegorical exegesis does not possess the
same value for us which it would have for many of those to whom it was
originally addressed : the real ground of Christian freedom from the yoke of
Jewish ordinances is to be found not in this narrative of Genesis but in the
logic of history, declaring (as the prophets also had done before) that it was the
purpose of God, not to condition for ever the saving knowledge of Himself by
membership in a single nation, or by the ritual of a single local cult. Comp.
farther Lightlbot on GaL iv. 21 ff.; and St John Thackeray, op. cit. pp. 196 ff., 214f.
22 And it came to pass at that time, that Abimelech and
Phicol the captain of his host spake unto Abraham, saying, God
22 — 34. The treaty with Abimelech, and the origin of the name
Beer-sheba. The narrative affords another illustration of the respect
2U THE BOOK OF GENTISIS [xxl 11-19
is with thee in all that thou doest : 23 now therefore swear F
nnto me here by God that thou wilt not deal falsely with me,
nor with ^my son. nor with my son's son : but according to the
kindness that I have done unto thee, thou shalt do unto me. and
to the land wherein thou hast sojourned 24 And Abraham
said. I will swear. 25 And Abraham reproved Abimelech because
of the well of water, which Abimelech's servants had violently
taken away. 26 And Abimelech said, I know not who hath
done this thing : neither didst thou tell me,, neither yet heard I
of it. but to-day. 27 And Abraham took sheep and oxen, and
gave them unto Abimelech ; and they two made a covenant
28 And Abraham set seven ewe lambs of the flock by themselves.
29 And Abimelech said unto Abraham, What mean these seven
^ Qc, wuf qfifrimg, war wiik wa/ fotUrity
with which Abraham is regarded by the native chiefs ; and also estab-
lishes Abraham's right to flie possession of Beer-sheba,
22. Even Abimelech, a 'king,' who has a 'captain of his host'
(1 S. xiv. 50, &C.), finds it to his advantage to enter into a definite
trearr with Abraham, seeing that God is 'with him' in all his un-
dertakings, and supports him with His blessing (of. similarly with
Isaac, xxvL 28 £).
23. h^re, with reference to Beer-sheba, the name of which is to
be explained.
nor icit?i my oSsprmg, nor with my progeny. An aUiterative
combination {nin and nekh.edj, found als^D in Job xviiL 19; Is. xiv. 22,
Ecclus. xIL 5, xlviL 22 (Heb.J.
accfjrding to the kindness <kc See xx. 15. Their relationship was
already friendly ; it Is now to be formally secured for the fatore.
2A, 25. The peace-loving patriarch is ready to accede to the re-
quest : he only wishes first to have an tmderstanding about a disputed
well, in order that, after the treaty had been concluded, there might
be no pretext for <iisrurbing it,
26. Abimelech protests his entire ignorance of what had been
done. The sequel shews that he recognize*! the well to be Abraham's,
and restored it to him. Disputes about wells are common in a desert
country (cf. xxvL 20 £) ; and a toll is often levied by their owners for
the use of them.
27. Abraham gives presents, as was customary when treaties were
made (1 K. xv. 19 ; Is. txt. 6 ; Hos. xiL 1), in order that he may con-
tinae unmolested in Gerar, and be imder Abimelech's protection
(Knob.). Abraham thus shews iJiat he thought the treaty would be
to his own advantage also.
28. the geeem ewe lambs, viz. those intended for the purpose
mentMned in v. 30.
XXL 39-34] THE BOOK OF GENi:SIS 215
ewe lambs which thou hast set by themselves ? 30 And he said, E
These seven ewe lambs shalt thou take of my hand, that it may
be a witness unto me, that I have digged this welL 31 Where-
fore he called that place Beer-sheba ; because there they sware
both of them. 32 So they made a covenant at Beer-sheba :
and Abimelech rose up, and Phicol the captain of his host, and R
they returned into the land of the Philistines. | 33 And Abraham J
planted a tamarisk tree in Beer-sheba, and called there on the
name of the Lord, the Everlasting God. | 34 And Abraham R
sojourned in the land of the Philistines many days.
30. Abimelech, by accepting the lambs, attests that Abraham is
the lawful owner of the weh.
31. The stress laid on the number 'seven* in vr. 28 — 30 seems
to shew that the writer intends to erplain 'Beer-sheba" as meaning
'Well of seven' (sheba' being 'seven' in Heb.); but in r. 31* it is
explained expressly as meaning ' Well of swearing.' Possibly, two narra-
tives have here been interwoven: it is also pos^^ible, however, that the
two explanations resolve themselves into one : for the Heb. word for ' to
swear" (nishha', the reflexive of the unused shaba') seems to mean
properly (as it were) ' to seven-oneseLf,' i.e. to pledge oneself in some
way by seven sacred things \ so that, if it might be assumed that the
'seven lambs' were used for this purpose, only one ceremony would
be described in the passage. But it is hardly doubtful that the real
meaning of the name is 'Well of seven,' i.e. the 'Seven wells,' with
allusion to the number of weUs in the locality; and that the expla-
nation given here grew up afterwards, hke the parallel one in xxvi. 33.
Beer-sheba is 25 m. SE. of Umm el-Jerdr, and 58 m. NE of the
Wddy Jerur, the two rival sites for 'Gerar' (see on xx. 1).
32^ (from and A bimelech), 34. Nothing has been said before about
Abimelech being king of the Phihstines, though he appears as such
in ch. xxvi (J). It seems as though vr. 32**, 34 were added, or
modified, by a compiler, who read the narrative here in the hght of
ch. xxvi., and imported into it the same local conditions. The "land
of the Phihstines' must be a proleptic expression : see on xxvi. 1.
33. There must have been a sacred tamarisk tree at Beer-sheba,
which tradition said had been planted by Abraham.
and called there 6:c. Cf. xii. 8, xiii. 4 ; and see on iv. 26.
the Everlasting God. Heb. 'El 'Oldm, — a title, as Di. remarks,
sufficiently suitable where the context relates to aji oath and compact,
but nevertheless not impossibly the name of a Canaanite deity, iden-
tified bv the narrate^ (like 'El 'Elyon in xiv. 18) with Jehovah: cf
the Phoen. 'HXos (= 'El) o Ka\ Kp6v^ (Euseb. Fraep. Ev. i. 10. 13 ff.),
smd XpoVos ay77paTos (Damasc. Princ. 123, p. 381 f . ed. Kopp).
^ Cf. Hdt. ni. 8 (the Arabs, ^hen a solemc oath is :«eiiig conduded, &mejir
ieven stones with blood drawn from the hands of the contracting parties).
216 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxii. i
Beer-sheba was (practically) the southernmost city of Judah (comp. the
expression 'from Dan even to Beer-sheba'), some 50 m. SSW. of Jerusalem,
and 28 m. SW. of Hebron. It was an ancient sanctuary^, hallowed by
associations with the patriarchs (see not only the present passage but also xxii.
19, xxvi. 23 — 25, 31 — 33, xxviii. 10, xlvi. 1 — 5) ; it is mentioned as an important
place in 1 S. viii. 2 ; and in the 8th cent. B.c. was a popular resort of pilgrims
(though the worship there was discountenanced by the prophets), Am, v. 5,
viii. 14. No doubt, situated as it was at the edge of the desert, Beer-sheba
owed its importance to its wells, five of which still remain (four being in
actual use), and two more are clearly traceable, though at present stopped up*.
Chapter XXII.
The sacrifice of Isaac. A list of tribes descended from Nahor.
Verses 1 — 19 of this chapter describe the supreme trial of Abraham's faith.
' The patriarch's only son is now grown into a lad, when he receives the command
to offer him to God in sacrifice. Obedient and devoted, he makes the necessary
preparations, and betakes himself to the appointed place of sacrifice, resolved
to satisfy even this extreme demand. His hand is even raised to slay his son
when he hears the Divine voice, clear and distinct, saying that God does not
desire the completion of the sacrifice, but is satisfied with the proved willingness
of the patriarch to surrender even his dearest to Him. The animal which is
to be substituted in his son's place stands there ready by Divine Providence,
and is offered in his stead. The reward for his perfected obedience is a solemn
renewal of all the Divine promises hitherto given him. Thus (1) Abraham's
faith is triumphantly established in the face of the most severe test of all ;
(2) his son is a second time granted to his faith, and reserved to become the
foundation of the future people of God ; (3) above all, in contradistinction to
Canaanite practice, the knowledge that God does not demand human sacrifices
is acquired and secured for all time to come' (Dillm.). The narrative is told
simply, but with singular pathos and dignity. Verses 1 — 13, 19 belong to B
(notice 'God,' not 'Jehovah') : vv. 14 — 18 are probably an addition due to
the compiler of JB : vv. 20 — 24 belong to J.
XXII. 1 And it came to pass after these things, that God E
did prove Abraham, and said unto him, Abraham ; and he said,
XXII. 1. after these things. Cf. on xv. 1.
did prove. I.e. put to the test, to ascertain whether, even under
this severe trial, Abraham would still obey God. See, in illustration
1 W. K. Smith {Rel. Sem. 165 f., " 181 f.) adduces examples shewing that among
the Semites a special sanctity attached to groups of seven wells.
* The latest and most complete account of the wells of Beer-sheba (with a map
and photographs) will be found in an article by G. L. Robinson in the Biblical
World (Chicago), April, 1901, p. 247 ft. (see an abstract in the writer's Joel and
Aviot, ed. 1901, p. 239 f.). Three of the wells have only been reopened since 1897
hence writers before that date (e.g. Couder, TW. 247) spoke only of two wells as
containing water. (There may be more wells than seven at Beer-sheba.)
XXII. 1, 2] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 217
Here am I. 2 And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son, e
whom thou lovest, even Isaac, and get thee into the laud of
Moriah ; and offer him there for a burnt offering uijon one of
of the meaning of the word, Ex, xvi. 4 ; Dt. viii. 2, xiii. 3 ; Jud. ii. 22,
iii. 4. Lxx. irreipa^ev, as Heb. xi. 17 TTcipa^o/Acvos (EVV. ' tried ')\
said. As may be inferred from v. 3 (cf. on xxi. 12, and xx. 3), in
a dream, or vision of the night.
2. thy son, thine only son &c. 'The severity of the demand is
indicated by the emphatic accumulation of the three accusatives.
Thine only son, who alone remains to Abraham after the dismissal of
Ishmael (xxi. 14 £f.). and has the whole of his father's love' (Di.).
the land of Moriah. An otherwise unknown region. It is true the
author of u 14 in all probability placed the sacrifice of Isaac on the
Temple-hill, and in 2 Ch. iii. 1 (the only other place where ' Moriah '
occurs) the ' mountain of Moriah ' denotes evidently the same spot ;
but these facts do not determine the meaning of the ' lavd of Moriah '
in the present verse. The * land of Moriah ' is the name of the region
into which Abraham is to go ; and he is to offer Isaac on ' one of the
mountains ' in it : it is not even suggested that it was a central or
important mountain, from which, for instance, the entire region might
have obtained its name. But what the limits of this region are, we do
not know. It is remarkable that, though it seems to be spoken of here
as if it were some well-known district, it is not mentioned elsewhere in
the OT. It is possible that the original text had some different name.
Pesh. reads ' of the Amorites,^ cf xv. 16, xlviii. 22, al, which DiUm. is
inclined to adopt: if this reading be correct, 2 Oh. iii. 1 must have
been based upon this passage after the text had become corrupt \
^ AV. has here tempt, on which, as the passage in this form is still a familiar
one, a few words of explanation may not be out of place. 'Tempt' in Old Engl.,
like the Lat. tentare, was a neutral word, meaning (like the Heb. nissdh) to test or
prove a person, to see whether he would act in a particular way, or whether the
character which he bore was well established; in modern English, it has come to
mean to entice a person in order to do a particular thing, especially something that
is wrong or sinful. God 'tests' or 'proves' man, when He subjects him to a trial
to ascertain whether his faith or goodness is real; man is said to 'test' or 'prove'
God, when he acts as if doubting whether His word or promise is true. AV., in the
former application, uses always prove, except in this passage, which (on account of
the change in the meaning of tempt) is rightly in RV. altered to prove: in the
latter application, it uses always tempt (Ex. xvii. 2, 7; Nu. xiv. 22; Dt. vi. 16;
Is. vii. 12 ; Mai. iii. 15 ; Ps. Ixxviii. 18, 41, 56, xcv. 9, cvi. 14), which does not at all
express to modern readers the meaning of the Heb., and would have been far better
altered in RV. to 'put to the test (or proof).' So temptation(s) in Dt. iv. 34, vii. 19,
xxix. 3, Ps. xcv. 8 RVm., means really j3roi;tn£r(«). In the NT. also there are many
passages in which Tretpafeic would be rendered far more clearly and intelligibly by
yrove or try than by tempt; see the note of the American Revisers at the end of
BV. of the NT., ' Classes of Passages,' vi.
* The meaning of 'Moriah' is obscure: but it certainly cannot mean, what it has
sometimes been supposed to mean, either 'shewn of Jah' (njX"ip) or 'vision of
Jah' (n^N")P) : neither of these forms could ever pass into nn'lJD. See, further, on
Moriah (including the renderings of the Aac. Versions), the writer's art. in DB.
218 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxii. 2-9
the mountains which I will tell thee of. 3 And Abraham rose E
early in the morning, and saddled his ass, and took two of his
young men with him, and Isaac his son ; and he clave the wood
for the burnt offering, and rose up, and went unto the place of
which God had told him. 4 On the third day Abraham lifted
up his eyes, and saw the place afar off. 5 And Abraham said
unto his young men, Abide ye here with the ass, and I and the
lad will go yonder ; and we will worship, and come again to you.
6 And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering, and laid it
upon Isaac his son ; and he took in his hand the fire and the
knife ; and they went both of them together. 7 And Isaac
spake unto Abraham his father, and said, My father : and he
said, Here am I, my son. And he said. Behold, the fire and the
wood : but where is the lamb for a burnt offering ? 8 And
Abraham said, God will ^provide himself the lamb for a burnt
offering, my son : so they went both of them together. 9 And
they came to the place which God had told him of; and Abraham
^ Heb. see for himself.
3. Abraham forthwith obeys, and makes his preparations accord-
ingly. (Cf. Wisd. X. 5.) With the reserve and self-control, charac-
teristic generally of the Biblical writers, the narrator leaves the reader
to picture for himself the mental agony which such a terrible command
must have produced in the patriarch's breast, the rude blow to his
natural affections, the dismay at the prospect of losing a son upon
whom all his hopes and aspirations for the future were centred, and the
many anxious questionings to which the conflict of motives must, under
such circumstances, have inevitably given rise. On the question why
Abraham did not at once revolt at the thought of executing the
command, see the remarks on p. 221 f.
5. come again. Come back : see on xxiv. 5 ; and cf xiv. 16.
6. ajid they went both of them together. Abraham, it seems to be
implied, walking silently, and full of sorrow.
7. 8. 'The patriarch is beautifully depicted as maintaining his
composure, unmoved by the question so innocently put by the un-
suspecting boy, his only and dearly loved son. His obedience to God
triumphs over the natural feeling of the father. The expressions my
father, my son, bring this out ' (Knob.).
8. provide himself Heb. see (i.e. bok out) for himself: the idiom,
as 1 S. xvi. 1, 17. The words used are ambiguous; and while not
betraying to Isaac what it would be distressing for him to hear, leave
room for the silent hope that after all he may be spared.
so they went both of them together. The clause is pathetically
repeated from v. 6.
XXII. 9-15] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 219
built the altar there, and laid the wood in order, and bound E
Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar, upon the wood.
10 And Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to
slay his son. 11 And the angel of the Lord called unto him out
of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham : and he said. Here am I.
12 And he said. Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do
thou any thing unto him : for now I know that thou fearest
God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from
me. 13 And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and
^behold, behind him a ram caught in the thicket by his horns :
and Abraham went and took the ram, and oflfered him up for a
burnt offering in the stead of his son. 14 And Abraham called
the name of that place ^Jehovah-jireh : as it is said to this day,
In the mount of the Lord ^it shall be provided. | 15 And the R
^ Or, according to many ancient authorities, behold a (Heb. one) ram caught
^ That is. The Lord will see, or, provide. ' Or, he shall be seen
9. bound. The word ('dkad) is found only here in the OT. : in
post-Bibl. Heb. it means specially to bind the bent fore- and hind-legs
of an animal for sacrifice.
12. for now I know &c. Abraham has now shewn his willingness
even to sacrifice his son : more God does not require : so his baud is
now stayed.
13. Tbe text and marg. difier only as between "i and i, two letters,
which in all phases of the Heb. alphabet are liable to be confused, and
are constantly confused in the ancient versions. The difference in the
general sense is inappreciable. The Mass. text, Symm. and Vulg. have
behind (nnx) ; many Heb. MSS., Sam., Lxx., Targg., Posh., Jubilees
xviii. 12, have one (inx), i.e. a (see 1 K. xix. 4 Heb.).
14. Jehovah-jireh (properly, Yahweh-yir'eh). 'Jehovah seeth','
i.e. (cf Ex. iii. 7 ; Ps. xxxv. 22, &c. ; and on xvi. 13) sees the needs of
His servants, and relieves them accordingly ; but with an allusion, no
doubt, at the same time to the sense which the verb has in v. 8, ' God
will see for himself the lamb for a burnt-offering.'
as it is said to this day, In the mount of Jehovah he is seen^ (or,
it is provided^). The tense of 'is said' shews that the reference is
to something said habitually (cf x. 9) ; so that, as the ' mount of
Jehovah ' is the Temple-hill (Is. ii. 3, xxx. 29 ; Ps. xxiv. 3), the clause
must preserve some proverb that was in general use in connexion with
the Temple. The proverb is, however, expressed ambiguously ; nor
does it correspond, as it might be expected to do, with the name to
which it is attached, the verb in the one case being active and in the
^ The tense (as in 'is said') expressing what is habitual. The futures of AV.,
RV. are misleading, as often (e.g. Is. xxxii. 6, 8 ; Jer. iii. 1, viii. 4, xiii, 12).
220 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxii. 15-18
angel of the Lord called unto Abraham a second time out of iZ
heaven, 16 and said, By myself have I sworn, saith the Lord,
because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thy
son, thine only son : 17 that in blessing I will bless thee, and in
multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven,
and as the sand which is upon the sea shore ; and thy seed shall
possess the gate of his enemies ; 18 and in thy seed shall all the
nations of the earth ^be blessed ; because thou hast obeyed my
^ Or, bless themselves
other passive. If, however, the text is correctly pointed, there must, it
seems, be a play on the double application of the word : Jehovah
' sees ' the needs of those who come to worship Him in Zion, and then
' is seen,' i.e. reveals Himself to them b)' answering their prayers, and
bestowing upon them the blessings of His providence and aid : His
'seeing,' in other words, takes practical effect in a ' being seen'.'
15 — 18. Appendix. Abraham's faith having thus been signally
confirmed, occasion is taken for a solemn repetition and ratification of
previous promises.
16. B;y myself have I sworn. So only Is. xlv. 23 ; Jer. xxii. 5,
xlix. 13 : cf Ex. xxxii. 13 ('by thyself &c.,' with allusion to the present
passage) ; Heb. vi. 13 f. Comp. the oath, ' As I live ' (in Jehovah's
mouth), Nu. xiv. 28 (P) ; Jer. xxii. 24, xlvi. 18 ; Zeph. ii. 9 ; Is. xlix.
18 ; and often in Ezek.
saith the Lord. ('Ti?) Jehovah's whisper ! — a solemn assevera-
tive interjection, used constantly by the prophets, but rare in the
hist, books : Nu. xiv. 28 (P) ; 1 S. ii. 30 ; 2 K. ix. 26, xix. 33
(= Is. xxxvii, 34), xxii. 19 (= 2 Ch. xxxiv. 27). The root in Arabic
signifies to utter a low sound : and hence the Heb. expression probably
denoted properly a whispered or muttered utterance, of a revelation
heard quietly by the mental ear.
17. I will bless thee &c. Cf. xii. 2.^
as the stars of the heaven. So xxvi. 4 ; Ex. xxxii. 13 ; Dt. i. 10,
X. 22, xxviii. 62 ; cf. ch. xv. 5.
as the sand &c. So Josh. xi. 4 ; Jud. vii. 12 ; 1 S. xiii. 5 ; 1 K.
iv. 29 ; and nearly so, 2 S. xvii. 11. 1 K. iv. 20 (of Israel). Cf. as the
sand of the sea, of Jacob's seed, ch. xxxii. 12 ; of Israel, Hos. i. 10, Is.
X. 22 (cf xlviii. 19) : otherwise ch, xli. 49.
shall possess &c. Fig. for, shaU conquer and take possession of their
cities.
18. a7id by thy seed shall all the nations of the earth bless them-
selves. I.e. in wishing blessings for themselves, will use the names of
1 The proverb, if it stood by itself, would be most naturally rendered ' In the
mount of Jehovah one appeareth ( = mera appear),' viz. at the annual pilgrimages
and other occasions tor worship ('appear,' as Ex. xxiii. 17; Ps. xlii. 2, Ixxxiv. 7);
but if this be its actual meaning, it cannot be rightly brought into oonnenon with
the name ' Jehovah seeth.' See farther DB. b.t. Jehovae-jibeh.
XXII. i8, 19] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 221'
voice. I 19 So Abraham returned unto his young men, and they R E
rose up and went together to Beer-sheba ; and Abraham dwelt
at Beer-sheba.
Abraham's descendants as iy^Q^ of blessedness (see on xlviii. 20 ; and
cf. Ruth iv. 11, 12). So xxvi. 4. Whatever may be the case with the
form used in xii. 3 (see the note), xviii. 18, and xxviii. 14, the form
used here and xxvi. 4 is certainly reflexive : see Dt. xxix. 19 (where it
has the force oi congratulate oneself) ; Jer. iv. 2 (read by for in) ; Is. Ixv.
16 ; Ps. Ixxii. 17 (RVm., and hy for in). Lxx. render inexactly by the
passive, which is followed in the quotation. Acts iii. 25.
obeyed. Hearkened to, — as the same Heb. is often rendered, both
more exactly and also more expressively (e.g. Dt. xi. 13).
19 (E). to Beer-sheba. See xxi. 31 (E), 33 (J).
The Sacrifice of Isaac.
In order to understand rightly the nature and significance of Abraham's
act, we must bear in mind the conditions of the age in which he Uved. The
custom of human sacrifice was widely spread in the ancient world, as it is still
among savage or half-civilized tribes, the idea lying at the bottom of it being
that the surrender of something of the highest value, — and so especially of a
relative, or a child, — to the deity, would have extraordinary eflacacy in averting
his anger, or gaining his help. The custom was thus practised among the
Phoenicians and other neighbours of Israel (cf. 2 K. iii. 27, xvii. 31) : the
Carthaginians, Greek writers tell us, in times of grave national danger or
calamity, would sacrifice by the hundred the childi'enof their noblest families.
Under the later kings, especially Ahaz and Manasseh, the custom found its way
into Judah (comp. 2 K. xvi. 3, xxi. 6, xxiii. 10 ; Jer. vii. 31, xix. 5 ; Ez. xvi. 20,
21, xxiii. 37; Is. Ivii. 5), in spite of its being strenuously forbidden by legislators
(Dt. xii. 31, xviii. 10 ; Lev. xviii. 21, xx. 25), and condemned by prophets (see
especially Mic. vi. 7 f.). In view of this prevalence of the practice among
Israel's neighbours it is quite possible that Jehovah's claim to the first-bom in
Israel (Ex. xxii. 29, xiii. 12 — 16, al.) stands in some relation to it ; Jehovah ,
took the first-born, but gave it back to its parents upon payment of a redemp-
tion-priced
The facts which have been mentioned explain how Abraham was able to
recognize a command to sacrifice his son, as Divine. JVe could not so regard
such a command : an alleged command of God to sacrifice a child could not be
accepted as such ; and if it were acted upon, the action would be condemned as
a violation of conscience by the whole Christian Church : there had been, it
would be said, some hallucination or delusion. The reason is that we live in
an age, and under a moral light, in which we could not regard as Divine a
1 The word used in Ex. xiii. 12 ' cause to pass over ' is the same as that used in
the phrase 'cause to pass through' the fire to Moleeh, Dt. xviii. 10, Jer. xxxii.
35, al. Bones of infants, which had been presumably sacrificed, buried in jars,
have been found at Gezer, Taanach, and Megiddo : see the writer's ' Schweich
Lectures ' (1908) on Modern Research and the Bible, pp. 68 f., 82, 84 ; Cook, Religion
ofAnc. Pal. (1908), p. 86 f.
222 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
command to violate uot only our sense of what was morally right, but even our
natural instincts of love and affection. It was possible for Abraham so to
regard it, because he lived under the mental and moral conditions of an age
very different from ours. He lived not only in an age when such sacrifices
were common, but also in an age in which the rights of the individual were
much less clearly recognized than they are now, when it was still a common
thing for instance (cf. on xx. 7) for the family of a criminal to be punished with
him, and when also a father's power over his son was far more absolute than it
is now. The command would not therefore shock the moral standard to which
Abraham was accustomed, as it would shock ours. It would not be out of
harmony with what he might suppose could be reasonably demanded by God.
But, secondly, the sacrifice, though commanded, was not exacted. Abraham's
hand was stayed, before the fatal act was completed This shewed, once for
all, clearly and unmistakably, that in contrast to what was imagined of the
heathen deities worshipped by Israel's neighbours, the God of Israel did not
demand human sacrifices of his worshippers. He demanded in reality only the
surrender of Abraham's will. Abraham, by his obedience, demonstrated his
readiness to part vrith what was dearest to him, and with something moreover
on which all his hopes for the future depended : thus his character was
' proved,' the sincerity of his religion was established, and his devotion to God
confirmed and strengthened. It was the supreme trial of his faith; and it
triumphed. And so the narrative teaches two great lessons. On the one
hand, it teaches the value set by God upon the surrender of self, and obedience;
on the other, it demonstrates, by a signal example, the moral superiority of
Jehovah's religion above the religions of Israel's neighbours^
In the NT. comp. Heb. xi. 17 — 19 (where the offering of Isaac is referred
to as the crowning example of Abraham's faith) ; and Jas. ii. 21 f. (where
Abraham's act is quoted against the perversion of the doctrine of justification
by faith). Notice also that the Christian Church has constantly treated this
scene as typical of the Father's willingness to sacrifice the Son (cf the Good
Friday Lesson) ; and though this api)lication is not explicitly made in the
NT., yet v. 8 may be alluded to in John i. 29 (see Westcott's note), and the
incident itself in Rom. viii. 32 (cf. e<^ei'<ra) in Gen. xxii. IC lxx.).
The later Jews, it may be added, attributed peculiar merit to the sacrifice, —
or, as they called it, the ' binding,'— of Isaac (P^T. ^IPV.), saying, for instance,
that when every morning and evening the lamb was offered in the Temple as a
burnt-offering, God 'remembered the binding of Isaac' See, further, DB.
s.v. Isaac ; Levy, Neuhehr. Worterb. iii, 683.
20 — 24. The NaJ},oridae. Naljor, in xi. 27 the brother of Abraham, appears
here as the unit from which were derived bj the Hebrew genealogists whose
system J here follows, a group of twelve Aramaean tribes resident on the E.
or NE. of Canaan, just as 'other groups of tribes were derived, as we shall see,
from Abraham's second wife, ICeturah (xxv. 1 — 4), or from Ishmael (xxv. 12 — 16).
Nahor's home was Haran (see p. 233) ; so this is the centre from which
1 See further, on the subject of the preceding paragraphs, Mozley's Ruling
Ideas oj Early Ages and their relation to OT. faith, Lectures ii. and ui.
XXII. 2o-n] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 223
these tribes are regarded as having been diflFused. Whether or not Nahor
was an historical person, must remain an open question ; his relationship to
Abraham, whether real or assumed, served in either case as a measure of the
degree of relationship which was held to subsist between the tribes referred to
him and the descendants of Abraham. If the name be not that of an individual,
it will naturally be that of a lost tribe, resident once about Haran, of which the
* sons ' of Nahor were regarded as offshoots, and of which recollections were
preserved by the Hebrews (cf. Ewald, Hist. L 268 £, 310 f.). Eight of the
twelve tribes are referred to Nahor through a wife, Milcah, and four through a
concubine, Re'umah,
20 And it came to pass after these things, that it was told J
Abraham, saying. Behold, Milcah, she also hath borne children
unto thy brother Nahor; 21 Uz his firstborn, and Buz his
brother, and Kemuel the father of Aram ; 22 and Chesed, and
Hazo, and Pildash, and Jidlaph, and BethueL 23 And Bethuel
begat Rebekah : these eight did Milcah bare to Nahor, Abraham's
brother. 24 And his concubine, whose name was Reumah, she
also bare Tebah, and Gaham, and Tahash, and Maacah.
20. Milcah. According to xi. 27 (P), 29 (J), Nahor's niece.
If Nahor be really a tribal name, this marriage with his ' niece ' will
represent the amalgamation of two kindred tribes.
21. ' Uz. In X. 23 (P) described as a ' son ' of Aram. A tribe
settled probably in the S. part of the Syrian desert, not far NE. of
Edom. See Job i. 1 ; Jer. xxv. 20 ; Lam. iv. 21 ; and cf xxxvi. 28.
Buz. Also near Edom. Mentioned in Jer. xxv. 23 by the side of
Dedan (x. 7) and Tema (xxv. 15). Elihu, Job's fourth friend, was
a Buzite (Job xxxii. 2). Buz and Ha,zo {v. 22) are possibly the
countries of Bdzii and Hazu (the former described as fuU of snakes
and scorpions), which Esar-haddon invaded {KB. n. 131).
Kemuel. Otherwise unknown.
Aram. In x. 22 (P) Aram, i.e. probably (see the note) the Syrians
of Damascus, is a ' son ' of Shem : it is strange to find him here
subordinated to the unknown Kemuel. There are, however, many
indications (cf on x. 7, 22, 23) that both the Aramaean and Arabian
tribes known to the Hebrews were represented in different genealogical
systems as differently related to one another.
22. Chesed. Generally supposed to be the eponymous ancestor
of the Casdim (see on xi. 31). The change of form would be in
agreement with the rules of the Massoretic vocalization; but we
hardly expect to find a tribe belonging to the extreme S. of Babylonia
grouped with Aramaic tribes centred at Haran.
Hazo. See on ^?. 21. Pildash and Yidlaph are unknown.
Bethiiel appears in xxiv. 15, &c. as an historical personage.
24. Four tribes referred to Nahor through a 'concubine,' i.e. less
directly connected with the main group (cf xxv. I — 4).
224 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxiii. ., *
Tebak No doubt the Tebah (so read with Pesh.) of 2 S. viii. 8,
and the Tihhath (Pesh. Tehak) of the || 1 Ch. xviii. 8, one of the cities
of Hadad'ezer, king of Aram-zobah. Gaham and Tahash are un-
known. Ma'acah is the people of this name, dwelling S. of Hermon,
and E. of the Sea of Gennesareth, who are often mentioned, Dt. iii. 14 ;
Josh. xiii. 11, 13 ; 2 S. x. 6, 8, al.
Chapter XXIII.
Hie death of Sarah. Abraham's purchase of the cave of
Machpelah at Hehron.
This narrative describes how a permanent possession was acquired by
Abraham in Canaan. The people of Hebron shew him the highest respect :
they listen to his proposal with the utmost friendliness ; and after the exchange
of preliminary courtesies, such as are still usual upon similar occasions in the
East, the land tendered is accepted, and paid for by him openly in the presence
of all the citizens of Hebron : it is thus publicly certified that Abraham is its
lawful owner and possessor. The narrative belongs entirely to P, whose style
it exhibits throughout, not only in particular phrases and expressions, but also
in the circumstantial description of the transaction, and of the legal formalities
accompanying it. The detail with which the narrative is told (cf. ch. xvii.)
is on account of the importance attached by the author to this hallowed
patriarchal possession in Canaan.
XXIII. 1 And the life of Sarah was an hundred and seven P
and twenty years : these were the years of the life of Sarah.
2 And Sarah died in Kiriath-arba (the same is Hebron), in the
land of Canaan : and Abraham came to mourn for Sarah, and to
XXIII. 1, 2. Death of Sarah.
2. Kiriath-arha' . I.e. the ' City of four' (notice the article in
XXXV. 27, Neh. xi. 25), or the Tetrapolis, — formed, for instance, by
the settlement of four kindred or confederate tribes : in P used regularly
for 'Hebron' (xxxv. 27; Jos. xv. 13, 54, xx. 7, xxi. 11 : so Neh. xi. 25),
and said in Jos. xiv. 15 = Jud. i. 10 (JE) to have been its older name.
But the name was misunderstood, as if it signified the ' City of Arba" ;
and so 'Arba" became (Jos. xv. 13, xxi. 11, cf xiv. 15) the 'father^'
of the 'Anakim, the giants whom, as tradition told, Caleb had driven
out of Hebron
to mourn. To wail, with loud demonstrations of grief, in the
Eastern fashion (see the writer's Joel and Amos, pp. 183, 233 f ; and
cf Lane, Mod. Egyptian^, ii. 252). This is the meaning of the Heb.
word: see esp. Mic. i. 8; and cf 2 S. i. 12, iii. 31; 1 K. xiii. 30; Zech.
1 See, however, txx. of the three passages quoted {DB. b.v. Kiriath-Arba\ Moore,
Judges, p. 35),
XXIII. a-7] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 225
weep for her. 3 And Abraham rose up from before his dead, P
and spake unto the childi-en of Heth, saying, 4 I am a stranger
and a sojourner with you : give me a possession of a burying-
place with you, that I may bury my dead out of my sight
5 And the children of Heth answered Abraham, saying unto him,
6 Hear us, my lord : thou art ^a mighty prince among us : in
the choice of our sepulchres bury thy dead ; none of us shall
withhold from thee his sepulchre, but that thou mayest bury thy
dead. 7 And Abraham rose up, and bowed himself to the people
^ Heb. a prince of God.
xii. 11, 12 (EVT. in all, except Mic. i. 8, inadequately, 'mourn*); Jer.
iv. 8, xxii. 18 (EVV. 'lament').
3, 4. Abraham's request.
3. rose up. From sitting, or Ijang, on the ground, the posture
of a mourner, 2 S. xii. 16 (cf. v. 20 'arose from the earth'), xiii. 31;
Is. iii. 26 ; Lam. ii. 10.
spake &c. As appears from v. 10, in the 'gate' of the city, where
legal and other business was often transacted (cf. on xix. 1).
the children of Heth. I.e. the Hittites (cf. on x. 15). The ex-
pression is rne peculiar to P {vv. 5, 7, 10, 16, 18, 20, xxv. 10, xlix.
32, — always of the inhabitants of Hebron: cf. the 'daughters of
Heth' in xxvii. 46). On the difficulties arising out of the mention
of ' Hittites ' in Hebron, see p. 229.
4. stranger. The word (ger) explained on xv. 13. The combi-
nation, strayiger and sojourner, — or, better, sojourner and settler, —
recurs Lev. xxv. 35, 47, Nu. xxxv. 15, and, applied tiguratively, to
denote one having a precarious tenure and position, Lev. xxv. 23, Ps.
XXxix. 12, 1 Ch. xxix. 15, 1 P. ii. 11 (TrapoiKoi koI irapiTrih]fxot, aS LXX.
here and Ps. xxxix. 12).
give me &c. As a temporary settler, Abraham has no landed
possession in Canaan : he therefore asks, as a favour, to be allowed
a site for a family sepulchre, such as all families of distinction possessed
in the East.
6, 6. 'Compliments pass, in oriental style. Abraham is made
welcome, as a great man, to choose any of their sepulchres ; a gracious,
though perhaps only a formal courtesy', which Abraham acknowledges
(«. 7), hke an Arab, by bowing low' (Geikie, Hours with the Bible, i. 365).
6. a mighty pirince. Heb. a prince of God, i.e. a prince worthy
to belong to God, mighty or noble. Comp. analogous expressions in
Ps. xxxvi. 6, Ixviii. 15 (RV.), Lxxx. 10, civ, 16; Nu. xxiv. 6 ; 1 Ch. xii.
22 ('hke a camp of God ') : and cf. on x. 9, and xxxv. 5.
7 — 9. Abraham acknowledges the offer courteously, though he
will not take advantage of it, and indeed knows that he is not intended
^ It was not usual to allow strangers to be interred in a family burial-place (see
the footnote on p. 227).
D. 15
226 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxiii. 7-13
of the land, even to the children of Heth. 8 And he communed P
with them, saying. If it be your mind that I should bury my
dead out of my sight, hear me, and intreat for me to Ephron the
son of Zohar, 9 that he may give me the cave of Machpelah,
which he hath, which is in the end of his field ; for the full price
let him give it to me in the midst of you for a possession of a
buryingplace. 10 Now Ephron was sitting in the midst of the
children of Heth : and Ephron the Hittite answered Abraham in
the audience of the children of Heth, even of all that went in at
the gate of his city, saying, 11 Nay, my lord, hear me : the field
give I thee, and the cave that is therein, I give it thee ; in the
presence of the sons of my people give I it thee : bury thy dead.
12 And Abraham bowed himself down before the people of the
land. 13 And he spake unto Ephron in the audience of the
people of the land, saying, But if thou wilt, I pray thee, hear
to do so. He begs only their good offices with Ephron, the cave in
whose field he desires to buy at its full value.
8. communed. Spake, — the word beiug the ordinary Heb. word
for 'speak.' Cf. on xviii. 33.
9. the cave. Caves are numerous in Palestine; and were much
used as burial-places (cf. John xi. 38). See DB. s.v. Sepulchre.
Machpelah. Not the name of the cave, but, as vv. 17, 19 shew,
the name of the district in which the field containing the cave was.
The common interpretation of Machpelah as meaning the 'double
place,' with reference to a supposed 'double cave,' is thus extremely
questionable (so aheady Grove in Smith's DB. s.v.). Machpelah is
not otherwise mentioned, except in passages of P referring back to the
present occasion, xxv. 9, xlix. 30, 1. 13.
10. 11. Ephron was present, and heard Abraham's request; so
he immediately offered him the cave and field as a gift. This again
is a mere piece of politeness, not intended to be accepted. Cf. 2 S.
xxiv. 22 f.'
10. in the audience. Lit. in the ears; and so always rendered
(e.g. 1. 4, 2 K. xxiii. 2), except here, vv. 13, 16; Ex. xxiv. 7; 1 S. xxv.
24 (AV.); 1 Ch. xxviii. 8; Neh. xiii. 1.
tliat went in &c. Those who 'go in' or (xxxiv. 24) 'go out' at the
city gate are the citizens, who have the right of entrance to the com-
munal assembly.
12, 13. Abraham declares that he desires to purchase the field.
12. As before, v. 7.
* 'An Ai-ab gives his house, field, horse, to-day, as in Abraham's time, to an
intending buyer, and appeals to witnesses that he does so. But it is none the less
known that this is only a form to help iiim to raise the price in the end' (Geikie,
l.c. p. 365. Similarly Lane, Mod. Eg. n. 13 L).
xxiii. 13-18] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 227
me : I will give the price of the field ; take it of me, and I will P
bury my dead there. 14 And Ephron answered Abraham,
saying unto him, 15 My lord, hearken unto me : a piece of land
worth four hundred shekels of silver, what is that betwixt me
and thee? bury therefore thy dead. 16 And Abraham hearkened
unto Ephron ; and Abraham weighed to Ephron the silver,
which he had named in the audience of the children of Heth,
four hundred shekels of silver, currer.t money with the merchant.
17 So the field of Ephron, which was in Machpelah, which was
before Mamre, the field, and the cave which was therein, and all
the trees that were in the field, that were in all the border
thereof round about, were made sure 18 unto Abraham for a
14, 15. Ephron yields the point: a piece of land worth 400 shekels
of silver, what is that betwixt me and thee ? what can a sum like that
signify between men in our position ? In this way he politely indicates
the price. A shekel of silver was worth probably about 2s. dd. (A. R. S.
Kennedy, art. Money, in DB. p. 420), so that 400 shekels would equal
£55 of our money, though its purchasing power, it must be re-
membered, would no doubt be a good deal greater (ibid. § 11).
16 — 18. Abraham pays the price asked in tne presence of the
citizens of Hebron as witnesses, and the field is legally assured to him
as his property.
16. weighed. Up to at least the time of the return from the
Exile, the Hebrews had no coined money; but the precious metals
circulated in the form of ingots of known weight, which u];on occasion
of any commercial transaction were regularly 'weighed' as a security
against fraud. Comp. the same word in 1 K. xx. 39 (EVV. pay) ; Jer.
xxxii. 9, 10; Is. Iv. 2; Zech. xi. 12; Est. iii. 9.
current money with. Lit. passing over to, i.e. (as the Targ. of Ps.-
Jon. explains it), 'good silver, passing at every (banker's) table, and
receivable in all transactions' (DB. l.c.). Cf. 2 K. xii. 4.
17. The situation and contents of the field are here defined more
precisely.
in front of Mamre. I.e., presumably, on the E. of Mamre: cf.
on xiii. 18.
and all the trees &c. In the Ass. and Bab. contract-tablets, the
number of trees sold with a piece of ground, esp. date-palms, is
generally specified, KB. iv. 101 (747 B.C.), 161, 165 (721 B.C.). Comp.
also the specification of the houses, gardens, wells, &c., appertaining
to a family sepulchre, in the Nabataean inscription, of the 1st cent, a.d.,
cited in Hogarth's Authoriti/ and Archaeology, p. 135'.
^ The Nabataean inscriptions illustrate also the jealousy with which family
sepulchres were guarded, and the fines and solemn imprecations held out over those
who allowed unauthorized persons to be buried in them.
15—2
228 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxiii. is-w
possession in the presence of the children of Heth, before all P
that went in at the gate of his city. 19 And after this, Abraham
buried Sarah his wife in the cave of the field of Machpelah
before Mamre (the same is Hebron), in the land of Canaan.
20 And the field, and the cave that is therein, were made sure
unto Abraham for a possession of a buryingplace by the children
of Heth.
18. in the presence of &c. As witnesses : cf. Jer. xxxii. 12 ; Ruth
iv. 9—11.
19. Burial of Sarah in the cave thus acquired.
20. Repetition (in P's style: cf. on xvii. 22 — 27) of the substance
of vo. 17, 18, in a condensed form.
T?ie Cave of Machpelah. The traditional site of this cave, on the NB. edge
of the modern El-HalU (see on xiii. 18), is now surmounted by a mosque,
70 ft. long (from NW. to SE.) and 93 ft. broad, which occupies the SE. part
of a court 181 ft. long by 93 ft. broad, called the Haram ('prohibited,' i.e.
sacred, 'place'), and enclosed by massive walls 8 ft. thick and 40ft. high. The
Haram is most jealously guarded by the Moslems, and has never in modern
times been entered by Christians except on rare occasions by distinguished
strangers, for instance in 1862 by the (then) Prince of Wales, accompanied
by Dean Stanley and other members of his suite, and in 1881 by the Princes
Albert Victor and George, Canon Dalton, Sir Charles Wilson, and Capt. [now
Col.] Conder. Dean Stanley's account may be read in his Jewish Church, L
App. 2 : and the report drawn up by Col. Conder after his visit in 1881 is given
in PEFM., m. 333 — 346 : see also, more briefly, DB. 8.v. Machpelah (all with
plans). The following is all that we have space to mention here. The Haram-
enclosure contains six large cenotaphs, equidistantly disposed along tlie length
of the enclosure, and supposed by the Moslems to stand vertically above the
actual graves of the three patriarchs and their wives, each enclosed in a separate
chapel, guarded by doors inlaid with brass-work, and covered with richly
embroidered silk hangings. The cenotaphs of Isaac and Rebekah are in the
mosque itself, those of Abraham and Sarah in the porch on the NW. of it, in
the middle of the Haram, and those of Jacob and Leah in two separate
chambers at the NW. end of the Haram. There is also a cenotaph of Joseph
in a building just outside the Haram, on its NW. corner. The cave below has
never been entered in modern times : there are in the floor of the mosque
three entrances said to lead into it, but they could be reached only by break-
ing up the flags of the flooring, a proceeding which the Moslems would regard
as sacrilegious. As regards the date of the Ilaram and its contents, the
massive enclosing walls are considered to belong to the time of Herod ; the
mosque contains large remains of a Christian Church, belonging probably to
the 12Lh cent. A.D.; the cenotaphs and their decorations are of later Arab
workmanship.
On Hie ' Hittites ' in Hebron. The term ' Hittite,* aa has been explained
(on X. 15), is used in the OT. (1) of the great people resident on the N. of
THE HITTITES IN HEBRON 229
Phoenicia and the Lebanon; (2) of a branch of them settled in the extreme N.
of Canaan, under Hermon ; (3) in the lists of nations to be dispossessed by the
Israelites, of a branch, perhaps the same as (2), but possibly (see on xv. 20) a
branch located, or supposed to have been located, elsewhere in Canaan (see
Nu. xiii. 29); (4) in P of the inhabitants of Hebron (see the passages on
xxiii. 3), and of two of Esau's wives (Gen. xxvi. 34, xxvii. 46, xxxvi. 2). This
mention of Hittites at Hebron, in the South of Canaan, is surprising, and
diflScult to explain satisfactorily, {a) It is possible, no doubt, in the abstract,
that there might have been a colony of the N. Hittites there ; but if so, it is
remarkable that there is no hint of its existence elsewhere, e.g. in the accounts
of the conquest of Hebron by the Israelites (Josh. xv. 13 f. ; || Jud. i. 10).
The alleged proof from archaeology of the existence of Hittites in Hebron^
breaks down entirely ; the fact that ' among the prisoners of Ramses II.
(b.o. 1300 — 1234, Petrie), represented on the walls of Karnak, are natives of
Ashkelon, whose features and mode of wearing the hair are Hittite' proves
nothing as to the presence ol Hittites in Hebron 1000 years previously^; while
the argument that because Thothmes III. speaks of the 'greater Hittite land'
(in the North), therefore there must have been a 'lesser Hittite land' at
Hebron in the South, is a very bad piece of reasoning : it is obvious that it may
have lain equally well in any other directioa (6) There are grounds for supposing
that, after the Hittites had ceased to exist as an independent people (c. B.o. 700),
and when they came to be known practically to the Hebrews only by tradition,
the term was generalized, and used vaguely with reference to the pre-Israelite
population of Canaan generally, much as * Canaanite ' and * Amorite ' were
often employed^: it is possible therefore that P, when he speaks of the natives
of Hebron as 'children of Heth,' really means no more than to describe
them as * Canaanites.' In support of this view we may point to Josh. i. 4
(Deuteronomic*), where *all the land of the Hittites' manifestly embraces
the whole of Palestine ; to Ez. xvl. 3, 46, where the prophet, reproaching
Jerusalem for its innate depravity, says that (morally) its father was an
'Amorite,' and its mother a ' Hittite'; and to Gen. xxvii. 46, xxviii. 1, 6, 8 (all
P), where, with reference to Esau's 'Hittite' wives (xxvi. 34), daughters of
Heth ' and ' daughters of Canaan ' are used interchangeably (cf. xxxvi. 2). In
illustration of the vague and general ideas associated with some of these
ethnographic terms it may be observed that the inhabitants of Hebron, who
are called 'Hittites' by P, are called 'Amorites' by B (Josh, x. 6), and
'Canaanites' by J (Jud. i. 10). (c) Jastrow {EncB. 8.v. Hittites) thinks that,
though the Hittites of Hebron were certainly by Hebrew tradition identified
with the Hittites of the North, they were in reahty a different tribe altogether,
who were settled in S. Palestine, and had nothing in common with the
^ Sayoe, Monumentt, 144; EHU. 55 f., and elsewhere.
' Prof. Sayce's date for Ramses II. is (or was) B.C. 1348—1281 ; and for Ham-
murabi (with whom, if he be the Amraphel of Gen. xiv. 1, Abraham will have
been contemporary) b.c. 2376—2333 (more probably, 2130—2088: see p. 156).
2 It is remarkable that the term was generalized similarly by the Assyrians:
Sennacherib, for instance, in the ' land of the Hatti,' includes Phoenicia and
Palestine (EncB. ii. 2098).
* Or perhaps, as the clause is not in the Lxx., a gloss by a late hand : but even
80, it remains as evidence of what was believed at the time when it was introduced.
230 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
N. Hittites but the name. This seems rather a forced solution of the diflBculty.
To the present writer, judging as far as he is able on the basis of present
knowledge, (b) seems the most probable view.
We have no doubt in this chapter a faithful picture of the manner in which
purchases were negotiated, and the transfer of land was legally effected, in the
writer's own time : but evidence that the details of the transaction, as here
narrated, belong essentially to the 'early Babylonian period*,' is entirely
lacking. Obviously, if the narrative is to be shewn by this argument to be
contemporary with the events which it purports to describe, it must contain
expressions which occur only in other documents (whether Hebrew or Baby-
lonian) of the same age, and do not occur subsequently. As a matter of fact,
it contains no such expressions. Of the expressions quoted by Prof. Sayce
in support of his statement, 'elders' does not occur in the chapter at all; the
transaction doubtle>»8 took place at the 'gate' of the city, but this was a
common place for such formalities long aftenvards (Ru. iv. 1, 10, 11; Is. xxiy.
21 ; cf Prov. xxxi. 23) ; ' in the presence of witnesses, occurs constantly not
only in the older Babylonian contract-tablets, but also in those of the age of
Sargon, Sennacherib, and later kings 2, — to say nothing of Jer. xxxii. 12 as well;
the term 'shekel,' and the expression 'to weigh money,' occur repeatedly in
Hebrew writings of the seventh cent, and later (see the note on ». 16); even the
imusual term 'current ' {v. 16] occurs in 2 K. xii. 4 [Heb. 6]. As we know now
from inscriptions more fuUy than we once did, formalities in legal transactions
were usual in the civilized societies of the ancient world, even in remote times ;
but on the date of those described in Gen. xxiii. the evidence of archaeology is
simply neutral ; it does not shew them to be either early or late.
Chapter XXIV.
How Rehehah beccymes Isaac's wife.
The narrative in this chapter is told with singular picturesqueness and
grace, and presents an idyllic picture of simple Eastern life. The confidence
placed by Abraham in his long-tried servant, the preparations for the journey,
the scene by the well outside Haran, the touches of character in Rebekah and
Laban, the negotiations ending in her consenting to go with Abraham's
servant, and her meeting with Isaac, are all depicted with simple, yet perfect,
literary skill, and with the utmost truth to nature and life. Each successive
scene, as it is drawn by the narrator, stands out before the reader in clear and
vivid outline. At the same time, the writer weaves delicately into his narra-
tive a religious motive : he notices, as he goes along, the providence of God, as
over-ruling the chief actors in the transaction {vv. 7^ 12, 14, 27, 48, 50, 61, 66);
the servant whom Abraham sends finds the right spot, meets with the right
damsel, who quickly, though unconsciously, announces herself as his master's
niece ; and both she and her family at once fall in with the tokens of the Divine
will — Verse 36" anticipates xxv. 6 in such a way as to lead Dillm. and others
to suppose that in the original naiTative of J, xxv. 1 — 6, IV' preceded ch. xxiv.
1 Sayce, EHH. p. 61. » See e.g. KB. iv. 109, 111, 113, 115, 117, 119, 121.
XXIV. 1-5] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 231
XXIV. 1 And Abraham was old, and well stricken in J
age : and the Lord had blessed Abraham in all things. 2 And
Abraham said unto his servant, the elder of his house, that
ruled over all that he had. Put, I pray thee, thy hand under my
thigh : 3 and I will make thee swear by the Lord, the God of
heaven and the God of the earth, that thou shalt not take a wife
for my son of the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom
I dwell : 4 but thou shalt go unto my country, and to my
kindred, and take a wife for my son Isaac. 5 And the servant
said unto him, Peradventure the woman will not be willing to
XXIV. 1 — 9. Abraham commissions his principal and confidential
servant to find a wife for his son Isaac, and to find her, not from among
the Canaanites among whom he was dweUing, but from his own rela-
tions in the land of his nativity. As is usual in the East (cf DB. UL
270), the betrothal is arranged without Isaac's own personal inter-
vention.
1. had blessed &c. Hence his desire to find a wife for his son, in
order that Isaac's prospective heir might inherit his good fortune.
2. ths elder of his ho-use, that ruled over all that he had (Ps, cv. 21 ;
cf Gen. xxxLX, 4). The servant highest in authority, or, as we might
say, his steward. Whether he was identical with Eliezer of xv. 2 (E),
is more than we can definitely say.
Put, I pray thee &c. So xlvii. 29. Some specially solemn form of
attesting an oath is evidently intended, though the reason upon which
it rests is uncertain. Sons are elsewhere spoken of as coming cut of
their father's thigh (xlvi. 26 ; Ex. i. 5 : EVV. ' loins,' but the Heb. is
the same as here) ; and hence one view is that it was meant as a
symbolical invocation of a man's descendants to maintain the oath, and
avenge any infraction of it. It is remarkable that in Austraha there is
a similar custom : when natives swear amity to one another, or pledge
themselves to aid one another in avenging a death, both seat them-
selves on the ground, then one rests himself cross-legged upon the
thighs of the other, and places his hands under his thighs ; after
remaining thus a minute or two, he withdraws : not a word has been
spoken, but an inviolate pledge to avenge the death has by this
ceremony passed between the two (Grey, Journals of Expeditions in
NW. and W. Australia, 1841, n. 342, cited by Spurrell).
3. the God of heaven &c. Who knows aU that happens in the
world, and is powerful to avenge a broken oath.
of the Canaanites. Abraham will have no dealings with the
Canaanites : tribal feeling, and religious motives (cf Dt. vii. 3 ; Josh.
xxiii. 12), combine to induce him to find a bride for his son from his
own family.
4. unto my country. I.e. as the sequel shews, Haran (see oa
xi. 31).
232 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxiv. s-io
follow me nnto this land : must I needs bring thy son again J
unto the laud from whence thou camest? 6 And Abraham said
unto him, Beware thou that thou bring not my son thither again.
7 The Lord, the God of heaven, that took me from my father's
house, and from the land of my nativity, and that spake unto
me, and that sware unto me, saying, Unto thy seed will I give
this land ; he shall send his angel before thee, and thou shalt
take a wife for my son from thence. 8 And if the woman be not
willing to follow thee, then thou shalt be clear from this my
oath ; only thou shalt not bring my son thither again. 9 And
the servant put his hand under the thigh of Abraham his master,
and sware to him concerning this matter. 10 And the servant
took ten camels, of the camels of his master, and departed ;
^having all goodly things of his master's in his hand : and he
arose, and went to ^Mesopotamia, unto the city of Nahor.
* Or, for all the, goods of his master were in his hand ' Heb. Aram-naharaim,
that is, Aram of the two rivers.
5. bring thy son again. We should now say, * taJce thy son back*
(viz. to Haran) : similarly tw. 6, 8 (' take not my son hack thither ').
' Again ' is in E W. constantly used (as in Old English generally) where
we should now say hack (comp. e.g. Nu. xvii. 10, AV. and RV.) ; and
the archaism sometimes creates indistinctness and ambiguity.
7. the God of heaven. LXX. adds, and the God of the earth, as
V. 3, — no doubt rightly. * God of heaven ' (alone) is a late, post-exilic
expression (see LOT, p. 519, ed. 7, p. 553).
that took me..., and that spake &c. See xii. 1, 7, xiii. 15, xv. 18.
and from the land of my nativity. I.e. Haran, which (and not Ur)
this narrator pictures as Abraham's native country.
send his angel &c. Cf. Ex. xxiii. 20, 23, xxxiii. 2, Nu. xx. 16.
9. concerning this matter. In accordance with — ht. on (the
basis of) — this word (viz. the instructions just given).
10 — 27. The servant starts on his journey ; and finds all things
happen for him providentially, in accordance with Abraham's desire.
10. having &c. Viz. as presents, for the bride aud her relations
{w. 22, 53).
Mesopotamia. Heb. Aram-Naharaim (so Dt. xxiii. 4 ; Jud. iii. 8 ;
Ps. be. title), i.e. Aram (or Syria : see on x. 22) of the two rivers\ the
country between the Euphrates, in the upper part of its course (cf.
xxxi. 31), and the Habor (2 Ki. xvii. 6 = xviii. 11), the Greek XaySoJpas,
now the Khabour.
^ The occurrence in inscriptions of the forms Naharin, Nahrima, has led recent
scholars to doubt whpther the dual -aim is correct: see EncB. i. 287, and on the
other side i. 278 n. (Noldeke).
XXIV. II-I8] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 233
11 And he made the camels to kneel down without the city by J
the well of water at the time of evening, the time that women
go out to draw water. 12 And he said, O Lord, the God of my
master Abraham, send me, I pray thee, good speed this day, and
shew kindness unto my master Abraham. 13 Behold, I stand
by the fountain of water ; and the daughters of the men of the
city come out to draw water : 14 and let it come to pass, that
the damsel to whom I shall say. Let down thy pitcher, I pray
thee, that I may drink ; and she shali say. Drink, and I will give
thy camels drink also : let the same be she that thou hast
appointed for thy servant Isaac ; and thereby shall I know that
thou hast shewed kindness unto my master. 15 And it came to
pass, before he had done speaking, that, behold, Rebekah came
out, who was born to Bethuel the son of Milcah, the wife of
Nahor, Abraham's brother, with her pitcher upon her shoulder.
16 And the damsel was very fair to look upon, a virgin, neither
had any man known her : and she went down to the fountain,
and filled her pitcher, and came up. 17 And the servant ran to
meet her, and said, Give me to drink, I pray thee, a little water
of thy pitcher. 18 And she said, Drink, my lord : and she
the city of Nahor. The city which Nahor (xi. 29), after Abraham
had migrated to Canaan, still continued to inhabit, i.e. Haran ; cf.
xxvii. 43, xxix. 4 f.
11. the well of water. On the plan of Haran in Sachau's Reise in
Syrien (1883), p. 223, there is a well of good water (p. 217) marked,
some little distance on the N. of the citadel.
to draw water. As is still the duty of the women in the East. Cf.
Ex. ii. 16; 1 S. ix. 11; Jn. iv. 7; and see Thomson, L. and B. L
260 f. (in the shorter, one vol. ed., 1898, &c., p. 592).
12 — 14. Abraham's servant prays for a sign by which he may
recognize Isaac's destined bride.
12. said. Viz. 'in his heart ' {v. 45), i.e. mentally (cf. xviii. 17).
send me... good speed. Heb. make (it) to meet (i.e. happen rightly)
before me. So xxvii. 20.
15 — 20. AU happens accordingly.
15. Bethuel. Son of Nahor and Milcah (xxii. 20, 22, 23), and so
Abraham's nephew.
upon her shoulder. In the S3rrian fashion (Thomson, I.e.) : in Egypt
the pitcher is carried on the head.
17 — 20. Thomson {I.e.) remarks that though it is common enough
in the East for a girl drawing water to be willing to give some to
a traveller, he had never found one as generous as Rebekah : ' she drew
234 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxiv. i8-»7
hasted, and let down her pitcher upon her hand, and gave him J
drink. 19 And when she had done giving him drink, she said,
I will draw for thy camels also, until they have done drinking.
20 And she hasted, and emptied her pitcher into the trough, and
ran again unto the well to draw, and drew for all his camels.
21 And the man looked stedfastly on her ; holding his peace,
to know whether the Lord had made his journey prosperous or
not. 22 And it came to pass, as the camels had done drinking,
that the man took a golden ring of ^half a shekel weight, and
two bracelets for her hands of ten shekels weight of gold ;
23 and said. Whose daughter art thou? tell me, I pray thee.
Is there room in thy father's house for us to lodge in ? 24 And
she said unto him, I am the daughter of Bethuel the son of
Milcah, which she bare unto Nahor. 25 She said moreover
unto him, We have both straw and provender enough, and room
to lodge in. 26 And the man bowed his head, and worshipped
the Lord. 27 And he said. Blessed be the Lord, the God of my
master Abraham, who hath not forsaken his mercy and his
^ Heb. a beka. See Ex. xxxviii. 26.
for all his camels, and for nothing, while I have often found it difficult
to get my horse watered, even for money.'
20. the trough. Such as in the East are * always found about weUs,
and frequently made of stone.*
21. holding his peace. I.e. reflecting silently.
22. The present is intended partly as a return for the services
rendered, and partly (being on a liberal scale) for the purpose of
securing Rebekah's good-will. The ' ring ' was intended for the nostril
(u 47). 'Jewels for the face, forehead, and arms are stiU as popular
amongst the same class of people as they were in the days of Abraham.'
half a shekel weight &c. The shekel weighed about | oz. ; so that
^ a shekel would (at the present value of gold) be worth about a
sovereign, and 10 shekels about £20. But no doubt in patriarchal
times gold was worth more than it is now. The 'bdka" ('cleaving,'
' fraction ') recurs in Ex. xxxviii. 26, where its value is stated.
23 — 25. In reply to the servant's question, Rebekah now explains
to him who she is, and assures him that in her father's house there
is both room for him to lodge, and also provender for his camels.
26, 27. worshipped Jehovah &c. In thankfulness that the object
of his errand had been so far accomplished ; the disclosure in v. 24
having satisfied him that he had been led to the right goal.
27. Blessed he Jehovah &c. An exclamation of gratitude : Ex.
xviii. 10 ; Ru. iv. 14 ; IS. xxv. 32, 39 al.
mercy. Rather, kindness (as m. 12, 14). Of. v. 49, xlvii. 29 ;
XXIV. «7-35] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 235
truth toward my master : as for me, the Lord hath led me in J
the way to the house of my master's brethren. 28 And the
damsel ran, and told her mother's house according to these
words. 29 And Rebekah had a brother, and his name was
Laban : and Laban ran out unto the man, unto the fountain.
30 And it came to pass, when he saw the ring, and the bracelets
upon his sister's hands, and when he heard the words of Rebekah
his sister, saying, Thus spake the man unto me ; that he came
unto the man ; and, behold, he stood by the camels at the
fountain. 31 And he said, Come in, thou blessed of the Lord ;
wherefore standest thou without ? for I have prepared the house,
and room for the camels. 32 And the man came into the house,
and he ungirded the camels ; and he gave straw and provender
for the camels, and water to wash his feet and the men's feet
that were with him. 33 And there was set meat before him to
eat : but he said, I will not eat, until I have told mine errand.
And he said, Speak on. 34 And he said, I am Abraham's
servant 35 And the Lord hath blessed my master greatly ;
and he is become great : and he hath given him flocks and
Jos. ii. 12, 14 (in all lit. do kindness and trutK) \ and see the writer's
Parallel Psalter^ p. 447.
brethren. I.e. relations, as xiii. 8. Cf. on v. 48.
28. ran. Hastening, as a girl would do, to relate what had
happened and to shew her presents.
her motlier's house. The women's part of Bethuel's establishment,
where, in Eastern fashion, she and her mother would live, secluded
from the men.
30. Laban is attracted by the sight of the presents : his character,
as it comes out more fuUy in his dealings with Jacob, aheady displays
itself.
31. thm blessed of Jehovah. A title of high regard (cf.
xxvi. 29).
32. The camels were apparently brought into the house : cf.
Thomson (p. 261), 'I have often slept in the same room with these
peaceful animals, in company with their owner and all his family.'
33. meat. Pood : see on i. 29.
34 — 48. With ' epic particularity,' the narrator lets the reader hear
the whole story again, almost in the same words that had been used
before, from the servant's lips.
35. The description is intended to impress Laban with a sense of
Isaac's prospective wealth and importance (see v. 36"') : an alliance with
such a man would be one worth making.
236 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxiv. 35-47
herds, and silver and gold, and menservants and maidservants, J
and camels and asses. 36 And Sarah my master's wife bare a
son to my master when she was old : and unto him hath he
given all that he hath. 37 And my master made me swear,
saying. Thou shalt not take a wife for my son of the daughters
of the Canaanites, in whose land I dwell : 38 but thou shalt go
unto my father s house, and to my kindred, and take a wife for
my son. 39 And I said unto my master, Peradventure the
woman will not follow me. 40 And he said unto me, The Lord,
before whom I walk, wiU send his angel with thee, and prosper
thy way ; and thou shalt take a wife foi my son of my kindred,
and of my father's house : 41 then shalt thou be clear from my
oath, when thou comest tc my kindred ; and if they give her
not to thee, thou shalt be clear from my oath. 42 And I came
this day unto the fountain, and said, 0 Lord, the God of my
master Abraham, if now thou do prosper my way which I go :
43 behold, I stand by the fountain of water ; and let it come to
pass, that the maiden which cometh forth to draw, to whom I
shall say. Give me, I pray thee, a little water of thy pitcher to
drink ; 44 and she shall say to me. Both drink thou, and I will
also di-aw for thy camels : let the same be the woman whom the
Lord hath appointed for my master's son. 45 And before I had
done speaking in mine heart, behold, Rebekah came forth with
her pitcher on her shoulder ; and she went down unto the
fountain, and drew ; and I said unto her, Let me drink, I pray
thee. 46 And she made haste, and let down her pitcher from
her shoulder, and said, Drink, and I will give thy camels drink
also : so I drank, and she made the camels drink also. 47 And
I asked her, and said. Whose daughter art thou ? And she said.
The daughter of Bethuel, Nahor's son, whom Milcah bare unto
him : and I put the ring upon her nose, and the bracelets upon
flocks and herds &c. Cf. xii. 16, xiii. 2.
■37—41. Cf. m 3—8.
42—44. Cf. m 12—14.
42, do. The word is emphatic (notice K** in the Heb.).
45—48. Cf. w. 15—20, 22—27.
47. upon her nose. Cf. Is. iii. 21 ; Ez. xvi. 12. A ring of metal,
passed usually through the right nostril, is stiU often worn as an orna-
ment by women in Eg)rpt and Syria (Lane, Mod. EgypV ii. 323).
XXIV. 47-56] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 237
her hands. 48 And I bowed my head, and worshipped the J"
Lord, and blessed the Lord, the God of my master Abraham,
which had led me in the right way to take my master's brother's
daughter for his son. 49 And now if ye will deal kindly and
truly with my master, tell me : and if not, tell me ; that I may
turn to the right hand, or to the left. 50 Then Laban and
Bethuel answered and said. The thing proceedeth from the
Lord : we cannot speak unto thee bad or good. 51 Behold,
Rebekah is before thee, take her, and go, and let her be thy
master's son's wife, as the Lord hath spoken. 52 And it came
to pass, that, when Abraham's servant heard their words, he
bowed himself down to the earth unto the Lord. 53 And the
servant brought forth jewels of silver, and jewels of gold, and
raiment, and gave them to Rebekah : he gave also to her
brother and to her mother precious things. 54 And they did
eat and drink, he and the men that were with him, and tarried
all night ; and they rose up in the morning, and he said. Send
me away unto my master. 55 And her brother and her mother
said. Let the damsel abide with us a few days, at the least ten ;
after that she shall go. 56 And he said unto them, Hinder me
48. brother^ a daughter. Kinsman's daughter ; ' brother ' being
used of a nephew, as xiv. 14, 16, xxix. 12.
49. kindly and truly {v. 27). As becomes those who are near
relations.
that I may tv/rn &c. Le. proceed somewhere else to find a wife for
Isaac.
50. had or good. A proverbial expression meaning anything of
any kind, anything at all : cf xxxi. 24, 29, Nu. xxiv. 13, 2 S. xiii.
22 ; also Zeph. i. 12, Is. xli. 23, Jer. x. 5.
51. hath spoken : viz. by the facts, as just narrated. The betrothal
is thus settled. The consent of the damsel is not necessary : as now,
' the parents manage the whole affair ; often, however, with the advice
of the eldest son and heir, as Laban was in this case ' (Thomson, 262).
52. bowed himself &c., as v. 26, in thankfulness,
53. 'Presents are absolutely essential in betrothals. They are
given with much ceremony before witnesses, and are even described in
a written document, so that, if the match be broken off, the bridegroom
can recover them,' The jewels, &c, are intended as presents for the
bride : the ' precious things ' are the mohar, or purchase-money of the
bride, paid to her relations : see on xxxiv, 12,
54. Only now, his business being finished, does Abraham's servant
consent to take food.
238 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxiv. 56-^54
not, seeing the Lord hath prospered my way ; send me away J
that I may go to my master. 57 And they said, We will call the
damsel, and inquire at her mouth. 58 And they called Rebekah,
and said unto her, Wilt thou go with this man ? And she said,
I will go. 59 And they sent away Rebekah their sister, and her
nurse, and Abraham's servant, and his men. 60 And they
blessed Rebekah, and said unto her, Our sister, be thou the
mother of thousands of ten thousands, and let thy seed possess
the gate of those which hate them. 61 And Rebekah arose, and
her damsels, and they rode upon the camels, and followed the
man : and the servant took Rebekah, and went his way. 62 And
Isaac came ^from the way of Beer-lahai-roi ; for he dwelt in
the land of the South. 63 And Isaac went out to meditate in
the field at the eventide : and he lifted up his eyes, and saw,
and, behold, there were camels coming. 64 And Rebekah lifted
* The Sept. has, through the wilderness.
57. inquire at her mouth. I.e. consult her. So Josh. ix. 14 ; Is.
XXX. 2.
59. their sister. So called, in so far as her brother Laban has
thioughout taken the lead {w. 31, 50, 53, 55).
her nurse. E gives her name as Deborah (xxxv. 8).
60. The parting blessing upon Rebekah, — cast (like xiv. 19 f.,
xxvii. 27 — 9) into a rhythmical, semi-poetical form. May she become
the mother of countless descendants, and may her seed triumph over
aU their foes !
be thou the mother of. Lit. ' become thou ' (exactly as xvii. 16) ;
i.e. mayest thou grow (in thy descendants) into. Cf. Ru. iv. 11 £
let thy seed &c. See xxii. 17^
61. h^r damsels. I.e. her attendants : for Rebekah is pictured as
a woman holding some position. Cf. 1 S. xxv. 42 ; Ps. xlv. 14.
62. Aiid Isaac came. Now Isaac had come, — viz. before
Abraham's servant returned.
from the way of. Lit. from coming to, which can hardly be right.
Perhaps to the wilderness of^ (imc) for xno) should be read (on the
basis of Lxx., Sam.) :_ the object of the words will then be to state that
it was near Beer-lahai-roi (xvi. 14) that Isaac met Rebekah.
for he dwelt in the land of the South — the Negeb (xii. 9), which
extended to the neighbourhood of Beer-lahai-roi.
63. to meditate. The word is found otherwise only in poetry,
esp. in the Psalms, as cxix. 15, 23, 27, and with tlie collat. idea of
complaint, Iv. 17, Ixxvii. 3 ('complain'), 6 ('commune'); and its
correctness here is open to suspicion. Perhaps Pesh. to walk a^out
(12)^ for nw) has preserved the true reading: cf. v. 65.
XXIV. 64-xxv. 2] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 239
up her eyes, and when she saw Isaac, she lighted off the camel, j
65 And she said unto the servant. What man is this that walketh
in the field to meet us ? And the servant said, It is my master :
and she took her veil, and covered herself. 66 And the servant
told Isaac all the things that he had done. 67 And Isaac
brought her into his mother Sarah's tent, and took Rebekah,
and she became his wife ; and he loved her : and Isaac was
comforted after his mother's death.
64. she lighted off the camel. As a mark of respect, in accordance
with Eastern etiquette : cf. Josh. xv. 18 ; 1 S. xxv. 23 ; and Thomson,
p. 262, ' It is customary for both men and women, when an emeer or
great personage is approaching, to ahght some time before he comes up
with them.'
65. Hitherto the servant's 'master' has been uniformly Abraham:
it has hence been supposed that the narrative contained originally
(perhaps after v. 62) a notice of the death of Abraham, which the
compiler omitted, as he preferred to retain the notice of P, xxv. 7 — 11',
and she took her veil &c. A woman of any position in the East still
appears veiled before her betrothed, until the ceremony of marriage is
completed (cf Lane, Mod. Egijptians^, i. 201, 218, 225).
67. After hearing what had happened {v. 66) Isaac took Rebekah
as his bride.
his mother Sarah's tent. What had been his mother's special tent ;
cf xxxi. 33'.
was comforted &c. According to P (xxv. 20, comp. with xvii. 17,
xxi. 5, xxiii. 1) Sarah had been dead 3 or 4 years, when Isaac married,
— an unusually long period for mourning in the East. However, there
are many indications (see the Introd. § 2) that the chronology of P
cannot be adjusted to the narratives of J^
Chapter XXV. 1—18.
The sons of Abraham by Keturah. Death and burial of
Abraham. Tribes descended from Ishmael.
XXV. 1 And Abraham took another wife, and her name J"
was Keturah. 2 And she bare him Zunrau, and Jokshan, and
XXV. 1 — 6 (J). Sons of Abraham by Keturah. Different tribes,
dwelHng (speaking generally) on the E. or SE. of Palestine, ' which the
Israehte historians reckoned to their own race, though not of the full
^ But the syntax of lf3J< nbnsn is so anomolous that most modern com-
mentators consider niK* 1JDN to be a gloss (reading then simply 'into the tent').
2 It has been suggested, upon independent grounds (cf. on v. 65), that mother's
in V. 67'' was originally father's.
240 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxv. 1-5
Medan, and Midian, and Ishbak, and Shuah. 3 And Jokshan J
begat Sheba, and Dedan. And the sons of Dedan were
Asshurim, and Letushim, and LeumminL 4 And the sons of
Midian ; Ephah, and Epher, and Hanoch, and Abida, and Eldaah-
All these were the children of KeturaL 5 And Abraham gave
blood (Keturah beiug a second wife, or concubine), and a step farther
removed than the Ishmaelites' (Moore, Judges, p. 177).
2. Six principal tribes, ' sons ' of Keturah.
Zimran. Perhaps Za/?pa/x, the capital of an Arabian tribe, W. of
Mecca, on the E,ed Sea (Ptol. vi. 7. 5).
Yokshan. Unknown.
Meddn. Wetzstein (in Delitzsch's Jesaias, p. 665, ed. 2, p. 701)
compares a Wady Meddn (Yakftt iv. 445) near Dedan {v. 3).
Midian. This is a well-known name. The proper home of the
tribe appears to have been on the E. of the Gulf of 'Akaba, where there
was a place known to the Greeks as Mo8tava (Ptol. vi. 7. 2), and called
by the Arab, geographers (see Di. ; and cf EncB. 3081) Madyan,
about 75 m. S. of Elath'. In Ex. ii. 15, iii. 1 they appear also in the
neighbourhood of Sinai. ' The nomad branches of the tribe wandered
northward along the margin of the desert, making forays into Edom,
Moab fxxxvi. 35 ; cf Nu. xxii. 4, 7), and Gilead, and even pouring
across Gilead into Palestine ' TJud. vi. — viii.). Cf ch. xxxvii. 28, 36.
Shuah. The tribe of Job s friend, Bildad the Shuhite (Job ii. 11) ;
perhaps (Del. Parad. 297 f, Dillm.) identical with the 'land of Suhu'
{KB. I. 33, 99, 101), a little S. of Haran, somewhere near the junction
of the Euphrates with Ihe Belih.
3. Tribes regarded as offshoots from Yokshan.
Shebd and Dedan. Both have been already mentioned in x. 7 (P) :
see the notes there. The northern Sheba is doubtless meant. Different
tribal genealogies must have been current : P has preserved one, and J
the other. Of the ' sons ' of Dedan, mentioned in this verse, nothing
certain is known : the names_in the Heb. are all plural in form. The
Asshurim, if we vocalize Ashurim, may be identical with A'shur,
a tribe mentioned by the side of Egypt in two Minaean inscriptions
from S. Arabia : cf Hommel, AHT. 238 f , 249, 252; EncB. s.v.
4. Five tribes regarded as offshoots of Midian.
'Ephah. Cf Is. Ix. 6, where the * young camels of 'Ephah and Midian '
are pictured by the prophet as bringing gold and frankincense from
Sheba to the restored Jerusalem : it must therefore have been a weU-
known trading tribe. Perhaps (Parad. 304, Dillm.) the Hayapd, a N.
Arabian tribe, mentioned by Tiglath-pileser III., and stated by Sargon
to have been placed by him in Samaria {KB. n. 21, 43 ; KA T."^ 211).
Abida'. It is rather remarkable that in one of the Minaean
inscriptions mentioned on v. 3 Abi-yada'a {= Abida') occurs as the
name of a king of Ma'^n (in S. Arabia) : Hommel, I.e. 250, 272.
1 See Burton's Gold Mines of Midian. and The Land of Midian revisited.
XXV. s-i^] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 241
all that he had unto Isaac. 6 But unto the sons of the J
concubines, which Abraham had, Abraham gave gifts ; and he
sent them away from Isaac his son, while he yet lived, eastward,
unto the east country. | 7 And these are the days of the years of P
Abraham's life which he lived, an hundred threescore and fifteen
years. 8 And Abraham gave up the ghost, and died in a good
old age, an old man, and full of years ; and was gathered to his
people. 9 And Isaac and Ishmael his sons buried him in the
cave of Machpelah, in the field of Ephron the son of Zohar the
Hittite, which is before Mamre ; 10 the field which Abraham
purchased of the children of Heth : there was Abraham buried,
and Sarah his wife. 11 And it came to pass after the death of
Abraham, that God blessed Isaac his son ; j and Isaac dwelt by j
Beer-lahai-roi.
12 Now these are the generations of Ishmael, Abraham's P
son, whom Hagar the Egy\)tian, Sarah's handmaid, bare unto
5. Identical verbally with xxiv. 36.
6. the ccmcuhines. I.e. Hagar (ch. xvi.), and Keturah (xxv. 1). Isaac
was treated as the heir ; the sons of the concubines were sent away
with smaller gifts of servants, cattle, &c.
from. lilt, from upon : i.e. so as to relieve Isaac of their presence.
unto the east country. A general expression for the country E., or
even NE. or SE., of Palestine. Cf. on xxix. 1.
7_lla (p)_ Tiie death and burial of Abraham.
8. gave up the ghost. The Heb. is a single word, meaning properly,
it is probable, to fail (lxx. 8 times iKktitrta) or sink, in poetry a syn. of
to die: cf on vi. 17. So v. 17, xxxv, 29, xlix. 33 (all P^.
gathered to his father's kin (see on xvii. 14), viz. m Sheol. The
expression is one peculiar to P (see p. x; and cf v. 17, xxxv. 29,
xlix. 33): the more common expression is 'to He (EW. 'sleep') with
one's fathers' (xlvii. 30; 1 K. i. 21, ii. 10, &c.).
9, 10. See xxiii. 17—20 (also P).
ll** (J), and Isaac dwelt &c. Cf xvi. 14, xxiv. 62. The v. forms
the original sequel of v. 6.
12 — 17 (P). The 'generations' of Ishmael: twelve tribes reputed
to have been descended from Ishmael. The compiler, before passing
formally (xxv. 19 ft.) to the history of Isaac, introduces here what
he deems it necessary to say on the collateral line of Ishmael. It
had been promised in xvii. 20 (P) that Ishmael should beget twelve
'princes'; and accordingly, in an excerpt irom the same source, he
here states their names. The 'princes' are naturally the assumed
eponymous ancestors of the twelve tribes of which Ishmael was the
reputed ancestor.
12. these are the generations of. See on ii. 4*.
P. 16
242 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxv. i,-i6
Abraham : 13 and these are the names of the sons of Ishmael, P
by their names, according to their generations : the fii-stbom of
Ishmael, Nebaioth ; and Kedar, and Adbeel, and Mibsam, 14 and
Mishma, and Dumah, and Massa ; 15 Hadad, and Tema, Jetur,
Naphish, and Kedemah : 16 these are the sons of Ishmael, and
these are their names, by their villages, and by their encamp-
13. Nebaioth and Kedar were probably the most important of
the Ishmaelite tribes. They are mentioned together in Is. Ix. 7 (' all
the flocks of Kedar... the rams of Nebaioth'): Nebaioth is mentioned
otherwise in the OT. only in Gen. xxviii. 9, xxxvi. 3, as the tribe to
which one of Esau's wives belonged. Kedar appears also as a wealthy
pastoral tribe in Jer. xlix. 29, as famous for its archers in Is. xxi. 16 f ,
as dwelling far away in the wilderness in Jer. ii. 10, Is. xlii. 11, and
as a S5anbohcal designation of unfriendly neighbours in Ps. cxx. 5.
Asshurbanipal (b,c. 668 — 626) describes his invasion and subjugation
of the Nabaiti and Kidrai (6. Smith's Assurbanipal, 1871, pp. 256 —
298). Of. the Nabataei and Cedrd of Plin. NH. v. § 65. The home of
Nebaioth was probably somewhere E. of Edom, Kedar being still
further to the E., in the desert.
Adbe'el. Supposed to be the tribe Idibi'il, mentioned by Tiglath-
pileser III. {KB. n. 21, 1. 56).
14. Mishma\ Perhaps (Dillm.) the name is preserved in Jebel
Misma\ 160 m. E. of Teima (y. 14), or in another Jebel Misma', 120 m.
NW. of it.
Dumah. * Probably the eponym of the oasis of Duma or Dumat
el-Jandal, now usually called al-Jof, on the S. border of the S3n*ian
desert' (Noldeke, EncB. 2213),— the AovfjiWa of Ptol. v. 19. 7, and
the Dumeh of the Arabic geographers, 140 m. N. of Teima.
Massa. Probably the Mao-avoi of Ptol. v. 19. 2, NE. of Duma;
a city or tribe Mas'aa is also mentioned by Tiglath-pileser III., im-
mediately before Temd (see v. 15), and Hayapd {- 'Ephah, «. 4), as
sending him tribute (Farad. 301, 302; KB. ii. 21).
15. Tema. See Is. xxi. 14; Jer. xxv. 23; Job vi. 19 (a trading-
tribe). The city Temd of Tiglath-pileser III., now Teima, in NW.
Arabia, about 250 m. SE. of Edom, an important station on the
ancient trade-route from Yemen to Syria, where some interesting in-
scriptions have recently been found (Studia Bihlica, i. 209 — 214).
YetUr and Naphish are mentioned in 1 Ch. v. 19 as waging war
with the Israehtes on the E. of Jordan. Yetur is no doubt the same
as the later Ituraeans (cf Lk. iii. 1), a wild and predatory tribe, —
Cicero {Phil. ri. 44) calls them 'omnium gentium maxime barbaros,' —
famous as archers (Verg. G. ii. 448), — a troop of whom formed a body-
guard to Mark Antony in Rome, — whose home, at least in the first
cent. B.C., was in the mountainous S. and SE. parts of Anti-Libauus
(see HG. 544 fif. ; or DB. s.v.).
16. villages. Cf. Is. xlii. 11 (the 'villages' of Kedar).
XXV. i6-i8] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 243
ments ; twelve princes according to their nations. 17 And these P
are the years of the life of Ishmael, an hundred and thirty and
seven years : and he gave up the ghost and died ; and was
gathered unto his people. | 18 And they dwelt from HavilahJ"
unto Shur that is before Egypt, as thou goest toward Assyria :
he ^ abode ^in the presence of all his brethren.
^ Or, settled Heb. Jell. ^ Or, over against
encampments. Or enclosures, — an unusual word, denoting apparently
the circular and temporary encampment of a nomad tribe: cf Nu.
xxxi. 10; Ez. xxv. 4. The Ishmaelite tribes hved partly in fixed
villages, partly in movable 'encampmerts.'
twelve princes. Cf. xvii. 20.
nations. A very rare word in Heb., though common in Arabic
and Aramaic: probably the word specially used of these Ishmaelite
tribes; cf Nu. xxv. 15 (P), of the clans of Midian.
17. unto his father's kin. Cf v. 8.
18 (J). The general direction in which the Ishmaelite tribes were
settled (cf xvi. 12). If Havilah (ii. 11) be in NE. Arabia, and Shur
is the part of the Sinaitic Peninsula bordering on Egypt (xvi. 7), the
positions, so far as they have been determined above, of the Ishmaelite
tribes would fall mostly within the limits assigned,
unto Shur that is in front of Egypt. See on xvi. 7; and cf
1 S. XV. 7 (where, however, 'from Havilah' can scarcely be the correct
text).
as thou goest toward Asshur. 'Ass}Tia' can hardly be meant,
as it would be in the wrong direction altogether. Either the name
is that of some place, or people, otherwise unknown, in the direction
of Egypt (? the Asshtirim of v. 3"); or the words ("iiEi'K nsNa) are
a misplaced variant of 'unto Shur' ("ii:^ ny); cf "illJ' iKn in 1 S. xv. 7.
he (i.e. Ishmael, as represented by his descendants) settled (cf
Jud. vii. 12 Heb.) in front of all his brethren. See on xvi. 12.
The Hebrews classified their neighbours genealogically according to the
degree of relationship in which they were regarded as standing towards them-
selves. The Edomites were most closely related to them ; they were accordingly
the descendants of Esau, the twin-brother of Jacob. Moab and Ammon were
descended from Lot, Abraham's nephew (xix. 30 ff.). To Nahor, Abraham's
brother, are traced twelve Aramaean tribes, — eight to a wife, Milcah, and
four to a concubine, Re'umah (xxii. 20—24). Six tribes (one being Midian),
and several sub-tribes, are the descendants of Abraham by a second wife,
JKeturah (xxv. 1 — 4). And here twelve other tribes, spread over different
parts of N. Arabia and the country B. of Israel, are traced to Abraham through
a 'handmaid,' Hagar, holding an intermediate position between Sarah and
Keturah. Historical recollections, similarities of language or civilization, or
other characteristics, the exact nature of which cannot now in every case be
determined, must have guided the Hebrew genealogists in thus forming ethnic
16—2
244 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxv. 19, 20
groups, and defining the precise position occupied by each in relation to Israel.
Ishmael, it is said, is to be made a 'great nation' (xvii. 20, xxi. 18) ; so the
Ishmaelite tribes must have enjoyed considerable reputation among the
Hebrews. At a much later date, Ishmael was* connected vaguely with Arabia
in general M Mohammed was supposed to have been descended from him
through Kedar''; and his tomb is still shewn in Mecca. In the OT., however,
it is to be observed, Ishmael is hardly at all connected with what we call
' Arabia'': the 'Arabian' peninsula is peopled by the Jo^tanidae (descendants
of Joktan, son of Abraham's sixth ancestor, 'Bber, and consequently much less
closely connected with Israel), ch. x. 26 — 30; the Ishmaelites are limited to
certain specified tribes, living almost entirely on the N. and NW. of these.
XXV. 19— XXXV. 29.
The 'generations' of Isaac, i.e. (according to the principle followed by the
compiler) the history of Isaac and his descendants, from the time of his father's
death to that of his own death, and including consequently much of Jacob's
life.
XXV. 19—34.
Formal introduction to the history of Isaac. The hirth
and youth of Esau and Jacob.
19 And these are the generations of Isaac, Abraham's son : P
Abraham begat Isaac : 20 and Isaac was forty years old when
he took Rebekah, the daughter of Bethuel the ^Syrian of
Paddan-aram, the sister of Laban the ^Syrian, to be his wife. |
1 Heb. Aramean.
19, 20 (P). The birth and marriage of Isaac. Both events have
been narrated in detail before (xxi. 1 — 3, xxi v.); but the compiler
has preserved here from P the summary statement with which this
writer introduced his account of Isaac's 'generations.'
20. the Syrian. J7^€ Aramaean : see on x. 23. Cf. xxviii. 5 (P) ;
xxxi. 20, 24 (E); and above, xxiv. 10.
Paddan-aram. A name used only by P (xxviii. 2, 5, 7, xxxi. 18,
xxxiii. 18, XXXV. 9, 26, xlvi. 15; xlviii. 7 Paddan alone^: J says (xxiv.
10) 'Aram of the two Rivers.' Prob. a particular district in this Aram
is meant. In Aramaic paddan means a yoke or span of oxen ; padanu,
also, is said to be explained in Ass. word-lists as signifjdng a field
^ Josephus {Ant. i. 12. 2) even calls him /cHcttt/j tov (9vom rOiv 'Apd^uv.
' And 80 in mediaeval Jewish writers ' the language of Ishmael, ' or ' of Kedar,'
means Arabic.
•' 'Arab ' and 'Arabia' are used in the OT. in a much narrower sense than they
are used by as : see DB. i. 135, or EncB. t. 272—5,
XXV. .1-231 THE BOOK OF GENESIS 245
21 And Isaac intreated the Lord for his wife, because she was J
barren : and the Lord was intreated of him, and Rebekah his
wife conceived. 22 And the children struggled together within
her ; and she said. If it be so, ^wherefore do I live? And she
went to inquire of the Lord. 23 And the Lord said unto her,
Two nations are in thy womb.
And two peoples shall be separated even from thy bowels :
And the one people shall be stronger than the other people ;
And the elder shall serve the younger.
^ Or, wherefore am I thus f
(perhaps, originally, what a span of oxen could plough in a given
time): hence the expression may perhaps mean properly 'the corn-
land of Aram.' Ten miles W. of Haran, there are still two mounds
called the N. and the S. Tel Fedddn (Sachau, Eeise, p. 222, and
Map II.), which may preserve the name (cf further Noldeke, EncB.
I. 278).
21—26* (J). The birth of Jacob and Esau.
21. Like Sarah (xi. 30, xvi. 1), and Rachel (xxix. 31), Rebekah
is for long barren: her seed is represented as being a gift of grace,
not of nature.
was intreated. Rather, let himself be intreated, i.e. yielded to
his entreaty, — which, however, is in reality the meaning here of 'was
intreated'; for in Old English 'to in treat' meant not, as now, simply
to supplicate, but to prevail upon hy entreaty. So elsewhere in EVV.,
as 2 S. xxi. 14, 15; Is. xix. 22. Cf. W. A. Wright, Bible Word-Book,
s.v. Entreat, who quotes from an old author, 'I desired him to rest
with us that night, but I could not intreat him ' (i.e. prevail upon him).
22. Esau and Jacob are the ancestors, respectively, of Edom and
Israel ; and the future rivabies between the two nations are pre-
figured in them. The rivahies between Edom and Israel being
particularly irreconcilable and inveterate (see e.g. Am. i. 11; Ez.
XXXV.), the struggles are represented as manifesting themselves even
before birth.
wherefore do I live ? Lit. wherefore, then, am I ? The rend, of the
text is right. On ni (=the enclitic 'then'), see Lex. p. 261^
to inquire &c. Viz. at a sanctuary, — perhaps that of Beer-sheba.
For 'inquire' (t^'m) see e.g. 1 S. ix. 9; 1 K. xxii. 5; 2 K. i. 2.
23. The answer is cast into a poetical form. The infants represent
two nations ; and their struggles prefigure the contest between these
two nations for supremacy. In the end the younger will prevail.
peoples... people... people. The Heb. word used is poetical (xxvii. 29,
and often in the Psalms).
from. In a temporal sense (as e.g. Ps. xxii. 10), the meaning being
•will pursue divergent, and mutually hostile, courses, from their birth.'
the elder shall serve the younger. Edom was subjugated by David,
246 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxv. n-»6
24 And when her days to be delivered were fulfilled, behold, J^
there were twins in her womb. 25 And the first came forth
^red, all over like an hairy garment ; and they called his name
Esau. 26 And after that came forth his brother, and his hand
had hold on Esau's heel ; and his name was called ^ Jacob : |
and Isaac was threescore years old when she bare them. P
^ Or, ruddy ' That is, One that takes by the heel or supplants.
2 S. viii. 12, 13 [see RVm.], 14 ('became servants to David '^; and
remained subject to Judah for some 130 years. See furtner on
xxvii. 40.
25. red. Heb. 'admoni, — with allusion, doubtless, to the name
' Edom,' though the origin of this is otherwise explained in v. 30.
an hairy mantle. Zech. xiii. 4 (of the shaggy sbeepskin cloak worn
by the prophets); 2 K. i. 8. In 'hairy' (se'dr; cf. xxvii. 11, 23),
there is very probably a play on Se'lr, the home afterwards of Esau's
descendants (xxxvi. 8).
'Esau. The meaning of the word is not discoverable from Hebrew,
though from the connexion we should suppose that it signified hairy.
In Arabic 'atkiya means to have thick or matted hair, and 'a^thd is
thick-haired ; though this by rule ought to correspond to 'Eskau (not
'Esau) in Heb. It is possible that the Massoretic punctuation is at
fault, and that we ought to pronounce 'Eshau {wv for ib'y).
26. had hold on Esau's heel. He would fain hold Esau back, and
himself be the first-born, so eager was he, even from the first, to gain
the advantage over his brother. Cf the allusion in Hos. xii. 3 * in the
womb he took his brother by the heel.'
Jacob. The name being explained from 'dkeb, 'heel,' just before.
The verb 'dkab means properly to follow at the heel\ then fig. to
assail insidiously, circumvent, overreach : see Jer. ix. 4 * every brother
surely overreacheth' ; cognate words are rendered deceitful Jer. xvii. 9,
subtilty 2 K. x. 19. Jacob, it was declared, had sought to overreach
his brother even at his birth ; and tradition loved to tell of the
occasions on which afterwards he verified his name, and either ' over-
reached' his brother (cf xxvii. 36), or outwitted Laban.
26^. A notice, from P, of Isaac's age at the time.
How much in these narratives is strictly historical, how much due to
popular fancy or embellishment, we cannot say. Israel was a youuger nation
than Edom (cf. xxxvi. 31), though it eventually acquired supremacy over it;
and these relations between the two nations are reflected in the experiences
told traditionally of their twin ancestors. Jacob is the younger brother; and
evidently one aim of the narrators who recount the national traditions is to
explain how, nevertheless, his descendants secured through him the supremacy
over Edom: in xxv. 22 — 26 this is stated to have been foreshadowed, and
1 Not to 'supplant,' the figure in which is different (to 'tiip up').
XXV. ar, 28] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 247
foreordained, at the time of their birth; in xxv. 29 — 34 and ch. xxvii. it is stated
to have been won actually by Esau's thoughtlessness, and Jacob's craft. But
the importance and real significance of the narratives lies in the types of
character which they exhibit, and in the moral and spiritual lessons which,
whether they are strictly historical or not, may be deduced from them. The
patriarchs are rvnoi »;/x(5i/; and in their biographies examples of faith and
goodness, — and also, sometimes, of unworthiness and moral failure, — are set
vividly and impressively before us.
In V. 23 it is important to bear in mind that the reference is i*eally not to
two individuals, as such, but to two nations \ and the future which the verse
holds out in prospect is the future not of Jacob and Esau, but of Israel and
Edom. The last clause of the verse is quoted by St Paul (Rom. ix. 12) in his
argument to shew that the rejection of Israel is not inconsistent with the
Divine promises: God is not pledged to Israel, as such : His action is determined
by a principle of selection which is not dependent either upon human merit or
upon the conventional claims of human birth; of Rebekah's twin sons, He
chose the younger in preference to the elder, and that before either had done
anything, whether good or bad, which might have seemed capable of determin-
ing His choice (cf. Jer. 1. 5; also GaL 1. 15, and fig., of the ideal Israel, Is. xlix.
1, 5). It may be that v. 23 is really the verdict of history, thrown back in a
poetical form to the ideal beginning of the two nations; but even so, St Paul's
argument does not lose its force : it is an appeal to an emphatic declaration of
a far-reaching principle of Divine action (cf xlviii. 19; IS. xvi 6 — 13). God
* chooses ' both individuals and nations, — not, we must suppose, arbitrarily, but
because, by His foreknowledge. He sees, as man cannot see, that one has
endowments, physical, mental, or spiritual, fitting it better than another to
accomplish the work, whatever it may be, that He desires to have done upon
earth. See further Sanday-Headlam, Romans, p. 238 flf.; Gore, 'The argument
of Rom. ix. — XL,' in Stvdia BiUica, ul 37 fif.
27 And the boys grew : and Esau was a cunning hunter, a J
man of the field ; and Jacob was a ^ plain man, dwelling in tents.
28 Now Isaac loved Esau, because he did eat of his venison :
^ Or, quiet Or, harmless Heb. perfect.
27 — 34 (J). The contrasted lives and characters of the two lads.
27. cunning. As in Old English, simply skilful (lit. kenning, know-
ing), without any of the modern associations of the word : often used
in AV., RV., of technical skiU, as Ex. xxxviii. 23; 1 S. xvi. 16; 2 Ch.
ii. 7; Jer. ix. 17.
plain. Heb. perfect, — usually (e.g. Job i. 1 ; Ps. xxxvii. 37) in
a moral sense (= blameless), such as would hardly be applicable to the
crafty Jacob: here, apparently, with reference to his manner of hfe,
quiet, settled, orderly, opp. to the wild and restless huntsman.
dwelling in tents. I.e. living the more peaceful hfe of a shepherd:
cf. iv. 20 ; and see ch. xxxL
28. See xxvii. 1—45.
248 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxv. .8-34
and Rebekah loved Jacob. 29 And Jacob sod pottage : and J
Esau came in from the field, and he was faint : 30 and Esau
said to Jacob, Feed me, 1 pray thee, with Hhat same red
pottage ; for I am faint : therefore was his name called ^Edom.
31 And Jacob said, Sell me ^this day thy birthright. 32 And
Esau said. Behold, I am at the point to die : and what profit
shall the birthright do to me ? 33 And Jacob said, Swear to me
^this day ; and he sware unto him : and he sold his birthright
unto Jacob. 34 And Jacob gave Esau bread and pottage of
lentils ; and he did eat and di*ink, and rose up, and went his
way : so Esau despised his birthright.
1 Heb. the red pottage, thit red pottage. * That is, Red. ' Or, first of all
29 — 34. Esau sells his birthright. The narrative is one which
at the same time illustrates vividly the different characters of the
two brothers.
30. Feed me... with. Let me swallow (or, eat quickly). The
word occurs only here, and implies voracity.
some of this red, red (food). It is possible, however, that we
ought (with T. D. Anderson, Dillm,, Cheyne) to read '^ddm for 'ddOm,
and render (from the Arab, 'iddm) 'this savoury, savoury food.'
Edam. It is going too far to say (with KVm.) that this means
* Red ' : rather, the name is explained (cf on iv. 1) from its assonance
with 'adorn, 'red' (or 'Mom, 'savoury food'). The Hebrews saw, in
the name of the rival nation, a standing reminder of the impulsive
shortsightedness of its ancestor. Sayce {EHH. 66) supposes the name
to be really derived from the red hue of its cliffs {S. and P. SI f ).
31. Jacob takes advantage of his brother's distressed condition
to secure for himself the birthright. The birthright was highly valued :
it implied both a better position in the family and tribe, and also,
ultimately, a larger inheritance, than fell to any of the other brothers
(cf xliii. 33, xlviii. 13—20; Dt. xxi. 17).
this day. First of all, as RVm. rightly paraphrases the idiom :
so V. 33. Cf 1 S. ii. 16 RVm., 1 K. i. 51 RVm., xxii. 5 (for 'to-day').
33. Jacob, with characteristic prudence, wiU not part with the
pottage till Esau has sealed his promise with an oath.
34. lentils. Still called by the corresponding name Cadas) in Arabic.
Lentils 'are cultivated everywhere in the East. Tney are usually
stewed with onions, rice, and oil, or small bits of meat and fat, and
seasoned to the taste' (Post, in DB. s.v.); and are said to form then
a palatable and substantial dish. See further Thomson, L. and B.
I. 252 — 5 (according to whom there are two principal varieties of
lentil, one being pale red, and the other dark brown); Tristram,
NHB. 461 f ; and cf 2 S. xvii. 28.
and he did eat and drink &c. The words used are graphically
descriptive of Esau's lightheartedness. Cf Heb. xii. 16 f.
XXVI. i] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 249
The narrator comments only on the heedlessness with which Esau, for the
sake of satisfying an immediate appetite, barters away what would otherwise
have been an inalienable right : the modem reader is more impressed by the
avarice and selfishness shewn by Jacob in taking such'a mean advantage of his
brother's need. But in truth neither Esau nor Jacob can be called an ideal
character. Esau is frank, straightforward, generous, but without depth of
character or farsightedness of aim : he is goveraed by the impulses and desires
of the moment; a 'profane' person (Heb. xi? 16), i.e. unspiritual, a man
without love or appreciation of worthier possessions, and heedless of what he
was throwing away : Jacob is selfish, scheming, and clutches at every advantage;
but he looks beyond the immediate moment; he has ambition and perseverance;
his character is thus a deeper one (in both a good and a bad sense) than
Esau's; it contains sound and genuine elements, which, when purified from
purely personal and selfish aims, are capable of consecration to the service
of God, and of being made subservient to carrying out His purposes (see
further after xxxii. 32). No doubt, if history told us more about the Edomites,
we should find their national characteristics reflected in Esau, as ~tKose^ of
Israel are reflected in Jacob.
Chapter XXVI.
Incidents in Isaac's life at Gerar and Beer-sheba.
Esau's ^Hittite' wives.
This chapter contains all that is related of Isaac individually, — apart from
incidents in which he is mentioned in connexion either with his parents or
with his sons. His life is not that of a wanderer like Abraham's : Hebron,
Beer-sheba, Beer-lahai-roi, and Gerar, — all in the S. of Palestine, — being the
places at which he is almost exclusively found. He hved in fact ' on the border-
land of the two peoples (Edom and Israel), who aftei-wards boasted their descent
from him ' (Sayce).
The chapter falls naturally into seven paragraphs, the first four {vv. 1 — 5,
6 — 11, 12 — 17, 18 — 22) relating to Isaac's sojourn in Gerar; the fifth and sixth
{vv. 23 — 25, 26 — 33) describing incidents which happened after his return to
Beer-sheba; and the seventh {vv. 34 — 5) giving the names of Esau's 'Hittite'
wives. It belongs chiefly to J : but there are probably redactional additions
in vv. 1% 2", 3' — 5, 15, and perhaps 18; and w. 34, 35 are clearly from P.
XXVI. 1 And there was a famine in the land[, beside the J R
first famine that was in the days of Abraham]. And Isaac went J
XXVI. 1 — 5. Isaac, on account of a famine, leaves Canaan for
Gerar ; and' receives there a promise of Jehovah's protecting presence
and blessing.
1. beside &c. See xii. 10.
250 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxvi. 1-5
unto Abimelech king of the Philistines unto Gerar. 2 And the J
Lord appeared unto him, and said, Go not down into Egypt ;
[dwell in the land which I shall tell thee of :] 3 sojourn in this B J
land, and I will be with thee, and will bless thee[ ; for unto thee, /^
and unto thy seed, I will give all these lands, and I will establish
the oath which I sware unto Abraham thy father ; 4 and I will
multiply thy seed as the stars of heaven, and will give unto thy
seed all these lands ; and in thy seed shall all the nations of the
earth ^be blessed ; 5 because that Abraham obeyed my voice, and
kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws].
^ Or, hlest themselves
king of the, Philistines. If what is stated on x. 14 respecting the
origin of the Philistines is correct, this expression must be an ana-
chronism. So Sayce {EHFL p. 64), ' In the age of the patriarchs the
SW. corner of Palestme has not as yet been occupied by Philistine
immigrants.' The Abimelech mentioned in xx. 2 is called only king
of Gerar
G&rar. See on xx. 1.
2. appeared imto him. Cf. xii. 7.
Go not down &c. As Abraham had done (xii. 10).
dwell in the land &c. The words (notice ' which I shall tell thee
of) agree badly both with v. 1'' and with v. 3* (' sojourn in this land') :
they are perhaps a fragment of E, addressed to Isaac when he was
still in Beer-sheba.
3. sojourn. I.e. remain temporarily (xii. 10).
/ will be with thee. Cf. on xxi. 20.
and tvill bless thee. In thy different undertakings : cf. w. 12, 24,
xxiv. 1, 35.
3'' — 5. These verses appear to be an amplification made by a later
editor, for the purpose, presumably, of giving Isaac as explicit a
promise of the land, as Abraham had had (xv. 18 — 20). The ex-
pression 'these lands' (of diiferent parts of the Isr. territory) is
peculiar and late (1 Ch. xiii. 2; 2 Ch. xi. 23); and the language of
V. 5 suggests a writer familiar with the phraseology of the 'Law of
Holiness' (Lev. xvii. — xxvi.), and Deuteronomy. As the parallels quoted
will shew, w. S^ — 5 are dependent in particular upon xxii. 15 — 18.
I will give &c. Cf. xii. 7, xiii. 15. For the 'oath,' see xxii. 16.
4*. See XV. 5, xxii. 17.
and by thi/ seed shall... hless themselves. As xxii. 18 (where see
the note).
5. The son being rewarded, on account of the father's piety:
cf V. 24.
he&rkened to my voice. Cf xxii. 18^
kept my charge &c. No such expressions are used elsewhere in
connexion with the patriarchs. The obedience of Abraham is described
XXVI. 6-14] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 251
6 And Isaac dwelt in Gerar : 7 and the men of the place j
asked him of his wife ; and he said, She is my sister : for
he feared to say, My wife ; lest, said he, the men of the place
should kill me for Rebekah : because she was fair to look upon.
8 And it came to pass, when he had been there a long time, that
Abimelech king of the Philistines looked out at a window, and
saw, and, behold, Isaac was sporting with Rebekah his wife.
9 And Abimelech called Isaac, and said, Behold, of a surety she
is thy wife : and how saidst thou. She is my sister ? And Isaac
said unto him, Because I said, Lest I die for her. 10 And
Abimelech said. What is this thou hast done unto us ? one of the
people might lightly have lien with thy wife, and thou shouldest
have brought guiltiness upon us. 11 And Abimelech charged
aU the people, saying. He that toucheth this man or his wife
shall surely be put to death. 12 And Isaac sowed in that land,
and found in the same year an hundredfold : and the Lord
blessed him. 13 And the man waxed great, and grew more and
more until he became very great : 14 and he had possessions of
here in terms borrowed from the later Mosaic law : thus, for ' charge,'
see Lev. xviii. 30, xxii. 9, Dt. xi. 1 ; for 'commandments' and 'statutes,'
Dt, vi. 2, xxviii. 45, xxx. 10; and for 'laws,' Lev, xxvi. 46, Ez. xliv.
25, — though this word, which is properly a technical expression (see
Law in DB.\ must be used here in a more general sense than it has
in these passages.
6 — 22. Isaac in Gerar.
6 — 11. Isaac gives out that Rebekah is his sister; and is taken
to task for his falsehood by Abimelech. Cf. xii. 10 — 20 (Abraham and
Sarah in Egypt), ch. xx. (Abraham and Sarah in Gerar).
7. fm- he feared &c. Cf. xii. 12, xx. 11.
8. sporting. In the Heb., the same word as in xxi. 9 (see RVm.),
— with a play on the name ' Isaac'
9. 10. Cf. xii. 18 f., XX. 9.
10. lien. An archaism for laiw. so Nu. v. 19; Ps. Ixviii. 13
(AV., PBV.), al. Lightly is another archaism for easily.
11. The matter had not gone so far as in xii. 15, xx. 2: so it is
sufficient for Abimelech to give strict directions to ensure the personal
safety of Isaac and Rebekah.
12 — 17. Isaac, being blessed (v. 3) by Jehovah, is envied by the
Philistines for his prosperity, and withdraws to the Wady of Gerar.
12. an hundredfold. There is no occasion to interpret the ex-
pression literally; but at least in the rich lava-soil of Hauran wlieat
IS said to yield on an average 80, and barley 100 fold (Wetzstein,
Hauram, p. 30).
252 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxvi. 14-11
flocks, and possessions of herds, and a great household : and the J
Philistines envied him. 15 [Now all the wells which his father's R
servants had digged in the days of Abraham his father, the
Philistines had stopped them, and filled them with earth.]
16 And Abimelech said unto Isaac, Go from us ; for thou art J
much mightier than we. 17 And Isaac departed thence, and
encamped in the valley of Gerar, and dwelt there. 18 And Isaac
digged again the wells of water, which they had digged in the
days of Abraham his father ; for the Philistines had stopped
them after the death of Abraham : and he called their names
after the names by which his father had called them. 19 And
Isaac's servants digged in the valley, and found there a well of
^springing water. 20 And the herdmen of Gerar strove with
Isaac's herdmen, saying. The water is ours : and he called the
name of the weU ^Esek ; because they contended with him.
21 And they digged another well, and they strove for that also :
* Heb. living, * That is, Contention.
15. had stopped them. Regarding them as encroachments upon
their own rights, and with the view of preventing Isaac from en-
camping or settling in their land. The verse is a parenthetic pre-
paration for V. 18, u 16 being the sequel to v. 14.
16. Abimelech shares the envy of his people (cf. «. 27), and bids
Isaac betake himself elsewhere.
17. Isaac accordingly retires to the Wady (Heb. nahal). The
nahal is a watercourse running between hills, which in the winter, or
even after a storm, may be filled with a rushing stream, but in summer
is usually reduced to a mere brook, or thread of water, or may even
be entirely dry (cf. S. and P. App. § 38; BB. River). ^ There is no
proper English equivalent; but it corresponds to what is now in the
East known by the Arabic term, Wddy. The word may denote either
the stream itself (1 K. xvii. 4), or the valley through which the stream
flowed (as Nu. xxi. 12, and here). In the bed of such Wadys, water
may often be found by digging {v. 19).
18—22. The wells reopened (v. 18), or dug afresh (vv. 19—22),
by Isaac in the Wady of Gerar. In a region so near the desert wells
would be prized: hence their prominence in the narrative, and the
disputes to which they gave rise.
19. of springing water. And therefore doubly valuable. Heb.
living water, — the standing Heb. expression for running or moving
water: Lev. xiv. 5, 6, 50, 51, 52, Zech. xiv. 8; and fig. Cant. iv. 15,
Jer. ii. 13, xvii. 13 (in these two passages, of Jehovah). Cf. Jn. iv.
10, 11, vii. 38.
xxYi. 71-28] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 253
and he called the name of it ^Sitnah. 22 And he removed from J
thence, and digged another well ; and for that they strove not :
and he called the name of it ^Rehoboth ; and he said, For now
the Lord hath made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the
land. 23 And he went up from thence to Beer-sheba. 24 And
the Lord appeared unto him the same night, and said, I am
the God of Abraham thy father: fear not, for I am with thee,
and will bless thee, and multiply thy seed for my servant
Abraham's sake. 25 And he builded an altar there, and called
upon the name of the Lord, and pitched his tent there : and
there Isaac's servants digged a well. 26 Then Abimelech went to
him from Gerar, and Ahuzzath his friend, and Phicol the captain
of his host. 27 And Isaac said unto them, ^Vherefore are ye come
unto me, seeing ye hate me, and have sent me away from you ?
28 And they said, We saw plainly that the Lord was with thee :
and we said. Let there now be an oath betwixt us, even betwixt
^ That is. Enmity. ^ That is, Broad placet, or, Boom.
21. Sitnah. The name (of which the explanation in the text will
hardly give the real origin) may be preserved in the Wddy Shutnet
er-Ruhaibeh, a little E. of Ruhaibeh (Palmer, Desert of the Ex. p. 385, —
prob. the Wddy esh-Shutein of Robinson, BR. i. 200).
22. Rehoboth. Usually identified with Ruhaibeh, 19 miles SW. of
Beer-sheba, where there are still remains of wells (Rob. BR. i. 196 f.,
200 ; Palmer, pp. 383 — 5). See the map in EncB. s.v. Negeb.
23 — 25. Isaac returns to Beer-sheba ; and tliere, as soon as he re-
enters the limits of the promised land, receives a renewal of the promise
of an abundant seed, made to Abraham (xii. 2, xiii. 16, xviii. 18).
23. went up. From the Wady er-Ruhaibeh to the high ground on
the N. (though it is true there is a descent again into the Wady in
which Beer-sheba lies). See the elevations, as shewn in G. A. Smith's
large Map of Palestine.
24. fear not &c. Cf. xv. 1, xxii. 17 ; and v. 3*.
for my servant Abraham's sake. Cf. * for the sake of David,' 1 K.
xi. 12, 13, 32, 34 ; 2 K. viii. 19 al.
25. And he builded &c. Cf xii. 8, xiii. 4, 18, xxi. 33. Isaac
thus acknowledged pubhcly the God who had given him these promises ;
and at the same time marked out Beer-sheba as a sacred place.
26—33. Abimelech's league with Isaac ; and second explanation
(see xxi. 28 — 33) of the name Beer-sheba.
26. friend. I.e. confidential adviser : cf. 1 K. iv. 5 ; 1 Ch.
xxvii. 33.
27. See m 14, 16.
28. that Jehovah was with thee. Cf xxi. 22, where the fact is
254 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxvi. »8-35
us and thee, and let us make a covenant with thee ; 29 that J
thou wilt do us no hurt, as we have not touched thee, and as we
have done unto thee nothing but good, and have sent thee away
in peace : thou art now the blessed of the Lord. '30 And he
made them a feast, and they did eat and drink. 31 And they
rose up betimes in the morning, and sware one to another : and
Isaac sent them away, and they departed from him in peace.
32 And it came to pass the same day, that Isaac's servants came,
and told him concerning the weU which they had digged, and said
unto him, We have found water. 33 And he called it ^Shibah :
therefore the name of the city is Beer-sheba unto this day.
34 And when Esau was forty years old he took to wife P
Judith the daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and Basemath the
daughter of Elon the Hittite : 35 and they were ^a grief of
mind unto Isaac and to Rebekah.
^ See ch. xxi. 31. • Heb, hittemtti of$pint.
mentioned as a motive for securing a good understanding with Abraham,
as here with Isaac.
29. the blessed of Jehovah (cf. xxiv. 31), — and therefore one with
whom it is desirable to be on good terms.
30. The common meal would be a token and seal of amity between
the contracting parties (cf. on xxxi. 46).
32. See v. 25 end.
33. S/iib'ah (nw^) is merely the fern, of 'sheba" (VW), in Beer-
sheba' (as though, ' Well of swearing '). See another explanation of the
origin of the name in xxi. 31.
34. 35 (P). Esau's ' Hittite ' wives (see p. 229 ; and cf. on xxxvi.
2. 3).
35. Because, viz., they were averse to any intermixture with the
native races (cf. xxvii. 46 ; also, in J, xidv. 3).
As was remarked on ch. xx., the narratives in xii. 10 — 20, xx., and xxvi. 6 — 11,
especially the two last, read like variations of a single fiindamental theme:
xxvi. 26 — 33 (Isaac's dealings with Abimelech, and naming of Beer-sheha) also
can hardly be anything but a duplicate version of xxl 22 — 34 (Abraham's
dealings with an Abimelech, also king of Gerar, and naming of Beer-sheba).
As Prof. Sayce writes {EHH. p. 64), 'Doubtless, history repeats itself; dis-
putes about the possession of wells in a desert-land can frequently recur, and
it is possible that two kings of the same name may have followed one another
on the throne of Gerar. But what does not seem very possible is that each of
these kings should have had a " chief captain of his host " called by the strange
non-Semitic name of Phicol (xxL 22; xxvi. 26); that each of them should have
taken the wife of the patriarch, believing her to be his sister; or that Beer-
sheba should twice have received the same name from the oaths sworn over it'
THE BOOK OF GENESIS 256
Of course there are differences in detaiP, but these are not greater than would
naturally arise from the fluctuation of tradition, and from the individual
colouring stamped upon each narrative by the narrator.
Chapter XXVII. 1—45.
Jacob by craft secures Ms father's blessing.
A striking and picturesque narrative, full of circumstance and detail, which
impart to the descriptions animation and life. Its aim is to shew how Jacob
finally secured precedence over the firstborn ; and so obtained the better land,
the greater power, and even dominion over his elder brother. The means was
his father's blessing, which was held in antiquity (cf. on ix. 25) to exert a
determining influence upon a person's future. But the blessing was won by
craft and falsehood {vo. 19, 20, 24). Jacob was Rebekah's favourite son, as
Esau was Isaac's (xxv. 28); and the narrative tells how, instigated by his
ambitious and designing mother, Jacob deceives his aged father, and wi-ests
from his brother his father's blessing. That the action of Rebekah and Jacob
was utterly discreditable and indefensible, is of course obvious. The writer
(though his sympathies seem to be with Jacob) narrates all without comment, —
it may be in accordance with the usual (though, it is true, not quite uniform)
custom of the Biblical writers to leave the reader to form his own judgement on
the events recorded; but it may be also, because, as Gunkel observes, the
moral sense has been educated gradually. There are other indications in the
OT. that truthfulness was not observed by the normal Israelite with the
strictness demanded by a Christian standard ; and the narrator, — who naturally
would tell the story as it was currently told in Israel, with some satisfaction
that the ancestor of Edom had been overreached by Jacob, — may accordingly
not have viewed the intrigue and treachery which he describes with the aversion
which it arouses in a modern reader. But be that as it may, the guilt does
not remain unpunished: it brings with it a train of consequences such as
might be expected; and the estrangement of Esau, the flight of Jacob, the
separation for many years of mother and son, the trials, anxieties, and dis-
appointments, through which Jacob afterwards has to pass, are just and
natural punishments for their sin*. The narrative belongs chiefly, if not entirely,
to J3.
^ Thus contrast xii. 15 and 19 (Sarah actually Pharaoh's wife), xx. 2 and 4»,
xxvi. 10 (liarm to Rebekah only apprehended) ; xii. 16, xx. 14 — 16 (presents given
afterwards, by way of compensation) ; xii. 17, xx. 3, xxvi. 8 (the truth discovered
by sickness sent of God, by God appearing in a dream, and by an accident,
respectively); xii. 18 f. (no defence of the falsehood attempted), xx. 11 — 13
(excuses), xxvi. 9; xii. 20 and xx. 15. Comp. further Gunkel, p. 203 f.
' It is sometimes supposed that Isaac acted wrongly in seeking to set aside the
will of God that 'the elder should serve the younger' (xxv. 23), and that Rebekah
interfered for the purpose of preventing this frustration of Providence. Nothing cf
this is, however, at all implied in the narrative. Isaac is there represented as
acting simply from the very natural desire to bless his firstborn; and there is
nothing to suggest that Rebekah attempted to justify herself even by the worthless
excuse that the end sanctifies the means.
' Most critics attribute parts to E, but it may be doubted whether upon
sufficient grounds.
256 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxvii. 1-13
XXVII. 1 And it came to pass, that when Isaac was old, J
and his eyes were dim, so that he could not see, he called Esau
his elder son, and said unto him, My son : and he said unto him,
Here am I. 2 And he said. Behold now, I am old, I know not
the day of my death. 3 Now therefore take, I pray thee, thy
weapons, thy quiver and thy bow, and go out to the field, and
take me venison ; 4 and make me savoury meat, such as I love,
and bring it to me, that I may eat ; that my soul may bless thee
before I die. 5 And Rebekah heard when Isaac spake to Esau
his son. And Esau went to the field to hunt for venison, and to
bring it. 6 And Rebekah spake unto Jacob her son, saying.
Behold, I heard thy father speak unto Esau thy brother, saying,
7 Bring me venison, and make me savoury meat, that I may eat,
and bless thee before the Lord before my death. 8 Now there-
fore, my son, obey my voice according to that which I command
thee. 9 Go now to the flock, and fetch me from thence two
good kids of the goats ; and I will make them savoury meat for
thy father, such as he loveth : 10 and thou shalt bring it to thy
father, that he may eat, so that he may bless thee before his
death. 11 And Jacob said to Rebekah his mother, Behold,
Esau my brother is a hairy man, and I am a smooth man.
12 My father perad venture will feel me, and I shall seem to him
as a ^deceiver ; and I shall bring a curse upon me, and not a
blessing. 13 And his mother said unto him, Upon me be thy
^ Or, mocker
1 — 5. Isaac proposes to bless his firstborn, Esau, before he dies.
3,4, venison... such as I love. See xxv. 28.
4. my soul. A pathetic periphrasis for the pers, pron. (which is
used in v. 7) : see on xii. 13. So w. 19, 25, 31.
6 — 17. Rebekah, having overheard (u 5) Isaac's words, plans to
frustrate his purpose, and secure the blessing for her favourite (xxv.
28), Jacob.
7. before Jehovah. With a solemn sense of His presence, often (as
Jud. xi. 11), though not necessarily (cf. 1 S. xxiii. 18), at a sanctuary,
11, 12. Jacob, with his customary prudence, anticipates diffi-
culties.
11. hairy. See xxv, 25, with the note.
12. as a mocker (RVm, ; see 2 Ch. xxxvi. 16 'scoffed'). As one
who is making sport of his aged father.
13. 14. Rebekah, sure of her plan, bids her son just do what she
tells him. He obediently complies.
XXVII. 13-n] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 257
curse, ray son : only obey my voice, pnd go fetch me them. J
14 And he went, and fetched, and brought them to his mother :
and his mother made savoury meat, such as his father loved.
15 And Rebekah took the goodly raiment of Esau her elder son,
which were with her in the house, and put them upon Jacob her
younger son : 16 and she put the skins of the kids of the goats
upon his hands, and upon the smooth of his neck : 17 and she
gave the savoury meat and the bread, which she had prepared,
into the hand of her son Jacob. 18 And he came unto his
father, and said, My father : and he said. Here am I ; who art
thou, my son? 19 And Jacob said unto his father, I am Esau
thy firstborn ; I have done according as thou badest me : arise,
I pray thee, sit and eat of my venison, that thy soul may bless
me. 20 And Isaac said unto his son, How is it that thou hast
found it so quickly, my son? And he said. Because the Lord
thy God sent me good speed. 21 And Isaac said unto Jacob,
Come near, I pray thee, that I may feel thee, my son, whether
thou be my very son Esau or not. 22 And Jacob went near
unto Isaac his father ; and he felt him, and said, The voice is
Jacob's voice, but the hands are the hands of Esau. 23 And he
discerned him not, because his hands were hairy, as his brother
Esau's hands : so he blessed him. 24 And he said, Art thou my
very son Esau ? And he said, I am. 25 And he said. Bring it
near to me, and I will eat of my son's venison, that my soul may
bless thee. And he brought it near to him, and he did eat : and
he brought him wine, and he drank. 26 And his father Isaac
said unto him. Come near now, and kiss me, my son. 27 And he
came near, and kissed him : and he smelled the smell of his
raiment, and blessed him, and said,
15. the choicest raiment. I.e., as we should say, his best suit.
18 — 29. Jacob, in disguise, enters his father's presence, and obtains
his blessing.
20. sent me good speed. Lit. caused (it) to meet before ms (cf. xxiv. 1 2).
21 — 23. Isaac's suspicions, aroused by the quickness with which
his commission had been carried out, and by the voice of Jacob, are
lulled by his touch.
27^—29. The blessing (cf. Heb. xi. 20), couched in an elevated,
semi-poetical form (cf. ix. 25 f., xiv. 19 f., xxiv. 60). The smell of the
(supposed) hunter's raiment, redolent of the wild and open field (cf.
XXV. 27, 'a man of the f eld,' 29), suggests the thought of a field blessed
D. 17
258 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxvil n-29
See, the smell of my son «
Is as the smell of a field which the Lord hath blessed :
28 And God give thee of the dew of heaven,
And of the fatness of the earth,
And plenty of corn and wine :
29 Let peoples serve thee,
And nations bow down to thee :
Be lord over thy brethren,
by Jehovah with abundant crops : and so the first part of the blessing
(v. 28^ relates to the land which Jacob is to possess, while the second
{v. 29; passes on to describe the lordship which his descendants will
exercise over neighbouring nations.
28. May his son have a land in which the dew of heaven, and
richness of soil, combine to produce abundant crops !
dew. In Palestine, dew, including in the term (Neil, Palest.
Explored, 1882, p. 134 flf.; EncB. s.v.) 'night-mist,' — moisture brought
by the W. winds from the Medit. Sea, and condensed during the cool
nights into a heavy mist, — is copious {HG. 65), as it is also indis-
pensable for vegetation, during the hot and rainless summer ; it is thus
often mentioned as a condition of fertility : e.g. Dt. xxxiii. 13, 28 ;
Hos. xiv. 5 ; Zech. viii. 12.
fatness. Rather, fat places. May he have a share in the most
fertile places of the earth! Cf. for the figure. Is. v. 1, xxviii. 1. The
fertility of the land ' flowing with milk and honey ' is often alluded to :
e.g. Dt. viii. 7—9, xi. 11 f.
corn and must. Two of the three staple products of Canaan
(the third being 'fresh oil'), often mentioned together as a triad of
blessings (Dt. vii. 13, xi. 14 ; Hos. ii. 8, 22 ; Joel ii. 19, al). The word
rendered ' must ' is tirosh, on which much has been written, — not always
wisely. It was a highly-prized beverage (Is. Ixii. 8 ; Zech. ix. 17),
prepared from the fruit of the vine (Is. Ixv. 8 ; Mic. vi. 15 [misrendered
' vintage ']) ; and the term, it seems, was a comprehensive one, denoting
sometimes (cf Joel ii. 24) the freshly-expressed, unfermented juice of
the grape, sometimes (cf Jud. ix. 13 ; Hos. iv. 11) a light kind of wine,
such as the ancients were in the habit of making by checking the
fermentation of the juice before it had run its fuU course. In RV. it
is rendered sometimes 'new wine,' but, as a rule, unfortunately, 'wine'
(so that it is then confused with j") : 'vintage' in Nu. xviii. 12, Mic,
vi. 15, and the marg. of Neh. x. 37, 39, Is. Ixii. 8, is altogether
incorrect. See more fully the writer's note in Joel and Amos, p. 79 f
29. peoples .. .nations. The reference is partly to the Canaanites,
subjugated gradually by the Israelites, as they took possession of the
country, partly to the neighbouring nations of Moab, Ammon, &c.
subjugated by David (2 S. viii.).
Be lord &c., with allusion to David's conquest of Edom, 2 S. viii.
J 3, 14; 1 Ki. xi. 15 f ; Ts. Ix. title. Cf the oracle, xxv, 23^ For
XXVII. .9-37] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 269
And let thy mother's sons bow down to thee : ,
Cursed be every one that curseth thee,
And blessed be every one that blesseth thee.
30 And it came to pass, as soon as Isaac had made an end of
blessing Jacob, and Jacob was yet scarce gone out from the
presence of Isaac his father, that Esau his brother came in from
his hunting. 31 And he also made savoury meat, and brought
it unto his father ; and he said unto his father. Let my father
arise, and eat of his son's venison, that thy soul may bless me,
32 And Isaac his father said unto him, Who art thou ? And he
said, I am thy son, thy firstborn, Esau. 33 And Isaac trembled
very exceedingly, and said, Wlio then is he that hath taken
venison, and brought it me, and I have eaten of all before thou
earnest, and have blessed him? yea, and he shall be blessed.
34 When Esau heard the words of his father, he cried with an
exceeding great and bitter cry, and said unto his father. Bless
me, even me also, 0 my father. 35 And he said, Thy brother
came with guile, and hath taken away thy blessing. 36 And he
said. Is not he rightly named ^acob? for he hath supplanted
me these two times : he took away my birthright ; and, behold,
now he hath taken away my blessing. And he said. Hast thou
not reserved a blessing for me? 37 And Isaac answered and
said unto Esau, Behold, I have made him thy lord, and all his
^ See oh. xxv. 26.
brethren and mother's sons interchanging in the parallel clauses, cf.
Ps. 1. 20.
Cursed &c. For this concluding couplet, cf. xii. 3 ; Nu. xxiv. S"'**.
30 — 40. Esau now comes in to his father. Upon hearing what has
happened, he utters a bitter cry of disappointment ; but nevertheless
succeeds in obtaining from Isaac a partial and qualified blessing.
33. The old man is greatly agitated, upon discovering the fraud
that has been practised upon him, and finding his purpose {v. 4)
frustrated.
yea, and he shall he blessed. Isaac sees that it is God's will : what
he has done, though he has done it involuntarily, cannot be revoked.
36. Jacob. See on xxv. 26.
supplanted. As explained on xxv. 26, the metaphor must not be
pressed : a more general word, such as overreached, would be better.
my birthright. See xxv. 29 — 34.
37. Behold &c. After having given Jacob as much as he has
{v. 28 f.), what is there remaining for Esau ?
17—2
260 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxvii. 37-40
brethren have I given to him for servants ; and with corn and J
wine have I sustained him : and what then shall I do for thee,
my son ? 38 And Esau said unto his father, Hast thou but one
blessing, my father ? bless me, even me also, O my father.
And Esau lifted up his voice, and wept 39 And Isaac his
father answered and said unto him,
Behold, ^of the fatness of the earth shall be thy dwelling.
And ^of the dew of heaven from above ;
40 And by thy sword shalt thou live, and thou shalt serve thy
brother ;
^ Or, aioay from
38. Esau admits that the blessing given cannot be recalled ; but
thinks it possible that his father may have more than one blessing.
and wept. Cf. Heb. xii. 17.
39, 40. The blessing of Esau.
39. of. Marg. ' Or, awayfrom.^ The Heb. prep, (which is the same
as that used in v. 28) is ambiguous : it may have a partitive sense (as
V. 28), or it may be privative (see Job xix. 26'' RVm.). The great
majority of modern commentators (see e.g. Delitzsch), supposing a
contrast with v. 28 to be intended, take it in the privative sense, away
from : on the other hand, it would more obviously, in a passage such
as the present, have the partitive sense, of ; and it is quite possible (cf.
Noldeke, EncB. 1184) that 'of is right ; the contrast between the two
blessings would then lie, not in «. 39 as compared with v. 28 (except
that corn and must are not mentioned here), but in vi. 40 as compared
with V. 29.
The country possessed by Edom was the mountainous region
between the Dead Sea and the Gulf of 'Akaba, on the E. of the Wady
el-'Ar<\bah, and the elevated plateau W. of it, as far as Kadesh
(Nu. XX. 16). It is true, parts of this region are now barren; but in
other parts there are fruitful valleys, and abundant traces of former
cultivation. Palmer writes {Desert of the Ex. 430 f), 'The country is
extremely fertile, and presents a favourable contrast to the sterile
region [the desert et-Tili] on the opposite side of the 'Arabah. Goodly
streams flow through the valleys, which are filled with trees and
flowers ; while on the uplands to the east rich pasture-lands and corn-
fields may everywhere be seen. With a peaceful and industrious
population, the country might become ' again thriving and prosperous\
Even, therefore, though the soil of Edom may not have been equally
fertile with that of Canaan, it is doubtful whether it could be described
as devoid of fertility.
fatness. Fat places, as v. 28.
1 Cf. N5ld. I. c. ; and for further testimony to the same efifect, see Puse.v, Minor
Prophets, p. 144; Buhl, Gesch. der Edomiten (1893), p. 15 f.; Bob. BR. n. 154. It is
the Wady el- 'Arabah, and the plateau West of it (cf. on xiv. 6), which are entirely
desert and sterile.
XXVII. 40-44] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 261
And it shall come to pass when thou shalt break loose, .
That thou shalt shake his yoke from off thy neck.
41 And Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing wherewith his
father blessed him : and Esau said in his heart, The days of
mourning for my father are at hand ; then will I slay my brother
Jacob. 42 And the words of Esau her elder son were told to
Rebekah ; and she sent and called Jacob her younger son, and
said unto him, Behold, thy brother Esau, as touching thee, doth
comfort himself, purposing to kill thee. 43 Now therefore, my
son, obey my voice ; and arise, flee thou to Laban my brother
to Haran ; 44 and tarry with him a few days, until thy brother's
40. hy thy sword. I.e. by war and plunder, like many of the
Bedawi tribes to-day (cf. on xvi. 12). How far this was true to fact of
the Edomites, the information at our disposal does not tell us. They
were, however, a fierce, undisciplined, and turbulent nation (Jos. BJ.
rv. 4. 1 ; cf IV. 5. 1 <^vtr£i w/xoVaToi </)ov€veiv oi/t€s ; and Obad. 13°, 14°\
shilt serve thy brother. The doom of subjection to Israel (u 29°' )
is not revoked ; but it is limited, in the two next lines, in duration.
And it shall come to pass when than becomest restless, That thou
shalt break &c. The time will come, when, after repeated efforts,
Edom will recover its freedom. Edom revolted from Judah, under
Jehoram, B.C. 849 — 2 (2 K. viii. 20 — 22) : it may be conjectured that
circumstances with which we are unacquainted — perhaps a series of
abortive efforts before the final success — suggested the terms used.
becomest restless. The word (rud) occurs in Heb. only here,
Jer. ii. 31^ Ps. Iv. 2^ Hos. xi. 12 (doubtfully), and by a probable
emendation (W. R. Smith), Jud. xi. 37 (for ' go down ') : its meaning
appears from the Arabic, where it signifies to go to and fro, be restless,
unsettled.
break. As AV. : the word is the same as that rendered ' break
off ' in Ex. xxxii. 2. Evidently changed in RV. simply on account of
the preceding ^ break loose.'
41 — 45. The results of Jacob's fraud. Esau waits only for an
opportunity of taking vengeance on his brother : so E,ebekah urges
Jacob to flee to his uncle Laban in Haran.
41''. Esau will wait till his father dies {w. 4, 7) ; but even within
the customary mourning-time — usually seven days (1. 10) — he threatens
then to slay his brother, so that the birthright may devolve upon
himself.
42. thy brother Esau is comforting himself with regard to
thee, purposing to kill thee. I.e. is planning to relieve his feelings by
vengeance : cf. the same verb in Ez. v. 13 ; Is. i. 24 ('ease me ').
43. to Laban &c. See xxiv. 29 ; and xi. 31 : and cf. Hos.
xii. 12.
262 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxvii. 44, 45
fury tuni away ; 45 until thy brother's auger turn away from J
thee, and he forget that which thou hast done to him : then
I will send, and fetch thee from thence : why should I be
bereaved of you both in one day?
45. both. Because Esau, as the murderer, would take to flight to
escape the blood- avenger (2 S. xiv. 7).
The preceding narrative involves a serious chronological discrepancy.
Isaac is to all appearance, according to the representation of the narrator,
upon his death-bed (cf. v. 2) : yet, according to P (xxv. 26, xxvi. 34, xxxv. 28),
he survived for eighty years, dying at the age of 180. Ussher, Keil, and others,
arguing back from the dates given in xlvii. 9, xlv. 6, xli. 46, xxxi. 41, infer
that Jacob's flight to 5aran took place in his 77th year: this reduces the
80 years to 43, though that is hardly less incredible. Even, however, supposing
this were credible, and consistent with the representation of the narrator, it
does not remove the chronological diflSculties of the narrative ; for it involves
the fresh incongruity of supposing that thirty-seven years elapsed between
Esau's marrying his Hittite wives (xx\i. 34 P), and Rebekah's expressing her
fear (xxvii. 46, also P) that Jacob, then aged seventy-seven, should follow his
brother's example ! Nor is it natural to picture Jacob seeking a wife in Haran,
and tending Laban's sheep, as a man 77 years old. The fact is, we have here
another of the many examples, aflForded by the book of Genesis, of the
impossibility of harmonizing the chronology of P with that of JE (see the
Introd. § 2). [On Dr Orr's objections, see the Addenda?^
XXVII. 46— XXVIII. 9.
Jacob sent by his pai'ents to obtain a wife from among
his relations in Haran.
An extract from P, written entirely without reference to xxvii. 1 — 45, and
suggesting a completely different motive for Jacob's visit — it is not here spokeii
of as 9. flight — to Laban. The paragraph attaches directly to xxvi. 34 f. (also P),
where it is said that Esau, to his parents' great vexation, had taken two
' Hittite ' wives : Rebekah here, fearful lest Jacob should do the same, men-
tions her apprehensions to Isaac, who thereupon charges Jacob to journey to
Paddan-aram, and find there a wife among the daughters of his uncle Laban.
Jacob obeys; and departs accordingly with his father's blessing. — It is of
course true that, in itself, his representation is not inconsistent with that in
xxvii. 42 — 45 (though the affectionate terms in which Isaac addresses Jacob in
xxviii. 1, 3—4, read strangely after what has been told in xxvii. 1 — 45): men
often act under the influence of more motives than one; and Rebekah may not
have mentioned to Isaac her principal motive for wishing Jacob to leave his
home. But presenting, as this paragraph does, all the literary marks of a
hand different from that of the author of xxvii. 1 — 46, there can be no question
that it forms part of a different representation of the current of events.
xxvii. 46-xxviiL 9] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 263
46 And Rebekah said to Isaac, I am weary of my life because P
of the daughters of Heth : if Jacob take a wife of the daughters
of Heth, such as these, of the daughters of the land, what good
shall my life do me? XXVIII. 1 And Isaac called Jacob,
and blessed him, and charged him, and said unto him, Thou shalt
not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan. 2 Arise, go to
Paddan-aram, to the house of Bethuel thy mother's father ; and
take thee a wife from thence of the daughters of Laban thy
mother's brother. 3 And ^God Almighty bless thee, and make
thee fruitful, and multiply thee, that thou mayest be a company
of peoples ; 4 and give thee the blessing of Abraham, to thee,
and to thy seed with thee ; that thou mayest inherit the land of
thy sojournings, which God gave unto Abraham. 5 And Isaac
sent away Jacob : and he went to Paddan-aram unto Laban, son
of Bethuel the ^Syrian, the brother of Rebekah, Jacob's and
Esau's mother. 6 Now Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob
and sent him away to Paddan-aram, to take him a wife from
thence ; and that as he blessed him he gave him a charge,
saying. Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan ;
7 and that Jacob obeyed his father and his mother, and was
gone to Paddan-aram : 8 and Esau saw that the daughters of
Canaan pleased not Isaac his father ; 9 and Esau went unto
Ishmael, and took unto the wives which he had Mahalath the
daughter of Ishmael Abraham's son, the sister of Nebaioth, to
be his wife.
* Heb. El Shaddai. * Heb. Aramean.
46. the daughters of Heth. See xxvi. 34 f.
XXVIII. 1. Isaac acts in accordance with Rebekah's suggestion.
The verse forms the immediate sequel of xxvii. 46.
3. 4. The blessing is expressed in phrases characteristic elsewhere
of P : God Almighty, as xvii. 1, xxxv. 11, xlviii. 3 ; make fruitful and
multiply, as xvii. 20, xlviii. 4 ; company of peoples, as xxxv. 11, xlviii.
4 ; thy seed with thee, as xvii. 7, 8, 9, 10, 19, xxxv. 12, xlviii. 4, al. ;
laiid of thy sojournings, as xvii. 8, xxxvi. 7, xxxvii. 1, Ex, vi. 4. So
Paddan-aram, vv. 2, 5, 6, 7 (see on xxv, 20).
4. the blessing of Abraham. See xvii. 8 (P).
5. Bethuel the Aramaean. Cf. xxv. 20 (P).
6 — 9. Esau follows the example of his brother ; and in order to
secure his parents' approval, takes a cousin (see xxv. 13) as his wife,
in addition to his two 'H^'ttite' wives (xxvi. 34 f ).
264 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxviil lo-ia
XXVIII. 10—22.
Jacob's Journey to Hainan. His dream at Bethel
Jacob starts from Beer-sheba on his joiirney to Haran, and passes the night
at a ' place ' close by Luz. He has there the dream of a ' ladder ' reaching to
heaven, with angels ascending and descending upon it; and receives an
assurance that he will be protected by Jehovah's presence throughout his
journevings, and brought back in safety to the laud that he is leaving. He
names the place ' Bethel ' ; and promises a vow in the event of his safe return.
There was afterwards an important sanctuary at Bethel (Jud. xx. 18, 26;
1 S. X. 3): it was accordingly selected by Jeroboam as the shrine for one of his
golden calves, 1 K. xii. 29; and it is often alluded to as a popular place of
worship. — though one discountenanced by the prophets, — in Amos and Hosea
(Am. iii. 14, iv. 4, v. 5, 6, viL 10, 13; Hos. x. 15^). The present narrative
explains how it came to be regarded as a sacred place: tradition said that it
had been consecrated by Jacob. — The main narrative is that of £; but cc. 10,
13—16, 19, belong to J.
10 And Jacob went out from Beer-sheba, and went toward J
Haran. | 11 And he lighted upon ^a certain place, and tarried E
there all night, because the sun was set ; and he took one of the
stones of the place, and put it under his head, and lay down in
that place to sleep. 12 And he dreamed, and behold a ladder
set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven : and
behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it. |
^ Heb, the place.
10. from Beer-skeba. The last place at which Isaac has been
mentioned (xxvi. 23). The v. forms the true sequel to xxvdi. 41 — 45.
11. vpon the place. Perhaps, 'the' (sacred) place (xii. 6), known
afterwards as Beth-el; perhaps, according to a Heb. idiom (G.-K. § 126"),
'a' place.
of the stones of the place. Beitin, the site of the ancient Bethel,
is a small village, with ruins of early Christian and Crusaders'
buildings, about 10 miles N. of Jerusalem, on a slight elevation (hence
the standing expression, to 'go up ' to Bethel : e.g. 1 S. x. 3), a little
to the E. of the well-worn track leading from Jerusalem to Shechem
and the North. The valley through which the track here winds is
' covered; as with grave-stones, by large sheets of bare rock, some few
sta,nding up here and there like cromlechs' (^S*. and P. p. 219); while
a hiU a little to the SE. rises to its top in terraces of stone^
12. In his dream, the natural features of the locality {v. 11) shape
themselves into a 'ladder,' or flight of stone steps, rising up to heaven;
^ Bethel is also meant by 'Beth-aven' in Hos. iv. 15, v. 8, i. 5.
* In the PEF. Memoirs, n. 305, there is a view of a large 'gilgal,' or ciicle of
stones, near Bethel. Cf. PEFQS. 1902, p. 323 (at Gezer).
xxviiL 13-.7] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 265
13 And, behold, the Lord stood ^above it, and said, I am the J"
Lord, the God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac :
the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy
seed ; 14 and thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and
thou shalt ^spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to
the north, and to the south : and in thee and in thy seed shall
all the families of the earth be blessed. 15 And, beliold, I am
with thee, and will keep thee whithersoever thou goest, and will
bring thee again into this land ; for I wiU not leave thee, until
I have done that which I have spoken to thee of. 16 And
Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely the Lord is
in tliis place ; and I knew it not. | 17 And he was afraid, and E
said, How dreadful is this place I this is none other but the
* Or, beside him ' Heb. break forth.
and he sees angels ascending and descending upon it. The vision is
a symbolical expression of the intercourse which, though invisible to
the natural eye, is nevertheless ever taking place between heaven and
earth. The vision, though in the narrative, and as understood by
Jacob, it relates only to Bethel, implies naturally a much wider truth.
The expression used in this verse seems evidently to suggest the terms
of John i. 51, where it is appUed to denote symbolically, to those who
could discern it, the constant and hving intercourse ever maintained
between Christ and the Father.
13 — 16. Jehovah, as he dreams, appears at his side; and addresses
him with words of encouragement and hope. The promise is in u 13 f.
a renewal of xii, 3, 7, xiii. 14 — 16 ; in u 15 it is accommodated to Jacob's
present situation.
13. above it. Better (as RVm.), beside him: properly, (bending)
over him, as he slept.
14. as the dust of the earth. Cf. xiii. 1 6.
spread abroad. Heb. break forth (so xxx. 30 [see RVm.], 43; Ex.
i. 12) : hence Is. hv. 3.
through thee and through thy seed &c. As xii. 3 (see the note),
xviii. 18.
15. bring thee again. Bring thee back : see on xxiv. 5.
16. 17. The impression which this vision of glory made upon
Jacob.
16. and I knew it not. Jacob had been accustomed to associate
Jehovah's presence with the sacred spots at which his father had dwelt
and worshipped ; and is surprised to find Him here as well.
17. dreadful. The Heb. is usually rendered terrible (ht. to be
feared, cognate with was afraid here). The English word dreadful has
rather deteriorated since 1611. Cf Dan. ix. 4 {^terrible, Dt. vii. 21);
Mai. i. 14 and iv. 5 AV. (in RV. terrible).
266 THE BOOK OF OEI^nESIS [xxviii. .7-,,
house of God, and this is the gate of heaven. 18 And Jacob E
rose up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had '
put under his head, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil
upon the top of it. | 19 And he called the name of that place j
^Beth-el : but the name of the city was Luz at the first. |
20 And Jacob vowed a vow, saying. If God will be with me, e
and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread
to eat, and raiment to put on, 21 so that I come again to
my father's house in peace, ^then shall the Lord be my God,
1 That is, The house of God. * Or, and the Lord will be my God, then this
stone <&c.
the house 0 ' God &c. The place which is God's own abode, and
where earth and heaven meet.
18 The origin of the sacred monolith, or 'pillar,' such as may
be assumed (cf. Hos. x. 1) to have stood beside the altar (Am. iii. 14)
at Bethel.
a pillar. Or standing -stone (Heb. mazzehdh^). What is meant is
a sacred monolith, or 'pillar,' such as is oiPten alluded to in the OT.
as the distinguishing mark of a sacred place, or as standing beside
an altar, in later times, the 'pillars' of the Canaanites were ordered
to be destroyed (Ex. xxiii. 24 ; cf. 2 K. x. 26), and the erection of
'pillars' by the altar of Jehovah was forbidden (Dt. xvi. 22) on account
of their heathen associations. Ex, xxiv. 4; Hos. iii, 4, x. 1, 2.
In AV. the word is often mistranslated 'image.' A Phoenician
mazzebdh was just an obelisk : see the illustration in DB. iii, 881.
poured oil upon it. Thereby consecrating it. See further the
remarks at the end of the chapter,
19. Luz. Cf. XXXV. 6, xlviii, 3; Jos. xvi. 2, xviii. 13; Jud. i. 23,
26t. The 'place' is distinguished from the 'city': the sacred place,
'Bethel,' was outside the ancient city, Luz (cf. Jos. xvi. 2), though
afterwards the fame of the sanctuary led to the city being known by
the same name.
20 — 22. Jacob's vow. The vow was common in ancient Israel,
as among other ancient peoples: it consisted essentially of a solemn
promise to render God some service, in the event of a particular prayer
or wish being granted; and it was resorted to in warfare, or other
need, as a motive to influence the Deity accordingly : see e.g. Nu. xxi.
2; Jud, xi. 30 f; 1 S. i. 11; 2 S, xv. 8; and cf Ps. Ixvi. 13 f
21, The rend, of the marg. cannot be pronounced impossible:
but that of the text is much the more natural and obvious: though
it carmot be said to suggest a very high idea of the strength of Jacob's
faith. At the same time, it may be observed, Jacob's request is a
modest one : he asks simply for bread and clothing. The main point
in his promise, however, lies undoubtedly in v. 22 : so perhaps Dillm.
* I.e. something vmde to stand, or set up ; see the verb in xxxv, 14, 20,
xxviii. 22] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 267
22 and this stone, which I have set up for a pillar, shall be God's E
house : and of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the
tenth unto thee.
and others are right in regarding the words ) wrhah "h mn* as a later
insertion, and reading as the original text simply, ' then this stone' &c.
22. Jacob promises (1) that the stone (not the place) shall be the
'house,' or abode, of Goa, — clearly a second explanation of the name,
'Bethel,' different from the one in ij. 17; and (2) that he will pay
tithes to God of aU his gains. From Am. iv. 4 we learn that it was
customary to pay tithes at Bethel : no doubt these words of Jacob are
intended as an explanation of the custom.
The belief in a stone being the abode of a deity or spirit was, and still is,
one widely diflFused among primitive and semi-primitive peoples. The Second
Isaiah speaks (Is. Ivii. 6) of libations being offered to sacred stones by the
idolatrous Israelites: naXai fiev ovv,..oi "Apa^ts rbv \l6ov...7vpo(TfKvvovv, says
Clement of Alexandria*; the classical writers often mention 'anointed and
garlanded stones,' on which the passers-by would pour oil, at the same time
uttering a prayer'; and at the present day, in many parts of India, every
village has its fetish stone, in which the spirit of a god or deified man is
believed to reside, and which is venerated accordingly by the inhabitants^.
The sacred standing-stone, or ' pillar ' {mazzebdh), so often mentioned in the
OT,, arose in all probability out of the same belief: originally it appears to
have corresponded to what we should call a 'menhir' (Celtic for a 'long
stone ') : i.e. it was a natural boulder or block of stone, set up perpendicularly,
and venerated by the heathen Semites as the abode of a deity ^ In process of
time artificial obelisks took the place of the natural boulders : Hosea's expression
' made goodly' (x. 1) implies that in his day there was some artistic workman-
ship about them. A mazzebdh of this kind, whether more or less sliaped
artificially, was 'in the pre-Deuteronomic period the never-failing accom-
paniment of the Heb. sanctuary or bdmdh ("high-place"). It was the symbol
of the Divine presence or numen, which was considered in some way to reside
in or be attached to it ' ( Whitehouse in DB. a.v. Pillak).
1 Protrept. tv. § 46. The famous black stone, which forms part of the Ca'ba at
Mecca, was originally a heathen idol; and al-Lat, Dhu 'IChalasa, and Dhu 'IShara
were all worshipped in the form of large stones (Wellh. Reste Arab. Ileidentums'-,
29, 45, 49). Doughty saw at Tayif, near Mecca, the three unshapely granite-blocks
which represent al-'Uzza, al-Hubbal, and al-Lat (Arab. Deserta, ii. 515 f.).
2 Arnobius (c. 300 a.d.), before he became a Christian, if he passed an anointed
stone, would worship it tamqxiam inesset vis praesens, and ask for blessings from it
{Contra Gentes, i. 39). For other similar allusions to such stones, see Theophr.
Charact. 16 (the superstitious man, passing an anointed stone, would pour oil upon
it, and pray) ; Lucian, Alex. 30; Deor. Cone. 12; Clem. Al. Strom, vn. 4. 26, p. 843
Pott. ; Min. Felix, iii. 1 ; Pausan. x. 24. 6 (the stone at Delphi anointed daily), with
Frazer's note, v. 354 f.; and cf. Pillab in DB.
* See further Tylor, Primitive Culture', ii. 160—7 ; Rel. Sem.^ 204—212, 232 f, ;
Pausan. vn. 22. 4, with Frazer's note, iv. 154 f. ; and G. F. Moore's very full art.
Masseba in EvcB.
* See the writer's Schweich Lectures (1908), pp. 62 — 5, 84 (with illustrations).
268 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxix. i, «
Jacob's act (v. 18), it is difficult not to think, especially when it is said
(». 22) that the stone itself is to be 'God's house,' must stand in some relation
to these beliefs. It may be that originally the sacred monolith of Bethel was
conceived as the actual abode of the deity, — Jacob's act appears at least to
imply that he attributed his dream to a numen resident in it, — and that traces
of this idea remain in v. 22, though the rest of the narrative has been
accommodated to the higher level of religious belief, on which the narrator
himself stood. For us the religious value of the narrative lies not in what is
said about the sacred stone, but in the truths which find expression, — though,
it may be, in a form conditioned partly by the needs, and habits of thought, of
an immature stage of religious belief, — in vv. 12 — 17, that heaven and earth are
not spiritually parted from one another, that God's protecting presence ac-
companies His worshippers, and that He is ever at their side, even when they
are away from their accustomed place of worship, or are otherwise tempted by
circumstances not to realize the fact^.
Chapter XXIX. 1— -30.
Jacob's arrival at Haran. His seven years* service with
Lahan; and marriage ivith Leah arid Rachel.
XXIX. 1 Then Jacob ^went on his journey, and came to E
the land of the childi-en of the east. | 2 And he looked, and j
behold a well in the field, and, lo, three flocks of sheep lying
^ Heb. lifted up his feet.
XXIX. 1 — 14 {v. 1 E ; w. 2 — 14 J). Jacob reaches Haran (xxiv.
10) ; and quickly makes the acquaintance of his uncle and cousins.
1. went on his journey. Heb. lifted up his fent, an expression
found only here.
the child/ren of the east. A general designation of the tribes E. and
NE. of Moab, Ammon, Gilead, &c. (so Jud. vi. 3, 33; Is. xi. 14; Jer.
xlix. 28; Ez. xxv. 4, 10, al.: cf. on xv. 19). It is true, Haran was
a good deal more N. than E. of Palestine; but the expression is used
broadly ; and in Nu. xxiii. 7 Balaam, whose home was Pethor (the Ass.
Pitru), a little W. of Haran, is said to have been brought from the
' mountains of the east.^
^ The Ass. kings, when, in restoring a temple, they came upon the foundation-
stone laid by its founder, anointed it with oil, and poured libations upon it, before
reinstating it in its place (KB. i. 45, ii. 113, 151, 261); but the cases seem too
different to be regarded at least as directly parallel to Jacob's act, as they are
treated by Lagrange (htudes sur les Religions Semitiques, 1903, pp. 196 f., 203).
The RatTiyXia of the Phoenicians (Eus. Praep. Ev. i. 10. 18; and a curious extract
from Damascius, preserved by Photius, ap. Migne, Bibl. Patr. vol. cin. 1292 I'.), —
small portable stones, supposed to have the power of automatic movement, as well
as other magical prupcitiea, — do not appear to have any connexiou with the sacred
stones referred to above {Rel. Sem.^ p. 210 n.; Lagrange, p. 194).
XXIX. 2-io] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 269
there by it ; for out of that well they watered the flocks : and J
the stone upon the well's mouth was gi-eat. 3 And thither were
all the flocks gathered: and they rolled the stone from the
well's mouth, and watered the sheep, and put the stone again
upon the well's mouth in its place. 4 And Jacob said unto
them, My brethren, whence be ye? And they said, Of Haran
are we. 5 And he said unto them. Know ye Laban the son of
Nahor? And they said. We know him. 6 And he said unto
them. Is it well with him ? And they said, It is well : and,
behold, Rachel his daughter cometh with the sheep. 7 And he
said, Lo, it is yet high day, neither is it time that the cattle
should be gathered together : water ye the sheep, and go and
feed them. 8 And they said. We cannot, until all the flocks be
gathered together, and they roll the stone from the well's
mouth ; then we water the sheep. 9 While he yet spake with
them, Rachel came with her father's sheep ; for she kept them.
10 And it came to pass, when Jacob saw Rachel the daughter of
Laban his mother's brother, and the sheep of Laban his mother's
2, 3. The tenses in the Heb. are here distinguished with particular
precision : the flocks were lying (at the time) ; then v. '2^ — 3 is
parenthetical, describing the practice: used to water, used to be
gathered, used to roll, &c. (in the lxx,, correctly, partcp. and imper-
fects, respectively) : the narrative of v. 2* is resumed in v. 4.
the stone &c. Cisterns — and sometimes also (Thomson, L. and B.
I. 256) ' wells' — are in the East still generally covered in by a broad
and thick flat stone, with a round hole cut in the middle, which in
its turn is often covered with a heavy stone, which it requires two
or three men to roll away, and which is removed only at particular
times (Rob. BR. i. 490; cf. v. 8).
4. Haran. See on xi. 31, and xxiv, 10,
5. son. I.e. descendant, Laban being in reality son of Bethuel
(xxviii, 5), and grandson of Nahor (xxii, 22). So in 'Jehu, son of
Nimshi,' 2 K. ix. 20 (see v. 14), 'Zechariah, son of Iddo,' Ezr. v. 1 (see
Zech. i. 1).
7. he gathered together. In order, viz., to be folded for the night.
8. Wells surrounded with drinking troughs, and flocks waiting
beside them to be watered, are still a common sight in the East (Rob.
BR. I. 201, 204, II. 22, 26, 35, 226, 378).
9. with her father's sheep. Cf. Ex. ii. 16. The daughter of an
Arab sheikh will do the same thing at the present day.
10. Jacob, attracted by Rachel's beauty (u 17), and pleased also
at finding himself so near to his relations (notice the stress on 'his
270 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxix 10-17
brother, that Jacob went near, and rolled the stone from the J"
well's mouth, and watered the flock of Laban his mother's
brother. 11 And Jacob kissed Rachel, and lifted up his voice,
and wept. 12 And Jacob told Rachel that he was her father's
brother, and that he was Rebekah's son : and she ran and told
her father. 13 And it came to pass, when Laban heard the
tidings of Jacob his sister's son, that he ran to meet him, and
embraced him, and kissed him, and brought him to his house.
And he told Laban all these things. 14 And Laban said to him,
Surely thou art my bone and my flesL And he abode with him
the space of a month. | 15 And Laban said unto Jacob, Because E
thou art my brother, shouldest thou therefore serve me for
nought? tell me, what shall thy wages be? 16 And Laban had
two daughters : the name of the elder was Leah, and the name
of the younger was RacheL 17 And Leah's eyes were tender ;
mother's brother'), hastens to produce a favourable impression upon
her by offering her his services.
11. wept. Orientals are more emotional than we are; so that
Jacob, overcome with joy at this happy termination of his journey,
might quite naturally burst into tears.
12. brother. Le. relation; here, nephew, as xiv. 14, xxiv. 48.
So ^.15.
13. Jacob being now grown up, it is evident that Laban must
have parted with his sister (xxiv. 61) more than 20 years before': so
the delight with which he welcomed her son is quite natural.
14. Laban, satisfied with Jacob's account of himself, greets him
as his 'bone' and his 'flesh': of., for the expression, Jud. ix. 2; 2 S.
V. 1, xix. 12, 13.
15 — 30 (E, except vu. 24, 29, which belong to P, perhaps also
V. 28''). ' In this marriage with two sisters, Jacob is no model for Israel
(Lev. xviii, 18): but it was at least not of his own choice: one of the
sisters was forced upon him by Laban's craft, so that the marriage
has the aspect of a Haran custom rather than of a Hebrew one. While
however the double marriage thus finds its excuse in Laban's deceit,
the ethical consideration also asserts itself that Jacob's own fraud
on Esau and Isaac is avenged by the deception which he himself must
now suffer' (Dillm.).
15. Laban's offer is in appearance disinterested: but it is no
doubt prompred in reality by the observation that Jacob was a skilful
shepherd, whose services it would be worth while to retain.
17. tender. I.e. weak, opp. to the large, black, lustrous eyes, re-
sembli ng those of a gazelle, such as Orientals love.
1 Indeed, according to P (cf. xxvi. 34), more than 40, — or, according to the
computatioua of Ussher and Keil (p. 262), 77, — years before : but see the Introd. § 2.
XXIX. 17-^6] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 271
but Rachel was beautiful and well favoured. 18 And Jacob E
loved Rachel ; and he said, I will serve thee seven years for
Rachel thy younger daughter. 19 And Laban said, It is better
that I give her to thee, than that I should give her to another
man : abide with me. 20 And Jacob served seven years for
Rachel ; and they seemed unto him but a few days, for the love
he had to her. 21 And Jacob said unto Laban, Give rae my
wife, for my days are fulfilled, that I may go in unto her.
22 And Laban gathered together all the men of the place, and
made a feast. 23 And it came to pass in the evening, that he
took Leah his daughter, and brought her to him ; and he
went in unto her. | 24 And Laban gave Zilpah his handmaid p
unto his daughter Leah for an handmaid. | 25 And it came to e
pass in the morning that, behold, it was Leah : and he said to
Laban, What is this thou hast done unto me? did not I serve
with thee for Rachel? wherefore then hast thou beguiled me?
26 And Laban said. It is not so done in our place, to give the
beautiful. Heh./air inform: see the next note.
well favoured. I.e. good-looking (Heb. fair in aspect or looks),
handsome: so xxxix. 6, xli. 2, al.; and conversely 'ill favoured,' Gen.
xh. 3, 'evilfavouredness,' Dt, xvii. 1. 'Favour' in Old English (see
Aldis Wright's Bible Word-Book, s.v.) meant appearance, aspect, look,
and even face (e.g. Cymbeline, v. b. 93, ' His favowr is famihar to
me'); and in many Eng. dialects 'to favour' is still used in the sense
of to seem, appear (Jos. Wright's Engl. Dialect Diet. s.v.).
18. / will serve thee seven years &c. Jacob's service takes the place
of the mohar, usually paid to her parents for a bride (see on xxxiv. 12).
The custom of serving a term of years for a wife is said to be still
common in Syria. Burckhardt ( Travels in Syria, p. 297 f.) mentions
a case very similar to that of Jacob.
19. It is better &c. On account, viz., of his being a relation.
Marriages tending to break down the family connexion, and family
influence, were viewed with disfavour.
22. a feast. The marriage-feast was usually, it seems, given by the
bridegroom (Jud. xiv. 10): but see 2 Esdr. ix. 47; Tob. viii. 19; Mt. xxii. 2.
23 — 25. Thus Jacob, who had overreached his brother and deceived
his father, is now overreached himself. Laban takes advantage of the
fact that the bride (see on xxiv. 65) was brought to her husband veiled ;
but it is still difficult to understand how the disguise could be carried
successfully through.
24. for an handmaid. I.e. as a female slave (xvi. 1). So v. 29,
XXX. 4, 7, 9, 10, 12, 18 and always (cf. on xii. 16).
26. In Egypt ' a father very often objects to marrying a younger
272 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxix. .6-3^
younger before the firstborn. 27 Fulfil the week of this one, E
and we will give thee the other also for the service which thou
shalt serve with me yet seven other years. 28 And Jacob did so,
and fulfilled her week : | and he gave him Rachel his daughter to P
wife. 29 And Laban gave to Rachel his daughter Bilhah his
handmaid to be her handmaid. | 30 And he went in also unto E
Rachel, and he loved also Rachel more than Leah, and served
with him yet seven other years.
daughter before an elder' (Lane, Mod. Eg. i. 201). But of course
Laban's excuse is inadequate: he ought, if it really existed, to have
explained the custom to Jacob before.
27. Fulfil the week of this one. Do not break the marriage off";
complete the usual round of wedding festivities. For the * week,' see
Jud. xiv. 12; Tob. xi. 19.
28. The seven days being over, and Jacob having agreed to Laban's
proposal to serve him another seven years, he receives Rachel as well
XXIX. 31— XXX. 24.
The birth of Jacob's eleven sons, and one daughter.
The narrative (in the main J, witli short excerpts from E) is brief, the
principal aim of both writers being simply to explain the names. The explana-
tions may in one or two cases be correct: but in most cases they rest merely
upon assonances (as explained on iv. 1)^: it must also remain an open question
whether even so the actual origin of the different names is preserved, and
whether the explanations offered are not in reality popular etymologies of the
names of the tribes. But the narrative has also an ethical side : it illustrates
indirectly the evils of polygamy, and the jealousies and rivalries to which it
gives rise. 'The struggle of Rachel and Leah for their husband gives us a
strange picture of manners and morals, but, naturally, must not be judged by
our standard' (Payne Smith): at the same time, in so far as the temper and
attitude of Rachel are concerned, it is fair to remember that Leah was not the
wife of Jacob's choice, but had been forced by fraud into what was really
Rachel's rightful place in his house,
31 And the Lord saw that Leah was hated, and he opened J
her womb : but Rachel was barren. 32 And Leah conceived,
31 — 35. Leah bears Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah.
31. hated. The word is to be understood in a relative sense
= kss loved (cf V. 30): similarly Dt. xxi, 15; Mt. vi. 24.
^ It is for this reason that the margins of RV. do not state the meanings of the
several names, but (as on iv. 1, 25) mention n»erely the Heb. words which they
resemble in sound.
XXIX. 3^-xxx. 2] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 273
and bare a son, and she called his name Reuben : for she said, j
Because the Lord %ath looked upon my affliction ; for now my
husband will love me. 33 And she conceived again, and bare a
son ; and said, Because the Lord ^hath heard that I am hated,
he hath therefore given me this son also : and she called his
name ^Simeon. 34 And she conceived again, and bare a son ;
and said. Now this time will my husband be * joined unto me,
because I have borne him three sons : therefore was his name
called Levi. 35 And she conceived again, and bare a son : and
she said, This time will I Upraise the Lord : therefore she called
his name ^Judah ; and she left bearing.
XXX. 1 And when Rachel saw that she bare Jacob no E
children, Rachel envied her sister ; and she said unto Jacob,
Give me children, or else I die. 2 And Jacob's anger was
kindled against Rachel : and he said. Am I in God's stead, who
^ Heb. raah beonyi. ^ Heb. shama. ^ Heb. Shimeon. * From the
root lavah. ^ From the Heb. hodah. * Heb. Jehndah.
32. Reuben. The word signifies, in appearance, BeJwld (plur.)
a son! but it is very doubtful if this is the real meaning of the
name. Here, however, the name is stated to have been given simply
from its resemblance in sound to radii ¥'onyi, ' looked upon my
affliction' ; cf 1 S. i. 11 (of the childless Hannah), Luke i. 48; and often
with the accus. ('see,' 'behold'), as ch. xxxi, 42; Ex. iii. 7; Ps. ix. 13.
33. Simeon. This, as well as most of the following names, is
sufficiently explained by the marg. of the RV. It has been supposed
(W. R. Smith, Journ. of Phil. ix. 80, 96, and others) that 'Simeon'
is really an animal name, the word being akin to the Arab, sim^u, which
denotes a cross between a wolf and a hyaena'.
34. he joined. Heb. yilldveh, from Idvdh, to join. The name is
similarly played upon in Num. xviii. 2. For conjectures respecting the
actual meaning of the name, see Levi in DB.
35. The same apparent connexion with the Heb. word for to praise
(or, better, to acknowledge,^ thank : Ps. ix. 1, and frequently) forms the
starting-point of the blessing in xlix. 8.
XXX. 1 — 8. Bilhah, Rachel's female slave (xxix. 29), bears
Dan and Naphtah.
1. Rachel, discontented and envious, petulantly reproaches Jacob
for her childlessness.
2. in God's stead. Who is the author of life, and is alone able
to grant such a request. The same phrase recurs in 1. 19: cf. also
2 K. V. 7.
^ Many Heb. proper names are animal names: e.g. Rachel, 'ewe'; Jael,
'mountain-goat'; Jonah, 'dove'; Shaphau, 'rock-rabbit.' See the list in Gray'a
Heh. Proper Names (1890), p. 88 ff.; or EncB. Names, § 68.
D. 18
274 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxx. 2-,i
hath withheld fi-om thee the fruit of the womb? 3 And she E
said, Behold my maid Bilhah, go in mito her; that she may
bear upon my knees, and I also may ^obtain children by her. |
4 And she gave him Bilhah her handmaid to wife : and Jacob J
went in unto her. 5 And Bilhah conceived, and bare Jacob a
son. I 6 And Rachel said, God hath ^judged me, and hath also E
heard my voice, and hath given me a son : therefore called she his
name Dan. | 7 And Bilhah Rachel's handmaid conceived again, J
and bare Jacob a second son. 8 And Rachel said, With ^mighty
wrestlings have I ^ wrestled with my sister, and have prevailed :
and she called his name Naphtali. 9 When Leah saw that she
had left bearing, she took Zilpah her handmaid, and gave her to
Jacob to wife. 10 And Zilpah Leah's handmaid bare Jacob
a son. 11 And Leah said, ^Fortunate I and she called his name
1 Heb. he builded by her. ^ Heb. dan, he judged. * Heb. wresth'jigs
of God. "• Heb. niphtal, he wrestled. •> Heb, With fortune I Another
reading is, Fortune is come.
3. Rachel resorts to the same expedient as Sarah, ch. xvi. 2, 3.
that she may bear upon my knees. A fig. expression for, that I may
acknowledge her children as my own : of. 1. 23, and Job iii. 12. An
expression, denoting properly, it seems, recognition and acceptance by
the father, and metaphorically adoption by another: and originating,
it is probable, in the custom, once widely diffused over the world,
and still, it is stated, common in many parts of Germany, of the
mother being actually delivered of her child upon the father's knees, —
the latter, by so receiving it, owning it symbolically as his legitimate
offspring (see Stade, ZATW. 1886, p. 148, in a discussion of this
expression).
may be builded up from her. See on xvi. 2.
6. judged me. And (as is implied) given me my due. A common
usage : see e.g. Ps. xxvi. 1, xliii. 1.
heard my voice. As Ps. xviii. 6, al.
8. With mighty wrestlings. The lit. rendering (see marg.) being
interpreted in accordance with the principle explained on xxiii. 6.
Others, however, explain 'with wiestlings for God,' i.e. 'to win his
favour and blessing' (Tuch, Del., Dillm., Gunkel).
9 — 13. Zilpah, Leah's female slave (xxix. 24), bears Gad and
Asher.
11. The Heb. text has "J^? ' With fortune !' (lxx. Iv n^xv) = ' For-
tunate!' The Massorites direct the Heb. letters to be read as though
they were two words t?! ^? ' Fortune is come' (so Targg. and Pesh.) ;
the general sense remaining the same. Gad is the name of an old
Semitic god of fortune, mentioned particularly in iVramaic inscriptions
from Hauran and Palmyra, and also once in the OT. (Is. Ixv. 1 1 RV.) :
XXX. II-I6] TIIE BOOK OF GENESIS 275
^Gad. 12 And Zilpah Leah's handmaid bare Jacob a second son. J
13 And Leah said, ^Happy am I! for the daugliters will ^call me
happy : and she called his name Asher. 14 And Reuben went
in the days of wheat harvest, and found ^mandrakes in the field,
and brought them unto his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to
Leah, Give me, I pray thee, of thy son's mandrakes. 15 And
she said unto her. Is it a small matter that thou hast taken
away my husband? and wouldest thou take away my son's
mandi'akes also ? And Rachel said. Therefore he shall lie with
thee to-night for thy son's mandrakes. 16 And Jacob came
from the field in the evening, and Leah went out to meet him,
^ That is, Fortune. ^ Heb. With my happiness ! ' Heb. asher, to
call happy. * Or, love-apples
the name is also preserved in Baal-gad, the name of a place at the
foot of Hermon (Josh. xi. 17, al.), and Migdal-gad, 'tower of Gad,' in
Judah {ib. xv. 37). In Syriac the word has rfuiik to be a mere appella-
tive, fortune.
13. call me happy. For the word, see Pr. xxxi. 28; Cant. vi. 9
(Heb.); .Tob xxix. 11 (Heb.V, Ps. Ixxii. 17 (RV.).
14—21 Leah bears Is^achar and Zebulun. and a daughter, Dinah.
14. Reuben. To be pictured here as a child of 7 or 8.
mandrakes. The mandrake (Gk. fiav8pay6pa<s) is a plant (cf Tris-
tram, jV/JB. 466—8; Thomson, L. and B. ii. 240 f) of the same
family (Soktnaceai) as the potato, growing flat on the ground; its
leaves present generally the appearance of a large primrose ; and ' the
fruit is of the size of a large plum, quite round, yeLow, and full of
soft pulp.' Both the fruit and the roots appear (see Tuch's note) to
have stimulating qualities : Greek writers speak of a decoction from
the roots being used as a love philtre ; and the fruit is still considered
in the East to possess aphrodisiac properties, and to promote con-
ception. These facts explain Rachel's anxiet}' to obtain some of those
which the child Reuben had gathered. The Heb. name is akin to the
Heb. word for (sexual) 'love' (Ez. xvi. 8); and RVm. is thus a good
explanatory comment on the little-known 'mandrake.' The fruit is
ripe in May (Tristram, I.e.), which is just the time of 'wheat-harvest'
in the East.
15. taken away. In so far, viz., as Jacob was fonder of Rachel
than of Leah.
And liadiel said &c. Rachel was content that her sister should
have a chance of another son, if only she could secure some of the
love-apples for herself
16. Leah says that she has 'hired' Jacob with the love-apples
which she has given Rachel. The words are evidently intended as an
explanation of the name ' Issachar.'
18—2
276 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxx 16-74
and said, Thou must come in unto me ; for I have surely hired J
thee with my son's mandrakes. And he lay with her that night. |
17 And God hearkened unto Leah, and she conceived, and E
bare Jacob a fifth son. 18 And Leah said, God hath given me
my ^hire, because I gave my handmaid to my husband : and she
called his name Issachar. 19 And Leah conceived again, and
bare a sixth son to Jacob. 20 And Leah said, God hath
endowed me with a good dowry ; | now will my husband ^ dwell J
with me, because I have borne him six sons : | and she called E
his name Zebulun. 21 And afterwards she bare a daughter,
and called her name Dinah. 22 And God remembered Rachel,
and God hearkened to her, and opened her womb. 23 And she
conceived, and bare a son : and said, God hath taken away my
reproach : | 24 and she called his name Joseph, saying, The J
Lord ^add to me another son.
1 Heb. sachar. ' Heb. tubal, he dwelt. ' Heb. Joseph.
18. Leah says here that Issachar is the ' hire,' or payment, which
she has received in return for havini,' given Jacob her maid, Zilpah, —
obviously a second explanation of 'Issachar' (sdchdr = 'hire,' v. 32, or
'payment,' Jon. i. 3).
20. Two explanations of 'Zebulun,'
endowed me with a good dowry. Neither the verb nor the (cognate)
subst. occurs elsewhere in the OT. (except in proper names, as Jozabad,
Zebediah, Zabdi — Zehedee) : the subst. (zebed) occurs in Syriac, of
the present given to the bride b}- her father.
dwell. Zdbal occurs only here; but this is the traditional ex-
planation of it (Aq., Targ., Jerome: cf Pesh. 'wiU adhere to me')^
It expresses the second etjTnology of 'Zebulun.'
21. Dinah. The writer offers no explanation of this name,
though it might naturally be interpreted as signifying judgement
(cf 'Dan').
22 — 24. Rachel's long-deferred hopes are at length accomplished ;
and she bears a son, Joseph.
22. remembered. Cf 1 S. i. 19.
23. 24. Two explanations of 'Joseph,' one (E: notice God) from
'dsaph, to take away ; and the other (J : notice Jehovah) from ydsaph,
to add.
23. my reproach. Cf Luke i. 25.
1 Some Assyriologists (but not Mr Ball) have advocated lately the rend, will
exalt or honour (see Lex., p. 259'' ; EncB. iv. 5386). It is true, zdhal is not known
to occur in the other Semitic languages with the meaning dwell: but Heb. has
other roots peculiar to itself; the Ass. zabdlu means commonly to carry, bring (e.g.
bricks), and the evidence that it means also to lift up, or exalt, seems at present to
be questionable.
XXX. i5-3i] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 277
XXX. 25—43.
How Lahan concludes a new agreement loith Jacob, and
how Jacob circumvents it.
Jacob, having uow been in Laban's service for 14 years (xxix. 20, 30), craves
permission to return home to his father. Laban, reluctant to part with a
servant, who, as he admits {v. 27''), has served him well, invites him, with a
show of liberality, to name the terms on which he will continue in his service.
Jacob thereupon proposes an arrangement, by which, ostensibly, he will gain
Httle or nothing, and with which, therefore, Laban immediately closes {w. 25 —
34), but which, it soon appears, his son-in-law knows how to turn to his own
advantage {w. 35—43).
25 And it came to pass, when Rachel had borne Joseph, that J
Jacob said unto Laban, Send me away, that I may go unto mine
own place, and to my country. 26 Give me my wives and my
children for whom I have served thee, and let me go : for thou
knowest my service wherewith I have served thee. 27 And
Laban said unto him, If now I have found favour in thine eyes,
tar7'y : for I have divined that the Lord hath blessed me for
thy sake. 28 And he said, Appoint me thy wages, and I wiU
give it. 29 And he said unto him, Thou knowest how I have
served thee, and how thy cattle hath fared with me. 30 For it
was little which thou hadst before I came, and it hath Mucreased
unto a multitude ; and the Lord hath blessed thee Whithersoever
I turned : and now when shall I provide for mine own house
also? 31 And he said, AVhat shall I give thee? And Jacob
said, Thou shalt not give me aught : if thou wilt do this thing
^ Heb. broken forth. ^ Heb. at my foot.
27. divined. The word found in xliv. 5, 15, and meaning properly
to observe omens : used here, it seems, in the metaph. sense of perceive
by careful observation (cf. 1 K. xx. 33, — though there RVm. is prob.
preferable).
28. Laban offers to give him whatever wages he may demand.
29. 30. Jacob does not deny that he has been useful to Laban,
but urges that it is now time for him to look to his own interests.
30. increased abundantly (l Ch. xxii. 5, 8). Cf on xxviii. 14.
whithersoever I turned. For the Heb. idiom employed (lit. 'accord-
ing to my foot,' — i.e. wherever it turned), see Job x^^ii. 11 (RV. 'at
his heels'), Is. xli. 2 (RV. 2nd marg.).
31—34. Jacob's offer to Laban: he will serve him for nothing,
if he will agree to the following arrangement: Jacob will remove from
278 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxx. 31-36
for me, I will again feed thy flock and keep it. 32 I will pass J
through all thy flock to-day, removing from thence every speckled
and spotted one, and every black one among the sheep, and the
spotted and speckled among the goats : and of such shall be my
hire. 33 So shall my righteousness answer for me hereafter,
when thou shalt come concerning my hire that is before thee :
every one that is not speckled and spotted among the goats, and
black among the sheep, that if found with me shall be counted
stolen. 34 And Laban said, Behold, I would it might be
according to thy word. 35 And he removed that day the
he-goats that were ringstraked and spotted, and all the she-
goats that were speckled and spotted, every one that had white
in it, and all the black ones among the sheep, and gave them
into the hand of his sons ; 36 and he' set thi*ee days' journey
the flocks under his charge all the animals of abnormal colour (i.e.
the parti-coloured goats, and the black sheep) ; and having done this
will take as his wages only the animals so marked, which are born
afterwards of those which remain with him. Laban, supposing that,
under the conditions proposed, these will be few or none, at once
closes with the offer.
32. every bla^k one among the sheep &c. The sheep being, as
a rule, white (Cant. iv. 2, vi. 6), while the goats (cf. v. 35) were usually
dark-coloured or black (Cant. iv. 1).
33. answer. In a forensic sense = bear witness. So Dt. xix. 18
(RV. 'testified'), 1 S. xii. 3 (RV. 'witness'); Ex. xx. 16 (lit. 'Thou
shalt not answer against thy neighbour as a false witness').
for me. Against me : i.e. there will be nothing whatever to allege
against my honesty.
concerning. Better, to view: lit. upon or over, i.e. to come (and
look) over.
every one that is not &c. I.e. all black goats, and all white sheep,
bom after this arrangement is concluded, if found in his possession,
will ipso facto be proved to have been stolen.
34. Laban, gratified at such apparently advantageous terms,
closes with them at once.
35. 36, Laban, for greater security, removes all the animals of
abnormal colour (the parti-coloured goats, and the black sheep) from
the flocks himself ; and, as an additional precaution, places three days'
journey between them and the normally coloured animals (black goats
and white sheep) left with Jacob.
35. ringstraked. I.e. streaked (as we should now say : so v. 37
streaks for strakes) with rings, — though there is no philological reason
for limiting the ' streaks' to such as were ring-shaped.
XXX. 36-4i] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 279
betwixt himself and Jacob : and Jacob fed the rest of Laban's J
flocks. 37 And Jacob took him rods of fresh ^poplar, and of the
ahnond and of the plane tree ; and peeled white strakes in them,
and made the white appear which was in the rods. 38 And he
set the rods which he had peeled over against the flocks in the
gutters in the watering troughs where the flocks came to drink ;
and they conceived when they came to drink. 39 And the
flocks conceived before the rods, and the flocks brought forth
ringstraked, speckled, and spotted- 40 And Jacob separated
the lambs, [and set the faces of the flocks toward the ringstraked R
and all the black in the flock of Laban ;] and he put his own J
droves apart, and put them not unto Laban's flock. 41 And it
came to pass, whensoever the stronger of the flock did conceive,
* Or, storax tree
36. himself. LXX., Sam. them, i.e. his sons. As the text stands,
it must be supposed that Laban was w^'th his sons.
37 — 42. The three devices by which Jacob outwits his uncle.
(1) 37 — 39. Jacob places parti-coloured rods in front of the
ewes at the time when they conceived, so that they bore in con-
sequence parti-coloured young\
37. poplar. Heb. lihneh, also Hos. iv. 13. The Arab, luhnd, —
so called (Ges. Del.) from its exuding the milk-Vik& gum [Arab, leben,
milk] called storax, — the stor ax-tree (so LXX. here), makes RVm. very
probable (cf Poplar in DB.).
38. over against. Le. opposite to. Better, in front of.
in the gutters (Ex. ii. 16 'troughs'). In the 'wa.ter -troughs (xxiv. 20)
is in any case in apposition, and perhaps an explanatory gloss.
(2) 40. Jacob separates the spotted lambs and kids thus pro-
duced from the rest of the flock, but arranges that the latter should
nevertheless, while feeding, have them in view, so that when the ewes
conceived, there should be a further tendency to bear spotted young.
This at least appears to be the meaning of the verse as it stands;
but it is indistinctly expressed: and most modern scholars (Del.,
Dillm., &c.) consider that the words 'and set... of Laban' are a gloss,
in which case the verse will merely state that the parti-coloured
young, produced as described in vv. 37 — 39, were carefully kept apart
from those of normal colour, which Jacob was tending, and which
would of course be Laban's.
(3) 41, 42. Jacob set up the peeled rods only when the stronger
^ The physiological principle involved ia well established, and, as Bochart
shewed {Hieroz. ii. c. 49: i. p. 619 ff. , ed. Rosenm.), was known to the ancients,
and was applied, for instance, for the purpose of obtaining particular colours in
horses and dogs (Oppian, Kynegetica, i. 327 ft., 353 — 6). According to an authority
quotod by Delitzsch, cattle-breeders now, in order to secure white lambs, surround
the diinking-troughs with white objects.
280 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxx. 41-xxxL i
that Jacob laid the rods before the eyes of the flock in the J
gutters, that they might conceive among the rods ; 42 but when
the flock were feeble, he put them not in : so the feebler were
Laban's, and the stronger Jacob's. 43 And the man increased
exceedingly, and had large flocks, and maidservants and men-
servants, and camels and asses.
ewes were about to conceive; he thus secured all the strongest animals
for himself ^
43. The result of these ingenious devices was that Jacob's pos-
sessions increased (v. 30) immensely.
Chapter XXXI.
Jacob's return from Haran,
Jacob leaves Laban, taking with him his family and cattle, w. 1 — 21 ;
Labau's pursuit of Jacob, vv. 22 — 25 ; the parley between them, and mutual
recriminations, vv. 26 — 44 ; the double agreement concluded finally between
them, cc. 45 — 54; return of Laban to llarau, c. 55. — In vv. 1 — 44 the main
narrative is E, only part of ». IS being from F, and vv. 1, 3, with possibly one
or two verses besides, from J. Independently of the use of God in vv. 7, 9,
11, 16, 24, 42, and some other stylistic features, it is particularly noticeable
that the account given in this chapter of Laban's arrangement with Jacob,
and of the manner in which its consequences were evaded by Jacob, differs
ft-om that given in ch. xxx. ; in xxxi. 7 — 12, 41, Jacob says that Laban had
been in the habit of arbitrarily changing his wages, as seemed most Ukely to
benefit himself, of which there is nothing in ch. xxx. ; and further, that the
effect of the change had each time been frustrated, not (as in xxx. 37 — 42) by
his own ingenious contrivances, but by the dispositions of providence (xxxi. 8, 9):
ch. xxx. gives J's representation of the transactions, ch. xxxi. gives that of E.
It follows, from this difference between the sources of the two narratives, that
xxxi. 5', 7 — 9, 12, 24, 29 does not express, or imply, Divine approval of the
artifices described in xxx. 31 — 42. On vv. 45 — 54, see p. 287.
XXXI. 1 And he heard the words of Laban's sons, saying, j
Jacob hath taken away all that was our father's, and of
that which was our father's hath he gotten all this ^glory. |
^ Or, wealth
XXXI. 1 — 3. The reasons which decided Jacob to leave Laban
1. The unfriendly remarks of Laban's sons (.xxx. 35).
glory. I.e. wealth: of. Is. x. 3, Ixvi. 12; Nah. ii. 9; Ps. xlix. 16.
1 Symm. , for strong and feeble, has, respectively, wpwifw. and oxpifui (whence
Vulg. privw tempore and serotina; similarly Onk.); and the paraphrase ia very
probably a correct one; the stronger ewes lambing in winter, and the weaker in
spring (Colum. RR. vu. 3; Varro, RR. ii. 2 § 13; Pliny, HN. viii. § 187).
XXXI. 2-13] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 281
2 And Jacob beheld the countenance of Laban, and, behold, it was E
not toward him as beforetime. | 3 And the Lord said unto Jacob, j
Return unto the land of thy fathers, and to thy kindred ; and I
will be with thee. | 4 And Jacob sent and called Rachel and E
Leah to the field unto his flock, 5 and said unto them, I see your
father's countenance, that it is not toward me as beforetime ;
but the God of my father hath been with me. 6 And ye know
that with all my power I have served your father, 7 And your
father hath deceived me, and changed my wages ten times ; but
God suffered him not to hurt me. 8 If he said thus, The
speckled shall be thy wages ; then all the flock bare speckled :
and if he said thus. The ringstraked shall be thy wages ; then
bare all the flock ringstraked. 9 Thus God hath taken away the
cattle of your father, and given them to me. 10 And it came to
pass at the time that the flock conceived, that I lifted up mine
eyes, and saw in a dream, and, behold, the he-goats which leaped
upon the flock were ringstraked, speckled, and grisled. 11 And
the angel of God said unto me in the dream, Jacob : and I said,
Here am I. 12 And he said, Lift up now thine eyes, and see,
aU the he-goats which leap upon the flock are ringstraked,
speckled, and grisled : for I have seen all that Laban doeth
unto thee, 13 I am the God of Beth-el, where thou anointedst
2, The dissatisfaction visible in Laban's face (cf. v. 5),
3. The consciousness that Jehovah sanctions his departure.
4 — 13. Jacob explains his position to his wives.
6. They themselves (the pron. ye is emphatic) can testify that he
has served Laban well (cf. xxx. 26'', 29).
7 — 9. Laban's ingratitude. He repeatedly changed Jacob's wages,
in the hope of serving his own ends; but each time the flocks bore
young just of the kind of which his wages were to be: the increase
of his wealth had thus been by God's appointment. The tenses in
V. 8 are aU frequentative, and describe what happened habitually. The
verses, it is evident (cf the remarks above), give a different repre-
sentation of the course of events from xxx. 32 — 42.
7. deceived. Lit. mocked ; viz. by taking advantage of me ( Jer. ix. 5).
10 — 12. Jacob had learnt by a dream that the birth of the parti-
coloured young was by God's appointment in compensation {v. 12 end)
for Laban's treatment of him.
10. grisled. Patched (i.e. black, with patches of white) — perhaps
meaning properly hail-marked, spotted as if by hail: sou 12; Zech.
vi. 3, 6 (of horses). Nearly the same word is used similarly in Syriac.
' Grisled' (now spelt grizzled) means grey (Fr. gris).
282 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxi. la-rg
a pillar, where thou vowedst a vow unto me : now arise, get B
thee out from this land, and return unto the land of thy nativity.
14 And Rachel and Leah answered and said unto him, Is there
yet any portion or inheritance for us in our father's house?
15 Are we not counted of him strangers? for he hath sold us,
and hath also quite devoured ^our money. 16 For all the
riches which God hath taken away from our father, that is ours
and our children's : now then, whatsoever God hath said unto
thee, do. 17 Then Jacob rose up, and set his sons and his wives
upon the camels ; 18 and he carried away all his cattle, | and all P
his substance which he had gathered, the cattle of his getting,
which he had gathered in Paddan-aram, for to go to Isaac his
father unto the land of Canaan. | 19 Now Laban was gone to E
^ Or, the price paid for u$
13. God identifies Himself with the God whom Jacob had seen at
Bethel (xxviii. 18, 20 — 22), and bids him return to Canaan. The verse
coheres badly with iw. 10, 12; for vt>. 10, 12 clearly describe some-
thing which happened in the past, whereas v. 13 as clearly describes
something belonging to the present occasion (cf. v. 3). It may be that
originally vv. 10, 12 stood in E in a different connexion, and that v. 13
was the immediate sequel to u 11 (with 'a dream,' — i.e. a recent
dream, — for 'the dream,' as the Heb. equally permits).
14—16. His wives consent : their father has behaved towards them
unnaturally, and treated them as aliens.
14. Is there yet &c. They have nothing more to expect from their
father, — in addition viz. to what they may have received from him at the
time of their marriage. Or the Heb. may be rendered, Have we still
any portion or in/ieritance in &c. ? in wliich case the words will be an
expression of emphatic repudiation : cf. 2 S. xx. 1 ; 1 K. xii. 16.
15. strangers. Foreigners, or aliens: cf. on xvii. 12.
sold us. See xxix. 20, 27. The word is however used here with
some bitterness, impl3dug that Laban no longer owns even the ties of
relationship.
our money. Or, our price (Ex. xxi. 35 Heb.), i.e. the price received
for us, the gains accruing to him from Jacob's fourteen years' service,
some part of which he would, if generous, have naturally allowed his
daughters.
16. t/iat is ours &c. There is consequently no reason why we
should not go with thee.
17—21. Jacob's flight.
18, Notice, in the second part of the verse, the marks of P's style :
'substance' and 'gathered' (xii. 5, xxxvi. 6), 'getting' (xxxvi. 6), and
'Paddan-aram' (xxv. 20).
19. Sheep-shearing was an occasion for some festivity (1 S. xxv.
XXXI. 19-24] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 283
shear his sheep : and Rachel stole the ^ teraphim that were her E
father's. 20 And Jacob ^ stole away unawares to Laban the
Syrian, in that he told him not that he fled 21 So he fled with
all that he had ; and he rose up, and passed over ^the River,
and set his face toward the mountain of Gilead.
22 And it was told Laban on the third day that Jacob was
fled. 23 And he took his brethren with him, and pursued after
him seven days' journey ; and he overtook him in the mountain
of Gilead. 24 And God came to Laban the Syrian in a dream
^ See w. 30, 34, Judg. xvii. 5, 1 Sam. xix. 13, and Hos. iii. 4. " Heb. stole
the heart of Laban the Aramean. ' That is, the Euphrates.
2, 8, 11 ; 2 S. xiii. 23), and might naturally, if the flocks were large,
last for several days.
teraphim. Images, with at least a head resembling that of a man
(1 S. xix. 13, 16), which were venerated by the less spiritual Hebrews,
apparently as a kind of household god, or Penates (cf 1 S. I.e., and
the concern of Laban here at their loss), and were likewise consulted
for the purpose of obtaining oracles (Zech. x. 2, and esp. Ez. xxi. 21):
the regard in which they were popularly held is apparent also from the
narrative of Jud. xvii. 5, xviii. 14 — 20, and from Hos. iii. 4. The etymo-
logy of the name is obscure. Rachel, by taking her father's teraphim,
hoped, it may be supposed, to carry with her into Canaan the good
fortune of her paternal home (Ewald).
20. Jacob duped Lahan: lit. stole LahavbS heart (i.e. his under-
standing: Hos. vii. 11 RVm. ; Jer. v. 21 RVm.) : so v. 26, 2 S. xv. 6.
Cf. Kkkirrf-iv v6ov\ and (i;. 27) KKiimw Tiva.
21. the River. I.e. the Euphrates, ' the river,' /car l^ox>iv, to the
Hebrews (cf on xv. 18); in RV., when this is the meaning, the word
being printed with a capital R (e.g. Jos. xxiv. 2; 1 K. iv. 21, 24; Is.
viii. 7, xi. 15 ; Ps. Ixxii. 8). Haran was N. of the Euphrates (on xi. 311
mountain of Gilead. Or, hill country of Gilead (as Dt. iii. 12).
Gilead was the rough and rugged, but finely- wooded and picturesque
region on the E. of Jordan, extending from the Yarmuk (a little S. of
the Sea of Gennesareth) on the N., to the vale of Heshbon (a little
N. of the Dead Sea) on the S., and divided into two parts, or 'iialves'
(d. Dt. iii. 12 ; Jos. xii. 2, 5, xiii. 31), by the deep gorge of the Jabbok
(now the Zerkd : see on xxxii. 22).
22 — 25. Laban pursues Jacob, and overtakes him in Gilead.
22. 23. The distance from Haran to Giiead, — some 350 miles, —
is much more than a seven-days' march, or even, for a party like
Jacob's, travelling with flocks, than a ten-days' march. No doubt the
narrator 'underestimated the required time' (Carpenter).
23. brethren. I.e. kinsfolk; so vv. 25, 32, 37, 46, 54. Cf xiii. 8.
24. Laban, the night before {v. 42 end) he overtakes Jacob, ' as if
an evil conscience preyed secretly upon him' (Ewald, Hist. i. 356), is
warned in a dream (cf. xx. 3) not to do him any harm.
284 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxi. .4-30
of the night, and said unto him, Take heed to thyself that thou E
speak not to Jacob either good or bad. 25 And Laban came up
Avith Jacob. Now Jacob had pitched his tent in the mountain :
and Laban with his brethren pitched in the mountain of Gilead.
26 And Laban said to Jacob, What hast thou done, that thou
hast stolen away unawares to me, and carried away my daughters
as captives of the sword ? 27 Wherefore didst thou flee secretly,
and ^ steal away from me ; and didst not tell me, that I might
have sent thee away with mirth and with songs, with tabret and
with harp ; 28 and hast not suffered me to kiss my sons and my
daughters ? now hast thou done foolishly. 29 It is in the power
of my hand to do you hurt : but the God of your father spake
unto me yesternight, saying. Take heed to thyself that thou
speak not to Jacob either good or bad. 30 And now, though
thou wouldest needs be gone, because thou sore longedst after
^ Heb. didst steal me.
either good or had. See on xxiv. 50.
25. in the mountain. I.e. (see v. 23) the mountain of Gilead,
though the sequel seems to require a different one, the name of which
has accidentally fallen out: 'Jacob had pitched in the mountain [of
]; and Laban pitched in the mountain of Gilead.' What name
this may have been is, of course, uncertain, though ' Mizpah' (cf v. 49)
has been suggested.
It is evident that in this verse, whatever may be the case in v. 21,
some special 'mountain' in Gilead is intended. The name Jebel Jil'dd
attaches at present to a lofty part of the range, about 8 miles S. of
the Jabbok, from the summit of which, Jebel 'Oshd, there is a fine
view towards both Damascus and the West (Conder, Heth and Moab,
186 — 8); but this cannot be meant here, for Jacob does not cross the
Jabbok till xxxii. 23. In all probability, some locality on the NE. of
Jebel 'Ajlun is intended : cf. on v. 49.
26 — 30. Laban, with true Oriental dissimulation (cf w. 14, 15),
indignantly reproaches Jacob with having stolen away with his
daughters, as though they were captives taken in war, and without
having given him an opportunity of dismissing them with a parting
feast, and other natural marks of affection: still, under the circum-
stances {w. 29, 30'), he will let this pass ; but why has he stolen his
teraphim ?
28. sons. I.e. grandsons: cf. v. 43 Heb. ('children'), xxix. 5,
29. to do you hurt. It may be inferred therefore that Laban's
party was more numerous than Jacob's.
0/ your father. Isaac. Jacob's ancestral God is contrasted im-
plicitly with the god of Laban (cf v. 42, and esp. v. 53).
30. And now thou art gone, because thou sore longest &c. Jacob
XXXI. 30-37] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 285
thy father's house, yet wherefore hast thou stolen my gods ? E
31 And Jacob answered and said to Laban, Because I was
afraid : for I said, Lest thou shouldest take thy daughters from
me by force. 32 With whomsoever thou findest thy gods, he
shaU not live : before our brethren discern thou what is thine
with me, and take it to thee. For Jacob knew not that Rachel
had stolen them. 33 And Laban went into Jacob's tent, and
into Leah's tent, and into the tent of the two maidservants ;
but he found them not. And he went out of Leah's tent, and
entered into Rachel's tent. 34 Now Rachel had taken the
teraphim, and put them in the camel'd furniture, and sat upon
them. And Laban felt about all the tent, but found them not.
35 And she said to her father, Let not my lord be angry that I
cannot rise up before thee ; for the manner of women is upon
me. And he searched, but found not the teraphim. 36 And
Jacob was wroth, and chode with Laban J and Jacob answered
and said to Laban, What is my trespass? what is my sin, that
thou hast hotly pursued after me ? 37 Whereas thou hast felt
is gone; and his departure may be excused on account of his anxiety
to return home : so Laban, esp. after the Divine warning (v. 29), will
say no more about that ; but he cannot pass so lightly over the theft
of his gods.
31 — 35. In reply to the first charge, Jacob was afraid, he says,
lest, if he told him, he would retain his daughters by force; in reply
to the second, in regard to which he knows himself to be innocent, he
boldly challenges Laban to find the teraphim. Thereupon Laban, who
had before (xxix. 23) outwitted Jacob, is in his turn outwitted by his
own daughter.
34. furnitwe. Saddle-litter or howdah\ — a crated frame, with
cushions and carpets inside, and protected by an awning above, fastened
to the camel's saddle, such as is still often used by women travelling
in the East (Burckhardt, Bedouins, n. 85 ; Doughty, Arab. Deserta, i.
437, n. 304).
36 — 42. Jacob, emboldened by Laban's failure to establish his
charge, now indignantly retorts upon his father-in-law: so far from
having misappropriated anything of Laban's belongings, he has on
the contrary for 20 years spent himself unsparingly in his service ; and
yet, had not Providence interposed on his behalf, Laban would have
sent him away a beggar.
37. Jacob views the accusation about the teraphim as a pretext
for searching his goods.
^ The Arab, kur is explained by this Urdu word in a gloss on Tarafa, 1. 39.
286 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxi. 37-43
about all my stuff, what hast thou found of all thy household E
stuff? Set it here before my brethren and thy brethren, that
they may judge betwixt us two. 38 This twenty years have I
been with thee ; thy ewes and thy she-goats have not cast their
young, and the rams of thy flocks have I not eaten. 39 That
which was torn of beasts I brought not unto thee ; I bare the
loss of it ; of my hand didst thou require it, whether stolen by
day or stolen by night. 40 Thus I was ; in the day the drought
consumed me, and the frost by night ; and my sleep fled from
mine eyes. 41 These twenty years have I been in thy house ;
I served thee fourteen years for thy two daughters, and six
years for thy flock : and thou hast changed my wages ten times.
42 Except the God of my father, the God of Abraham, and the
Fear of Isaac, had been with me, surely now hadst thou sent me
away empty. God hath seen mine afliiction and the labour of
my hands, and rebuked thee yesternight. 43 And Laban
answered and said unto Jacob, The daughters are my daughters,
39. / brought not unto thee. As proof, viz., of what had happened,
in which case the shepherd was not usually held responsible (of. Ex.
xxii. 13). But Laban had been an exceptionally exacting master.
40. Cf. Jer xxxvi. 30. In the East the absence of clouds so
promotes the radiation of heat from the earth that, even when the
days are hot, the nights are sometimes very cold (cf. HG. 71).
41. / sermd thee &c. Cf. Hos. xii. 12 f. (where the flight and
hardships undergone by Jacob are contrasted [read But for And in
v. 13*] with the deliverance of his descendants under the honourable
guidance of a prophet) '.
42. tJw Fear of Isaac. I.e. the object of Isaac's fear : so v. 53.
The title is apparently an archaic one; the word 'fear' does not occur
elsewhere in this sense (Is. viii. 13, the Heb. word is different).
with me. On my side (Ps. cxxiv. 1, 2): Ut./or me (Ps. Ivi. 9).
43. 44. Unable to reply, Laban seeks to close the dispute by pro-
posing a treaty of friendship.
43. He feigns solicitude for his daughters' welfare: aU Jacob's
belongings, he says, are, in a sense, his ; and yet what can I do this
day for these my daughters, or for their children t he must part with
them, and does not know how they will be treated.
• The 20 years of this yerse are manifestly the same as the 20 years of v. 38.
The strange view adopted in the Speakers Commentary, p. 178, and at the end of
Genesis in Bp Ellicott's Commentary, that they are different (so that Jacob's stay in
Haran is extended to 40 years) is quite out of the question: nT--n* would mean
one... another only in contiguous and contrasted sentences [Le.v. p. 260'' lb; for
the use here, 261'' 4i). It is an additional improbability that the 20 years of v. 38
are, upon the proposed scheme, interpolated between the 14 and the 6 of v. 41.
xxxi. 43-47] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 287
and the children are my children, and the flocks are my flocks, E
and all that thou seest is mine : and what can I do this day
unto these my daughters, or unto their children which they have
borne ? 44 And now come, let us make a covenant, I and thou ;
and let it be for a witness between me and thee.
45 — 54. The treaty between Laban and Jacob. Two distinct agreements
are entered into by Laban and Jacob : (1) ev. 46 — 50, that Jacob will in no way
ill-treat Labau's daughters ; (2) vv. 51 — 53, that neither Laban nor Jacob will
pass the heap of stones thrown up as a landmark, with hostile purpose, towards
the other : at the same time, an explanation is given of the names Gilecul, and
Mizpah. The narrative is clearly composite ; for, if examined closely, it will
be seen to be confused, and also to contain doublets. Thus v. 46* is parallel to
V. 54, V. 47'' to V. 48\ V. 48* to vv. 61, 52* ; v. 49 comes in abruptly ; the ' heap'
and the 'pillar' are mentioned very unsymmetrically in vv. 51, 52; Jacob
makes both in vv. 45, 46, but in v. 51 Laban says that he has made them.
No doubt the incident was narrated by both J and E, with probably slight
differences of detail ; extracts from both have been combined by the redactor,
but either imperfectly adjusted by him, or (more probably) confused by the
introduction of later glosses. Quite apart from the question of the analysis,
the narrative would gain greatly in clearness, if it might be supposed (with
Dillm.) that Jacob in v. 45 was an old error for Lahan^ (sea v. 51 ) ; and that the
words bracketed in vv. 51, 52 were glosses. We may then refer vv. 45, 51 — 54
to E, and vv. 46 — 50 to J,
45 And [Jacob] took a stone, and set it up for a pillar. E
I 46 And Jacob said unto his brethren. Gather stones ; and they J
took stones, and made an heap : and they did eat there by the
heap. 47 And Laban called it ^egar-sahadutha : but Jacob
^ That is, The heap of witness, in Aramaic.
45, Jacob, — or perhaps originally (see v. b\) Lahan, — sets up a
large boulder (of. xxviii, 18), as a ' standing-stone,' or pillar,
46 — 50, The first agreement (J) ; viz, that Jacob will not ill-treat
Laban's daughters. Of this agreement the he^j), constructed by Jacob's
men, is the witness,
46, brethren. See on v. 23.
eat. As a mark of friendship, — or perhaps even, as in v. 54, as part
of a sacrificial meal. To eat bread together is still among the Arabs
a mark of friendship, or of the termination of a feud,
47, An explanation of the name Gilead, as though it were derived
from the cairn of stones thrown up on the present occasion *,
^ The original text may have had simply npM ('and he took,' viz. Laban), to
which a scribe supplied the wrong subject 3py\
* In reality, to judge from Arabic, 'Gilead' will have meant hard, strong, the
district being so called on account of the 'hard, impervious Dolomitio limestone,
which appears in the rugged grey hills round the Jabbok, and in Jebel 'AjUin,
rising on an average 1500ft. above the sandstone' (Conder, in Smith, DB.-i. 1191*).
288 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxi. 47-51
called it ^GaleecL 48 And Laban said, This heap is witness J"
between me and thee this day. Therefore was the name of it
called Galeed : 49 and ^Mizpah, for he said, The Lord watch
between me and thee, when we are ^absent one from another.
50 If thou shalt afflict my daughters, and if thou shalt take
wives beside my daughters, no man is with us ; see, God is
witness betwixt me and thee. | 51 And Laban said to Jacob, E
* That is, The heap of witness, in Hebrew. " That is, The watch-tower.
^ Heb. hidden.
Laban is called the 'Syrian' (Heb. the 'Aramaean') in vv. 20, 24:
and he and Jacob seem to represent here the later Syrians and Israelites
respectively, whose territories met on the NE. border of Gilead, and
who spoke two distinct languages. Yegar occurs in both Targ. and
Pesh. ; e.g. for the same Heb. word gal as here, in Hos. xii. 12 Targ.,
and Jos. vii. 26 Pesh. For sahadutha, ' witness,' see, for instance, Ex.
XX. 16 Targ. and Pesh.
48. This heap is witness. Cf. Jos. xxii. 34 ; also ch. xxi. 30. Even
now in the East a heap of stones may be piled up as a witness to a vow
(Curtiss, Primitive Semitic Religion To-day, 1902, p. 80).
49. and Mizpah. The name comes in abruptly ; and it has been
supposed either that the whole verse is a gloss, introduced by one who
wished to connect the Mizpah of Jud. x. 17, xi. 11, 34 with the present
incident, or that some words have accidentally fallen out before it. The
intention of the notice is manifestly to account for the name of a place
called 'Mizpah' ('outlook-point,' 'watch-post,' — not necessarily 'watch-
tower'). 'Mizpah' was, however, a name borne by many eminences,
or places situated on them^; and what Mizpah is intended here, is
uncertain. We seem, however, to desiderate a locality on the NE,
border of Gilead; and the terms of the verse point not so much to
a town or village, as to some prominent height with a cairn of stones
and tall boulder upon it.
watch between me and thee. And interpose, it is to be understood,
if either, when we are absent from each other, attempts to take any
advantage of the other. The passage is often misunderstood; the
prayer is not that Jehovah may watch, as between friends separated
from one another, but as between persons whose feelings towards each
other are such that either might at any moment be tempted to some
unfriendly act,
50. afflict. Or, ill-treat Txvi. 6), as Jacob might have done in
revenge for their father's behaviour towards him.
no man is &c. No man being vnth lis, to see what we do, and
bring us to account. The apodosis follows in see, God is witness.
51 — 53, The second agreement (E) ; viz. that neither Laban nor
Jacob will pass the heap of stones, with hostile purpose towards the
1 Jud. X. 17, xi. 11, 34; Hos. v. 1; also 'Mizpeh' Josh. xiii. 26; Jud. xi. 29:
but the sites of all these are either uncertain or unsuitable.
XXXI. 51-55] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 289
[Behold this heap, and] behold the pillar, which I have set E
betwixt me and thee. 62 [This heap be witness, and] the pillar
be witness, that I will not pass over this heap to thee, and that
thou shalt not pass over this heap [and this pillar] unto me, for
harm. 53 The God of Abraham, and the God of Nahor, the
^God of their father, judge betwixt us. And Jacob sware by the
Fear of his father Isaac. 54 And Jacob offered a sacrifice in the
mountain, and called his brethren to eat bread : and they did eat
bread, and tarried all night in the mountain. 55 And early in tlie [Ch. xxxii.
morning Laban rose up, and kissed his sons and his daughters, and ^ ^^ ^^^'
blessed them : and Laban departed, and returned unto his place.
^ Or, gods
other. Of this agreement (if the view taken above of the original
text of this verse is correct), the pillar is the witness.
51. set. Thrown (up). The verb (nn^) means to throw or cast
(Ex. XV. 4; Jos. xviii. 6), and is applicable to a foundation-stone (Job
xxxviii. 6 'laid'), but hardly to a 'pillar.' Unless in the original text
of the verse it referred somehow to the ' heap,' it seems that we must
(^vith Mr Ball) read set up, as in v. 45 (*noin for 'nn'').
53. In the Heb. the verb 'judge' is plural. Abraham represents
the Hebrews, and his brother Nahor (see xxii. 20 — 24) the Aramaean
tribes settled on the NE. of Canaan, among whom Laban and Rebekah
hold the most prominent place : the Gods of the two brother-races
are thus, it seems, treated as distinct (cf v. 29 ; and esp. Jos. xxiv. 2
(also E), where it is said that Abraham's relations across the Euphrates
' served ot//er gods'), and appealed to separately. The intention of the
words, 'the God of their father' (i.e. of Terah, xi. 27), appears to be
to identify the two deities: they are not however in the LXX.j and
most modern scholars (Del., Dillm., &c.) consider them to be a gloss,
added by a later hand for the purpose of softening a polytheistic trait
by subsuming the God of Abraham and the God (or gods) of Nahor
under a higher unity.
54. The sacrifice seals the compact. The meal is the sacrificial
one ; for the sacrifice here meant would be of the nature of the later
'peace '-offering, an essential part of which was the accompanying
meal (Lev. vii. 15; Dt. xii. 7, 18, xxvii. 7), in which the worshipper
and his friends partook, and which was a S)Tnbol partly of amity
among themselves, partly of communion with the deity. Here it is
a token of friendship between Laban and Jacob. For other cases
in which 'eating' (sometimes accompanied b)'^ 'drinking') is to be
understood in a sacrificial sense, see Ex. xviii. 12, xxiv. 11, xxxii. 6,
xxxiv. 15 (in the worship of heathen gods: so Num. xxv. 2; Ps. cvi.
28); 1 S. ix. 13; Ps. xxii. 26, 29.
55. sons. I.e. grandsons, as v. 28.
D. 19
290 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
Gilead was the debatable borderland between Hebrew and Aramaean
tribes. The Syrian wars, protracted through the reigns of Ahab, Jehoram,
Jehu, and Jehoahaz, and conducted sometimes with great barbarity (cf. 2 K.
viii. 12, X. 33 ; Am. 1. 3) lasted from c. 880 to c. 800 B.O. ; and at times the
Aramaeans of Damascus had complete possession of Gilead (1 K. xxii. 3 flF.).
The present narrative seems to describe something more than a mere agi*ee-
ment between two individuals : the representative ancestors of the Israelites
and Syrians respectively seem to be regarded in it as fixing the border between
the territories occupied aftei-wards by their descendants, which during the
period of the Syrian wars was matter of bloody dispute between them.
Though we cannot (cf. on v. 49) determine its site more precisely, there must,
it seems, have been on some eminence in the N. * half of Gilead, — probably on
the N E. edge of the Jebel 'Ajlun, — a cairn of stones, with a single boulder
standing up prominently beside it^, 'in which later generations saw a memorial
of tlie pact that had been sworn between Jacob and his father-in-law' (Sayce,
EHH. 72). The same height bore the name of Mizpah : it was an 'outlook-
point,' which commanded the broad plain of Hauran, and from it the Israelite
dwellers in Gilead could discern the appi-oach of a foe from the direction
of Damascus. It may be remarked that rude stone monuments — dolmens,
circles, cairns, &c. — are abundant still in the country B. of Jordan {Heth and
Moah, chap. vii.).
'The character of Laban is not attractive. His sister and daughters all
shew duplicity and acquisitiveness ; and Laban displays an exaggeration of the
same qualities. His leading motive is evidently self-interest ; and he is not
particular in the choice of means for securing his ends. The ruse by which he
passes oflF Leah upon his nephew instead of Rachel, is an unpardonable piece
of deceit. In his subsequent dealings with his son-in-law, he does not treat
him equitably. It is admitted by him expressly in J (xxx. 27), and by impli-
cation iu E, — for the statements in xxxi. 38 — 41, cf. v. 6, pass unchallenged, —
that Jacob is a good servant ; but Laban seeks to make out of him more than
fair profits. In xxx. 29 — 42 he betrays his grasping disposition by closing with
an arrangement which, if carried out fairly, could not but have proved an
inequitable one for Jacob, and in which, therefore, Laban had no right to be
surprised if he found himself circumvented. In the narrative of E (xxxi. 1 — 42)
— which, as remarked above (p. 280), differs {vv. 8—12) from that of J in not
representing Jacob as taking any unfair advantage of his father-in-law — Laban
is charged with defrauding Jacob, and arbitrarily changing the wages that had
been agreed upon, to suit his own ends {vv. 7, 41). And his daughters own
(xxxi. 14, 15) that he is a hard and unnatural parent' (from the writer's art
Laban in DB.). Laban's treatment of Jacob has naturally a bearing on
the estimate that we form of Jacob's behaviour towards Laban. Laban is
not only the first to break faith with Jacob, but is throughout the chief
ofi"ender : and had Laban treated Jacob honestly and generously, there is no
reason to suppose that he would have sought (as he does in J) to overreach
him.
1 Exactly such a boulder, at Tannur, near Gerasa, called el-Hajar el-Manmb,
•the stone set up,' is represented in a photograph in the Mitth. u. Nachr. des
ZBPV. 1900, p. 68.
xxxii. i-^J THE BOOK OF GENESIS 291
Chapter XXXII.
Jacob continues his journey to Canaan. He reaches Mahanaim ;
and makes preparations for meeting Esau, His lorestling
with the angel at Penuel.
XXXII. 1 And Jacob went on his way, and the angels of ^
God met him. 2 And Jacob said when he saw them, This is
God's host : and he called the name of that place ^Mahanaim.
3 And Jacob sent messengers before him to Esau his brother J
unto the land of Scir, the field of Edom. 4 And he commanded
them, saying, Thus shall ye say unto my lord Esau ; Thus saith
thy servant Jacob, I have sojourned with Laban, and stayed
until now : 5 and I have oxen, and asses and flocks, and
menservants and maidservants : and I have sent to tell my
lord, that I may find grace in thy sight. 6 And the messengers
^ That is, Two hosts or companies.
XXXII. 1,2. As Jacob proceeds on his journey, the ' angels of
God' meet him, — as though to remind him, once again, of the Divine
protection accompanying him (of. xxviii. 15, xxxi. 3), and to welcome
him on his return to the land of promise. From this circumstance the
name of the place Mahanaim ('double camp'; or perhaps [DB. in.
213* w.] 'place of camps') is explained.
2. God's host. God's camp, — the proper meaning of mahdneh,
and the word by which it is ordinarily rendered (e.g. Jud. vii. 1, 8, 9
RV.). Mahanaim was afterwards an important place (2 S. ii. 8, xvii.
24; 1 K, iv. 14): but its situation is not certainly known: it must
however have been N. of the Jabbok {v. 22), and within sight of the
Jordan {v. 10). A site such as that of Deir *Alld, on the great route
which still passes N. to S. along the Gh6r (or Jordan- valley), and 4 m.
N. of the ford mentioned on v. 22, would best suit the conditions of
the Biblical narrative (see G. A. Smith's large Map, and cf. p. 302).
3 — 21. Jacob's preparations for meeting Esau, whose vengeance
(xxvii. 41) he still fears.
3. In the existing text of Genesis, Esau's migration into Edom
is not mentioned till xxxvi. 6 — 8 P (see the note): J must have
pictured it as taking place earlier ; and perhaps also, in a part of his
narrative no longer preserved, narrated it.
4 — 6. Jacob, being now on the point of re-entering Canaan, and
approaching Esau's domain, sends his brother a very humble and con-
ciliatory message (notice 'my lord,' 'thy servant,' and v. 5 end),
acquainting him with what he has been doing ; but learns in reply that
he is aheady on the way to meet him with 400 men.
19—2
292 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxii. 6-11
returned to Jacob, saying, We came to thy brother Esau, and J
moreover he cometh to meet thee, and four hundred men with
him. 7 Then Jacob was greatly afraid and was distressed : and
he divided the people that was with him, and the flocks, and the
herds, and the camels, into two companies ; 8 and he said. If
Esau come to the one company, and smite it, then the company
which is left shall escape. 9 And Jacob said, 0 God of my
father Abraham, and God of my father Isaac, O Lord, which
saidst unto me, Return unto thy country, and to thy kindred,
and I will do thee good : 10 ^ I am not worthy of the least of all
the mercies, and of all the truth, which thou hast shewed unto
thy servant ; for with my staflT I passed over this Jordan ; and
now I am become two companies. 11 Deliver me, I pray thee,
from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau : for I fear
him, lest he come and smite me, the mother with the children.
^ Heb. I am less than all dx.
7, 8. Though greatly alarmed, Jacob's resourcefulness does not
desert him : he divides his party into two camps, in the hope that, in
the event of a fatal encounter, at least one might escape.
companies... company... company. Camps... camp... camp {rnor-
haneh): so v. 10 end. The words are chosen with evident allusion
to the place Mahanaim; and are pretty clearly meant as an expla-
nation of it, parallel to the one in v. 2, from the other narrator, B.
In the sequel no further reference is made to this division of Jacob's
party into two.
9 — 12. Jacob, feeling that human precautions alone are insuffi-
cient, invokes God's aid m prayer. The titles in v. 9 recall Jehovah's
gracious dealings with his forefathers: in the sequel, Jacob first re-
minds God that it was He who had bidden him return to his native
land; and afterwards pleads before him the blessings which He had
already bestowed upon him {v. 10), and the promises which He had
given him (v. 12). The prayer breathes a spirit of trustful humility
and thankfulness: but it does not, it may be observed, contain any
confession of sin, or any note of penitence for the deceit by which
Jacob had once grievously wronged his brother.
9. which saidst &c. See xxxi. 3.
do thee good. Cf Nu. x. 29, 32 (Heb.).
10. / am less than all the mercies. I.e. not worthy of so many.
The paraphrase 'the least of is not justified by the Heb.
two companies. Two camps {w. 7, 8) : so wonderfully had God
been with him, and blessed him (xxviii. 15, xxxi. 5, 7, 9, 42).
11. the mother with the children. A proverbial expression (Hos.
X. 14), denoting a merciless and cruel slaughter.
xxxiL ia-2o] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 293
12 And thou saidst, I will surely do thee good, and make thy J
seed as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered for
multitude. 13 And he lodged there that night ; and took of
that which he had with him a present for Esau his brother ;
14 two hundred she-goats and twenty he-goats, two hundred ewes
and twenty rams, 15 thirty milch camels and their colts, forty
kine and ten bulls, twenty she-asses and ten foals. 16 And he
delivered them into the hand of his servants, every drove by
itself ; and said unto his servants, Pass over before me, and put
a space betwixt drove and drove. 17 And he commanded the
foremost, saying, ^Vhen Esau my brother meeteth thee, and
asketh thee, saying, Whose art thou ? and whither goest thou ?
and whose are these before thee ? 18 then thou shalt say, Tliey
he thy servant Jacob's ; it is a present sent unto my lord Esau :
and, behold, he also is behind us. 19 And he commanded also
the second, and the third, and all that followed the droves,
saying. On this manner shall ye speak unto Esau, when ye find
him ; 20 and ye shall say. Moreover, behold, thy servant Jacob
is behind us. For he said, I will appease him with the present
that goeth before me, and afterward I will see his face; per-
12. And thou saidst &c. Viz. (implicitly) in xxviii. 14, 15, though
in phrasing the verse resembles xxii. 17 and xvi. lO**. If Jacob
and his party perish by the hand of Esau, God's promise of a numerous
posterity must of necessity remain for ever unfulfilled.
13b — 21. Jacob seeks to conciliate Esau by a present.
IS**, a present. The word used {minhah) is the one explained on
iv. 3, meaning a present intended to secure or retain the good-will of
a superior (cf, 2 K. yiii. 9). The present sent by Jacob was a sub-
stantial one, comprising no less than 580 head of cattle, and including
representatives of all the principal elements of pastoral wealth.
16 — 20. The object of the division into separate droves was to
make a favourable impression upon Esau, who as drove after drove
came up, would be at once gratified and surprised, when he learnt that
each was intended for himself.
20. appease him. Lit, cover his face, i.e. induce him, by means of
the present, to overlook the injury done to him. Cf for the figure —
though the Heb. word used is a different one — ch. xx. 16. The word used
here {kipper) is an interesting one; it is in the Levitical terminology
used of the priest cmering sin (i.e., in a fig. sense, hiding it from God)
by means of a sacrifice, being then commonly rendered by ' make
atonement' (see more fully the writer's art. Propitiation in DB.).
294 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxii. lo-.s
adventure he will accept me. 21 So the present passed over J"
before him : and lie himself lodged that night in the company.
22 And he rose up that night, and took his two wives, and
his two handmaids, and his eleven children, [and passed over the
ford of Jabbok. 23 And he took them,] and sent them over the
stream, and sent over that he had. 24 And Jacob was left
alone ; and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of
the day. 25 And when he saw that he prevailed not against
him, he touched the hollow of his thigh ; and the hollow of
accept me. Lit. lift up my face : fig. for receive favourably. So
xix. 21 and frequently. 0pp. to turn back the face of a suppliant,
1 K. ii. 16, al. Hence in lxx. and NT. Tr/aoo-cDTrov Xafjcpdv^Lv.
21. in the company. In the camp (v. 7), — viz. with his wives and
children and the main bulk of his possessions. The division into two
* camps ' of w. 7, 8 is disregarded.
22 — 32. Jacob's wrestHng with the angel at Penuel. The narrative
does not attach well to either v. 13* or v. 21''; the statement that
Jacob 'lodged that night' at a given place being hardly followed con-
sistently by the statement that he 'rose up that night' and proceeded
elsewhere. Very possibly, in the compilation of the book, something
has been omitted, containing mention of a 'night,' to which v. 22
refers. It is also hardly possible that the whole of vv. 22, 23 can be
by the same hand : for Jacob and his family having crossed the ford
in V. 22, his family is sent across again in v. 23 (the Heb. for sent over
is properly made to pass over), and v. 24 implies that he himself re-
mained behind alone. The omission of the bracketed words at least
renders the narrative much clearer.
22. the Jabbok. The Jabbok rises a few miles W. of Rahbath-
'Ammon (Philadelphia) : taking at first a NE. course, past the city, it
afterwards fetches a wide compass to the NW., tiU finally it falls into the
Jordan, just N. of the ford ed-Bdmiyeh, about 25 m. N. of the Dead Sea.
The great gorge through which, for the last 25 or 30 miles of its course,
it flows down into the Gh6r forms, as was stated above (on xxxi. 21), the
dividing line between the two ' halves' of Gilead. From the ford a little
S. of Jerash tiU it enters the Jordan- valley, the Jabbok flows swiftly
through a deep chasm, with steep and lofty sides like a cauon, its
banks fringed by tall canes and rushes. The water, seen from a dis-
tance, is of a grey-blue colour, which gives the river its present name of
the Zerka (cf HG. 583 — 5). The ford here referred to will be most
naturally the one about 3 m. E. of the Jordan, by which the route
mentioned on v. 2 still crosses the Zerka.
24. wrestled (P??*.!). The word occurs besides only in v. 25 ; and
appears to be chosen for the sake of the assonance with Yabbok, as
though this meant, or suggested the idea of, torestling.
25. So strong was Jacob (xxix. 10), and so bravely did he wrestle,
xxxii. 25-^8] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 296
Jacob's thigh was strained, as he wrestled with him. 26 And he J
said, Let me go, for the day breaketh. And he said, I will not
let thee go, except thou bless me. 27 And he said unto him,
What is thy name ? And he said, Jacob. 28 And he said. Thy
name shall be called no more Jacob, but ^Israel : for ^thou
hast 'striven with God and with men, and hast prevailed.
^ That is, He who striveth with God, or, God striveth. * The Sept. and
Vulgate have, thou hast had power with God, and thou shall prevail against men.
^ Or, had poioer with
that his antagonist could not overcome him by the means which a
wrestler would ordinarily employ; so, in order to escape before day-
light, and at the same time to shew that he was superior to Jacob, he
sprained Jacob's thigh.
the hollow &c. I.e. the socket of Jacob's thigh-bone.
26. Jacob perceives now that his antagonist is more than mortal:
so he seizes the opportunity to win a blessing for himself.
27 f The blessing takes the form of a change of name. Jacob
is to receive a name suggestive of his success in the approaching en-
counter with Esau : at the same time, as the name was to the Hebrews
the symbol or expression of the nature (cf e.g. Is. i. 26, Lxi. 3), the
change of name is significant of a change of character in the patriarch
himself: he is to be no longer 'Jacob,' the Crafty one, the Over-
reacher, he is to be 'Israel,' the Perseverer with God, who is worthy
also to prevail.
28. thou hast persevered &c. * Isra'el,' meaning properly (on the
analogy of other names similarly formed, as Ishma'el, Jerahmfi'el)
'God perseveres' (or, 'Let God persevere!') is interpreted here as
suggesting the meaning 'Perseverer with God.' Of course, as in other
similar cases (cf on iv. 1), we need not suppose the actual etymology
to be given. For the meaning, cf the Arab, shariya, to persist, or
persevere^: the same root is contained in Seraiah, 'Jah persists.'
and hast prevailed. Jacob's persevering struggle with God is just
ended : among men, he has persevered against both Laban and Esau ;
his contest with Laban had ended previously; that with Esau is not
ended yet, but ' Imst prevailed' is a word of good omen for its successful
issue. Comp. Hos. xii. 3, 4 (' In the womb he overreached his brother;
and in his strength he persevered with God : yea, he persevered with
the angel, and prevailed-, he wept and made supplication unto him'),
where the ambition shewn by Jacob to secure pre-eminence even in
the womb, and the persistence with which at Penuel he exerted himself
to secure the blessing, are held up as examples for the imitation of liis
lax and indifferent descendants.
^ Not to * strive^', this idea is peculiar to conj. iii. in Arabic (which expressea
the idea of rivalry), to persist or persevere against another. Had power (KVm.;
LXI. here and in Hos.) has no probability : Hos. xii. 4 [Heb. 5], as pointed, should
be rendered, and he ruled as 'prince (Is. xxxii. 1) ; but clearly "ib'M and he persevered
should be read, to agree with v. 3 [Heb. 4].
296 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxii. .9-
■3"-
29 Aud Jacob asked him, and said, Tell me, I pray thee, thy name. J
And he said, ^Vherefo^e is it that thou dost ask after my name ?
And he blessed him there. 30 And Jacob called the name of
the place ^Peniel : for, said he, I have seen God face to face, and
my life is preserved. 31 And the sun rose upon him as he
passed over Penuel, and he halted upon his thigh. 32 Therefore
the children of Israel eat not the sinew of the hip which is upon
the hollow of the thigh, unto this day : because he touched the
hollow of Jacob's thigh in the sinew of the hip.
1 That is, The face of God.
29. For the refusal of the name, cf. Jud. xiii. 17.
30. Explanation of the name Peniel : Jacob had seen God face
to face (Ex. xxxiii. 11; Dt. xxxiv. 10), aytd (i.e. and yet) his life had
been preserved ; for it was the current belief that no one could ' see
God, and live' (Ex. xxxiii. 20; Jud. vi. 22 f., xiii. 22; cf. Dt. iv. 33,
v. 24, 26).
Peniel (elsewhere Penuel: cf. G.-K. 90°) means Face of God. There
was however in Phoenicia, a little S. of Tripolis, a headland called
®eov TTpoo-wTTov (Strab. XVI. 2. 15 f.); so it is possible that in reality
Penuel derived its name from some physical feature presented by it.
The site is uncertain ; but it must have been near the ford mentioned
in V. 22, and a Httle E. of Jacob's next halting-place (xxxiii. 17),
Succoth (cf Jud. viii. 5, 8). Not improbably it was some projecting
ridge or height, near where the Jabbok descends from the upland into
the Jordan-valley. A site, S. of the Jabbok, near where the Gh6r
route crosses the route from es-Salt to the ford ed-DS,miyeh (see G. A.
Smith's large Map), though it can only be assigned conjecturaUy,
would satisfy the conditions of the Biblical narrative.
32. the sinew of the hip. The sciatic muscle, a powerful muscle,
passing along the thigh, injury to which occasions limping (see Ges.
Tlies.). The Israelite custom of not eating the corresponding muscle
in animals is deduced from this incident; it was regarded as sacred
through the touch of God. The custom is not mentioned elsewhere
in the OT., but its observance is enjoined in the Mishna.
The struggle at Penuel is the turning-point in Jacob's life. Jacob's
character is a mixed one : it includes inconsistent elements. On the one
hand, it is marked by trust in self, aud exceptional devotion to crooked
methods ; on the other, it has a healthy basis of perseverance and ambition,
it is not devoid of regard for God, God is represented as watching over him
with His providence, and his prayer in xxxii. 9 — 12 shews genuine religious
feeling, and a sincere sense of dependence upon Him. The story of his
wrestling shews how the higher eien^etits in his nature gained the ascendency
over the lower elements. It is a critical moment in his life. He is on the
point of re-entering the land which he left 20 years before (xxxi. 41) ; he is
XXXIII. ., i] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 297
about to meet his brother, whom he had wrougod and deceived ; memoiies
of the past crowd upon him ; his conscience smites him, and he is ' greatly
afraid.' But God is his real antagonist, not Esau ; it, is God whom his sins
have offended, and who here comes to contest His right. These thoughts and
fears are, as it were, materialized in his dream. He struggles with his
mysterious antagonist ; and he struji:gles with such persistence and effect,
that his antagonist cannot overcome him, until by a divine touch he paralyses
his natural strength. Even then Jacob's tenacity of purpose remains un-
impaired ; he is conscious that he has a heavenly visitaut in his embrace ;
and he will not let Him go till he has received from Him a blessing. His
perseverance is thus rewarded. But he only gains the blessing after his
natural self has been rendered powerless. The moment marks a great spiritual
change in Jacob's character. He feels his carnal weapons become lamed and
useless ; they fail him in his contest with God ; as the result of his struggle
his natural self is left behind, he rises from it an altered man. A new truth is
vividly brought home to him, — the valuelessness before God of the weapons in
which he has hitherto trusted. The lameness which he carries away with him
is, as it were, a palpable memento of the fact. And his new name, Israel, the
' Perseverer with God,' symbolizes his new nature. And so we may notice that
from this point in his history we hear no more of him as practising craft and
deceit : he is still indeed (ch. xxxiii.) politic and resourceful ; but he becomes
more and more, especially after the trials and bereavements of his later years,
the type of a jast and God-fearing Israelite.
On the episode in general, comp. Stanley, Jewish Church, i. 67, who
remarks on the manner in which in all ages Jacob's encounter lias been taken
as an image of the like struggles and vsrestlings on the eve of some overhang-
ing trial or crisis, and who quotes Charles Wesley's hymn, ' Come, 0 thou
Traveller unknown, Whom still I hold, but cannot see ! ' Robertson, Sermons,
I. 37 ff. ; Bright, Morality in Doctrine, p. 199 ff. ; A. B. Davidson's Sermon in
The Galled of God (1902), p. 107 ff., and esp. (as dealing more directly with
the relation of the episode to Jacob's character) the one in the Expositor, Mar.
1902, p, 176 ff. : see other references in Exp. Times, x. 561—3.
Chapter XXXIII.
The meeting between Jacob and Esau. Jacob pursues his
journey to Succoth, and Shechem.
XXXIII. 1 And Jacob lifted up his eyes, and looked, and, ,
behold, Esau came, and with him four hundred men. And he
divided the children unto Leah, and unto Rachel, and unto the
two handmaids. 2 And he put the handmaids and their children
foremost, and Leah and her children after, and Rachel and
XXXIII. 1, 2. Jacob's arrangement of his wives and children
(as distinct from his people and cattle, xxxii. 7, 8) for the purpose of
meeting Esau.
296 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxra. i-io
Joseph hindermost. 3 And he himself passed over before them, j
and bowed himself to the ground seven times, until he came
near to his brother. 4 And Esau ran to meet him, and embraced
him, and fell on his neck, and kissed him : and they wept
5 And he lifted up his eyes, and saw the women and the
children ; and said. Who are these with thee ? And he said,
Hie children which God hath graciously given thy servant.
6 Then the handmaids came near, they and their children, and
they bowed themselves. 7 And Leah also and her children
came near, and bowed themselves : and after came Joseph near
and Rachel, and they bowed themselves. 8 And he said. What
meanest thou by all this company which I met ? And he said.
To find grace in the sight of my lord. 9 And Esau said, I have
enough ; my brother, let that thou hast be thine. 10 And Jacob
said, Xay, I pray thee, if now I have found grace in thy sight,
then receive my present at my hand : ^forasmuch as I have seen
^ Or, for therefore have I teen
2. hind^ermost. In the position of greatest safety. Jacob, it is
evident, prepares for the worst.
3. Jacob himself, going in front of his wives and children, ap-
proaches his brother with the profoundest marks of deference and
respexrt.
seven txmei. Cf in the Tel el-Amama tablets the frequent ' seven
and seven times fall I down at the feet of the king, my lord.'
4 — 7. Esan shews towards his brother a generous and magnanimous
spirit ; and inquires with interest about his family.
8 — 11. Esau accepts the present of cattle (xxxiL 13^—21') only
at his brother's urgent request
8. all this cainp. I.e. the 'present' (r. 10) of xxxii. 13", 21'.
10. JacDb begs his brother to give a still further proof of his friend-
liness towards him by accepting his gift.
forasmuch as &c.* I.e. inasmuch as thou hast received me favour-
ably. As one seeth the face of God is equivalent to ' and found it (Esau's
face) favourable' : to see the face being the phrase used of one a.'imitted
to the presence-chamber of a monarch, or other ruler (ch. xhii. 3, 5;
2 S. xiv. 24, 28; 2 K xxv. 19; fig. of God, Ps. xL 7; Job xxxiii. 26)*,
and, it \& imphed, viewed by his superior favourably. Jacob, by using
this expression, pays Esau a high comphment. The words are no
doubt chosen with allusion to the name 'Penuel' (xxxii. 30), even if
(WeUh., BiUm.) they are not meant as another explana.ion of it ' The
thought underlying both forms of the tradition is that at Penuel the
unfriendly God was found ultimately to be a friendly one' (Dillm.).
* On EYm-, see on rdiL 5. * Cf. Mt. iviii. 10.
XXXIII. IO-I7] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 299
thj face, as one seeth the face of God, and thou wast pleased j
with me. 11 Take, I pray thee, my ^gift that is brought to
thee ; because God hath dealt graciously with me, and because
I have ^enough. And he urged him, and he took it. 12 And
he said, Let us take our journey, and let us go, and I will go
before thee. 13 And he said unto him, My lord knoweth that
the children are tender, and that the flocks and herds with me
give suck : and if they overdrive them one day, all the flocks
will die. 14 Let my lord, I pray thee, pass over before his
servant : and I will lead on softly, according to the pace of the
cattle that is before me and according to the pace of the
children, until I come unto my lord unto Seir. 15 And Esau
said. Let me now leave with thee some of the folk that are with
me. And he said. What needeth it? let me find grace in the
sight of my lord. 16 So Esau returned that day on his way
unto Seir. 17 And Jacob journeyed to Succoth, and built him
an house, and made booths for his cattle : therefore the name of
the place is called ^Succoth.
1 Heb. blessing. ' Heb. all. J That is, Booths.
11. gift. Heb. blessing, — the gift being regarded as the expression
of good-wishes: cf. 1 S. xxv. 27, xxx. 26; 2 K. v. 15. Jacob diplo-
matically presses it upon Esau, no doubt hoping, if he should induce
him to accept it, to purchase thereby the continuance of his good-\dll
in the future.
12 — 16. Esau offers now (y. 12) to accompany Jacob for his pro-
tection, or at least (v. 15) to leave him some of his people as an escort :
but Jacob decHnes both these offers; he will lay himself under no
obligation to his brother, nor will he run the risk of a rupture in the
cordial relations now established between them.
13. tcnJer. Of age, as Pr. iv. 3, 1 Ch. xxii. 5. The youngest (cf.
xxxi. 38, 41) would not be more than six or seven.
with me give suck. Giving suck are a care to me (ht. give suck
upon me : cf. xlviii. 7 ; and see Lex. p. 753 b).
14. soft!}/. Or, gently (2 S. xviii. 5; Job rv. 11; Is. viii. 6).
15. Why ? let me Jin d &c. A pohte way of declining the offer.
17. Explanation of the name Succoth. The precise position of
Succoth is uncertain, all that is known about it being that it was in
the territory of Gad on the E. of Jordan (Jos. xiii. 27), in a 'vale'
(pJ?;^'). Ps. Ix. 6, and below Penuel, on the W. (Jud. viii. 5, cf. 8). If
the site suggested on xxxii. 30 for Penuel be approximately correct,
Succoth will have lain on one of the lower terraces of the Jordan-
valley (which here sinks from 500 ft. below the Medit. Sea to 1000 ft.
below it) a httle to tlie W. of it.
300 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxiii. 18-.0
18 And Jacob came ^in peace to the city of Shechem, which P
is in the land of Canaan, when he came from Paddan-aram ; |
and encamped before the city. 19 And he bought the parcel of E
ground, where he had spread his tent, at the hand of the
children of Hamor, Shechem's father, for an hundred ^pieces
of money. 20 And he erected there an altar, and called it
^El-elohe-IsraeL
1 Or, to Shalem, a city * Heb. kesitah. • That is, God, the God of
Israel.
18 — 20. Jacob's arrival at Shechem (xii. 6) ; and his purchase
there of the plot of ground on which he had pitched his tent.
18. in peace. In the Heb. an adj. = safe and sound. Cf. (for the
thought) xxviii. 21. The marg. (which grammatically is equally pos-
sible) agrees with the fact that there is still a village Salim on the low
hills forming the N. border of the plain E. of Shechem, 4 miles E. of
the city, and directly facing it (Rob. n. 275, 279).
before the city. I.e. East of it (cf xvi. 12). In the plain E. of
Shechem, at about a mile from the city, there was shewn in later times
(John iv. 6, 12), as there is shewn still, Jacob's well.
19. the children of S[amdr. The name of the clan settled at
Shechem (cf Jud. ix. 28).
ShechenCs father. Or, the father (i.e. founder: 1 Ch. ii. 21, 23, 42,
45, 49 — 52, al.) of (the city) Shechem; cf. Jud. ix. 28 'the men of
Hamor, the father 01 Shechem,' where this is evidently the meaning.
pieces of money. Heb. kesitdhs, — elsewhere only Jos. xxiv. 32 (of
the same transaction). Job xlii. 1 1. The meaning of the word is un-
known, though it is apparently the name of a coin, or ingot of metal :
an old tradition however (lxx., Onk., Vulg.) gave it the meaning
lamb. The purchase of this piece of ground is mentioned on account
of the sequel: it was the place in which the bones of Joseph were
ultimately buried (Jos. xxiv. 32 ; cf Acts vii. 16); and it had the same
interest and significance for the N. kingdom which the cave of Mach-
pelah at Hebron had for the kingdom of Judah.
20. erected. Heb. 3^vn made to stand, i.e. set up, used of a
'standing-stone,' or piUar (xxxv. 14, 20, al.), but never elsewhere of an
altar. Very possibly 'altar' (n3TD) is a correction for an original
'standing-stone' (n3V»).
'El, the God of Israel. Either (Di.) a contraction for ' the altar
[or standing-stone] of 'El, the God of Israel'; or (Gunk.) a survival
from a primitive stage of religious belief in which the 'standing-stone'
was identified with the deity (cf on xxviii. 22; and EncB. in. 2977).
Doubtless it is the 'pillar' of a sacred place (cf on xxviii. 18), well
known in the narrator's own day, the origin of which is here explained.
On the sites of MizpaJi, Maluinaim, Penuel, and Succoth. Of none of
these places has the name been preserved locally ; and as the data supplied
THE SITES OF MIZPAH, MAHANAIM, ETC. 301
by the OT. do not suffice to fix their sites with any precision, the identifications
that have been proposed are entirely conjectural. The following is a tabular
view of the principal identifications : —
Merrill
Conder^
Dilbnann
Mizpah
Kal'at er-Rabad*
SM
An indeterminable spot
on Jebel 'Ajlun
Mahanaim
Suleikhat
el-Bukei'a'
Undetermined
Penuel
Tulul edh-Dhahab*
Jebel 'Osha^
Undetermined
Succoth
Deir 'Alia
Deir 'Alia
S. of the Jabbok, in the
Jordan-valley, on the
road from es-Salt to
the ford ed-Damiyeh
All these places are shewn on G. A. Smith's large Topographical Map of
Palestine, with the exception of Suleikhat, which will be in the second Wady
N. of the Wady 'Ajlun, just below the figure '500.' It is natural to suppose
that Jacob, making for Shechem, would cross the Jordan by the ford
ed-Damiyeh, a little S. of the point at which the Jabbok eiiters the Jordan ;
and this is accordingly assumed by all the three authorities quoted : but they
bring Jacob to this ford by entirely different routes. The great objections to
the route postulated by Merrill's identifications are : (1) we seem to desiderate
for Mizpah (see p. 288) a site more on the NE. of Jebel 'Ajlun than Kal'at
er-Rabad ; and (2) if Jacob's goal were the ford ed-Damiyeh, it does not seem
probable that, having come down the Gh6r from Suleikliat, and reached the
neighbourhood of Deir 'Alia, he would then have made a detour of 6 miles to
the E., up the valley of the Jabbok, to TuMl edh-Dhahab, — crossing the stream
(Gen. xxxii. 32), as he returned, and afterwards, of course, re-crossing it, to
Deir 'Alia, in order then to resume his journey, and crossing it a third time, to
reach the ford ed-Damiyeh^.
According to Gender's route, Jacob, passing through Jerash, will have
crossed the Jabbok by the ford ez-Zubliyeh (a little S. of Jerash) ; then lie will
have climbed from the level of the Jabbok (between 500 and 1000 ft.), 1000 ft.
or more, up to el-Bukei'a (2000 ft.) ; after this he will have ascended 1200—
1500 ft. more, past es-Salt, to Jebel 'Osha (3597 ft.) ; then — though, if his goal
were ed-Damiyeh, the shorter and more obvious route would have been for
him to go straight down to it from es-Salt — turning to the NW., he will have
come down to the Jabbok, and crossed it at about one mile SE. of Deir 'Alia ;
1 Heth and Moab^, pp. 181—6 ; Smith, DB.^ s.v. Gilead, p. 1192.
^ A Saracenic castle standing on a height 10 miles N. of the Jabbok, with
a fine view of the Jordan-valley. Svf is 7 miles E. of this, and 3 miles N.W.
of Jerash.
* A depressed plain {Biikei'a is the dimin. of nyp3), on the mountains South of
the Jabbok, surrounded by sandstone and limestone ridges (Heth and Moah, 18G).
* 'The hills of gold,' so called from the yellowish metalliferous sandstone, of
which they are composed, — two conical hills, round which the Jabbok winds, — N.
of the first, and S. of the second, — about 6 miles B. of Deir 'Alia, up the valley.
« S. of the Jabbok, 12 m. W. of el-Bukei'a.
* It is also very' doubtful whether the identification of Penuel with Tnldl
edh-Dhahab suits Jud. viii. 8 ff.. On account of the banks of the Jabbok above this
point being impassable on either side : see the art. cited on p. 302 n.
302 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
finally, turning southwards along the Gh6r route, he will have crossed it again,
in order to reach the ford ed-Damiyeh. It is extremely unlikely that Jacob,
had he wished to reach the ford ed-Damiyeh from any part of the Jebel
*Ajlun, would have adopted a route as circuitous as this, or one which would
have led him, with his numerous flocks and herds, up and down so many lofty
mountains ^
Mizpah (see p. 2S8) may be reasonably located somewhere on the N. or
NE. of the Jebel 'Ajlun ; and Jacob, wishing to make his way hence to the
ford ed-Damiyeh, would naturally descend as soon as possible into the Ghor,
and join the track which passes along it from N. to S. : the rest of his route
would then be consistent and intelligible, if it might be assumed (as is done in
the notes above) that Mahanaim was (say) at Deir 'Alia, 4 miles N. of the ford
by which the Ghor route crosses the Jabbok, Penuel near where the Ghor
route crosses the route from es-Salt to ed-Damiyeh, and Succoth on one of the
lower terraces of the Jordan-valley, W. of the point just suggested for Penuel,
in the position postulated by Dillmannl
Chapter XXXIV.
Jacob at Shechem.
Much seems to have been recounted in ancient Israel respecting the
dealings of Jacob with the native inhabitants of Shechem (cf. xlviii. 22,
xlix. 5 — 7 : see the notes) ; and in the present chapter two narratives relating
to the same subject, agreeing in their main outline, but diflFering in details,
have been combined together. In the one narrative (J), Shechem himself is
the spokesman in the negotiations for Dinah's marriage (vv. 11, 12), and his
aim is the personal one of securing Dinah as his wife ; in the other narrative
(P, — perhaps based upon elements derived from E), his father Hamor is the
spokesman, and his aim is a tribal one, to secure viz. an amalgamation
between his people and Jacob's (vv. 8 — 10, 21, 23); in J only Shechi m is
circumcised (». 19), in P the condition is imposed upon the wliole people
(vv. 15, 22) ; in J Simeon and Levi slay Hamor and Shechem alone, and
rescue Dinah (v. 26), in P all Dinah's brothers fall upon the city, slay all the
males, and carry off the whole of the spoil {vo, 26'', 27 — 29). Thus in P the
entire transaction is on a much larger scale than in J, and what in J is
a personal matter becomes io P an affair involving the whole of the two
communities of Israel and Shechem.
J is sparing in his chronological notices : but if, like E (xxxL 38, 41), he
pictured Jacob as passing 20 years in Haran, he must, — though the narrative
does not at all suggest the fact, — have thought of Jacob as spending some
1 Mahanaim and Penuel, also, as identified by Conder, are many miles from both
the Jabbok and the Jordan (contrary to Gen. ixxii. 10, and xxxii. 22 — 24, 30).
* See further the writer's paper on these four sites in the Exp. Times, July, 1902,
p. 457 ff. It is to be regretted that in current maps of Palestine most questionable
identifications are often inserted without the least note or warning to the reader of
the uncertainty.
XXXIV. 1-7] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 303
years on the return to Canaan, probably at Succoth (xxxiiL 17): for otherwise
Dinah, who was the last but one of the children born to Jacob during his
14 years' service (xxx. 21), would be hardly more than 6 or 7 years of age at
the time of the incidents narrated in the present chapter.
XXXIV. 1 And Dinah the daughter of Leah, which she P
bare unto Jacob, went out to see the daughters of the land-
2 And Shechem the son of Hamor the Hivite, the prince of the
land, saw her ; | and he took her, and lay with her, and humbled J
her. 3 And his soul clave unto Dinah the daughter of Jacob,
and he loved the damsel, and spake ^kindly unto the damsel. |
4 And Shechem spake unto his father Hamor, saying, Get me P
this damsel to wife. | 5 Now Jacob heard that he had defiled j
Dinah his daughter ; and his sons were with his cattle in the
field : and Jacob held his peace until they came. | 6 And Hamor P
the father of Shechem went out unto Jacob to commune with
him. I 7 And the sons of Jacob came in from the field when they J
heard it : and the men were grieved, and they were very wroth,
because he had wrought folly in Israel in lying with Jacob's
1 Heb. to the heart of the damsel.
XXXIV. 1. Dinah. See xxx. 21.
2*. the Hivite. See on x. 17.
prince. Heb. nasi ; a word of very frequent occurrence in P (xvii.
20, xxiii. 6, xxv. 16; Nu. i. 16, al.), and Ezek., but rare elsewhere.
2^ humbled. I.e. dishonoured: so Dt. xxi. 14, xxii. 24, 29, al.
3. his soul. Mentioned as the seat of emotion and afiection : see
on xii. 13; and cf v. 8, 1 S. xviii. 1.
kindly. See marg. The same idiom, 1. 21 ; Hos. ii. 14; Is. xl. 2, al.
4. Get vie &c. It was the business of the parents to get their
son a wife: cf. Samson's words, Jud. xiv. 2; and Gen. xxi. 21, xxiv.,
xxxviii. 6.
5. until they came. The opinion of the brothers was of weight in
a matter affecting their sister's welfare : cf. xxiv. 50, 55, 59.
6. P's continuation of v. 4.
to commune. To speak : see on xviii. 33. So w. 8, 20.
7. J's continuation of v. 5.
wrought folly. It is difficult to find a good rendering for n*baldh :
but folly is not strong enough: xcrought senselessness would be
better. The word, Hke the corresponding subst. nahdl (the 'fool' of
Ps. xiv. 1), expresses an obstinate insensibility to moral and religious
relations, and repudiation of the claims which they impose : see the
definition in Is. xxxii. 6'. The phrase employed here is a standing one
1 See further the writer's Comm. on Dt. xxii. 21, xxxii. 6, 21; or his Parallel
Psalter, p. 457.
304 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxiv. 7-14
daughter ; which thing ought not to be done. | 8 And Hamor J .
communed with them, saying, The soul of my son Shechem
longeth for your daughter : I pray you give her unto him to wife.
9 And make ye marriages with us; give your daughters unto
us, and take our daughters unto you. 10 And ye shall dwell
with us : and the land shall be before you ; dwell and trade ye
therein, and get you possessions therein. | 11 And Shechem J"
said unto her father and unto her brethren, Let me find grace
in your eyes, and what ye shall say unto me I will give.
12 Ask me never so much doAviy and gift, and I will give ac-
cording as ye shall say unto me : but give me the damsel to wife. |
13 And the sons of Jacob answered Shechem and Hamor his P
father with guile, and spake, because he had defiled Dinah their
sister, 14 and said unto them, We cannot do this thing, to give
our sister to one that is uncircumcised ; for that were a reproach
for grave acts of immorality (Jud, xix. 23, 24, 2 S. xiii. 12, and with
*in Israel,' as here, Dt. xxii. 21, Jud. xx. 6, 10, Jer. xxix. 23), or
irreligion (Jos. vii. 15, also with 'in Israel'). The addition 'in Israel'
betrays here the author's date : he transfers unconsciously the relations
of his own time to the patriarchal age.
which thing &c. For the moral judgement, cf. xx. 9; 2 S. xiii. 12.
8 — 12. In both narratives, Shechem seeks now to make the best
reparation in his power for what he had done : he asks to marry Dinah
(cf. Ex. xxii. 16).
8 — 10. P's continuation of w. 4, 6. Hamor carries out his son's
request.
9, 10. Hamor proposes what is virtually an amalgamation (cf.
V. 16**) of the two peoples, with full reciprocal rights of intermarriage,
and permission to Jacob's sons to trade and settle in the territory of
Shechem.
11. 12. Shechem's offer to Dinah's father arid brethren. In v. 6
(P), Hamor comes to Jacob on Shechem's behalf: here (J) Shechem
appears conducting his own suit.
12. dowry. Heb. mohar, Arab, mahr, the price paid for the wife
to her parents, according to ancient custom: so Ex. xxii. 16, 17; 1 S.
xviii. 25. Not 'dowry' in our sense of the word.
gift. I.e. presents to the bride, which were often a matter of stipu-
lation beforehand: cf. on xxiv. 53, xxix, 18.
13 — 18. P's continuation of w. 8 — 10.
13. with guile. Wishing to avenge their sister's honour, they
only ostensibly accede to the proposal, and moreover attach a condition
which they foresee will, if agreed to, give them the opportunity which
they desire.
14. a reproach. Cf. Jos. v. 9.
XXXIV. ,4-i5] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 306
unto us : 15 only on this condition will we consent unto you : p
if ye will be as we be, that every male of you be circumcised ;
16 then will we give our daughters unto you, and we will take
your daughters to us, and we will dwell with you, and we will
become one people. 17 But if ye will not hearken unto us, to be
circumcised ; then will we take our daughter, and we will be gone.
18 And their words pleased Hamor, and Shechera Hamor's son. |
19 And the young man deferred not to do the thing, because he J
had delight in Jacob's daughter : and he was honoured above all
the house of his father. | 20 And Hamor and Shechem his son P
came unto the gate of their city, and communed with the men of
their city, saying, 21 These men are peaceable with us; therefore
let them dwell in the land, and trade therein ; for, behold, the
land is large enough for them ; let us take their daughters to us
for wives, and let us give them our daughters. 22 Only on this
condition will the men consent unto us to dwell with us, to
become one people, if every male among us be circumcised, as
they are circumcised. 23 Shall not their cattle and their
substance and all their beasts be ours ? only let us consent unto
them, and they will dwell with us. 24 And unto Hamor and
unto Shechem his son hearkened all that went out of the gate of
his city ; and every male was circumcised, all that went out of
the gate of his city. 25 And it came to pass on the third day,
when they were sore, that | two of | the sons of Jacob, | Simeon J P J
and Levi, Dinah's brethren, | took each man his sword, and P
19 (J). The verse relates to something to be done by Shechem
alone, not (as w. 15 — 17) by the whole people; and connects conse-
quently with w. 11, 12 (J), not with w. 13 — 18. J's account of the
condition imposed upon Shechem has been omitted by the compiler,
as unnecessary by the side oi vv. 13 — 18.
20 — 24. P's continuation of w. 13 — 18. Hamor and Shechem lay
the matter before the assembly of their people; and pointing out the
advantages to be gained by the settlement of the sons of Jacob
amongst them, obtain their assent to the proposal.
20. unto the gate. Cf on xix. 1.
24. that went out of tits gate. Cf. xxiii. 10, 18.
25. According to P, this deed of vengeance was the act of Jacob's
sons generally : the compiler introduces words from the parallel narra-
tive of J, limiting the actors to Simeon and Levi.
when they were sore (lit. in pain). When the inflammation, following
upon the operation, was at its height.
D. 20
306 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxiv. 25-31
came upon the city ^ unawares, and slew all the males. P
I 26 And they slew Hamor and Shechem his son with the edge J
of the sword, and took Dinah out of Shechem's house, and
went forth. | 27 The sons of Jacob came upon the slain, p
and spoiled the city, because they had defiled their sister.
28 They took their flocks and their herds and their asses, and
that which was in the city, and that which was in the field ;
29 and all their wealth, and all their little ones and their wives,
took they captive and spoiled, even all that was in the house. |
30 And Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, Ye have troubled me, to j
make me to stink among the inhabitants of the land, among the
Canaanites and the Perizzites : and, I being few in number, they
will gather themselves together against me and smite me ; and
I shall be destroyed, I and my house. 31 And they said, Should
he deal with our sister as with an harlot ?
1 Or, holdly
unawares. Lit. (while it was) in confidence or secure (Jud. viii. 11) :
G.-K. § 11 8^ In RVm. referred less probably to the assailants.
26. The continuation of J's narrative in v. 25, which must have
told, when complete, how Simeon and Levi, — Dinah's full brothers, by
the same mother, Leah, — entered the city.
with the edge of the sword. Lit. according to the mouth of the
sword, i.e. as the sword devours (2 S. xi. 25),= without quarter.
27 — 29. The continuation of P's narrative in v. 25. The ' sons of
Jacob,' — i.e. his sons generally, as w. 5, 7, 13, not Simeon and Levi
in particular, — having {v. 25**) slain all the males in Shechem, proceed
to sack the city. For the details, cf. Nu. xxxi. 9, 11 (also P).
30, 31. J's continuation of v. 26. Jacob blames his two sons for
having acted inconsiderately in exposing him to the hatred and
vengeance of the people of the land, by slapng their principal men,
Hamor, and his son.
30. trouhled. A strong word, lit. made turbid, fig. for, destroyed the
happiness of , undone: Jos. vi. 18, vii. 25; Jud. xi. 35; 1 K. xviii. 17.
to make me to stink. The same verb (in the Heb.) in Ex. v. 21;
1 S. xiii. 4, xxvii. 12; 2 S. x, 6, xvi. 21. Cf. our expression 'bring into
bad odour with.'
the Canaanites and the Perizzites. Cf. xiii. 7.
31. Simeon and Levi reply that the honour of their family stands
above every other consideration: should their sister be treated as
though she were a harlot?
The narrative is a strange one ; and it is difficult to feel sure what facts
really underlie it. It is evident, in the first place, that different traditions
were current respecting Jacob's dealings with Shechem. In xlviii. 22 (E)
JACOB AT SHECHEM 307
allusion is made to a tradition, according to wliich Jacob gained possession
of Shechem by sword and bow; in xlix. 5 — 7 (the Blessing) Simeon and Levi
are severely censured for the violence displayed by theiu on what, it seems,
is the occasion here narrated ; in ch. xxxiv. (J) Simeon and Levi avenge
Shechem's violation of their sister, by slaying him and his father, and Jacob
{v. 30) blames their action, though the narrator, by giving them the last word
(». 31), seems to approve it; in ch. xxxiv. (P) the sons of Jacob slaughter the
whole male population of Shechem, and carry off the women and children and
the spoil. Taking the narrative, as the older writers took it, as it stands, and
judging it from a Christian standpoint, we can but agree with the old
commentator, Adam Clarke, when he says that all parties concerned were to
blame : it was * wrong' in Jacob to suflFer his daughter, alone and unprotected,
to visit the daughters of the land ; it was ' excessively wicked ' of Shechem to
take advantage of her as he did ; it was ' diabolical ' in Jacob's sons, having
got the Shechemites into their power under the cloak of a religious rite, to
slay the whole tribe treacherously for the oflFence of one man, especially when
that one had sought to make all the restitution in his power, by offering to
marry Dinah ; and with the Speaker's Commentary, when it says that Jacob,
in reproving his sons {v. 30) as having merely brought him into danger, not as
having been guilty of treachery and murder, shews weakness and timidity.
These judgements will naturally be somewhat modified, if the modem critical
standpoint be adopted. In J, Simeon and Levi slay only Shechem and his
father ; and though this punishment was gi-eater than what Shechem's act
deserved (Ex. xxii. 16 f.), it might perhaps be excused on the part of two high-
spirited, martial youths, eager to avenge the outrage on their sister, and whose
moral standards could not be expected to be in advance of those of the age
in which they lived. That Hamor suffered with his son, was not more than
what was in accordance with ancient ideas of justice (cf. on xx. 7). In this
case, also, Jacob's reproof {v. 30) does not shew the weakness which it does
if spoken in view of the savage deeds described in vv. 25'', 27 — 29. In the
representation of P, the treachery and cruelty are much greater ; and probably,
— like the terrible narrative of Nu. xxxi. — it is merely an ideal picture of the
manner in which the priestly writer conceived that a people hostile to Israel,
and an enemy to the theocracy, ought to be treated.
The nan-ative, it should be added, is one of those, with regard to which it
may perhaps be questioned whether we are really dealing with individuals,
and whether incidents of tribal life may not be related in it under the form
of incidents in the lives of individuals. This is certainly what happens some-
times in the OT. ; for instance, in 1 Ch. vii. 21 — 23 (see Beriah in DB.;
Bennett, Chronicles, S7 ff, in the ' Expositor's Bible ' ; and cf. the Introd. p. liv) ;
and it is at least possible that this chapter is an instance of it. Jud. ix. shews
how, after the conquest, Israelites and Canaanites dwelt in Shechem side by
side; in Gen. xxxiii. 19 (as was remarked in the note) the almost complete
identity of expression with Jud. ix. 28 raises a legitimate doubt whether
' Shechem ' does not signify the place, and whether therefore in chap, xxxiv.
the same name is not a personification of the inhabitants of the place : if this
view be correct, cliap. xxxiv. will mean that an Israelite clan (Dinah) had
gained a footing in Shechem, and was in danger of being absorbed by the
20—2
308 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxv. ., .
native Canaanites (the B»nd HSmor) ; the tribes of Simeon and Levi inter-
posed,— not without treachery, — to prevent this, aa tending to contaminate
Israel with heathen elements ; but their action was not supported by the
Israelites in general (' Jacob,' v. 30 ; cf. Gen. xlix. 5, 6) : Gen. xlix. 7, it has even
been conjectured, contains an allusion to the result ; the Canaanites retaliated
with such effect that the two tribes were broken up, and never afterwards
recovered from the blow. The incident, though reflected back here, in a
personal form, into the patriarchal period, may be supposed upon this view to
have actually taken place when the Israelites, after the conquest, first began
to establish themselves on the West of Jordan.
Chapter XXXV.
Jacob moves on to Bethel. The birth of Benjamin, and death
of Rax^hel, at Ejjhi'ath. Jacob rejoins his father at Hebron.
Death and bv/rial of Isaac.
XXXV. 1 And God said unto Jacob, Arise, go np to^
Beth-el, and dwell there : and make there an altar unto God,
who appeared unto thee when thou fleddest from the face of
Esau thy brother. 2 Then Jacob said unto his household, and
to all that were with him. Put away the strange gods that are
among you, and purify yourselves, and change your garments :
XXXV. 1 — 8 (E). Jacob journeys as far as Beth-el. Death of
Deborah, Rebekah's nurse.
1. go up. The road from Shechem to Jerusalem is a continual
ascent ; and Beth-el (2890 ft. above the sea) is more than 1000 ft. higher
than Shechem (1880 ft.).
an altar. An addition to the vow of xx\aii. 22.
who appeared &c. Viz. at Beth-el, xxviii. 10 ff. ; cf xxvii. 43.
2 — 4. Jacob's preparations for carrying out this command. With
the service of the God, whom he iias promised to serve, the worship
of foreign gods, and {v. 4) superstitious usages, do not accord.
strange. Foreign, — which indeed was the meaning of 'strange'
in Old English (cf on xvii. 12), and is to be understood by it here and
V. 4, as often besides in EVV. (Ex. xxi. 8; 1 K. xi. 1), esp. in the
same phrase as here (Dt. xxxii. 12 ; Jud. x. 16; Ps. Lxxxi. 9 ; Jer. v. 19,
cf viii. 19). Some of Jacob's people might naturally have brought
with them the images of foreign gods from Haran: cf xxxi. 19, 53;
Jos. xxiv. 2, 14, 20, 23 \y&@i^ foreign for strange].
pnri/y yourselves. Viz. by ablutions, and Dy keejnng free from
everything which renders ceremonially 'unclean,' as was usual before
acts of pubhc worship. Cf Ex. xix. 10, 14 f ; Jos. vii. 13 ; 1 S. xvi. 5.
XXXV. 3-9] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 309
3 and let us arise, and go up to Beth-el ; and I Tvill make there E
an altar unto God, who answered me in the day of my distress,
and was with me in the way which I went. 4 And they gave
unto Jacob all the strange gods which were in their hand, and
the rings which were in thefr ears ; and Jacob hid them under
the ^oak which was by Shechem. 5 And they journeyed : and
^a great terror was upon the cities that were round about them,
and they did not pursue after the sons of Jacob. 6 So Jacob
came to Luz, which is in the land of Canaan (the same is
Beth-el), he and all the people that were with him. 7 And he
built there an altar, and called the place ^El-beth-el : because
there God was revealed unto him, when he fled from the face of
his brother. 8 And Deborah Rebekah's nurse died, and she was
buried below Beth-el under the oak : and the name of it was
called ^Allon-bacuth.
9 And God appeared unto Jacob again, when he came from p
» Or, terebinth » Heb. a terror of God. ^ That is, The God of Beth-el.
* That is, Tiie oak of weeping.
3. in the day &c. E.g. when needing help against Laban (xxxi.
24, 29, 42).
was with me &c. Cf xxviii. 20, xxxi. 3, xxxii. 1 ff.
4. rings &c. Ear-rings were used anciently not simply as orna-
ments, but as amulets. All these idolatrous and superstitious objects
were buried by Jacob under the terebinth (xii. 6) by Shechem.
5. a great terror. Heb. a terror of God, i.e. a panic, such as •
ordinary causes did not seem sufficient to explain. Cf. 1 S. xiv. 15,
xxvi. 12; 2 Ch. xiv. 14; Zech. xiv. 13. The verse presupposes some
warlike success at Shechem, — either such as the one recoimted in P
(or the parts of E underlying P) in ch. xxxiv., or such as the one
alluded to by E in xlviii. 22.
6. Luz. See xxviii. 19.
, 7. El-beth-el. I.e. The God of Beth-el: cf. xxxi. 13.
8. The name of Rebekah's 'nurse' is mentioned only here: she is
lid in xxiv. 59 (J) to have accompanied her mistress to Canaan, —
3Cording to P (xxv. 20, xxxv. 28), 140 years previously ! P's chron-
lOgy does not always harmonize with that of JE (p. xxv): on the
fcher hand, the present notice is perhaps displaced; for the sudden
ppearance of Rebekah's nurse in Jacob's company at this stage of his
istory is surprising.
9 — 13, 15. P's account of Jacob's change of name, of the promises
^ven to him by God at Beth-el, and of the origin of the name of
ieth-el. The style is throughout that of P; and the passage is evi-
'ently P's parallel to what in JE is placed at Jacob's first visit to
eth-el, when he was leaving Canaan for Haran (xxviii. 10 — 22).
310 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxv. 9-18
Paddan-aram, and blessed him. 10 And God said unto him, P
Thy name is Jacob : thy name shall not be called any more
Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name : and he called his name
Israel 11 And God said unto him, I am ^God Almighty: be
fruitful and multiply ; a nation and a company of nations shall
be of thee, and kings shall come out of thy loins ; 12 and the
land which I gave unto Abraham and Isaac, to thee I will give
it, and to thy seed after thee will I give the land. 13 And God
went up from him in the place where he spake with him. |
14 And Jacob set up a pillar in the place where he spake with J
him, a pillar of stone : and he poured out a drink offering
thereon, and poured oil thereon. | Ki, And Jacob called the P
name of the place where God spake with him, Beth-eL | 16 And J
they journeyed from Beth-el ; and there was still some way to
come to Ephrath : and Rachel travailed, and she had hard
labour. 17 And it came to pass, when she was in hard labour,
that the midwife said unto her, Fear not ; for now thou shalt
have another son. 18 And it came to pass, as her soul was in
^ Heb. El Shaddai. ""^
9. when he came from Paddan-aram (xxv. 20). Aheady these
words shew that a different narrator is here speaking : had they been
by the same writer who has been describing the roiite from Haran in
detail, the part of the route which Jacob had now reached would have
been specified (cf., similarly, xix. 29, xxxiii. 18).
10. P's account of Jacob's change of name, which J had placed
earlier, at Penuel (xxxii. 28).
11. 12. Jacob is here made the heir of the promises given to
Abraham in ch. xvii. (also P). For the expressions, cf. xvii. 1, 6, 8 ;
also xxviii. 3, 4 (Isaac's blessmg of Jacob in P). With v. 13 cf, xvii. 22.
14. A parallel to xxviii. 18; and, to all appearance, J's account of
the consecration of the sacred standing-stone at Beth-el. On this, and
on the libation of oil, see p. 267. The drink-offering, — presumably of
wine, — is a frequently-mentioned element of the later cultus, 2 K.
xvi. 13; Ex. xxix. 40, &c. : in idolatrous rites, Jer. vii. 18; Is. Ivii. 6
(offered to stones).
15. P's parallel to xxviii. 19 in J.
16— 22* (J). The birth of Benjamin; and death and burial of
Rachel.
16. some way. In the Heb., a peculiar expression, found besides
only in the parallel xlviii. 7, and 2 K. v. 19 : the distance denoted by
it cannot be exactly determined, but it will not have been great.
Ephrath. See on v. 19.
17. for this also is a son for thee. Cf. the wish, xxx. 24.
XXXV. 18-73] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 311
departing (for she died), that she called his name ^Ben-oni : but J
his father called him ^ Benjamin. 19 And Rachel died, and was
buried in the way to Ephrath (the same is Beth-lehem). 20 And
Jacob set up a piUar upon her grave : the same is the Pillar of
Rachel's grave unto this day. 21 And Israel journeyed, and
spread his tent beyond the tower of Eder. 22 And it came to
pass, while Israel dwelt in that land, that Reuben went and lay
with Bilhah his father's concubine : and Israel heard of it.
Now the sons of Jacob were twelve : 23 the sons of Leah ; P
^ That is, The ton of my sorrow. ' That is, The son of the right hand.
18. Benjamin. His father gave him a name of happier omen (see
the marg.); the right-hand side being deemed the more auspicious one:
cf. Yemen f* right hand ') = Arabia Felix; and Sextos opvis.
19. Epnrath is here, as also in xlviii. 7 (cf. Ruth iv. 11; Mic. v. 2),
identified with Bethlehem ; and a Kubbet Rdhel, or ' Dome of Rachel,'
— i.e. a stone structure, of comparatively modern date, exactly like an
ordinary Muslim * Wely,' or tomb of a holy person, — is still shewn at
a spot about one mile N. of Bethlehem, and 4 miles S. of Jerusalem.
But in 1 S. X. 2 Rachel's tomb is described as being on the 'border
of Benjamin' (i.e. the N. border) not far from Beth-el {v. 3), which was
10 miles N. of Jerusalem ; and a site in the same neighbourhood is
strongly supported by Jer. xxxi. 15, where Rachel's weeping is repre-
sented as being heard at Ramah, 5 miles N. of Jerusalem. It seems,
therefore, either that Ephrath, here and xlviii. 7, is really the name of
a place, otherwise unloiown, near Ramah (in which case the words
'the same is Beth-lehem' wiU be an incorrect gloss); or that there
were two different traditions respecting the site of Rachel's grave, one
(1 S. X. 2; Jer. xxxi, 15) placing it N. of Jerusalem, near Ramah, and
the other, found here, placing it S. of Jerusalem, near Bethlehem.
20. a pillar. I.e., here, a sepulchral monument, — a sense which
the word has often in Phoenician (Cooke, North-Sem. Inscrr. p. 60).
21. Israel. From this point onwards, 'Israel' is not unfrequently
used as the name of the patriarch, esp. in J : cf. on xliii. 6.
of Eder. Or, of {i\xQ) flock. Watch-towers, built for the protection
of flocks against robbers, are mentioned, at least in later times (2 K. xvii. 9,
xviii. 8 ; 2 Ch. xxvi. 10) : tlie one referred to here must have been between
'Ephrath' and Hebron. In Mic. iv. 8 the same expression appears to
be used symbolically of a tower on 'Ophel' (the fortified S. spur of
Zion, the Eastern hilP of Jerusalem, just below the royal palace); but
that is not evidence that Jerusalem is intended here.
22\ Cf. xhx. 4, with the note.
22^ — 26. An enumeration, from P, of the sons of Jacob, introduced
suitably after the account of the birth of the last.
^ Not, as marked incorrectly on many maps, the Western hill: see DB. s.v.
Zion.
312 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxv. .3-29
Reuben, Jacob's firstborn, and Simeon, and Levi, and Judah, P
and Issachar, and Zebulun : 24 the sons of Rachel ; Joseph and
Benjamin : 25 and the sons of Bilhah, Rachel's handmaid ; Dan
and Naphtali : 26 and the sons of Zilpah, Leah's handmaid ;
Gad and Asher : these are the sons of Jacob, which were born
to him in Paddan-aram. 27 And Jacob, came unto Isaac his
father to Mamre, to Kiriath-arba (the same is Hebron), where
Abraham and Isaac sojourned- 28 And the days of Isaac were
an hundi'ed and fourscore years. 29 And Isaac gave up the
ghost, and died, and was gathered unto his people, old and fuU
of days : and Esau and Jacob his sons buried him.
26. in Paddan-aram (xxv. 20). Benjamin {v. 17 f.) must be
tacitly excepted.
27 — 29 (P). Jacob's arrival at Hebron. The death and burial of
Isaac.
27. On Mamre, and Kiriath-arha\ see on xiii. 18, and xxiii. 2.
29. gave up the ghost... and was gathered unto his father's kin.
See on xxv. 8.
and Esau and Jacob &c. As Isaac and Ishmael, according to the
same source, P, had buried Abraham (xxv. 8).
Chapter XXXVI.
The generations of Esauu
Aa after the death and burial of Abraham (xxv. 7 — 11*), P proceeded at
once to enumerate the descendants of Ishmael (xxv. 12 — 17), before dealing
with the line of Isaac, so after the death and burial of Isaac, he introdiices an
account of the descendants of Esau, before passing on to the ' generations ' of
Jacob (xxxvii. 2). The particulars are more numerous in the case of Esau
than in that of Ishmael, partly, it is probable, on account of Edom's being
more important historically than the tribes descended from Ishmael, and more
closely related to Israel, and partly because in the case of Edom tlicre were
more details worth stating. The chapter contains much interesting information
respecting Edom : it is to be regretted that we possess at present no Edomite
inscriptions, 'and very little information from other sources, to supplement or
illustrate it. The original inhabitants of the mountain region called Se'^ir
(cf. on xiv. 6) bore the name of Horites (ibid.) ; but immigrants, closely allied
to the Israelites (Esau, or Baom, being Israel's 'brother,' Nu. xx. 14 ; Dt. xxiii.
7, al.), took possession of the Cuuntry, and in great measure dispossessed them ;
it was accordingly said that Jehovah had 'given mount Se'ir unto Esau'
Ot. ii. 5, cf. vv. 12, 22). Exactly, however, as happened in the case of the
'anaanites and Israelites, many Horite families and clans maintained them-
selves beside the immigrants, and in many cases intermarried with them;
XXXVI. 1-5] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 313
and particulars respecting some of these Horite families are included by the
narrator [vv. 20 — 30).
The chapter, after the title {v. 1), falls into seven paragraphs, as indicated
in the notes. The basis of the chapter is evidently supplied by P (notice the
form of vv. 1, 6*, 6 — 8, 9*, 40*, 43) ; but the discrepancies in the names of Esau's
wives (see on vv. 2 — 5) shew that these cannot have been derived from P ; and
it is possible that other parts of the chapter as well (e.g. vv. 31 — 39) have been
incorporated by the compiler from some other source. The question is not of
sufficient importance for further discussion here. Verses 4 — 5, 11 — 13
(abridged), 20— 24», 25—28, 31—39, 40—43 are excerpted, with slight textual
variations (see RVm.), in 1 Ch. i. 35—37, 38—42, 43— 6r, ai*— 64.
XXXVI. 1 Now these are the prenerations of Esau (the P
same is Edom). 2 Esau took his wives of the daughters of
Canaan ; Adah the daughter of Eloii the Hittite, and Oholibamah
the daughter of Anah, the daughter of Zibeon the Hivite ;
3 and Basemath Ishmael's daughter, sister of Nebaioth. 4 And
Adah bare to Esau Eliphaz ; and Basemath bare Reuel ; 5 and
* Some ancient authorities have, ton. See ver. 24.
XXXVI. 1. the same is Edom. So vv. 8, 19. Cf. xxv. 30.
2 — 5. Esau's wives and sons. In v. 2 Hivite is certainly an error
for Horite: see 'Zibeon' in v. 20, and cf. on v. 2.
In xxvi. 34, xxviii. 9 (both P), Esau's wives are— -
Judith, daughter of Beeri, the Hittite ;
Basemath, daughter of Elan, ths Hittite \ and
Mahalath, daughter of Ishmael, and sister qf Nebaioth,
Here, and in vv. 9 — 14, they are —
^Adah, daughter of Elon, the Hittite ;
Oholibamah, daughter of 'Anah, the Horite ; and
Basemath, daughter of Ishmael, and sister of Nebaioth,
The names are strangely interchanged in the two lists. Attempts
have been made to explain them by suppositions such as that Esau
had five wives, or that they had double names, or had been re-named :
but the variations in the two lists are not adequately accounted for
by any of these hypotheses; and the only reasonable explanation is
that they are due to a difference of tradition (or theory).
2. the daughter of Zibeon. So v. 14. Daughter (m) is prob. an
error for son (p), which is read by Lxx., Sam., Pesh. : see v. 24.
Oholibamah will then be an unnamed daughter of the 'Anah of v. 24,
not the 'Oholibamah, daughter of 'Anah' of v. 25 (for the 'Anah of
this verse, following the Lotan, Shobal, and Zibeon of vv. 22 — 24, is
evidently the 'Anah of v. 20, not the 'Anah of v. 24). Another view
is that the words are a gloss, added by one who incorrectly identified
the 'Anah of v. 25 with the 'x\nah of v. 24 : in this case, ' Oholibamah,
the daughter of 'Anah,' will be the one mentioned in v. 25.
314 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxvi. 5-10
Oholibamah bare Jeush, and Jalam, and Korah : these are P
the sons of Esau, which were born unto him in the laud of
Canaan. 6 And Esau took his wives, and his sons,
and his daughters, and all the souls of his house, and his cattle,
and all his beasts, and all his possessions, which he had gathered
in the land of Canaan ; and went into a land away from his
brother Jacob. 7 For their substance was too great for them to
dwell together; and the land of their sojournings could not bear
them because of their cattle. 8 And Esau dwelt in mount Seir :
Esau is Edom.
9 And these are the generations of Esau the father of Hhe
Edomites in mount Seir : 10 these are the names of Esau's
sons ; Eliphaz the son of Adah the wife of Esau, Reuel the son
1 Heb. Edom,
6 — 8. The migration of Esau into the land of Se'ir, occasioned, it
is stated, by Jacob's increasing possessions, — a cause which could only
have come into operation after Jacob's return to his father in Canaan
(xxxv. 27 — 29). In J, Esau's residence in Edom is already presupposed
in xxxii. 3, xxxiii. 14, 16. For the expressions, cf. xii. 5, xiii. 6* (where
a similar motive is assigned for Lot's separation from Abraham), xvii.
8,— aUP.
6, aland. Read, with Pesh., ^A« /awe? (j/^Sfeir: "iW has accident-
ally dropped out.
8. In the monntain-land of Seir. Cf. on xiv. 6, and xxvii. 39 f.
9 — 14, The tribes or clans of Edom, reckoned as descended from
Esau's three wives. The names are not those of individuals, but
merely represent tribes or clans (cf. ch. x.). The entire number (ex-
cluding the concubine's son, v. 12) is 12 : cf. the same number in the
cases of Ishmael (xxv. 12 — 16), and Israel, and the six 'sons' of Ke-
turah (xxv. 2). There must have been in Edom a distinct consciousness
that the dififerent clans were of mixed nationality: the clans reputed
to be descended from 'Adah, Basemath, and Oholibamah, having an
admixture of Canaanite, IshmaeUte, and Horite blood, respectively, in
their veins \
9. the father of Edom. Edom is here (unlike w. 1, 8, 19) the
name of the nation (as Nu. xx. 18, 20, 21, al). So v. 43^
10. Eliphaz. Also an Edomite personal name. Job ii. 11.
1 The following table will make the relationship of the different clans clear : —
'Adah Basemath Oholibamah
(Hittite or Canaanite line) {IshmaeUte line) (Horite line)
I I ■ I
Eliphaz = Timna' Re'uel Je'ush Ja'lam Eorah
Teman Omar l^epho Ga'tam J^enaz 'Amalek Nahath ZeraJ^ Shammah Mizzan •
XXXVI. ia-i7] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 316
of Basemath the wife of Esau. 1 1 And the sons of Eliphaz were P
Teman, Omar, ^Zepho, and Gatam, and Kenaz. 12 And Timna
was concubine to Eliphaz Esau's son ; and she bare to Eliphaz
Amalek : these are the sons of Adah Esau's wife. 13 And these
are the sons of Reuel ; Nahath, and Zerah, Shammah, and
Mizzah : these were the sons of Basemath Esau's wife. 14 And
these were the sons of Oholibamah the daughter of Anah, the
daughter of Zibeon, Esau's wife : and she bare to Esau Jeush,
and Jalam, and Korah. 15 These are the ^dukes of
the sons of Esau : the sons of Eliphaz the firstborn of Esau ;
duke Teman, duke Omar, duke Zepho, duke Kenaz, 16 duke
Korah, duke Gatam, duke Amalek : these are the dukes that
came of Eliphaz in the land of Edom ; these are the sons of
Adah. 17 And these are the sons of Reuel Esau's son ; duke
Nahath, duke Zerah, duke Shammah, duke Mizzah : these are
1 In 1 Chr. i. 36, Zephi. 2 Or, chiefs
11. Teman. Elsewhere in the OT. the name of a district in the
N. of Edom (Am. i. 12; Jer. xlix. 7, 20; Ez. xxv. 13; Hab. iii. 3; cf.
Bar. iii, 22 f.), the home of Job's friend, Eliphaz, Job ii. 11. Euseb.
{Onom. 260) names also a village ©ai/iav, 15 miles from Petra.
Kenaz. To all appearance, a collateral branch of the Kenizzites
(the gentile adj. of Kenaz), a tribe in the S. of Canaan, afterwards
absorbed into Judah (see on xv. 19).
12. ^Amalek. Wot counted as a full son of Eliphaz, but treated
as descended from a concubine and a Horite (see u 22), Timna' \
i.e. Amalek was a tribe or clan of inferior rank. The reference is
probably not to the people of Amalek itself (xiv. 7), but to an offshoot,
or remnant (see 1 Ch. iv. 42, 43), which had found a home in Edom,
or was in some way dependent upon it. Cf EncB. i. 129.
15 — 19. List of clan-chiefs of Edom. The names, with one exception
(see V. 16), are identical with those of the corresponding clans mentioned
in vv. 9 — 14. The word * duke' (^-l?^) simply represents the Vulg. dux,
which in its turn is based upon the lxx. Tyyc/twv : the Heb. word is
really formed from ^^ family or clan, Jud. vi. 15; 1 S. x. 19; Mic.
V. 2' (properly, either thousand, or association, tribal group). It was
apparently the native name for the tribal chiefs of Edom (of Judah,
only Zech. ix. 7, xii. 5, 6: otherwise only of Edom, in Gen. xxxvi., the
excerpts in 1 Ch. i. 51 — 54, and Ex. xv. 15). The names would be
better rendered the chief of Teman, the chief of Omar, &c., the
genitive in each case denoting either a clan or a district.
16. the chief of Korah. Introduced by some error from v. 18.
^ In the translation followed in Mt. ii. 6, read as ^pK = ijyefjuit>.
316 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxvi. 17-^
the dukes that came of Reuel in the land of Edom ; these are P
the sons of Basemath Esau's wife. 18 And these are the sons
of Oholibamah Esau's wife ; duke Jeush, duke Jalam, duke
Korah : these are the dukes that came of Oholibamah the
daughter of Anah, Esau's wife. 19 These are the sons of Esau,
and these are their dukes : the same is Edom.
20 These are the sons of Seir the Horite, the inhabitants of
the land ; Lotan and Shobal and Zibeon and Anah, 21 and
Dishon and Ezer and Dishan : these are the dukes that came of
the Horites, the children of Seir in the land of Edonu 22 And
the children of Lotan were Hori and ^Hemam ; and Lotan's
sister was Timna. 23 And these are the children of Shobal ;
^Alvan and Manahath and Ebal, ^Shepho and Onana. 24 And
these are the children of Zibeon ; Aiah and Anah : this is Anah
who found the hot springs in the wilderness, as he fed the asses
of Zibeon his father. 25 And these are the children of Anah ;
Dishon and Oholibamah the daughter of Anah. 26 And these
are the children of * Dishon ; ^Hemdan and Eshban and Ithran
and Cheran. 27 These are the children of Ezer ; Bilhan and
1 In 1 Chr. i. 39, Homam. « In 1 Chr. i. 40, Alian. « In 1 Chr. i. 40,
Shephi. * Heb. Dishan. » In 1 Chr. i. 41, Hamran.
20 — 30. The clans, families, and clan-chiefs of the aboriginal
Horites. Se'ir is elsewhere the name of the land (e.g. xiv. 6 ; Is. xxi.
11); but here the country is personified, and becomes the imaginary
ancestor of the tribes inhabiting it. Cf the similar cases in ch. x.
The name Horite perhaps means cave-dwellers, Troglodytes. Edom
abounds in caves, which till a much later time were used as dwellings.
Cf. the Commentaries on Obad. 3.
20, the inhabitants of the land. I.e. its autochthonous inhabi-
tants : opp. to the immigrant Esauites.
22—28. The sub-clans, or famihes, of the native Horites, regarded
as subdivisions of the seven larger groups enumerated in v. 20.
22. Hori. The national name appears here as a clan-name.
24. the hot springs. The Heb. word occurs only here, and the
rend, is uncertain. If it is correct, the reference will be to hot springs,
such as those which Burckhardt {Travels in Syria, 1822, p. 401)
found, near where the W. el-Ahs^ (above, p. 169) crosses the Derb
•'l-Haj, or Pilgrim-route to Mecca, some distance NE. of Busaireh (on
V. 33). (Hot saline springs are numerous about the Dead Sea.)
25. 'Anah. Of course the 'Anah of ■?;. 20, not the 'Anah oi y. 24.
27. In 1 Ch. i. 42, ' Ja'akan' stands for 'and 'Akan,' and is ob-
viously a transcriptional error for it (|pj;> for }pyi). Still, the name
xxxvi. .7-3^] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 317
Zaavan aud ^Akan. 28 These are the children of Dishan ; Uz p
and Aran. 29 These are the dukes that came of the
Horites ; duke Lotan, duke Shobal, duke Zibeon, duke Anah,
30 duke Dishon, duke Ezer, duke Dishan : these are the dukes
that came of the Horites, according to their dukes in the land
of Seir.
31 And these are the kings that reigned in the land of Edom,
before there reigned any king over the children of Israel.
32 And Bela the son of Beor reigned in Edom ; and the name of
^ In 1 Chr. i. 42, Jaakan.
may stand in some connexion with the place '(Wells of) the B^ne
Ja'kkan,' mentioned ic Nu, xxxiii. 31 f ; Dt. x. 6.
28. 'Uz. A branch of ihe Aramaean 'Uz (x. 23, xxii. 21) had
perhaps attached itself to the Horites.
29. 30. The ' dukes' or clan-chiefs (on v. 15) of the Horites. The
names (* the chief of Lotan,' &c.) agree (as in w. 15 — 18) with those
of the corresponding clans, v. 20 f
30. according to their dukes. Better (lxx. [>7y«/i.ovtais = * dukeries'],
Di.), according to their clans (DH^s^n^ for Dn^D^N^)'.
31 — 39. A list of eight Edomite kings. Verse SI** shews that the
writer lived after the beginning of the Isr. monarchy. The last mentioned
king will naturally have lived just before the time of Saul. Edom was
in advance of Israel, both in the possession of a settled territory, and in
attaining monarchical government (cf Nu. xx. 14) : in this respect, also,
Esau was the ' firstborn,' though in the end, Israel won from him his
supremacy (2 S. viii. 14). Of the kings named in this list, none is a son
of his predecessor : it may be inferred, consequently, that the monarchy
in Edom was not hereditary, but elective (cf Is. xxxiv. 12), or de-
pendent upon the abihty of a particular chief to acquire supremacy
over the rest.
32. Bela^ (^^2) the son of Be^or. The resemblance to ' Bala'am
(oySa) the son of Be'or' is remarkable; but hardly forms a sufficient
basis for the speculation that the two persons are the same, and that
Isr. and Edomite history had handed down different conceptions of
him (cf Sayce, EHH. 224, 229 w.; Hommel, AHT. 153, 223; EncB.
s.v. Bela).
1 Wellhausen has pointed out that several of the Edomite and Horite names
here enumerated are the same as, or very similar to, those of families of Judah,
especially of the clan of Hezron (Korah, 1 Ch. ii. 43; Teman, iv. 6; Kenaz,
iv. 13, 15; Shammah, cf. Shammai, ii. 28, 44, iv, 17; Shobal, ii. 52, iv. 1;
Manahath, cf. ii. 52, 54; Onam, ii. 28; Eshban, cf. Ahban, ii. 29; Ithran, cf.
Yether, ii. 32, iv. 17; Aran (QX)^ cf. Oren (p>5)^ ii. 2o; Elah (r. 41), iv. 15;
'Iram, cf. 'Iru, iv. 15). The fact may point to intermarriages having taken place
between the neighbouring peoples. The large proportion of animal names (cf.
p. 273 71.) is also noticeable; it is perhaps the survival of a primitive tutemism in
Edom: cf. Gray, Heh. Prop. Names, pp. 88 S., 112 ff.
318 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxvl 32-40
his city was Diuhabah. 33 And Bela died, and Jobab the son p
of Zerah of Bozrah reigned in his stead 34 And Jobab died,
and Husham of the land of the Temanites reigned in his stead-
35 And Husham died, and Hadad the son of Bedad, who smote
Midian in the field of Moab, reigned in his stead : and the name
of his city was AvitL 36 And Hadad died, and Samlah of
Masrekah reigned in his stead. 37 And Samlah died, and Shaul
of Rehoboth by the River reigned in his stead 38 And Shaul
died, and Baal-hanan the son of Achbor reigned in his stead.
39 And Baal-hanan the son of Achbor died, and ^Hadar reigned
in his stead : and the name of his city was ^Pau ; and his wife's
name was Mehetabel, the daughter of Matred, the daughter of
Me-zahab. 40 And these are the names of the dukes
^ In 1 Chr. i. 50, and some ancient authorities, Hadad. * In 1 Chr. L 50, Pai.
Dinhahah. Unknown : see conjectures in EncB.
33. Bozrah. An important Edomite town, Am. i. 12, Is. Ixiii.
1, al. : now Busaireh, 20 m. SE. of the Dead Sea, and 35 m. N. of Petra.
34. the land of the Temanites. See on v. 11.
35. Hadad. Also the name of an Aramaean deity, — the one
heading the lists of gods in the Aramaic inscriptions of Zinjirli (near
Aleppo), of the 8th cent. b.c. (Cooke, North-Sem. Inscriptions, 161 ff.,
164, cf. 360), and found also in ' Ben-hadad ' and ' Hadad-ezer,' — cor-
responding to the Ass. Kammdn (Rimmon), the storm- and thunder-irod
{KA T.^ 454 ; KA T.^ 443 f.). The name recurs in v. 39 (where RVm.
is no doubt right in following Heb. mss., Sam., and Pesh.), and also (as
that of an Edomite who troubled Solomon) in 1 K xi. 14 flf.
'Av'ith. Burckhardt {Syria, p. 375) mentions a ' chain of low moun-
tains, called el-Ghoweithe' on the E. of the upper course of the Arnon.
37. Shaul. The name in the Heb. is the same as 'Saul.' 'The
river' is usually in Heb. (as RV. interprets here: see on xxxi. 21) the
Euphrates : if RV. is right, Rehoboth may be Rahaba, a place on its
W. bank, a little S. of the mouth of the Habor (Chaboras); and ' Sliaul'
will have been of foreign origin.
39. Baal-hanan. The name ('Baal is gracious'; cf. Johanan,
Elhanan) points to the worship of Baal in Edom : cf. the many Phoen.
names formed with ' Baal.'
Mehetaiiel. ' God does good or benefits,' a name of Aram, forma-
tion (in late Heb., Neh. vi. 10). We have no remains of the language
of Eaom, except such as are preserved in proper names ; but these are
sufficient to shew (what might also have been inferred from the re-
lationship between the two nations) that in all probability it closely
resembled Hebrew, with dialectical differences analogous to those
which we know, from the 'Moabite Stone,' were displayed by the
language of Moab.
XXXVI. 40-43] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 319
that came of Esau, according to their families, after their places, p
by their names ; duke Timna, duke ^Alvah, duke Jetheth ;
41 duke Oholibamah, duke Elah, duke Pinon ; 42 duke Kenaz,
duke Teman, duke Mibzar ; 43 duke Magdiel, duke Irani : these
be the dukes of Edom, according to their habitations in the land
of their possession. This is Esau the father of ^the Edomites.
1 In 1 Chr, i. 51, Aliah. 2 Heb. Edom.
40 — 43. Second list of 'dukes,' or clan-chiefs, of Edom. The
relation of this list to the one in lav. 15 — 19 is not expressly stated:
but most probably (cf Ewald, Hist. i. 76; Di. ; Del.^ the 'dukes' here
enumerated were the heads of the territorial subdivisions of the country
(notice 'after their places,' v. 40) adopted for political or administrative
purposes, which may not have corresponded to the old tribal divisions
(cf. in Israel 1 K. iv. 7 — 19): perhaps indeed the list may relate to
the time when the Edomite monarchy had passed away, and the
country had become subject to Israel (2 S. viii. 14\ The tiames in
the list are partly those of clans (as Kenaz, and Onohbamah), partly
those of places.
40. duke Timna\ The chief of Timna'; and similarly in the
names following. Timna (in the Heb. exactly as w. 12, 22) is in some
editions of RV. spelt by an oversight Timnah.
41. the chief of Elah, In all probability, the sea-port usually
called Elath (see on xiv. 6).
Pinon. Doubtless the Punon of Nu. xxxiii. 42 f , said by Euseb.
and Jerome {Onom. 299, 123) to be in their time Phaenon, a village in
the desert, between Petra and Zo'ar, where criminals were sent to work
in the copper-mines.
42. Mibzar. According to Eus. {Onom. 277) a large village in
Gfibal (Ps. Ixxxiii. 7), a district in the N. of Edom.
Chapters XXXVII~L.
We enter now the last division of the Book, which (except in ch. xxxviii.)
deals entirely with the history of Joseph. The section is indeed headed
Toledoth Jacob : but this is simply a consequence of the plan followed by the
compiler : Isaac is dead ; and Jacob is therefore technically the leading figure ;
but in point of fact he takes a subordinate place, and though after the
denoHment he conies again to the forefront, and the events of his closing
years are told at some length, the chief interest of the narrative centres in
Joseph.
The story of Joseph, whether we take account or not of the double strand
of which it seems (p. 332) to be composed, 'is dramatic in form,— indeed, it
combines the elements which Aristotle {Poet, xi., xvi.) regarded as essential to
a good drama, the irepmeTfia, or " reversal " (viz. of the intended eflfect of an
32t THE BOOK OF GENESIS
action into its direct opposite)^ and the dvayv<Spi<ris, or "recognition," — and it
is told with a toucliing charm. The theme is a common one, common alike in
folk-lore, in the drama, and in history — the younger member of a family kept
down by the envy of the elder members, and at last triumphing over them.
Every trait in the narrative is in accordance with nature; and the whole forms
a vivid portraiture of the true development of human character.' The young
boy dreams his dreams of future greatness : almost immediately his hopes are,
to all appearance, shattered : he is sold away from his father and brethren
into foreign slavery; there, however, his integrity and loyalty save him ; after
many trials and disai)pointments (xl. 23)^, he is at length, by a surprising
sequence of circumstances, elevated to a high and responsible dignity in
Egypt ; one day, after many years, he suddenly sees his brethren, forced by
necessity, standing before him ; but he uses the advantage which his position
gives him, not to crush them or take vengeance on them, but to try them, to
discover whether they are loyal to his father and youngest brother, and then,
when he has at last assured himself of their altered mind, when he sees them
genuinely moved by the sight of their father's grief and the remorse of their
own conscience, and knows that they are willing even to go themselves into
slavery to spare their father, and save their younger brother, when he is
satisfied, in other words, that they are worthy to be forgiven, he discloses
himself to them and nobly and magnanimously forgives theml Though over-
ruled by Providence for good (xlv. 5, 7, 8, L 20), ami though justifying signally
in the end the ways of God to men, the events of Joseph's life move forward,
it may be noted, entirely within the lines of what is human and natural :
Joseph is the recipient of no supernatural warnings or promises, directing his
steps. ' No doubt, the story was told again and again by Hebrew rhapsodists
at the fireside of Hebrew homes': at length, in two slightly difi'erent versions,
one, probably, as it was told in Ephraim, and the other as it was told in Judah,
it was cast into a written form; and the two versions are interwoven together
in our present Genesis.
* It would be a most interesting study to compare the character of Ulysses
with that of Joseph, and to speculate what effect each hero may have had upon
his nation's subsequent history. Each is kept true by the tender memories of
home love ; each is god-fearing ; each is shrewd, resourceful, courageous,
growing with the experience of life ; but with Ulysses the shrewdness just
passes the line, and can scarcely be distinguished from guile and cunning, from
which Joseph is quite free, — Ulysses fimling his subsequent counterpart in
Tiiemistocles, Joseph in Daniel Most interesting, too, to compare the scene
where Joseph's brethren stand cowering, conscious of their guilt, before the
brother whom they have wronged, and receive only the winged words of
forgiveness, with that other scene in which the suitors of Penelope huddle
together at the end of the hall, conscious of their guilt, when Ulysses is
^ The brethren 'sell Joseph to be quit of him and his dreams; but the result is
that his dreams are fulfilled, and he siivos their lives. ' See Lock on the sense of
the term irepiiriTeia in the Class. Rev. jx. (1895), pp. 2.51 — 3.
* Of. Ps. cv. 19 ' Until the time tliat his word [Gen. xxxvii. 7, 9] came to pass,
the saying of Jehovah (the promise implied in Joseph's dreams) tested him
(exposed him to the discipUne of humiliation and disappointment).'
^ Dr Lock compares Prospuio in the Tempest.
xxxvii. 1, 2] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 321
revealed, and receive the winged aiTovsfs of death ; and to think how the young
Greek, as he grew up, had always before him the story of triumphant justice,
while the young Hebrew was nurtured in the nobler story of triumphant mercy'
(from a sermon by Dr Lock, Ea^p. Times, June, 1903, p. 396). See further
below, p. 400 f.
Chapter XXXVII.
Joseph sold into Egypt.
The narrative (except vv. 1, 2*, which belong to P) is composed of J and E.
In the earlier part of the chapter the details of the analysis are somewhat
uncertain: but from v. 21 the double strand apj^ears very distinctly; and if the
reader will follow the narrative carefully, he will see that theve are two
divergent accounts of the manner in which Joseph was rescued from his
brethren's hands, and sold into Egypt. In J, Judah takes the lead: he
dissuades his other brethren from carrying out their purpose, and induces
them to sell Joseph to a caravan of Ishmaelites, who happened to be passing
by on their way from Gilead into Egypt; and the Isliinaelites, upon their
arrival in Egypt, sell him as a slave to an Egyptian of rank (xxxix. 1). In E,
Reuben takes the lead, and dissuades the other brethren from carrying out
their plan : at his suggestion, tliey cast Joseph into a pit, and Midlanite
traders, passing by, draw him up out of the pit, while his brethren are at their
meal, and sell liim in Egypt to Potiphar, the * captain of the guard ' (». 36).
The principal grounds upon which this analysis rests are explained in the notes :
the difference as regards the position taken by Judah and Reuben will re-
appear subsequently.
XXXVII. 1 And Jacob dwelt in the land of his father's P
sojournings, in the land of Canaan. 2 These are the generations
of Jacob. Joseph, being seventeen years old, | was feeding the J
flock with his brethren ; and he was a lad with the sons of
BiUiah, and with the sons of Zilpah, his father's wives : and
Joseph brought the evil report of them unto their father.
XXXVII. 1. And Jacob divelt &c. In contrast to Esau, who
had withdrawn into Se'ir (xxxvi. 6 — 8).
of his father' s sojournings. Cf. xvii. 8, xxviii. 4 (both also P).
2*. P's introduction to the history of Jacob, so far as it belongs
to the period after Isaac's death (xxxv. 29).
2\ Kead, ...with his brethren, being (still) a lad, (even) with, &e.
the sons of Bilhah, Rachel's 'handmaid'; i.e. Dan and Naphtali.
the sons of Zilpah, Leah's 'handmaid'; i.e. Gad and Asher.
and Joseph brought &c. The words are intended to explain the
subsequent unfriendliness. Jacob is to be pictured as being at Hebron
{v. 14; cf. xxxv. 27). What the 'evil report' was, is not stated; per-
haps it was some dishonesty in the sale of their father's flocks, which
shocked the upright mind of Joseph.
D. 21
322 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxvii. 3-11
3 Now Israel loved Joseph more than all his children, because J
he was the son of his old age: and he made him ^a coat of many
colours. 4 And his brethren saw that their father loved him
more than all his brethren ; and they hated him, and could not
speak peaceably unto him. | 5 And Joseph dreamed a dream, E
and he told it to his brethren : and they hated him yet the more.
6 And he said unto them, Hear, I pray you, this dream which I
have dreamed: 7 for, behold, we were binding sheaves in the
field, and, lo, my sheaf arose, and also stood upright ; and,
behold, your sheaves came round about, and made obeisance to
my sheaf. 8 And his brethren said to him, Shalt thou indeed
reign over us? or shalt thou indeed have dominion over us?
And they hated him yet the more for his dreams, and for his
Avords. 9 And he dreamed yet another dream, and told it to
his brethren, and said. Behold, I have dreamed yet a dream ;
and, behold, the sun and the moon and eleven stars made
obeisance to me. 10 And he told it to his father, and to his
brethren ; and his father rebuked him, and said unto him. What
is this dream that thou hast dreamed ? Shall I and thy mother
and thy brethren indeed come to bow down ourselves to thee to
the earth ? 11 And his brethren envied hira ; but his father
kept the saying in mind. | 12 And his brethren went to feed J"
^ Or, o long garment with sleeves
3, 4. A further cause for the boy's unpopularity with his brethren :
he was his father's favourite. For ' Israel,' cf. on xliii. 6.
3. a coat of many colours. A coat, — or, more strictly, a tunic, —
0/ palms and soles, i.e. reaching to the hands and feet (which is what
is meant by RVm.); opp. to the ordinary tunic, which had no sleeves,
and reached only to the knees. So 2 S. xiii. 18 f. (worn in David's
time by royal princesses).
4. 'loved Am.' The pronoun is emphatic in the Hebrew.
could not. So completely had hatred fettered their tongues.
5 — 11. Two boyish dreams of future greatness, such as naturally
increase his brethren's dislike of him. In the eyes of the narrator,
they are divinely-sent presentiments of his future greatness. The
double dream indicates the certainty of the fulfilment (xli. 32).
10. thi/ mother. The words, as used by Jacob, obviously imply
that Rachel was still alive. J has mentioned her death in xxxv. 19;
perhaps E placed her death later.
ll^ Lxx. ^LiT/jpi](r€v (there is no 'in mind' in the Heb.). Cf Lk..
ii. 19 (crvviTijpii), 51 (Surr/pei ev 177 Kaphia avr^s).
xxxvii. 12-.0] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 323
their father's flock in Shechem. 13 And Israel said unto J
Joseph, Do not thy brethren feed the flock in Shechem ? come,
and I will send thee unto them. And he said to him, Here am I.
14 And he said to him, Go now, see whether it be well with thy
brethren, and well with the flock ; and bring me word again.
So he sent him out of the vale of Hebron, and he came to
Shechem. 15 And a certain man found him, and, behold, he
was wandering in the field : and the man asked him, saying,
What seekest thou ? 16 And he said, I seek my brethren : tell
me, I pray thee, where they are feeding the flock. 17 And the
man said, They are departed hence : for I heard them say. Let
us go to Dothan. And Joseph went after his brethren, and
found them in Dothan. 18 And they saw him afar off, and
before he came near unto them, they conspired against him to
slay him. | 19 And they said one to another, Behold, this E
Mreamer cometh. 20 Come now therefore, and let us slay
him, and cast him into one of the pits, and we wiU say, An evil
^ Heb. master of dreams.
12 — 17. Joseph sent to enquire after his brethren at Shechem.
12. in Shechem. The plain of Mukhna on the E. of Shechem
(xii. 6) supplies excellent pasturage. The incidents narrated in ch.
xxxiv. seem to have been forgotten.
14. the vale of Hebron. The broad vale, running NW. to SE., in
which Hebron lies,
17. Dothan. The name is still preserved in Tell Dothan, a fine
green mound, on the top of which the ancient 'city' (2 K. vi. 13 — 15)
must have stood, with two wells near its S. foot, 15 m. N. of Shechem,
on the S. of a broad plain (cf Judith iv. 6), where the pasturage is
even finer than it is about Shechem (Rob. in. 122; cf. EncB. s.v.).
18 — 36. Seeing Joseph approacning in the distance, the brethren
plan to kill him, and so to frustrate his dreams : he is saved, — by E,euben,
according to E; by Judah, according to J, — and carried down into
Eg5T3t; his father being persuaded by his brethren that he has been
killed by a wild beast.
19. Master (or owner) of (RVm.) is a Heb. idiom for possessing :
so xlix. 23 'archers' is lit. masters of arrows, 2 K. i. 8 'hairy' is lit.
owner of hair, Pr. xxix. 22 'wrathful man' is master of wrath, &c. As
used here, the expression is intended as a mocking exaggeration.
20. pits. Or, cisterns, for the storage of water, or {L. and B. i.
89, 90, n. 194, m. 458, cf Jer. xli. 8) grain. Cf. Dt. vi. 11; 1 S. xiii.
6 ; 2 Ch. xxvi. 10 (same word). Such cisterns are still very common
in Palestine, and are often dangerous to travellers (cf the law, Ex. xxi.
33 f ) : they are abundant in particular about Dothan, and ' as they
21—2
324 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxvii. 20-26
beast hath devoured him : and we shall see what will become of e
his dreams. | 21 And [Reuben] heard it, and delivered him out J
of their hand ; and said, Let us not take his life. | 22 And E
Reuben said unto them, Shed no blood ; cast him into this pit
that is in the wilderness, but lay no hand upon him : that he
might deliver him out of their hand, to restore him to his father.
23 And it came to pass, when Joseph was come unto his brethren,
that they stript Joseph of his coat, the coat of many colours
that was on him ; 24 and they took him, and cast him into the
pit : and the pit was empty, there was no water m it. 25 And
they sat down to eat bread : | and they lifted up their eyes and J
looked, and, behold, a travelling company of Ishmaelites came
from Gilead, with their camels bearing ^spicery and ^balm and
^ myrrh, going to carry it down to Egypt. 26 And Judah said
unto his brethren, What profit is it if we slay our brother and
^ Or, gum tragacanth Or, storax ^ Or, mastic * Or, ladanum
are shaped like a bottle with a narrow mouth, any one imprisoned
within would be unable to extricate himself without assistance' (Warren,
Recovery of Jerus., 1871, p. 463).
21 (J). Reuben. Originally, it is generally supposed by critics,
Judah, the sequel following in v. 25 ('and they lifted up,' &c.). With
'Reuben,' v. 21"^ and v. 22* are tautologous.
22— 25\ E's sequel to vv. 19—20.
22. wilderness. The Heb. word means a driving-place for cattle,
i.e. pasture ground, — uncultivated, but by no means barren: of. Ps.
Ixv. 12.
25*^—27. J's sequel to v. 21.
25^ a travelling company. A caravan (Job vi. 18, 19 ; cf. Is.
xxi. 13). The terms in which the Ishmaelites, and {v. 28) the Midian-
ites are mentioned are hardly in accord with at least the literal sense
of the representation in ch. xxi., xxv. 2, according to which both would
be Joseph's cousins.
from Gilead. The plain N, and W. of Dothan is still crossed by
the regular route from Gilead, past Beisan (Beth-shean) and Jezreel,
and on through the plain of Sharon, and Lydda, to Egypt (Rob. n. 316,
331 ; and G. A. Smith's Map).
spicery. Most probably, gum tragacanth: certa,inly, nothing so
general as ' spicery.'
balm. A product of Gilead: Jer. viii. 22, xlvi. 11.
myrrh. Ladanum, — the fragrant gum of the cistus, or rock-rose
(NHB. 458 fif.; EncB. Ladanum). These gums would be used in
Egypt, partly medicinally, partly as incense, and partly in embalming.
26, 27. Judah seizes the opportunity : and by appeahng to his
brothers' cupidity saves Joseph's life.
XXXVII. .6-35] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 326
conceal his blood? 27 Come, and let us sell him to thej
Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him ; for he is our
brother, our flesh. And his brethren hearkened unto him. |
28 And there passed by Midianites, merchantmen ; and they E
drew and lifted up Joseph out of the pit, | and sold Joseph to j
the Ishmaelites for twenty pieces of silver. ] And they brought E
Joseph into Egypt. 29 And Reuben returned unto the pit ;
and, behold, Joseph was not in the pit ; and he rent his clothes.
30 And he returned unto his brethren, and said, The child is
not ; and I, whither shall I go ? | 31 And they took Joseph's j
coat, and killed a he-goat, and dipped the coat in the blood ;
32 and they sent the coat of many colours, and they brought it
to their father ; and said. This have we found : know now
whether it be thy son's coat or not. 33 And he knew it, and
said, It is my son's coat ; an evil beast hath devoured him ;
Joseph is without doubt torn in pieces. 34 And Jacob rent his
garments, and put sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned for his
son many days. 35 And all his sons and all his daughters rose
26. and conceal his blood. That its cry for vengeance may not be
heard: cf. Ez. xxiv. 7 f. ; Is. xxvi. 21; Job xvi. 18.
28* (E). The absence of the art. in 'Midianites' shews that the
reference cannot be to 'the Ishmaelites' mentioned specifically in v. 21,
but that V. 28^ is parallel to vv. 25*^ — 27, and the sequel of v. 25* : while
the brethren are at their meal, Midianite traders, passing by, kidnap
Joseph, and (v. 28°) carry him away into Egypt. This agrees with
xl. 15 (also E), where Joseph is — not 'sold,' but — 'stolen away out of
the land of the Hebrews.'
and they dreio (E). I.e. (in the original context of E) the Midianites,
who drew Joseph up out of the pit, without his brethren's knowledge
(which explains Reuben's surprise in v. 29), while they were at their
meal (v. 25*).
28'' (J), and they sold. . .for twenty shekels of silver. The mention
of the ' Ishmaelites' shews that this clause is the sequel in J to v. 27.
The price (= about 50s. [see on xxiii. 15]) was two-thirds of that of an
ordinary (adult) slave (Ex. xxi. 32), but no doubt such as would be
usual for a youth like Joseph : cf. Lev. xxvii. 5.
28" (E). And they brought &c. Viz. the Midianites {v. 28*).
29 f. (E). Reuben upon returning, after the meal {v. 25*), to the
pit, in the hope, no doubt, of being able now to send Joseph home
secretly {v. 22''), finds to his dismay that the pit is empty.
31 — 35. The sequel in J to the middle clause of v. 28.
33. Jacob, upon seeing the blood-stained coat, at once draws the
desired conclusion {v. 20).
326 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxvii. 35, 36
up to comfort him ; but he refused to be comforted ; and he J
said, For I will go down to ^the grave to my son mourning.
And his father wept for him. | 36 And the ^Midianites sold him E
into Egypt unto Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh's, the ^captain
of the guard,
1 Heb. Sheol, the name of the abode of the dead, answering to the Greek Hades,
Acts ii. 27. - 'H.eh, Medanites. ^ tLeh. chief of the executioners.
35. the grave. Heb. Sheol. See RVm. On the Heb. idea of
Sheol, 'the meeting-place for all living' (Job xxx. 33), where the spirit,
without distinction of good and bad, was supposed to enter upon a
shadowy, half-conscious existence, devoid of interest or occupation,
and not worthy of the name of ' life,' see Kirkpatrick, Psalms, p. Ixxv. fif.,
and on Ps. vi. 5, and the writer's Sermons on the OT. p. 72 ff. (' The
growth of belief in a future state'); and cf Ps. Ixxxviii. 10 — 12; Is.
xiv. 9—10, 15, xxxviii. 18; Job x. 21—22; Ez. xxxii. 21 ff.
36. The sequel in E (notice the ' Midianites') to vv. 28^", 29—30.
Potiphar. The name is Egyptian; and means (see DB. s.v.) 'He
whom the Ra (or the sun-god) gave.' Cf. on xli, 45 (' Poti-phera').
officer. Lit. eunuch', though it is possible that the word is used
in its generalized sense of court-official : cf xl. 2, 7, and RV. of 1 K.
xxii. 9; 2 K. viii. 6, xxiv. 12; Est. i. 10.
the captain of the guard. Lit. 'captain (or chief) of the slaughter-
ers' (of animals [not 'executioners']), a Heb. title, though in usage
applied only to foreigners (except of Potiphar, it is used only, with
y\ for "w, of Nebuchadnezzar's ' captain of the guard,' 2 K. xxv. 8, al.,
Dan. ii. 14). The royal butchers must, it seems, have come in some
way to form the royal body-guard : cf. W. R. Smith, Old Test, in tlie
Jewish Church^, 262 f What native Egyptian official the term denoted
is uncertain ; possibly (see DB. I.e.) one corresponding to the apxt^frm-
fioLTOffivka^ of the Ptolemaic period.
Chapter XXXVIIL
Judah and Tamar,
This narrative (J) has a tribal interest; its main object being to explain the
origin of the three primary subdivisions of the tribe of Judah, viz. the families,
or clans, of Shelah, Perez, and Zerah (see Nu. xxvi. 20). The daughter of
Shua* is a Canaanitess, and presumably Tamar is likewise ; the narrative would
thus seem to betray a consciousness that there was a considerable admixture of
Canaanite blood in the tribe. It is at the same time a secondary purpose of
the narrative to impress the doty of marriage with a deceased brother's wife
(see on vv. 8 — 10). Here is the pedigree of the principal Judahite families : —
XXXVIII. 1-6] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 327
Shua's daughter =JnDAH =Tamar
I 1 S ' 1 ,
Tamar='Er Onan Snelah Perez Zerah
(1 Ch. iv. 21—23) I
1 I 1
Hezron Hamul Zimri (4 others)
■| (Zabdi) lOh. ii. 6
Jerahmeel Ram Chelubai Karmi
(Caleb) I
(1 Ch. ii, 9, (1 Ch. ii. 9, (1 Ch. ii. 9, 'Achan
25—33,34 10—17) 18—20,24, (ICh. ii. 7;
—41) 42— 50»i, JoBh.vii.l)
SOb—SS)
See also 1 Ch. iv. (the text of both 1 Ch. ii. and 1 Ch. iv. is in several places
corrupt); and cf. ch. xlvi. 12, Nu. xxvi. 19—21, 1 Ch. ii. 3 — 5.
Perez (cf. Ru. iv. 12) was regarded as having been, through Hezron, the
ancestor of three impoi tant families, or clans, in Judah. Ram (see 1 Ch. I.e.)
was the reputed ancestor of the royal line of David : many names were con-
nected with Jerahmeel; and the Caleb-clan was regarded as the founder of
Hebron, and other places in Judah (I.e. vv. 42 — 50*^). 1 S. xxvii. 10, xxx. 14
(cf. XXV. 3, XXX- 29), however, seem to shew that in David's time these two clans
were distinct from Judah, and inhabited the Negeb (see on xii. 9) : afterwards,
we must suppose, they, — wholly, or in part, — migrated northwards, and were
ultimately adopted into the tribe, and then the genealogies in 1 Ch. ii were
constructed for the purpose of legitimizing their connexion with it.
XXXVIII. 1 And it came to pass at that time, that J
Judah went down from his brethren, and turned in to a certain
Adullamite, whose name was Hirah. 2 And Judah saw there a
daughter of a certain Canaanite whose name was Shua ; and he
took her, and went in unto her. 3 And she conceived, and bare
a son ; and he called his name Er. 4 And she conceived again,
and bare a son ; and she called his name Onan. 5 And she yet
again bare a son, and called his name Shelah : and he was at
Chezib, when she bare him. 6 And Judah took a wife for Er
XXXVIII. 1—5. The birth of Judah's three sons, by the
daughter of Shua, a Canaanite (called in 1 Ch. ii. 3 Bath-shiia).
1. went down. From the high central ground of Canaan (Hebron ?
xxxvii. 14) to 'Adullam (Jos. xv. 35) in the ShepheJah, or 'lowland'
(Jos. XV, 33 — 44: see DB. iii. 893 f.); now probably 'Aid el-md,
17 m. SW. of Jerusalem {HG. 229).
5. Chezib. The Achzib of Jos. xv. 44, also in the 'lowland,' IMic.
i. 14, On the 'sons' of Shelah, or the Shelanites, see Nu. xxvi. 20;
1 Ch. iv. 21—23 and ix. 5 (|1 Neh. xi. 5) [read 'Shelanite(s)' for
'Shilonite(s)'].
1 To 'Caleb.' Bead then (with lxx.): 'The sons of Hur' [see v. 19], &c.
* Verses SO*" — 55 appear to relate to the pos<-exiUc period.
328 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxviii. 6-,.
his firstborn, and her name was Tamar. 7 And Er, Judah's ,/
fii'stborn, was wicked in the sight of the Lord ; and the Lord
slew him. 8 And Judah said unto Onan, Go in unto thy
brother's wife, and ^perform the duty of an husband's brother
unto her, and raise up seed to thy brother. 9 And Onan knew
that the seed should not be his ; and it came to pass, when he
went in unto his brother's \nfe, that he spilled it on the ground,
lest he should give seed to his brother. 10 And the thing which
he did was evil in the sight of the Lord : and he slew him also.
11 Then said Judah to Tamar his daughter in law, Remain a
widow in thy father's house, till Shelah my son be grown up :
for he said. Lest he also die, like his brethren. And Tamar went
and dwelt in her father's house. 12 And in process of time
* See Deut. xxv. 5.
6, 7. Er marries a wife, Tamar, but dies without issue.
6. took &c. According to the ancient custom : cf. on xxxiv. 4.
1\ Le. he died early : cf. Prov. x. 27 ; Job viii. 12 f.
8 — 10. Onan persistently refuses to fulfil the duty which custom
laid upon him, of raising up seed to his deceased brother Er. According
to a custom widely diffused (though with modifications in detail) in
both ancient and modern times, it was, and in many parts of the world
still is, the duty of a surviving brother to marry his deceased brother's
wife (or wives), and, as the case may be, to make provision for his
children, or, if he should have died childless, to perpetuate his
family and maintain the integrity of the estate^ With certain
limitations in detail, this institution of the ' Levirate-marriage,' as it
is called, was introduced afterwards into Heb. law (Dt, xxv. 5 — 10);
and Dt. xxv. 9 shews that a man who did not conform to it was regarded
as wanting in brotherly feeling, and looked upon with contempt. Onan,
while accepting outwardly the obligation which custom thus imposed
upon him, knew however that the issue of the marriage would not count
as his : so hoping perhaps selfishly to secure the rights of primogeni-
ture in his father's family for himself, he found means to evade giving
effect to it.
9. when. Whenever: the tenses (which are exactly like those
of Nu. xxi. 9, Jud. vi. 3) being frequentative (G.-K. §§ 159°, 112'').
11. Judah, afraid lest a similar fate should overtake his third
son, refuses to give him to Tamar; he however conceals his real purpose,
by pretending that Shelah was not yet old enough to take a wife.
in thy father's house. Whither a widow, having no children, retired
(Lev. xxii. 13).
12 — 18. Tamar's device to make Judah himself perform the duty
of husband's brother. ^
^ See further particulars in the writer's Comm. on Deut., pp. 281 f., 284 f.
XXXVIII. i2-.o] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 329
Shua's daughter, the wife of Judah, died ; and Judah was J
comforted, and went up unto his sheepshearers to Timnah, he
and his friend Hirah the AduUamite. 13 And it was told
Tamar, saying. Behold, thy father in law goeth up to Timnah to
shear his sheep. 14 And she put off from her the garments of
her widowhood, and covered herself with her veil, and wrapped
herself, and sat in the gate of Enaim, which is by the way to
Timnah ; for she saw that Shelah was grown up, and she was
not given unto him to wife. 15 A\Tien Judah saw her, he
thought her to be an harlot ; for she had covered her face.
16 And he turned unto her by the way, and said, Go to, I pray
thee, let me come in unto thee : for he knew not that she was
his daughter in law. And she said, What wilt thou give me,
that thou may est come in unto me? 17 And he said, I will
send thee a kid of the goats from the flock. And she said, Wilt
thou give me a pledge, till thou send it? 18 And he said, What
pledge shall I give thee? And she said. Thy signet and thy
cord, and thy staff that is in thine hand. And he gave them to
her, and came in unto her, and she conceived by him. 19 And
she arose, and went away, and put off her veil from her, and put
on the garments of her widowhood. 20 And Judah sent the
kid of the goats by the hand of his friend the AduUamite, to
12*". The meaning is, ' And when Judah was comforted (viz. after
the usual period of mourning was over), he went up,' &c.
Timnah. Either the modern Tihneh, 4 m. NE. of 'Aid el-mS,, or
the Timnah of Jos. xv. 57, in the 'hill-country' of Judah {ibid. v. 48), —
to judge from the cities with which it is grouped in v. 55 (Maon,
Carmel, &c.), a few miles S. of Hebron. (Not the Timnah of Jud. xiv. 1.)
his sheepshearers. Cf. on xxxi. 19,
14. in the entrance to 'Enaim. Prob. the 'Enam of Jos. xv. 34,
in the Shephelah.
15. covered her face. So that he did not recognize her.
18. The custom of suspending a signet-ring round the neck by a
cord is still common among the Arabs (Rob. i. 36).
thy staff. Which must be thought of as ornamented and valuable.
The ancient Babylonians carried a signet-ring and a stick, the latter
having its top carved into the form of a fruit, flower, bird, &c. (Hdt.
I. 195). The pledge was evidently of a character calculated afterwards
to convict Judah. 'Lange considers that the wickedness of Er had
caused him, equally with Onan, to neglect Tamar, and that conse-
quently there was no real incest' (Payne Smith).
19 — 26. The discovery of what Tamar had done.
330 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxviii. 2o-*6
receive the pledge from the woman's hand : but he found her J
not. 21 Then he asked the men of her place, saying, Where is
the ^harlot, that was at Enaim by the way side ? And they said,
There hath been no %arlot here. 22 And he returned to Judah,
and said, I have not found her ; and also the men of the place
said, There hath been no ^harlot here. 23 And Judah said, Let
her take it to her, lest we be put to shame : behold, I sent this
kid, and thou hast not found her. 24 And it came to pass about
three months after, that it was told Judah, saying, Tamar thy
daughter in law hath played the harlot ; and moreover, behold,
she is with child by whoredom. And Judah said, Bring her
forth, and let her be burnt. 25 When she was brought forth,
she sent to her father in law, saying. By the man, whose these
are, am I with child : and she said. Discern, I pray thee, whose
are these, the signet, and the cords, and the staff. 26 And
^ Heb. kedeshah, that is, a •woman dedicated to impure heathen worship. See
Deut. xxiii. 17, Hos. iv. 14.
21. harlot. Votary (lit. one sacred or dedicated, viz. to 'Ashtoreth
or some other deity). Tamar had dressed herself in the garb, not of
an ordinary harlot, but of a votary, or temple-prostitute — the allusion
being to the singular and repulsive custom, common in heathen Se-
mitic antiquity, esp. in Canaanitish and Phoenician cults, by which
persons of both sexes prostituted themselves in the service of a deity.
Comp. the law forbidding it to IsraeHtes in Dt. xxiii. 17 f. : and the
allusions in Hos. iv. 14, 1 K. xiv. 24, xv. 12, Jer. iii. 2 (where note
*by the ways'), 6, 8 f., 13; and (in Babylon) Hammurabi's Code [above,
p. 156 n.\ § 181, Hdt. i. 199, Ep. of Jeremy 43.
23. Let her take it to her. I.e. let her keep it, lest, if we search
further, we become a contempt (Heb. as Prov. xii. 8).
24. let her be burnt. Judah acts with the authority of head
of the family: cf. Jacob's words in xxxi. 32. Tamar is treated as
virtually betrothed to Shelah (v. 11), and consequently (cf. Dt. xxii.
23 f ) as an adulteress. The later legal punishment for adultery was
death (Lev. xx. 10; Dt. xxii. 22, — so in the case of one betrothed
w. 23 f), by stoning (Ez. xvi. 38 — 40; Jn. viii. 5), only a priest's
daughter who prostituted herself being liable to be burnt (Lev.
xxi. 10)'.
26. Judah acknowledges his error. The custom was but a tem-
porary one: nevertheless, living in the age in which she did Hve,
^ Death at the stake is the punishment prescribed in Hammurabi's Code,
§ 157, for both parties, in the case of incest with a mother: it was also an
Egyptian punishment for adulteresses (Petrie, Egyp. Tales, i. 15; Masp. i. 337;
cf. Hdt. n. 111).
xxxviii. .6-30] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 331
Judah acknowledged them, and said, She is more righteous than J
I ; forasmuch as I gave her not to Shelah my son. And he
knew her again no more. 27 And it came to pass in the time of
her travail, that, behold, twins were in her womb. 28 And it
came to pass, when she travailed, that one put out a hand : and
the midwife took and bound upon his hand a scarlet thread,
saying, This came out first. 29 And it came to pass, as he drew
back his hand, that, behold, his brother came out : and she said,
^Wherefore hast thou made a breach for thyself? therefore his
name was called ^Perez. 30 And afterward came out his brother,
that had the scarlet thread upon his hand : and his name was
called Zerah.
* Or, Row hast thou made a breach I a breach be upon thee I ' That is, A
breach.
Tamar had a right that it should be observed towards her; and Judah,
in refusing to comply with it, had done her a wrong.
is more righteous than I. 'Righteous' is to be understood, natur-
ally, in a relative sense: comp. Ez. xvi. 51, 52; Jer. iii. 11.
27 — 30. The birth of Perez and Zerah. The story in all probability
has its origin in a popular explanation (cf. xix. 36 — 38) of the name
'Perez,* suggested by rivalries between the two clans, and the fact
that the Perez-clan, although the younger, became in time more
powerful and important than the Zerah-clan (cf. xxv. 25 f ). In 1 Ch. ii.
the descendants of Perez are certainly far more numerous and widely-
spread than those of Zerah (comp. the Table, p. 327).
29, Wherefore &c. I.e. Why hast thou thus violently forced thy-
self out? So Del., Di. &c. RVm. is also possible (Ges.), but on the
whole less probable.
30. Zerah. The emphasis on the 'scarlet thread' suggests that it
is intended as an explanation of the name : and in Aram, zehurithd
means 'scarlet' (Pesh. here and v. 28): so perhaps that is alluded to
by the narrator (for the metathesis involved, cf 1 Ch. iv. 9 f , where
Ya'bez is explained by *dzeb). As a Heb. word, Zerah would mean
naturally risitig or shining forth (of the sun: Is. Ix. 3). It occurs also
as the name of an Edomite clan in ch. xxxvi. 13 (cf. v. 33).
The narrative is one of those (cf. on ch. xxxiv.) on which the question seems
to arise whether we are dealing really with individuals, or with tribes, and
divisions of tribes, represented as individuals. The strong tribal interest
which the chapter displays lends some countenance to the second alternative.
If this view is correct, 'Er and Onan may represent Judahite clans which early
disappeared ; while Perez and Zerah may represent clans which rose into pro-
minence afterwards, Zerah, though really the more ancient clan, — the name,
it has even been conjectured, signifies properly autochthonous (cf. ^ezrdh,
332 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
' native '), and points to the fact that the clan was of Canaanitish origin, —
being outnumbered by Perez, on account of the clans of Caleb and Jerahmeel
being reckoned, after their incorporation into Judah (p. 327), as belonging to
the latter (Stade, Gesch. i. 158 f.). Cf. G. A. Smith, HG. p. 289; Modern
Criticism and the Preaching of the OT. p. 104; DB. il 792^ (comp. 121 t,
126 £).
Chapter XXXIX.
Joseph cast into prison.
The chapter (with the exception of the words indicated in vv. 1, 20) belongs to
J; and forms the sequel to J's account of Joseph's being sold to the Ishmaelites
in xxxvii, 25'' — 27, 28 (middle clause), 31 — 35. It forms, morally, a bright
contrast to the discreditable story told in ch. xxxviii.
The history of Joseph must have been told at length in J and E alike, in
substantially the same form in both, but with occasional variations in details ;
and the method mostly followed by the compiler, esp. in chs. xxxix. — xlv,, has
been to excerpt long passages from J and E alternately, and at the same time
to incorporate in each short notices embodying traits derived from the other.
The grounds upon which this conclusion rests are the facts — (a) tiiat the re-
presentation in ditFerent parts of the narrative varies, and (6) that in the course
of the narrative there occur short, isolated passages not in entire harmony with
the context in which they are embedded, but prestipposing different circum-
stances, which, conversely, appear in the narrative elsewhere. It may be
convenient to place here a synopsis of the principal diflfereuces between the
two narratives (including those, already noticed, in ch. xxxvii.). According to
J, Joseph, when his brethren plot to kill him, is rescued by Judah, and then
sold by his brethren to Ishmaelites, who in their turn sell him to an Egyptian
of position, whose name is not given (see on xxxix. 1) ; he is made by him his
head servant (xxxix, 4) ; after the charge brought against him by his master's
wife, he is thrown into a prison bearing the peculiar name of the * Round (?)
House ' (xxxix. 20) ; and the keeper of this makes him overseer of the other
prisoners. In the sequel, the brethren tell Joseph about their younger brother
only in answer to his inquiry (xliii. 7, xliv. 19) ; nothing is said about Simeon
being detained as a hostage in Egypt ; the brethren open their sacks and
discover the money in them, at the lodging-place by the way ; Judah offers to
be surety to liis father for Benjamin's return ; and Goshen is named as the
district allotted to Jacob and his sons. According to E, Joseph is rescued
from his own brethren by Reuben, and thrown into a pit, from which he is
drawn up by Midianites without his brothers' knowledge : he is sold by them
to Potiphar, captain of tlie guard, who appoints him (xl. 4) to wait on the
prisoners confined in his house : the brethren, when taxed with being spies,
volunteer the information about their younger brother (xlii. 13, 32) ; Simeon is
left in Egypt as a hostage ; the brethren open their sacks at the end of tlieir
journey home ; Reuben oti'ers to be surety for Benjamin's return ; and there is
no mention of Goshen ^ Thus while both versions bring Joseph into relation
1 This distinction recurs in Exodus, where similarly it is only J who describes
the Israelites as living apart in Goshen (viii. 22, ix. 26),
XXXIX. 1-5] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 333
with a prison, he is a prisoner himself only in J ; in E he is merely appointed
to wait on the prisoners : further, while in J the keeper of the ' Round (?)
House ' (who is distinct from Joseph's master, xxxix. 20, 21) commits the other
prisoners into his charge, in E his own master, the 'captain of the guard'
(xxxvii. 36, xl. 3", 4), appoints him to wait upon the prisoners committed to his
charge. In the existing (composite) narrative the two versions are harmonized
(though imperfectly) by Potiphar being represented as both Joseph's master
and also 'captain of the guard.'
This and the following chapters contain many allusions to Egj'ptian customs
and institutions, which are explained, as fully as space permits, in the notes.
For further information, and fuller references to authorities, see DB. u.
772—5.
XXXIX. 1 And Joseph was brought down to Egypt; and J
[Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh's, the captain of the guard,] R
an Egyptian, bought him of the hand of the Ishmaelites, which J
had brought him down thither. 2 And the Lord was with
Joseph, and he was a prosperous man ; and he was in the house
of his master the Egyptian. 3 And his master saw that the
Lord was with him, and that the Lord made all that he did to
prosper in his hand. 4 And Joseph found grace in his sight,
and he ministered unto him : and he made him overseer over
his house, and all that he had he put into his hand. 5 And
it came to pass from the time that he made him overseer in
his house, and over all that he had, that the Lord blessed the
XXXIX. 1 — 6. How Joseph prospered in his master's house.
1. The V. forms the direct sequel to xxxvii. 28*" (also J).
Potiphar, an officer &c. See on xxxvii. 36 \
2. was with Joseph. Cf. w. 3, 21, 23; and see on xxi. 20.
4. Finding him to be quick and trustworthy, his master made him
first his personal attendant (' he ministered unto him ') ; and afterwards
'appointed him over his house,^ i.e. made him superintendent of his
establishment, or his major domo, such as was usual in large Egyptian
households, the mer-per, or superintendent of the house, being often
mentioned in the inscriptions {DB. ii. 772*).
5 f. As his affairs prospered under Joseph's management, his
^ If the name and description of Joseph's master orif^inally stood here, the
addition 'an Egyptian' seems superfluous, and it is strange also that the name
should never recur in subsequent parts of the chapter; hence it is generally
supposed by critics that the original text of J had here only 'and an Egyptian
bouglit him,' &c., the words referred to R being a harmonizing insertion, made
for the purpose of identifying the (unnamed) 'Egyptian' of J with the Potiphar of
xxxvii. 36 (E). If this supposition is correct, the difficulty that has been found in a
euuuch being married ( tliough, it is true, cases are known to occur, and the word
may not have that sense here : see on xxxvii. 36) will of course disappear.
334 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xxxix. 5-14
Egyptian's house for Joseph's sake ; and the blessing of the j
Lord was upon all that he had, in the house and in the field.
6 And he left all that he had in Joseph's hand ; and ^he knew
not aught that ivas with him, save the bread which he did eat.
And Joseph was comely, and well favoured. 7 And it came to
pass after these things, that his master's wife cast her eyes upon
Joseph ; and she said. Lie with me. 8 But he refused, and said
unto his master's wife. Behold, my master ^knoweth not what is
with me in the house, and he hath put all that he hath into
my hand ; 9 ^ there is none greater in this house than I ; neither
hath he kept back any thing from me but thee, because thou art
his wife : how then can I do this great wickedness, and sin
against God? 10 And it came to pass, as she spake to Joseph
day by day, that he hearkened not unto her, to lie by her, or to
be with her. 1 1 And it came to pass about this time, that he
went into the house to do his work ; and there was none of the
men of the house there within. 12 And she caught him by his
garment, saying. Lie with me : and he left his garment in her
hand, and fled, and got him out. 13 And it came to pass, when
she saw that he had left his garment in her hand, and was fled
forth, 14 that she called unto the men of her house, and spake
unto them, saying. See, he hath brought in an Hebrew unto us
^ Or, with him he knew not * Or, knoweth not with me what is dbc. * Or,
he is not
master entrusted to him more and more, until at last with him he
knew not aught, save the bread which he did eat, i.e. having him, he
troubled himself about nothing, except his food, which, probably on
account of religious scruples (cf. xliii. 32), he could not entrust to the
care of a foreigner.
6. well famwred. See on xxix. 17.
7 — 12. His master's wife makes advances to him, which he repels.
8. Read with marg., knoweth not with me what is in the house.
9. RVm. is the only legitimate rend, of the Heb. : he has given
me such authority that he has no greater authority himself. The rend,
of the text implies the omission of two letters (px for i:j»n). Joseph
casts the temptation from him, declaring finely that he will neither
(1) betray the trust which his master reposes in him, nor (2) sin
against God.
13—20. To avenge herself for the last repulse, she brings a false
charge against Joseph, firstly before her servants, and afterwards
before her husband, with the result that he is cast into prison.
XXXIX. 14-23] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 336
to mock us ; he came in unto me to lie with me, and I cried with J
a loud voice : 15 and it came to pass, when he heard that
I lifted up my voice and cried, that he left his garment by me,
and fled, and got him out. 16 And she laid up his garment by
her, until his master came home. 17 And she spake unto him
according to these words, saying. The Hebrew servant, which
thou hast brought unto us, came in unto me to mock me :
18 and it came to pass, as I lifted up my voice and cried, that
he left his garment by me, and fled out. 19 And it came to
pass, when his master heard the words of his wife, which she
spake unto him, saying, After this manner did thy servant to
me ; that his wrath was kindled. 20 And Joseph's master took
him, and put him into the prisonQ the place where the king's R
prisoners were bound] : and he was there in the prison. 21 But J
the Lord was with Joseph, and shewed kindness unto him, and
gave him favour in the sight of the keeper of the prison.
22 And the keeper of the prison committed to Joseph's hand all
the prisoners that were in the prison ; and whatsoever they did
there, he was the doer of it. 23 The keeper of the prison looked
not to any thing that was under his hand, because the Lord was
with him ; and that which he did, the Lord made it to prosper.
14. an Hebrew. A man of the unclean, foreign stock (xliii. 32,
xlvi. 34). She professes to be altogether dissatisfied with Joseph's
introduction into the house.
to mock us. Insinuating falsely that the other women in the house
had been exposed to similar insults.
16. laid up. I.e. deposited. We should now say rather 'laid
dmun: Cf Ex. xvi. 34; Dt. xiv. 28.
20. the prison. The Round House. The Heb. expression is
peculiar, and is found only here {vv. 20 — 23), and xl. 3^ S**. Under-
stood as two Hebrew words it might signify 'house of roundness,' i.e.
a circular tower, such as might be used for a prison; but sohar is
perhaps the Hebraized form of an Egj^t. word, though no satisfactory
original for it has hitherto been suggested. Nor is it known what
place is denoted by the expression \ The bracketed words are not
improbably an editorial preparation for ch. xl.
21 — 23. Here also, as before {v. 2), Jehovah is 'with him'; and
1 There are no sufficient grounds for identifying it with the ' White Castle ' at
Memphis (Hdt. iii. 13, 91; Thuc. i. 104); and the suhanu at Thebes, 300 miles up
the Nile, — a palace in which State prisoners were honourably confined (Masp.
11.271 n.), — seeras too remote from the Delta (in which, as 'Goshen' shews [see
on xlvi. 28] the scene of the following narrative is evidently laid), besides being
not very likely in itself.
336 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xL. 1-3
he wins the confidence and esteem of the keeper of the prison, so that
he made him overseer of the other prisoners, and entrusted them to
his care.
To the story of Joseph and his master's wife, narrated in this chapter, there
is a remarkable parallel (which has been often compared) in the Egyptian
romance, commonly called 'The Tale of the Two Brothers,' written for
Seti II., of the 19th dynasty (c. B.c. 1180, Petrie), and preserved in the
d'Orbiney Papyrus. The outline of this story is as follows : — Two brothers,
Anpu and Bata, lived together in one house ; the elder, Anpu, one day sent
Bata back from the fields into the house to fetch some seed ; Anpu's wife there
made advances to him, which he repelled ; when Anpu returned home in the
evening, his wife accused Bata to him falsely. Anpu, enraged, at first sought
to slay his brother, but in the end he was convinced that he was innocent and
had been accused falsely, and he thereupon slew his unfaithful wife^
Chapter XL.
Joseph interprets the dreams of Pharaoh's two officers.
The chapter, vsdth the exception of the few short passages referred to R, in
which the compiler seems to have introduced traits borrowed from the repre-
sentation of J, belongs to E ; and forms the sequel to E's account of Joseph's
being taken to Egypt in xxxvii. 28"''=, 29—30, 36.
XL. 1 And it came to pass after these things, that the E
butler of the king of Egypt and his baker offended their lord the
king of Egypt. 2 And Pharaoh was wroth against his two
officers, against the chief of the butlers, and against the chief of
the bakers. 3 And he put them in ward in the house of the
captain of the guard [, into the prison, the place where Joseph B
XL. 1 — 4. Pharaoh's two officers thrown into prison.
1. butler. The word in Neh. i. 11 rendered cup-bearer: lit. drink-
giver. ■ There is a representation of a servant offering wine to a guest
in a goblet, in Wilkinson-Birch, Manners and Customs of the Ancient
Egyptians (ed. 1878), i. 430.
2. officers. Vro^Qxly eunuchs', of. on xxxix. 1. So 'y. 7.
chief of the bakers. There were very numerous officials at the
ancient Eg)^tian court; and a 'superintendent of the bakery' is
mentioned in Erman, Life in Ancient Egypt, pp. 105, 187, 188.
3^ the prison. The Round House : so v. 5^ See on xxxix. 20".
i~The story is translated in full in Petrie, Egijpt. Tales (1895), ii. 36 £f.:
abridgments may be seen in Erman, Life in Ancient Egypt, p. 378 £., and Sayce,
Monuments, p. 209 ff.
2 The passages marked in vv, S*>, 5^ appear to be insertions identifying the
'ward' in the house of the captain of the guard, in which, according to E, Pharaoh's
officers were confined, with the 'Bound House' in which, according to J (xxxix.
20 — 23), Joseph was imprisoned. Of. the Introd. to ch. xxxix.
XL. 3-13] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 337
was bound]. 4 And the captain of the guard charged Joseph R E
with them, and he ministered unto them : and they continued a
season in ward- 5 And they dreamed a dream both of them,
each man his dream, in one night, each man according to the
interpretation of his dream[, the butler and the baker of the R
king of Egypt, which were bound in the prison]. 6 And Joseph E
came in unto them in the morning, and saw them, and, behold,
they were sad. 7 And he asked Pharaoh's oflBcers that were
with him in ward in his master's house, saying, Wherefore look
ye so sadly to-day? 8 And they said unto him. We have
dreamed a dream, and there is none that can interpret it. And
Joseph said unto them, Do not interpretations belong to God?
teU it me, I pray you. 9 And the chief butler told his dream to
Joseph, and said to him. In my dream, behold, a vine was before
me ; 10 and in the vine were three branches : and it was as
though it budded, and its blossoms shot forth ; mid the clusters
thereof brought forth ripe grapes: 11 and Pharaoh's cup was in
my hand ; and I took the grapes, and pressed them into Pharaoh's
cup, and I gave the cup into Pharaoh's hand. 12 And Joseph
said unto him, This is the interpretation of it : the three branches
are three days ; 13 within yet three days shall Pharaoh lift up
thine head, and restore thee unto thine office : and thou shalt
give Pharaoh's cup into his hand, after the former manner when
4. charged &c. Appointed Joseph (to be) with them. He is not
appointed over them, as in xxxix. 22; but, being Potiphar's slave
(xxxvii. 36, xli. 12), he is appointed (as the following words shew) to
be their attendant (xxxix. 4; 2 S. xiii. 17), and wait upon them.
5 — 15. Joseph interprets the dream of the chief of the butlers.
7. in ward &c. In the ward of &c. (so strictly also in v. 3).
The words do not necessarily imply that Joseph was ' in ward' likewise.
For 'with him,' of. v. 4, xli. 12.
8. none that can interpret it. Dreams were regarded by the
Egyptians, as indeed by most ancient nations, as significant; and great
importance was attached to their interpretation. Cf. Wiedemann, Bel.
of the Anc. Eg. 265—7.
belong to God. Cf. xli. 16, 38, 39; Dan. ii. 19, 28.
11. pressed &c. In a text found at Edfu, it is said that grapes
squeezed into water formed a refreshing beverage, which was drunk
by the king (Ebers, Darch Gosen zum Sinai (1872), p. 480; cf. Smith,
DB\ 1796«).
13. lift up thine head. Cf. (of Jehoiachin) 2 K. xxv. 27.
D. 22
338 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xl. 13-10
thou wast his butler. 14 But have me in thy remembrance E
when it shall be well with thee, and shew kindness, I pray thee,
unto me, and make mention of me unto Pharaoh, and bring me
out of this house : 15 for indeed I was stolen away out of the
land of the Hebrews [ : and here also have I done nothing that B
they should put me into the dungeon]. 16 When the chief Jg
baker saw that the interpretation was good, he said unto Joseph,
I also was in my dream, and, behold, three baskets of white
bread were on my head : 17 and in the uppermost basket there
was of all manner of bakemeats for Pharaoh ; and the birds did
eat them out of the basket upon my head. 18 And Joseph
answered and said. This is the interpretation thereof : the three
baskets are three days ; 19 within yet three days shall Pharaoh
lift up thy head from off thee, and shall hang thee on a tree ;
and the birds shall eat thy flesh from off thee. 20 And it came
to pass the third day, which was Pharaoh's birthday, that he
made a feast unto all his servants : and he lifted up the head of
14. out of this house. I.e. out of the condition of slavery, in which
he is forced by his master {v. 4) to act as gaoler.
15. stolen away, — and so not lawfully in slavery. The representa-
tion is in accordance with E's account in xxxvii. 28'''°\
the land of the Hebrews. An anachronism for ' the land of Canaan.'
16 — 19. Joseph interprets the dream of the chief of the bakers.
16. on my head. According to Egyptian custom : see the illustra-
tion of a royal bakery in Wilk.-B. 11. 34, or Erman, p. 191; the man
with the tray of rolls upon his head, also, in Maspero, i. 314.
17. bakemeats. I.e. pastry: an archaism. See DB. s.v. ; and cf
the note on i. 29 upon 'meat.'
19. shall hang thee &c. To hang the dead body of a malefactor,
and expose it so to public view, was regarded by the Hebrews as an
aggravation of the punishment (Dt. xxi. 22 f ; Jos. x. 26; 2 S. iv. 12);
and in Egypt giving it to beasts or birds of prey would be a special
indignity, on account of the superstitious ideas entertained by the
Egyptians respecting the body; its preservation, as a mummy, being
considered the condition of a person's immortality.
20, 21. Both interpretations come true.
20. Pharaoh's birthday. The Cauopus and Rosetta decrees (b.O.
239 and 195) are evidence tnat, at least in the Ptolemaic period, the
birthday of the Pharaoh was celebrated with a great assembly of priests
of aU grades, and a granting of amnesties to prisoners.
1 Verse 15'' appears to be an insertion, introducing the situation of xxxix. 20 —
23 (J), according to •yhich Joseph is himself a prisoner. Cf . p. 333.
XL. .o-XLi. 4] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 339
the chief butler and the head of the chief baker amoug his E
servants. 21 And he restored the chief butler unto his butler-
ship again ; and he gave the cup into Pharaoh's hand : 22 but
he hanged the chief baker : as Joseph had interpreted to them.
23 Yet did not the chief butler remember Joseph, but forgat
him.
Chapter XLI.
Joseph's elevation in Egypt, in consequence of his successful
interpretation of Pharaoh's dreams.
How Joseph, after two years, is rescued from servitude in consequence of
his interpretation of Pharaoh's dreams, and invested witli authority over the
entire land of Egypt for the purpose of making provision against the coming
years of famine. The chapter, with tlie exception, it seems, of a clause in v. 14,
and of V. 46 (P), belongs to E, and forms the immediate sequel to chap. xl.
XLI. 1 And it came to pass at the end of two full years, E
that Pharaoh dreamed : and, behold, he stood by the ^ river.
2 And, behold, there came up out of the river seven kine,
well favoured and fatfleshed; and they fed in the reed-grass.
3 And, behold, seven other kine came up after them out of the
river, ill favoured and leanfleshed ; and stood by the other kine
upon the brink of the river. 4 And the ill favoured and lean-
1 Heb. Yeor, that is, the Nile.
XLI. 1 — 7. The Pharaoh's two dreams.
the river. The Nile. So w. 2, 3, 17, 18. The Heb. is 7/e'dr
(Egypt, 'iotr, contr. 'io'r, watercourse, stream), the standing name for
the Nile throughout the OT. (e.g. Is. xix. 6, 7, 8, xxiii. 3, 10), as also
in Assyrian.
2. out of the Nile. Egypt is dependent for its fertility upon the
Nile, and in particular upon its annual overflow (due ultimately to
the spring rains in the Abyssinian highlands, and the melting of the
mountain snow) ; and the cow-headed goddess Hat-hor, and especially
Isis, seem at times to represent the land which the river fertihzes
(Masp. I. 99, 132). The cow being sacred to both these goddesses,
sine emerging from the Nile would be a natural emblem of fruitful
seasons, and might moreover appear naturally in a dream relating to
the fertility of the soil.
the reed-grass. Heb. 'd/m, Egypt, ahu (from aha, to be green),
found also in v. 18 and Job viii. 11, and (in the form a;;^et) in the lxx.
of 'W. 2, 3, 18, 19, Is. xix. 7, and Ecclus. xl. 16.
22—2
340 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xli. 4-9
fleshed kine did eat up the seven well favoured and fat kine. E
So Pharaoh awoke. 5 And he slept and dreamed a second
time : and, behold, seven ears of corn came up upon one stalk,
^rank and good. 6 And, behold, seven ears, thin and blasted
with the east wind, sprung up after them. 7 And the thin ears
swallowed up the seven ^rank and full ears. And Pharaoh
awoke, and, behold, it was a dream. 8 And it came to pass in
the morning that his spirit was troubled ; and he sent and
called for all the ^magicians of Egypt, and all the wise men
thereof: and Pharaoh told them his dream ; but there was none
that could interpret them unto Pharaoh. 9 Then spake the
^ Heb. fat. ' Or, sacred scribes
5. upon one stalk. I.e. closely following one another, like the
years which they symbolized.
6. the east wind. The sirocco (from the Arab. skerJciyeh, * eastern'),
including however winds from the SE., which in Palestine and neigh-
bouring countries often spring up suddenly, with great violence, from
the desert, darkening the sky with clouds of sand, 'burning like the
mouth of a furnace,' and so parching and withering vegetation that no
animal will afterwards touch it (cf. Eob. BB. 1. 195, 207, n. 123; HG.
67 — 9). This is always what is meant by the ' east wind' in the OT. :
cf Hos. xiii. 15; Ez. xvii. 10, xix. 12; Job xxvii. 21.
8. and he sent &c. The Egypt, hierarchy was highly organized ;
and among the priestly classes were two called the 'writers of sacred
things' (in the parallel Greek text of the Canopus decree, 1. 4\
irrepocfiopai, — depicted on the monuments with a feather (quill) on their
heads, and a book in their hand)^, and the 'knowers of things,' or,
as we might say, 'wise men' (in the Greek text, tepoypa/x./xarets, or
'sacred scribes'), whom the Egyptian king would consult in an emer-
gency^. Probably the ' hartummim' and 'wise men,' mentioned here,
corresponded to these two classes.
magicians. RVm. sacred scribes. Heb. hartummim, a word of un-
certain derivation, but found only in coimexion with Egypt («. 24, Ex.
vii. 11, 22, viii. 7, 18, 19, ix. 11), and (^borrowed from Gen.) in Dan. i.
20, ii. 2, 10, 27, iv. 7, 8, v. 11. LXX. (m Gen.) i^rjyiqTai, 'interpreters.'
9 — 16. The chief butler remembers Joseph, and mentions him to
the Pharaoh, who thereupon summons him before him.
9. RVm. is correct.
1 See Mahaffy, The Emvire of the Ptolemies (1895), p. 229.
a See Wilk.-B. ii. 324, Nos. 8, 9.
5 In the Tale of the Tioo Brothers (p. 54, Petrie), a lock of scented hair, which
has been found, is brought to the Pharaoh, who summons ' the scribep, and the
knowers of things,' to tell him who the owner is. On the learning possessed by
these sacred scribes (which included a knowledge of magic and charms), see
Brugsch's Aegyptologie (1891), pp. 77, 85, 149—159. Cf. Clem. AL Strom, vi. 36.
XLi.9-21] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 341
chief butler unto Pharaoh, saying, I Mo remember my faults E
this day : 10 Pharaoh was wroth with his servants, and put me
in ward in the house of the captain of the guard, me and the
chief baker : 11 and we dreamed a dream in one night, I and
he ; we dreamed each man according to the interpretation of his
dream. 12 And there was with us there a young man, an
Hebrew, servant to the captain of the guard ; and we told him,
and he interpreted to us our dreams ; to each man according to
his dream he did interpret 13 And it came to pass, as he
interpreted to us, so it was ; ^me he restored unto mine oflBce,
and him he hanged. 14 Then Pharaoh sent and called Joseph,
[and they brought him hastily out of the dungeon :] and he shaved R E
himself, and changed his raiment, and came in unto Pharaoh.
15 And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I have dreamed a dream, and
there is none that can interpret it : and I have heard say of thee,
that when thou hearest a dream thou canst interpret it. 16 And
Joseph answered Pharaoh, saying. It is not in me : God shall
give Pharaoh an answer of peace. 17 And Pharaoh spake unto
Joseph, In my dream, behold, I stood upon the brink of the
river : 18 and, behold, there came up out of the river seven
kine, fatfleshed and well favoured ; and they fed in the reed-
grass : 19 and, behold, seven other kine came up after them,
poor and very ill favoured and leanfleshed, such as I never saw
in all the land of Egypt for badness : 20 and the lean and ill
favoured kine did eat up the first seven fat kine : 21 and when
they had eaten them up, it could not be known that they had
1 Or, will make mention of 2 Qr, I was restored... and he was hanged
my faults. His offences (lit. sins, like the corresponding verb in
xl. 1) against the Pharaoh are intended.
13, RVm. interprets according to G.-K. § 144^': cf. xliii. 34.
14. shaved himself. The Egyptians shaved both their heads anc
their faces (though they wore on important occasions artificial hair
and beards) : on the monuments, only foreigners, and natives of inferior
rank, are represented as growing beards. Cf. Erman, p. 225 ^
16, It is not in me. Not at all (or Not I), deprecating (cf. on
xiv. 24). As in xl. 8, Joseph refers his skill to God.
God will give &c. Joseph, as befitted one addressing his sovereign,
assures Pharaoh that the dream will receive a favourable interpretation
17 — 24. The Pharaoh recounts his two dreams to Joseph.
1 The second clause in this verse is referred to R on the same grounds as those
stated in the footnote on xl. IS*"
342 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xli. .r-34
eaten them ; but they were still ill favoured, as at the beginning. E
So I awoke. 22 And I saw in my dream, and, behold, seven
ears came up upon one stalk, full and good : 23 and, behold,
seven ears, withered, thin, and blasted with the east wind,
sprung up after them : 24 and the thin ears swallowed up the
seven good ears : and I told it unto the magicians ; but there
was none tliat could declare it to me. 25 And Joseph said unto
Pharaoh, The dream of Pharaoh is one : what God is about to
do he hath declared unto Pharaoh. 26 The seven good kine
are seven years ; and the seven good ears are seven years : the
dream is one. 27 And the seven lean and ill favoured kine that
came up after them are seven years, and also the seven empty
ears blasted with the east wind ; they shall be seven years of
famine. 28 That is the thing which I spake unto Pharaoh :
what God is about to do he hath shewed unto Pharaoh.
29 Behold, there come seven years of great plenty throughout
all the land of Egypt : 30 and there shall arise after them seven
years of famine ; and all the plenty shall be forgotten in the
land of Egypt ; and the famine shall consume the land ; 31 and
the plenty shall not be kno^vn in the land by reason of that
famine which foUoweth ; for it shall be very grievous. 32 And
for that the dream was doubled unto Pharaoh twice, it is
because the thing is established by God, and God will shortly
bring it to pass. 33 Now therefore let Pharaoh look out a man
discreet and wise, and set him over the land of Egypt. 34 Let
Pharaoh do this, and let him appoint overseers over the land,
25 — 28. Joseph's interpretation of the dreams : tliey are a fore-
loding of what is about to happen in Egypt. Several instances are
nown from the inscriptions (cf. also Hdt. 11, 141) of the Pharaohs
itering upon important undertakings, in consequence of intimations
jnveyed to them in dreams. A vision of the god Ptah, for instance,
appearing in a dream, encouraged Merenptah (the Pharaoh, probably,
of the Exodus) to attack the Libyans by whom Egypt had been invaded
(cf. DB. 11. 772").
29 — 32. The meaning of the dreams explained more particularly.
33 — 36. Joseph ends by suggesting a practical means for making
provision for the seven years of famine by storing up in advance a fifth
of the produce of each of the years of plenty, and by appointing
a special oHicial, with local assistants under him, to see that this
was done.
XLL 34-41] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 343
and take up the fifth part of the land of Egypt in the seven E
plenteous years. 35 And let them gather all the food of these
good years that come, and lay up corn under the hand of
Pharaoh for food in the cities, and let them keep it. 36 And
the food shall be for a store to the land against the seven years
of famine, which shall be in the land of Egypt ; that the land
perish not through the famine. 37 And the thing was good in
the eyes of Pharaoh, and in the eyes of all his servants. 38 And
Pharaoh said unto his servants. Can we find such a one as this,
a man in whom the spirit of God is? 39 And Pharaoh said unto
Joseph, Forasmuch as God hath shewed thee all this, there is
none so discreet and wise as thou : 40 thou shalt be over my
house, and according unto thy word shall all my people ^be
ruled : only in the throne will I be greater than thou. 41 And
^ Or, order themselves Or, do homage
35. under the hand. I.e. under the authority and control: cf.
Is. iii. 6.
in the cities. Where the granaries were, in which the produce of
the surrounding districts would naturally be stored (v. 48). There
were granaries in all important cities of Egj^t, partly for the re-
ception of the corn-tax (an important item of the revenue), partly
to provide maintenance for soldiers and other public officials : the
'superintendent of the granaries' was one of the highest officers of
the state, and it was his duty to see that they were properly filled,
and to report to the king annually on the harvests; if he reported
favourably, the Pharaoh might decorate him with a collar of gold, v. 42
(Erman, p. 108, cf. pp. 81, 86, 89, 94, 95, 433, 434).
37 — 45. The Pharaoh, falling in at once with the suggestion,
appoints Joseph himself for the purpose, and decorates him with many
honours.
38. Joseph's explanation commended itself: and so, the Pharaoh
feels, he must be a man specially gifted by God (cf. v. 39*, xl. 8), and
consequently specially fitted to undertake the contemplated work.
the spirit of God. Regarded as the source of all extraordinary
powers or capacities: cf. Ex. xxxi. 3; Dan. v. 11, 14; and on ch. i. 2,
40. over my house. I.e. over my palace, — the title, in later times,
of an influential minister in the courts of Judah and Israel (1 K. iv. 6,
xvi. 9; 2 K. X. 5, xv. 5, xviii. 18; Is. xxii. 15, al.).
be ruled. The expression is difficult; but he ruled is quite
out of the question. The clause would most naturally be rendered,
* and upon thy mouth shall all my people kiss' (as a mark of homage,
1 S. X. 1 ; Ps. ii. 12) ; but a kiss on the mouth from the entire people can
not be regarded as probable. On the whole, order themselves, though
not entirely satisfactory, is preferable.
344 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xli. 41-45
Pharaoh said unto Joseph, See, I have set thee over all the land E
of Egypt. 42 And Pharaoh took off his signet ring fi-om his
hand, and put it upon Joseph's hand, and arrayed him in
vestures of ^fine linen, and put a gold chain about his neck ;
43 and he made him to ride in the second chariot which he had ;
and they cried before him, ^Bow the knee : and he set him over
all the land of Egypt. 44 And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I am
Pharaoh, and without thee shall no man lift up his hand or his
foot in all the land of Egypt. 45 And Pharaoh called Joseph's
name Zaphenath-paneah ; and he gave him to wife Asenath the
^ Or, cotton ' Abrech, probably an Egyptian word, similar in sound
to the Hebrew word meaning to kneel.
41. The terms of this verse suggest the important ofifice of T'a-te,
or governor : Erman, pp. 69, 87 — 89 (' the second after the king in the
court of the palace'), 473.
42, 43. The insignia of office conferred upon Joseph.
42. his signet ring. In many ancient countries a badge of autho-
rity (Est. iii. 10, viii. 2; Tob. i. 22; 1 Mac. vi. 15); but notably so
in Egypt, where the 'keeper of the seal' was the king's deputy (Ebers
in Smith, BB.' 1797).
yine linen. Such as was worn in Eg5rpt by men of rank: Erman,
p. 448; Petri e, Egyptian Tales, i. 125. On RVm. see EncB. Linen.
a gold chain about his neck. A pecuharly Egyptian form of de-
coration for services rendered to the crown: see Erman, pp. 118 — 120,
208 (with illustrations) ; and cf Petrie, Hist. 0/ Egypt, ii. 22.
43. in the second chariot which he had. Horses and chariots are
first represented on the Egypt, monuments under the 18th djaiasty, after
the expulsion of the Hyksos, and consequently long after Joseph's
time; but they may have been introduced during the Hyksos period
(of which few monuments remain) : Erman, p. 490. In earlier times,
the king was carried by soldiers on a sedan-chair, ib. p. 65 (an illastr.).
Bow the knee. Heb. Abrekh, which resembles closely the Heb. (cf
xxiv. 11) for 'make to kneel down' Qiabrekh): but the word is prob.
the Hebraized form of some Eg3rpt. expression: Brugsch and Reuouf
suggest dbu-rek ' thy command is our desire' = we are at thy service
(see other views in DB. and EncB.).
45. The monuments supply many illustrations, at least in and
after the 18th dynasty, of foreigners (including slaves from Syria)
rising to positions of political importance in Egypt, and adopting then
a change of name: see Erman, pp. 106, 517 f, 518 n.; DB. ii. 773^
Zcqyhenath-pa'neah. Egyptologists (Steindorff, Ebers, Brugsch,
Crum, Griffith, Budge) are now generally agreed that this name means
' God (or, the god) spake, and he (the bearer of the name) came into
life.' It is, however, remarkable that in the inscriptions names of this
tj^Q (with the name of a particular deity in place of 'God') appear
XLi. 45-49] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 345
daughter of Poti-phera priest of On. And Joseph went out E
over the land of Egypt. | 46 And Joseph was thirty years old P
when he stood before Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went
out from the presence of Pharaoh, and went throughout all the
land of Egypt. | 47 And in the seven plenteous years the earth e
brought forth by handfuls. 48 And he gathered up all the food
of the seven years which were in the land of Egypt, and laid up
the food in the cities : the food of the field, which was round
about every city, laid he up in the same. 49 And Joseph laid
first at the end of the 20th dynasty (^one inptance), and become frequent
only in the 22nd (the dynasty of Shishak), and subsequent dynasties.
Asenath. I.e. ' belonging to (the goddess) Neith,' — a type of name
similarly becoming frequent only in and after the 21st dynasty.
Poti-phera\ The fuller form of ' Potiphar' (xxsvii. 36), ' He whom
Ra (the sun-god) gave.' There is one example known of names of this
type in the 18th dyn., but otherwise they appear first in the 22nd, and
are common only in the 26th dyn. (B.C. 664 — 525).
This combination of names, otherwise all either rare or unknown
at an early period, is remarkable; and the Egyptologists mentioned
above agree that they cannot be genuinely ancient names, and did not
in fact originate before the 10th or 9th cent. B.C.'
On. Mentioned also v. 50, xlvi. 20, Ez. xxx. 17, called by the
Greeks Heliopolis, 7 miles NE. of the modern Cairo. In ancient
times On was the centre of Sun worship in Egypt, and its priests
were considered to be the most learned in the country (Hdt. n. 3).
The high priest of the great temple of Ra at On, who was also an
astrologer, was a most important dignitary (Erman, 76, 83, 290, 374).
'Cleopatra's Needle' was originally one of the numerous obelisks
erected in front of this temple by Thothmes III. (1503 — 1449 B.C.,
Petrie). On is also meant by ' Beth-shemesh ' in Jer. xliii. 13.
46. A summary statement from P (of. xix. 29) of Joseph's eleva-
tion to office in Egypt.
thirty years old. According to P, therefore (see xxxvii. 2), Joseph
was in servitude 12 or 13 years.
stood before Pharaoh = became his minister (Dt. i. 38; 1 S. xvi. 21 ;
1 K. xii. 6, al.).
went throughout &c. I.e. made a progress through it.
47 — 49. The seven fruitful years come, according to the dreams;
and during them Joseph amasses corn in the granaries of every city.
1 See further on these names DB. i. 6&5^, ii. 775* (with the references), in. 622*,
819", IV. 23, 963; Budge, Hist, of Eg. v. 126 f., 137. Of the ancients .Josephus {Ant.
II. 6. 1) explains Zaphenath-pa'neah by KpvirTuv evp€Tj]%; and Onk., Pesh. and others
by ' He to whom hidden things are revealed,' or ' the revealer of secrets,' — all thinking
of the Heb. zdphan, to hide vp. Jerome (Vulg. ; and Quaest. in Gen.: see Field,
Hexapla, ad loc.) — perhaps on the basis of the form in the lxx., 'irov6o/j,<pav't)K —
explains by Salvator mundi [so Cod. 75 of lxx., a-urijp K6crynou]: of. Jn. iv. 25, 29, 42.
346 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xli. 49-57
up com as the sand of the sea, very much, until he left numbering ; E
for it was without number. 50 And unto Joseph were born two
sons before the year of famine came, which Asenath the daughter
of Poti-phera priest of On bare unto him. 61 And Joseph called
the name of the firstborn ^Manasseh : For, said he, God hath
made me forget all my toil, and all my father's house. 52 And
the name of the second called he ^Ephraim: For God hath made
me fruitful in the land of my affliction. 53 And the seven years
of plenty, that was in the land of Egypt, came to an end.
54 And the seven years of famine began to come, according as
Joseph had said : and there was famine in all lands ; but in all
the land of Egypt there was bread. 55 And when all the land
of Egypt was famished, the people cried to Pharaoh for bread :
and Pharaoh said unto all the Egyptians, Go unto Joseph ; what
he saith to you, do. 56 And the famine was over all the face of
the earth : and Joseph opened all the storehouses, and sold unto
the Egyptians ; and the famine was sore in the land of Egypt.
57 And aU countries came into Egypt to Joseph for to buy
corn ; because the famine was sore in all the eartL
^ That is, Making to forget. ^ From a Hebrew word signifying to he fruitful.
50 — 52. The birth of Joseph's two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim.
Whether the narrative gives the actual origin of the two names, must,
as in the case of Jacob's own sons (xxix. 31 ff., xxxv. 18), be left an
open question^ On 'Ephraim,' cf. tlie play in xlix. 22.
51. for get... all my father^ s house. To the Hebrews, a mark of
happiness in a new estate : cf. Ps. xlv. 10.
53 — 57. Beginning of the seven years of famine.
54. in all lands. Similarly lyo. 56% bl^. For the hyperbole, cf.
1 K. X. 24, xviii. 10.
56. all the storehouses. This is no doubt what is intended : but
the Heb. is corrupt, and cannot be so rendered (it is lit. ' all that was
in them').
Famines in Egypt, due to the Nile failing to overflow, are not unfrequent ;
and they have even been known to last for several years ; there was one, for
exaniple, a.d. 1064 — 1071. Two inscriptions have been quoted as illustrating
what is here recorded of Joseph. In one of these, the sepulchral inscription of
Baba, found at El-Kab in Upper Egypt, the deceased, in an enumeration of
his good deeds, is represented as saying, 'I collected corn, as a friend of the
harvest god, and was watchful at the time of sowing. And when a famine
* For speculations as to their origin, see EncB. s.w. It has been supposed that
•Ephraim' referred originally to the fertile region occupied by the fcyibo,.
THE DATE OF JOSEPH 347
arose, lasting many years, I distributed com to the city each year of
famine.' The age of Baba (end of the 17th dynasty) would coincide approxi-
mately with that of Joseph; and it has even been supposed that the famine
referred to may have been the same. In the other inscription, Ameui,
governor of the 'nome of the Gazelle,' under Usertesen II., of the 12th djiiasty,
states how he made provision for the people : * In my time there was no poor,
and none were hungry. When the years of famine came, I ploughed all the
fields of the nome, I kept the inhabitants alive, and gave them food, so that
not one was hungry.' The extension of the famine to Canaan and other
countries (?•». 54, 57, xlii. 1, &c.) is remarkable, and can only be explained
by the supposition that there was a simultaneous failure of rain both in
Canaan, and in the country about the sources of the Nile (above on v. 2).
Certainly seven years of famine in both countries do not seem very probable :
but the narrative does not require more than two years in Canaan (xlv. 6 : on
slvii. 13 — 15, see p. 372) : and even if it did, the detail is of a kind which we
could never be sure had been correctly preserved by tradition.
With the data at present at our disposal, it is impossible to determine
definitely who the Pharaoh was under whom Joseph thus rose to dignity in
Egypt. As in the Book of Exodus, the personal name of the Pharaoh is not
mentioned ; and in view of the general fixity of Egyptian institutions, the
allusions to Egyptian manners and customs are not sufficiently distinctive to
constitute a clue even to the age in which he lived. The Biblical dates, both
of the Exodus and of the patriarchal age (which is dependent upon it, Ex. xiL 41),
are too uncertain to form a secure basis for further chronological calculations
(see the Introd. § 2). There are, however, strong reasons for supposing
Ramses II., of the 19th dynasty (b.o. 1300—1234, Petrie), to be the Pharaoh
of the oppression ; and reckoning back from this datum, it is probable that
Joseph's elevation in Egypt is to be placed under one of the later Hyksos
kings. The Hyksos (i.e. Hyk-shasu, 'prince of the Shasu,' or spoilers, Le.
desert-hordes) were a race of Asiatic invaders, who, according to Manetho
(Jos. c. Ap. 1. 14), held Egypt for 511 years, at first devastating and destroying,
but afterwards settling down, and assimilating much of the culture of the
conquered Egyptians, till they were finally expelled c. 1600 b.o. (Sayce and
Petrie; c. 15S0, Meyer and Breasted^). The capital of the Hyksos, as excava-
tions have shewn, was Zo'an (Tanis), in the NE. of the Delta, about 35 miles
N. of Goshen ; and it is true that the court of the Pharaoh is represented in
Genesis as being not far from Goshen. George the Syncellus (pp. 62, 69, 107,
ed. Goar) assigns the elevation of Joseph to the 17th year of Aphophis, i.e.
Apepa (II.), the last important Hyksos king (Petrie, Hist, of Eg. i. 242,
II. 17 ff.); but Erman^, by a comparison of the figures given by Josephus and
Africanus, has made it extremely probable that this date does not rest upon
an independent tradition, but was arrived at by reckoning back the 430 years
of Ex. xii. 41 from the first year of Amosis ( = Aahmes, the conqueror of the
Hyksos, and founder of the 18th dynasty), under whom the Exodus was
(incorrectly) placed (Eus. Praep. Ev. x. 10. 11, 11. 10).
^ After a rule, however, of only 100 years (see the Addenda on p. xxxiii).
a Zeitschr./Ur Aeg. Sprache, 1880, pp. 125—7; cf. Maspero u. 71.
348 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlii. i-8
Chapter XLII.
The first visit of Joseph's brethren to Egypt.
Jacob sends his sons into Egypt to buy com. Having, at their interview
with their brother, vohmteered the information that they have a younger
brother at home, Joseph, in order to test their truthfulness, demands to see him.
Upon their departure for Canaan, Simeon is left bound in Egypt, as a guarantee
that, when they come again, they will bring Benjamin with them. The narrative
is still — with exceptions similar to those in chaps, xl., xU. — that of B.
XLII. 1 Now Jacob saw that there was corn in Egypt, and E
Jacob said unto his sons, Why do ye look one upon another?
2 And he said, Behold, I have heard that there is corn in
Egypt : get you down thither, and buy for us from thence ; that
we may live, and not die. 3 And Joseph's ten brethren went
down to buy com from Egypt. 4 But Benjamin, Joseph's
brother, Jacob sent not with his brethren ; for he said, Lest
peradventure mischief befall him. 5 And the sons of Israel
came to buy among those that came : for the famine was in the
land of Canaan. 6 And Joseph was the governor over the
land ; he it was that sold to all the people of the land : and
Joseph's brethren came, and bowed down themselves to him
with their faces to the earth. 7 And Joseph saw his brethren,
and he knew them, but made himself strange unto them, and
spake roughly with them ; and he said unto them, Whence come
ye? And they said, From the land of Canaan to buy food.
8 And Joseph knew his brethren, but they knew not him.
XLII. 1 — 4. Journey of the brethren into Egypt.
1. looh one upon another. In perplexity and helplessness.
2. get you down. Cf. on xii. 10.
4. Benjamin, as the youngest and only-surviving son of Rachel
(xxix. 30), was his father's favourite.
5 — 17. Their Jirst interview with Joseph.
6. howed down themselves. Thereby fulfilling unconsciously the
dreams of xxxvii. 7 — 9.
8. knew not him. Since they saw him last, — according to E (xli.
1, 48, xlv. 6) more than something between nine and eleven years
before^ — he has grown from a youth into a man; and his language
{v. 23), costume, and bearing are all now those of an Egyptian.
1 If account be taken of the additional dates given by P (xxxvii. 3, xli. 46) more
than 2C years before (13 + the 7 or more of xli. 48, xlv. 6) ; but it is doubtful if the
chronologies of JE and P ought to be combined: cf. pp. xxx, 149, 262, &o.
XLii. 9-i8] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 349
9 And Joseph remembered the dreams which he dreamed of E
them, and said unto them, Ye are spies ; to see the nakedness
of the land ye are come. 10 And they said unto him. Nay, my
lord, but to buy food are thy servants come. 11 We are all one
man's sons; we are true men, thy servants are no spies. 12 And
he said unto them. Nay, but to see the nakedness of the land ye
are come. 13 And they said, We thy servants are twelve
brethren, the sons of one man in the land of Canaan ; and,
behold, the youngest is this day with our father, and one is not.
14 And Joseph said unto them, That is it that I spake unto you,
saying. Ye are spies : 15 hereby ye shaU be proved : by the life
of Pharaoh ye shall not go forth hence, except your youngest
brother come hither. 16 Send one of you, and let him fetch
your brother, and ye shall be bound, that your words may be
proved, whether there be truth in you : or else by the life of
Pharaoh surely ye are spies. 17 And he put them all together
into ward three days. 18 And Joseph said unto them the third
9. Ye are spies. The charge was a natural one ; on its E. side,
Egypt was always liable to invasion by Asiatics: under the 12th
djoiasty fortresses had been erected along the Isthmus of Suez, and
under the 19 th dynasty we read of officers being stationed there to
take the names of all passing in either direction (Erman, p. 538 f ;
Hogarth, Auth. and Arch. pp. 57, 60 f ).
the nakedness of the land. I.e. its exposed and defenceless parts.
11 — 13. The charge of being spies throws them off their guard;
and they seek to disarm his suspicions by volunteering information
about their family, of which Joseph at once takes advantage (vv.
14—16).
14 — 16. Like a high official, Joseph insists that he was right;
but at the same time uses the opportunity to assure himself about
Benjamin, whom he suspects they may have treated as badly as they
had treated himself
15. by the life of Pharaoh (or, better, As Pharaoh liveth). A form
of oath known from Egyptian monuments: in an account of criminal
proceedings, belonging to the 20th dynasty, a thief has an oath ad-
ministered to him by the king's life, to prevent him speaking falsely.
The popular Heb. forms of oath were As Jehovah liveth, and As thy
soul liveth (e.g. 1 S. xiv. 39, xvii. 55).
17. He treats them arbitrarily, as an Oriental official might do,
at the same time (^Kuob.) ' enabling them to realize how a prisoner feels,
who (like himself m xxxvii. 24) has the worst to expect.'
18 — 24. Their second interview with Joseph.
360 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlti. 18-17
day, This do, and live ; for I fear God : 19 if ye be true men, E
let one of your brethren be bound in your prison house ; but go
ye, carry corn for the famine of your houses : 20 and bring
your youngest brother unto me ; so shall your words be verified,
and ye shall not die. And they did so. 21 And they said one
to another, We are verily guilty concerning our brother, in that
we saw the distress of his soul, when he besought us, and we
would not hear ; therefore is this distress come upon us.
22 And Reuben answered them, saying. Spake I not unto you,
saying. Do not sin against the cliild ; and ye would not hear?
therefore also, behold, his blood is required. 23 And they knew
not that Joseph understood them ; for there was an interpreter
between them. 24 And he turned himself about from them,
and wept ; and he returned to them, and spake to them, and
took Simeon from among them, and bound him before their
eyes. 25 Then Joseph commanded to fill their vessels with
corn, and to restore every man's money into his sack, and to
give them provision for the way : and thus was it done unto
them. 26 And they laded their asses with their corn, and
departed thence. | 27 And as one of them opened his sack to J
18. / fear God. And will not, therefore, do more to you, on
a bare suspicion.
19. A more moderate proposal than the one in v. 16.
21. Their conscience smites them: and they recognize in their
misfortunes a nemesis for their treatment of Joseph.
the distress of his soul &c. When they cast him into the pit, xxxvii.
23 f. (also E).
22. See xxxvii. 22 (cf. 29 f.), also E.
required. Cf. ix. 5 f. Reuben assumes that he had in some way
lost his life.
23. for the interpi-eter (usual in such cases) was between them.
24. and wept, — touched by the spectacle of their sorrow and
penitence.
Simeon. Not Reuben, his former defender, but the next eldest of
his brethren.
25 — 38. Joseph gives orders for each man's money to be returned
to him in his sack. Their alarm at the discovery of it; and the
distress of their father upon learning that he will be obliged to part
with Benjamin.
27, 28. An insertion from J, according to whom (as is expressly
said in xliii. 21) the discovery of the money in all the sacks was made
at the lodging-place, and not, as in E (xlii. 35), — according to whom
XLii. .7-36] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 351
give his ass provender in the lodging place, he espied his J"
money ; and, behold, it was in the mouth of his sack. 28 And
he said unto his brethren, My money is restored ; and, lo, it is
even in my sack : and their heart failed them, and they turned
trembling one to another, saying, What is this that God hath
done unto us ? | 29 And they came unto Jacob their father unto E
the land of Canaan, and told him all that had befallen them ;
saying, 30 The man, the lord of the land, spake roughly with us,
and took us for spies of the country. 31 And we said unto him,
We are true men ; we are no spies : 32 we be twelve brethren,
sons of our father ; one is not, and the youngest is this day with
our father in the land of Canaan. 33 And the man, the lord
of the land, said unto us, Hereby shall I know that ye are true
men ; leave one of your brethren with me, and take corn for
the famine of your houses, and go your Avay : 34 and bring your
youngest brother unto me : then shall I know that ye are no
spies, but that ye are true men : so will I deliver you your
brother, and ye shall traffick in the land. 35 And it came to
pass as they emptied their sacks, that, behold, every man's
bundle of money was in his sack : and when they and their
father saw their bundles of money, they were afraid. 36 And
Jacob their father said unto them. Me have ye bereaved of my
cliildren : Joseph is not, and Simeon is not, and ye will take
provision for the way was given separately (v. 25), — at the end of their
journey'.
28. What is this &c. They wonder what such a surprising oc-
currence may portend ; and feel again the retributive hand of God.
29—34. Their report to their father of what had befallen them in
Egypt.
30. took us for. The Heb. is peculiar, and probably a word
("i»L^^3) recognized in lxx. (iv (fivXaKfj) has dropped out : render then,
'and put us in ward as men spying the country.'
35. The discovery of the money in their sacks, at the end of their
journey, according to E.
36. all these things &c. Upon me have all these things come.
The emphasis is upon 'me': it is I, the father, who suffer, not you.
1 The conclusion that vv. 27, 28 are from J, is confirmed by two independent
indications; (1) 'one of them' is lit. 'the one' (implying others to follow: J's full
account of what happened at the lodging-place is evidently not given); (2) 'sack'
in vv. 27 end, 28, is a peculiar word, 'ayntnhath, recurring 13 times in the sequel of
J's narrative here (xliii. 12, 18, 21 (twice), 22, 23, xliv. 1 (twice), 2, 8, 11 (twice), 12),
but found nowhere else in the OT,
362 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlii. 36-XLiii. 3
Benjamin away : all these things are ^against me. 37 And E
Reuben spake unto his father, saying, Slay my two sons, if I
bring him not to thee: deliver him into my hand, and I will
bring him to thee again. | 38 And he said, My son shall not go J
down with you ; for his brother is dead, and he only is left : if
mischief befall him by the way in the which ye go, then shall ye
bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to ^the grave.
1 Or, upon ' Heb. Sheol, See ch. ixxvii. 35.
37. Reuben at once steps forward, and offers his two sons as surety
for Benjamin's safe return from Egypt.
38. At this point there begins a long extract from J, which,
broken only by one or two insertions from E, extends to the end of
ch. xliv.*
Chapter XLIIL
The second visit of Joseph's brethren to Egypt.
The brethren return to Egypt, bringing Benjamin with them. He is
recognized by Joseph ; and the whole party are entertained by their brother
at a banquet, at which Benjamin is specially honoured. The narrative (except
vv. 14, 23»>) is that of J.
XLIII. 1 And the famine was sore in the land. 2 And it J
came to pass, when they had eaten up the corn which they had
brought out of Egypt, their father said unto them. Go again, buy
us a little food. 3 And Judah spake unto him, saying. The man
did solemnly protest unto us, saying. Ye shall not see my face,
XLIII. 1 — 14. By their father's direction, the brethren again go
down into Egypt to buy corn. Judah prevails upon Jacob to allow
Benjamin to accompany them.
3 ff. Observe that here it is Judah who takes the lead ([contrast
xlii. 37 in E), as before in J (xxxvii. 26 f); cf. xliv. 14 ff., xlvi. 28.
3, 5. Ye shall not &c. This must represent J's version of their
first interview with Joseph, according to which (cf. xliv. 21, 23, 26)
Joseph's desire is simply to see Benjamin: in E (xhi. 20, 34) Benjamin
is to be brought as proof that they are not spies, and to effect Simeon's
release.
see my face. I.e. be admitted to my presence. See the passages
quoted on xxxiii. 10.
^ For the grounds upon which this verse is referred to J, see the footnote on
xliii. 14, and cf. xliv. 31'' (also J). In its original context, the verse is supposed to
have been the reply Kimply to the announcement that the brethren would not be
able to see Joseph again without Benjamin,
XLiiL 3-1 1] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 35k
except your brother be with you. 4 If thou wilt send our J
brother with us, we will go down and buy thee food : 5 but if
thou wilt not send him, we will not go down : for the man said
unto us. Ye shall not see my face, except your brother be with
you. 6 And Israel «.dd, Wherefore dealt ye so ill with me, as
to teU the man whether ye had yet a brother? 7 And they
said, The man asked straitly concerning ourselves, and con-
cerning our kindred, saying, Is your father yet alive? have ye
another brother? and we told him according to the tenor of
these words : could we in any wise know that he would say,
Bring your brother down? 8 And Judah said unto Israel his
father. Send the lad with me, and we will arise and go ; that we
may live, and not die, both we, and thou, and also our little ones.
9 I will be surety for him ; of my hand shalt thou require him :
if I bring him not unto thee, and set him before thee, then ^let
me bear the blame for ever : 10 for except we had lingered,
surely we had now returned a second time. 11 And their father
Israel said unto them. If it be so now, do this ; take of the choice
fruits of the land in your vessels, and carry down the man a
present, a little ^balm, and a little honey, spicery and myrrh,
* Heb. I shall have sinned against thee for ever. ' See oh. xxxvii. 25.
6. Israel. The predominant (though not exclusive) name of the
patriarch in J after xxxv. 21. Cf. v. 8.
7. Another indication (cf. xliv. 19) that J's version of their first
interview with Joseph must have diflfered from that of E : in E (xHi.
13, cf. 32) the information that they had a father and brother living
was not given in reply to any question on Joseph's part, but volunteered
by them to meet the charge of being spies.
8 — 10. Judah now makes an oflfer similar to the one made by
Reuben in xhi. 37 (E).
9. For the marg., cf. 1 K. i. 21 (RVm.), Is. zxix. 21 (Heb.). So
xhv. 32.
11, The father yields to the inevitable; but bids them, in true
Eastern fashion, take a present to win, if possible, the favour of the
great man of the land.
choice fruits. The Heb. word occurs only here, and its meaning is
uncertain. The corresponding root in Aram, signifies to wonder; so
perhaps it may mean admirable or estimable things, of which 'choice
fruits' is a fair paraphrase.
honej/. Heb. d^bash, — here, probably, as also Ez. xxvii. 17, grape
juice, boiled down to a dark golden-brown syrup, intensely sweet, which
D. 23
354 THE BOOK OF GEISHESIS [xliii. 11-16
^nuts, and almonds : 12 and take double money in your hand ; J
and the money that was returned in the mouth of your sacks
carry again in your hand ; peradventure it was an oversight :
13 take also your brother, and arise, go again unto the man : j
14 and ^God Almighty give you mercy before the man, that he E
may release unto you your other brother and Benjamin. And if
I be bereaved of my children, I am bereaved.
15 And the men took that present, and they took double J
money in their hand, and Benjamin ; and rose up, and went
down to Egypt, and stood before Joseph. 16 And when Joseph
saw Benjamin with them, he said to the steward of his house,
^ That is, pistachio nuts. ^ Heb. El Shaddai.
nnder the name of dibs is much used in Palestine by all classes
wherever vineyards are found, as a condiment to their food (Rob. n. 81,
cf m. 381; L. and B. i. 279; DB. 11. 32"; JE^icB. 11. 2015).
spicery and myrrh. Gum tragacanth and ladanum. See on
xxxvii. 25.
pistachio nuts. Still esteemed as a delicacy in the East.
14. From E\ On God Almighty (Heb. El Shaddai), see on
xvii. 1, and p. 404 fF.
And if &c. I.e. If I must lose my children, let it be so : an ex-
pression of resignation. Cf Esth. iv. 16 ; 2 K. vii. 4 end.
15 — 17. The brethren appear before Joseph, who, when he sees
Benjamin among them, and learns thus that they have spoken the
truth, is ready to shew them friendliness, and invites them to a meal
in his house.
15. stood before Joseph. Viz. in his place of business, or, as we
might say, his 'office.' The 'house' spoken of afterwards is his private
residence.
16. the steward of his house. Lit. him that was over his home. So
». 19, xHv. 1, 4 : cf on xxxix. 4 and xli. 40^
^ In xlii. 13 — 24, 33 — 37 the detention of Simeon is an essential feature in the
narrative ; but in xlii. 38 — xliii. 10, aud again in xliv. 18 — 34, there is entire
silence respecting him ; his release is not one of the objects for which the brethren
return to Egypt. Had the whole narrative been by one hand, the non-mention of
Simeon in the parts of chs. xlii. — xliv. just referred to, would have been hardly
possible. It is inferred that the writer of xlii. 38 — xliii. 10, and of xliv. 18 — 34
(i.e. J), in his account of the first visit of the brethren to Egypt, made no viention-
of the detention of Simeon ; and that the notices of Simeon in xliii. 14, 23'', are
harmonizing passages, introduced into it from the parallel narrative of E.
^ The town house of a wealthy Egyptian was commonly on a large scale : it had
(at least in the 18th dyn.) a great vestibule with an ante-room for the porter; then
came the large dining-hall, the principal room in the whole house ; beyond this was
a small court, with the sleeping apartment of the master on one side, and the
kitchen and store-room on the other ; and still further beyond came the house for
the women and the garden. The rooms weie well furnished with atUsticftlly made
XLiii. 16-.4] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 366
Bring the men into the house, and slay, and make ready ; for J
the men shall dine with me at noon. 17 And the man did as
Joseph bade ; and the man brought the men into Joseph's
house. 18 And the men were afraid, because they were brought
into Joseph's house ; and they said, Because of the money that
was returned in our sacks at the first time are we brought in ;
that he may ^seek occasion against us, and fall upon us, and
take us for bondmen, and our asses. 19 And they came near to
the ste^\'ard of Joseph's house, and they spake unto him at the
door of the house, 20 and said. Oh my lord, we came indeed
down at the first time to buy food : 21 and it came to pass,
when we came to the lodging place, that we opened our sacks,
and, behold, every man's money was in the mouth of his sack,
our money in full weight : and we have brought it again in our
hand. 22 And other money have we brought down in our hand
to buy food : we know not who put our money in our sacks.
23 And he said, Peace be to you, fear not : your God, and the
God of your father, hath given you treasure in your sacks : I
had your money. [And he brought Simeon out unto them.] R
24 And the man brought the men into Joseph's house, and gave j
^ Heb. roll himself upon us.
18 — 23. Alarmed at this unexpected honour, they describe to
Joseph's steward, before entering the house, their discovery of the
money in their sacks, and explain that it was returned to them entirely
without their knowledge.
18. was returned. More exactly, came hack, — *as though some
chance agency had operated against them' (Kn.).
take us for bondmen. Like detected thieves (Ex, xxii. 3).
21. to the lodging place. In accordance with xlii. 27 f.
in full weight (ht. in its weight). Egyptian money consisted of
rings of gold, which were weighed by scribes who made this their
business (Erman, 464). However, the practice of 'weighing' money
was usual also among the Hebrews, even to quite a late date (see
on xxiii. 16).
23. The steward reassures them. Their money, he says, came
to me; what they had found must consequently have been other
money bestowed upon them by the tutelary deity of their family.
And he brought &c. See the footnote, p. 354.
24 f Their preparations for meeting Joseph.
chairs, sofas, ruga &c., and hangings for the walls; and there were numerous
dependents, superintending the different departments of the establishment, bakery,
kitohen, sideboard (we should say, cellar), &c. (Erman, 153, 177 — 188).
23—2
356 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xliil 44-33
them water, and they washed their feet ; and he gave their asses J
provender. 25 And they made ready the present against Joseph
came at noon : for they heard that they should eat bread there.
26 And when Joseph came home, they brought him the present
which was in their hand into the house, and bowed down them-
selves to him to the earth. 27 And he asked them of their
welfare, and said, Is your father well, the old man of whom ye
spake? Is he yet alive? 28 And they said, Thy servant our
father is well, he is yet alive. And they bowed the head, and
made obeisance. 29 And he lifted up his eyes, and saw Benjamin
his brother, his mother's son, and said, Is this your youngest
brother, of whom ye spake unto me? And he said, God be
gracious unto thee, my son. 30 And Joseph made haste ; for
his bowels did yearn upon his brother : and he sought where
to weep ; and he entered into his chamber, and wept thei'e.
31 And he washed his face, and came out; and he refrained
himself, and said. Set on bread. 32 And they set on for him by
himself, and for them by themselves, and for the Egyptians,
which did eat with him, by themselves : because the Egyptians
might not eat bread with the Hebrews ; for that is an abomina-
tion unto the Egyptians. 33 And they sat before him, the
26 — 30. The meeting with Joseph. Joseph's emotion at seeing and
being again able to converse with Benjamin.
26. bowed down themselves. A second time (cf. xhi. 6) fulfilling
the omen of the dreams (xxxvii. 7 — 9).
30. made haste. Viz. to close the conversation and retire.
did yearn. Cf. 1 K. iii. 26; Hos. xi. 8 (Heb.).
31 — 34. The meal with Joseph. The brethren's surprise to find
themselves seated according to their ages; and the honour shewn to
Benjamin. At Egyptian feasts the guests did not sit round a table,
a,s with us : they were anointed and wreathed with flowers by attendants,
and sat on rows of chairs facing a sideboard; the viands, interspersed
with rich floral decorations, were arranged on this, and carried round
to them by servants: musicians, with harps, lutes, or flutes, and
dancing girls, were also regularly in attendance (Erman, pp. 193, 250 —
255 ; W.-B. I. 425 flf.).
because &c. On account of the exclusiveness with which the
Egyptians viewed foreigners, especially such as had no regard for their
religious scruples: thus, as Hdt. (11. 41) tells us, they would not use
the knife or cooking utensil of a Greek, because it might have been
employed in preparing food from the flesh of a cow, which was sacred
to I sis.
XLiii. 33-XLiv. 3j THE BOOK OF GENESIS 367
firstborn according to his birthright, and the youngest according J
to his youth : and the men marvelled one with another. 34 And
^he took and sent messes unto them from before him : but
Benjamin's mess was five times so much as any of theirs. And
they drank, and ^were merry with him.
* Or, messes were taken ' Heb. drank largely.
34. And messes were taken : constr, as xlviii. 2 (G.-K. § 144*).
messes. I.e. honorary portions (properly, something taken from the
table), sent, as a mark of attention, to guests whom it was desired to
honour. Cf. 2 S. xi. 8; also iZ. vn. 321; Od. rv. 65 f., xiv. 437.
were merry. The Heb. word is the one which is regularly rendered
to be drunken, and generally (e.g. ch. ix. 21) is so used as certainly
to imply that meaning. In itself, however, it may not have denoted
more than drink largely (RVm.): cf. the other two passages in which
EW. render similarly, Cant. v. 1 ('Drink, yea, drink abundantly').
Hag. i, 6 (' Ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink'); also fjudvaOwcriv
in John ii. 10.
Chapter XLIV.
Joseph, by arranging for Benjamin to he suspected unjustly
of theft, tests still further the sincerity and disinterested-
ness of his brethren.
The brethren, upon leaving Egypt, have their money again returned to
them, Joseph's cup being at the same time placed in Benjamin's sack. They
are recalled, and brought before Joseph. Judah, speaking first in the name
of the brethren generally, admits that it is a just retribution which has be-
fallen them {v. 16) ; and afterwards (v. 18 fi".), speaking in his own name, makes
an eloquent intercession on Benjamin's behalf, offering to remain himself in
servitude in his stead. The narrative is throughout that of J.
XLIV. 1 And he commanded the steward of his house, J
saying, Fill the men's sacks with food, as much as they can
carry, and put every man's money in his sack's mouth. 2 And
put my cup, the silver cup, in the sack's mouth of the youngest,
and his corn money. And he did according to the word that
Joseph had spoken. 3 As soon as the morning was light, the
XLIV. 1, 2. Joseph's device for still further testing (see xHi.
15 f., 20) the sincerity of his brethren.
2. cup. Better, goblet: in Jer. xxxv. 5 rendered bowl.
3 — 10. Joseph's steward overtakes them, and taxes them with the
theft of the cup. Their consciences being clear, they voluntarily offer
the ofi'ender to justice.
358 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xliv. 3-14
men were sent away, they and their asses. 4 And when they J
were gone out of the city, and were not yet far off, Joseph said
unto his steward, Up, follow after the men ; and when thou dost
overtake them, say unto them. Wherefore have ye rewarded evil
for good? 5 Is not this it in which my lord drinketh, and
whereby he indeed divineth? ye have done evil in so doing.
6 And he overtook them, and he spake unto them these words.
7 And they said unto him. Wherefore speaketh my lord such
words as these ? God forbid that thy servants should do such a
thing. 8 Behold, the money, which we found in our sacks'
mouths, we brought again unto thee out of the land of Canaan :
how then should we steal out of thy lord's house silver or gold ?
9 With whomsoever of thy servants it be found, let him die, and
we also will be my lord's bondmen. 10 And he said. Now also
let it be according unto your words : he with whom it is found
shall be my bondman ; and ye shaU be blameless. 11 Then
they hasted, and took down every man his sack to the ground,
and opened every man his sack. 12 And he searched, and
began at the eldest, and left at the youngest : and the cup was
found in Benjamin's sack. 13 Then they rent their clothes, and
laded every man his ass, and returned to the city. 14 And
5. wh&reby he indeed divineth. The allusion is to the method of
divination called hydromancy : water was poured into a glass or other
vessel, pieces of gold, silver, or precious stones were then thrown inl-
and from the movements of the water, or the figures which appeared
in it afterwards, the unknown was divined. There were also other
methods. See lamblichus, de Myst. m. 14; Strab. xvi. 39 (practised in
Persia) ; Aug. Civ. Dei vn. 35. Travellers in modern times have de-
scribed similar means of divination as being still resorted to in Eg3^t'.
10. The steward accepts less than they offer: he asks only for
the guilty one to be given up, and that not for death, but only for
servitude.
11 — 13. Their dismay and despair, when the cup is found in
Benjamin's sack.
1 Norden (quoted by Kn.), whose Travels were published in 1752 — 5, relates that
when he and his party sent their firman to a local dignitary in Egypt, they were
met with the reply, 'The firman of the Porte is nothing to me. I have consulted my
cup, and I find you are Franks in disguise, who have come to spy out the land.' And
Lane (Mod. Eg. i. 337 ff.) mentions a ' magic mirror ' of ink : in order to discover
the author of a theft, ink was poui-ed by a magician into a boy's palm ; he was
duected to look into it stedfastly, and at last declared that he saw in it the image
of a person, who proved to be the thief. See also Wade, OT. Hist. p. 81.
XLiv. u-io] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 359
Judah and his brethren came to Joseph's house ; and he was J
yet there : and they fell before him on the ground. 15 And
Joseph said unto them, What deed is this that ye have done?
know ye not that such a man as I can indeed divine ? 16 And
Judah said, What shall we say unto my lord? what shall we
speak? or how shall we clear ourselves? God hath found out
the iniquity of thy servants : behold, we are my lord's bondmen,
both we, and he also in whose hand the cup is found. 17 And
he said, God forbid that I should do so : the man in whose hand
the cup is found, he shall be my bondman ; but as for you, get
you up in peace unto your father.
18 Then Judah came near unto him, and said. Oh my lord,
let thy servant, I pray thee, speak a word in my lord's ears, and
let not thine anger burn against thy servant : for thou art even
as Pharaoh. 19 My lord asked his servants, saying, Have ye a
father, or a brother ? 20 And we said unto my lord. We have a
father, an old man, and a child of his old age, a little one ; and
14, 15. Joseph, with affected indignation, reproaches them for
what they have done.
15, such a man as I &c. Cannot a man such as I am, initiated
into the wisdom of Egypt, divine, and so discover the thief ?
16, 17. Judah, speaking on behalf of the brethren generally,
attempts no excuse, for the facts seem to allow of none : it is a just
retribution which has befallen them (cf. xhi. 21 in E); they will all
remain bondmen in Egypt. But Joseph presses his advantage home;
and in order to make them feel their position the more keenly, declares
that he will retain Benjamin alone.
17, get you up. Viz. into Canaan : cf. w. 24, 33, 34, and on xii. 10.
18 — 34. Judah now steps forward, and in a speech of singular
pathos and beauty, remarkable not less for grace and persuasive
eloquence than for frankness and generosity, makes a personal appeal
on Benjamin's behalf: explaining how all had happened from the
beginning, he entreats Joseph to have compassion on the feelings of
an aged father, and to allow him to remain as bondman himself in his
brother's stead. Judah's representation of what had occurred differs
in some details from that given by E in xlii. 1 — 37, and enables us to
reconstruct what must have been J's version of it.
18, for thou art even as Pharaoh. Justifying the deferential tone
of the preceding words: he is aware of the greatness of his request,
for Joseph is like the king in authority and dignity.
19 f My lord asked &c. In agreement with J's representation in
xliii. 7 (where see the note).
360 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xLiv. 20-31
his brother is dead, and he alone is left of his mother, and his J
father loveth him. 21 And thou saidst unto thy servants, Bring
him down unto me, that I may set mine eyes upon him. 22 And
we said unto my lord, The lad cannot leave his father : for if he
should leave his father, his father would die. 23 And thou
saidst unto thy servants. Except your youngest brother come
down with you, ye shall see my face no more. 24 And it came
to pass when we came up unto thy servant my father, we told
him the words of my lord. 25 And our father said. Go again,
buy us a little food. 26 And we said, We cannot go doAvn : if
our youngest brother be with us, then will we go down : for we
may not see the man's face, except our youngest brother be
with us. 27 And thy servant my father said unto us, Ye know
that my wife bare me two sons : 28 and the one went out from
me, and I said. Surely he is torn in pieces ; and I have not seen
him since : 29 and if ye take this one also from me, and mischief
befall him, ye shall bring down my gray hairs with ^sorrow to
^the grave. 30 Now therefore when I come to thy servant my
father, and the lad be not with us; seeing that ^his life is bound
up in the lad's life; 31 it shall come to pass, when he seeth that
the lad is not with us, that he will die : and thy servants shall
bring down the gray hairs of thy servant our father with sorrow
to ^the grave. 32 For thy servant became surety for the lad
* Heb. evil. * Heb. Sheol, See ch. ixxvii. 35. * Or, his soul it knit
with the lad's soul See 1 Sam. xviii. 1.
20. his brother is dead &c. Cf. xlii. 38 (J).
21. thai I may set mine eyes upon him. The expression suggests
the idea of noticing favourably, taking under one's protection : cf. Jer.
xxxix. 12, xl. 4 Heb. (EVV. 'look well to'). Judah very cleverly
interprets Joseph's desire to see Benjamin as indicating a favourable
disposition towards him.
22. Not so stated in ch. xlii. (E).
23 — 26. In agreement with xliii. 3 — 5 (J). See on xliii. 3.
27—29. See xxxvii. 33 and xlii. 38 (both J).
29. sorrow. Heb. evil, i.e. misfortune, trouble. Not as in xlii. 38.
30. seeing &c. The Heb. nephesh ('soul') may denote either (on
i. 20, ix. 4) the principle of life (RV.;, or (on xii. 14: cf. Parallel
Psalter, p. 459 f.) the seat of feeling and affection (RVm.): the latter
sense is the more probable here.
31. with sorrow. The same word as in xlii. 38.
32. became surety &c. See xliii. 9. The words give here the
XLiv. 32-XLV. 4] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 361
unto my father, saying, If I bring him not unto thee, then shall j
I bear the blame to my father for ever. 33 Now therefore, let
thy servant, I pray thee, abide instead of the lad a bondman to
my lord ; and let the lad go up with his brethren. 34 For how
shall I go up to my father, and the lad be not with me ? lest I
see the evil that shaU come on my father.
reason why Jacob relies upon Benjamin's safe return, and why also
Judah makes this appeal on his behalf.
hewr the blame. See on xliii. 9.
33 f, Judah's final appeal, to be allowed to remain as a slave in
Benjamin's place.
Chapter XLV.
Joseph makes himself known to his brethren.
Overcome by the force and pathos of Judah's words, and convinced at last
of his brethren's altered mind, Joseph discloses himself to them. For a while,
they cannot answer him : but he encourages them, and allays their fears : in
what they have done, they have been, after all, the unconscious iustrmnents of
Providence ; he has been sent before them of God to ' preserve life.' And he
sends an affectionate message to his father, to come and settle in Egypt, and
be supported by him there. The Pharaoh, also, hearing that Joseph's brethren
were with him, sends an invitation to the same effect {vv. 17 — 20). The narra-
tive, except in a few isolated clauses, returns now to B.
XLV. 1 Then Joseph could not refrain himself before aU B
them that stood by him ; and he cried, Cause every man to go
out from me. And there stood no man with him, while Joseph
made himself knovm unto his brethren. 2 And he ^wept aloud:
and the Egyptians heard, and the house of Pharaoh heard.
3 And Joseph said unto his brethren, I am Joseph ; doth my
father yet Uve ? And his brethren could not answer him ; for
they were troubled at his presence. 4 And Joseph said unto
^ Heb. gave forth his voice in weeping.
XLV. 1 — 3. Joseph makes himself known to his brethren.
1. could not refrain himself. Contrast xliii. 31.
3. doth my father yet live ? The question was no doubt a natural
one in the context of E: according to J (xliii. 26 f., xliv. 24 — 34)
Joseph had just been told that his father was living.
troubled. Dismayed : Is. xxi. 3 ; Jer. h. 32 (EVV. ' are affrighted').
4 — 8. Joseph reassures them.
362 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlv. 4-"
his brethren, Come near to me, I pray you. And they came E
near. And he said, 1 am Joseph your brother, [whom ye sold JR
into Egypt.] 6 And now be not grieved, nor angry with your- E
selves, [that ye sold me hither :] for God did send me before JR
you to preserve life. 6 For these two years hath the famine
been in the land : and there are yet five years, in the which
there shall be neither plowing nor harvest. 7 And God sent me
before you to preserve you a remnant in the earth, and to save
you alive ^by a great deliverance. 8 So now it was not you
that sent me hither, but God : and he hath made me a father to
Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and ruler over all the land of
Egypt. 9 Haste ye, and go up to my father, and say unto him.
Thus saith thy son Joseph, God hath made me lord of all Egypt :
come down unto me, tarry not : 10 [and thou shalt dwell in the J
land of Goshen,] and thou shalt be near unto me, thou, and thy E
children, and thy childi'en's children, and thy flocks, and thy
herds, and all that thou hast: 11 and there will I nourish thee;
for there are yet five years of famine ; lest thou come to poverty,
thou, and thy household, and all that thou hast. 12 And, behold,
your eyes see, and the eyes of my brother Benjamin, that it is my
* Or, to he a great company that escape
4*, 5''. Two insertions from the narrative of J, which alone has
described the brethren as selling Joseph (xxxvii. 27, 28'').
5. for God &c. They are to recognize a providential purpose in
what had been done. Cf. w. 7, 8, 1. 20 : also Ps. cv. 1 7.
7. to give you a remnant. I.e. to leave you descendants : cf. 2 S.
xiv. 7 (* so as not to give my husband name or remnant'); Jer. xliv. 7
('to leave you no remnant'). The foil, clause is difficult; but probably
the best rend, is, to save you alive for a g7-eat escaping -. cf. xxxii. 8 J
(where ' shall escape' is lit. ' shall he for an escaping'). \
8. a father. Fig. for beneficent adviser and administrator : see
Is. xxii. 21 ; and cf. Rest of Esther xiii. 6 [ = the second place in the
kingdom, v. 3], xvi. 11; 1 Mace. xi. 32. Ges. compares also Atdbek,
'chief father,' a Turkish title for principal minister or vizier^
lord of all his house. Cf. xh. 40.
9 — 13. Joseph's invitation to his father.
10. the land of Goshen. See on xlvi. 28".
1 On Brugsch's supposition that 'father' and 'lord' (v. 9) are Egyptian titles,
see DB. n. 774.
* The clause is referred to J, because it is presupposed in xlvi. 28' (also J), and
because it is only J who speaks elsewhere of the Israelites as d'.velling apart in
Goshen, xlvi. 28^ 29, 34, xlvu. 1, 4, 6, 27, 1. 8 ; Ex. viii. 22, ix. 26 (cf. p. 332).
XLV. n-73] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 363
mouth that speaketh unto you. 13 And ye shall tell my father E
of all my glory in Egypt, and of all that ye have seen ; and ye
shall haste and bring down my father hither. 14 And he fell
upon his brother Benjamin's neck, and wept ; and Benjamin
wept upon his neck. 15 And he kissed all his brethren, and
wept upon them : and after that his brethren talked with him.
16 And the fame thereof was heard in Pharaoh's house,
saying, Joseph's brethren are come : and it pleased Pharaoh
well, and his servants. 17 And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, Say
unto thy brethren. This do ye ; lade your beasts, and go, get you
unto the land of Canaan ; 18 and take your father and your
households, and come unto me : and I will give you the good of
the land of Egypt, and ye shall eat the fat of the land. 19 Now
thou art commanded, this do ye ; take you wagons out of the
land of Egypt for your little ones, and for your wives, and bring
your father, and come. 20 Also regard not your stuff ; for the
good of all the land of Egypt is yours. 21 And the sons of
Israel did so : and Joseph gave them wagons, according to the
commandment of Pharaoh, and gave them provision for the
way. 22 To all of them he gave each man changes of raiment ;
but to Benjamin he gave three hundred pieces of silver, and five
changes of raiment 23 And to his father he sent after this
manner ; ten asses laden with the good things of Egypt, and
14 f. Now that Joseph has made his brethren comprehend the
situation, the actual greeting takes place, Benjamin receiving the first
and warmest welcome.
16 — 20. The Pharaoh sends Jacob a similar invitation, and autho-
rizes Joseph to send wagons from Egypt for the conveyance of his
father and his family.
18. the good. I.e. the good things, as r. 23; Dt. vi. 11; 2 K.
viii. 9.
20. regard not. Lit. let not ycywr em pity (Dt. vii. 16, xiii. 8, a/.) :
i.e. do not trouble about your household furniture; do not have regrets
at leaving it behind.
21 — 24. Joseph dismisses his brethren, with presents both for
themselves and for their father.
22, changes of raiment. I.e. superior apparel, to be exchanged for
the ordinary dress on festal occasions, — still a common form of present
in the East. So Jud. xiv. 12 f, 19; 2 K. v. 5, 22 f.
pieces. Shekels: cf. on xxiii. 15, About £42.
23. after this manner. In like manner; i.e. also as presents.
364 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlv. 23-XLVi. 3
ten she-asses laden with corn and bread and victual for his E
father by the way. 24 So he sent his brethren away, and they
departed : and he said unto them, See that ye fall not out by
the way. 25 And they went up out of Egypt, and came into
the land of Canaan unto Jacob their father. 26 And they told
him, saying, Joseph is yet alive, and he is ruler over all the land
of Egypt. And his heart fainted, for he believed them not.
27 And they told him all the words of Joseph, which he had
said unto them : and when he saw the wagons which Joseph
had sent to carry him, the spirit of Jacob their father revived :
28 and Israel said, It is enough ; Joseph my son is yet alive :
I wiU go and see him before I die.
24. See that ye fall not out. More exactly, Be not disturbed
or angry (Ps. iv. 4 RVm. : lxx. in both opyt^co-^e) ; i.e. do not quarrel,
or reproacn one another, on account of your past treatment of me
(cf. «. 5).
25 — 28. They return home and tell their father. His delight,
when he is satisfied that the news they bring him is true.
26. fainted. Lit. became numb, was (fig.) unable to move for
astonishment.
Chapter XLVI. 1—27.
The migration of Jacob into Egypt. List of his descendants
who accompanied him.
XLVI. 1 And Israel took his journey with all that he had, E
and came to Beer-sheba, and offered sacrifices unto the God of
his father Isaac. 2 And God spake unto Israel in the visions
of the night, and said, Jacob, Jacob. And he said, Here am I.
3 And he said, I am God, the God of thy father : fear not to go
down into Egypt ; for I will there make of thee a great nation :
XLVI. 1 — 4 (E). Jacob sets out, — presumably from Hebron
(xxxvii. 14), — and journeys as far as Beer-sheba, where, previously to
leaving the land of promise and taking up his abode in the land of
Egjrpt, he receives encouragement and assurances suitable to the
occasion (cf. before, at Bethel, xxviii. 13 — 15).
1. the God of his father Isaac. Beer-sheba was especially the home
of Isaac, and he had built an altar there (cf. xxvi. 25, xxviii. 10).
3. a great nation. Cf,, of Abraham, xii. 2, xviii. 18. Here it is
added that the increase is to take place thei-e, in Egypt : cf. Ex. i. 7
XLVi. 4-8] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 866
4 I will go down with thee into Egypt ; and I will also surely E
bring thee up again : and Joseph shall put his hand upon thine
eyes. 5 And Jacob rose up from Beer-sheba : and the sons of
Israel carried Jacob their father, and their little ones, and their
wives, in the wagons which Pharaoh had sent to carry him. |
6 And they took their cattle, and their goods, which they had P
gotten in the land of Canaan, and came into Egypt, Jacob, and
all his seed with him : 7 his sons, and his sons' sons with him,
his daughters, and his sons' daughters, and all his seed brought
he with him into Egypt.
8 And these are the names of the children of Israel, which
came into EgyptQ Jacob and his sons] : Reuben, Jacob's firstborn.
4. bring thee up again. Viz. in the persons of thy descendants.
'Bring up/ as Ex. iii. 8, Jud. ii. 1, and frequently.
put his hand upon thine eyes. I.e. perform the last offices to the
deceased. Cf. E. xi. 453; Od. xi. 426, xxiv. 296; Eur. Hec. 430;
Aen. IX. 487.
5. Jacob sets out from Beer-sheba.
6. 7. A summary account, from P, of the migration of Jacob and
his family into Egypt. For the expressions, cf xii. 5, xxxi, 18, xxxvi. 6;
xvii. 7, 9, 10, XXXV. 12 ('his seed with him').
8 — 27. The list, from P, of the descendants of Jacob who came
with him into Egypt. So far as the names of Jacob's grandchildren
are concerned, nearly all recur, with slight textual variations (see
B,Vm,), in Nu. xxvi. (P), and some also in different parts of 1 Ch. ii. —
viii. The number 70 {v. 27) was traditional (Dt. x. 22); and the
present list, it seems, represents an attempt, or combination of attempts,
—for it contains indications of two computations, one {vv. 26*, 27 end),
like Ex. i. 5 (P), ea:cluding Jacob from the 70, and the other {vv. 8,
26 end, 27*) mcluding him, — to fill it out with names; the names, as
Nu. xxvi. shews, being those of the reputed ancestors of the leading
famihes, or clans, of the several tribes. Perhaps the list was originally
one of Jacob's descendants as such, drawn up {vv. 12, 20) without
reference to the migration into Egypt, and afterwards not quite con-
sistently adjusted to its present place'. On the bracketed clauses, see
on V. 26 f
1 There is here a grave chronological discrepancy between P and JE. According
to P, Joseph at his elevation had been 13 years in Egypt (xxxvii. 2, xli. 46) ; and
according to .JE, 9 years further had elapsed, when he sends for Jacob and his
family (xli. 47, xlv. 6), But the position of ch. xxxviii. places the events recorded
in it after Joseph had been sold into Egypt. Now in that chapter, Judah marries
Shua', and has three children; two grow up, and in succession marry Tamar;
then Tamar, after waiting some time {vv. 11, 12, 14), has twin sons, Perez and
Zerah, by her father-in-law; and here the two sons of Perez, Hezron and Hamul,
come flown with Jacob into Egypt. Thus Jndah marries, lias" three children, and
after the third has grown up, becomes a father again, and through the child thus
366 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlvi. 9-17
9 And the sons of Reuben ; Hanoch, and Pallu, and Hezron, P
and Carmi. 10 And the sons of Simeon ; ^ Jemuel, and Jamin,
and Ohad, and ^Jachin, and ^Zohar, and Shaul the son of a
Canaanitish woman. 11 And the sons of Levi; *Gershon,
Kohath, and Merari. 12 And the sons of Judah; Er, and
Onan, and Shelah, and Perez, and Zerah : but Er and Onan
died in the land of Canaan. And the sons of Perez were
Hezron and HamuL 13 And the sons of Issachar ; Tola, and
^Puvah, and lob, and Shimron. 14 And the sons of Zebulun;
Sered, and Elon, and JahleeL 15 These are the sons of Leah,
which she bare unto Jacob in Paddan-aram [, with his daughter
Dinah] : all the souls of his sons and his daughters were thirty
and three. 16 And the sons of Gad ; ^Ziphion, and Haggi,
Shuni, and ^Ezbon, Eri, and ^Arodi, and Areli 17 And the
sons of Asher ; Imnah, and Ishvah, and Ishvi, and Beriah, and
Serah their sister : and the sons of Beriah ; Heber, and MalchieL
1 In Num. xxvi. 12, 1 Chr. iv. 24, Nemuel. » In 1 Chr. iv. 24, Jarib. s In
Num. xxvi. 13, 1 Chr. iv. 24, Zerah. * In 1 Chr. vi. 16, Gershom. " In
1 Chr. vii. 1, Puah, Jashub. See Num. xxvi. 23, 24. * In Num. xxvi. 15,
Zephon. '' In Num. xxvi. 16, Ozni. ^ In Num. xxvi. 17, Arod.
8 — 15. The sons of Leah.
9. Beuben. Cf. Ex. vi. 14; Nu. xxvi. 5 f.; 1 Ch. v. 3.
10. Simeon. Cf. Ex. vi. 15; Nu. xxvi. 12 f.; 1 Ch. iv. 24. The
families of Shaul must have had an admixture of Canaanite blood:
cf. on ch. xxxviii. (p. 326). Ohad is not mentioned in Nu., Ch.
11. Levi. Cf. Ex. vi. 16; Nu. xxvi. 57. The Gershonites,
Kohathites, and Merarites are also often mentioned besides, on account
of their duties in connexion with the sanctuary, e.g. Nu. iii. 17 ff.
12. Judah. Cf. Nu. xxvi. 19 — 21; 1 Ch. ii. and iv. ; and on ch.
xxxviii. Achan was of the family of the Zerahites (Jos. vii. 1).
13. Issachar. Nu. xxvi. 23 f.; 1 Ch. vii. 1. Jashub, in these
passages, for lob, is certainly the correct form (so LXX. here).
14. Zebulim. Nu. xxvi. 26.
15. Paddan-aram. See on xxv. 20.
thirty and three. The number must tnclude Er and Onan, but
girclude Dinah, whose name, from the awkwardness of the Heb. (. . . nxi)j
it is independently probable, is a later insertion in the list.
16 — 18. The sons of Leah's handmaid, Zilpah.
16. Gad. Nu. xxvi. 15—17.
17. Asher. Nu. xxvi. 44—46 (without Ishvah); 1 Ch. vii. 30 f.
born becomes a grandfather, all within the space of 22 years ! Even though the
vagueness of 'at that time' in xxxviii. 1 might allow this period to be exteuded by
(say) 10 years, the difficulty would not be appreciably diminished.
XLvi. 18-26] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 367
18 These are the sons of Zilpah, which Laban gave to Leah his P
daughter, and these she bare unto Jacob, even sixteen souls.
19 The sons of Rachel Jacob's wife ; Joseph and Benjamin.
20 And unto Joseph in the land of Egypt were bom Manasseh
and Ephraim, which Asenath the daughter of Poti-phera priest
of On bare unto him. 21 And the sons of Benjamin ; Bela,
and Becher, and Ashbel, Gera, and Naaman, ^Ehi, and Rosh,
^Muppim, and ^Huppim, and Ard. 22 These are the sons of
Rachel, which were born to Jacob : all the souls were fourteen.
23 And the sons of Dan; *Hushim. 24 And the sons of
Naphtali ; ^Jahzeel, and Guni, and Jezer, and ^Shillem.
25 These are the sous of Bilhah, which Laban gave unto
Rachel his daughter, and these she bare unto Jacob : aU the
souls were seven. 26 AU the ^ souls that came with Jacob
into Egypt, which came out of his loins, besides Jacob's sons'
1 In Num. xxvi. 38, Ahiram. 2 Jq Num. xxvi. 39, Shephupham in 1 Chr.
vii. 12, Shuppim. ^ In Num. xxvi. 39, Eupham. * In Num. xxvi. 42, Shuham.
8 In 1 Chr. vii. 13, Jahziel. « In 1 Chr. vii. 13, Shallum. ' Or, souls
belonging to Jacob that came
19—22. The sons of Rachel
20. Joseph. See xli. 50. On the sons, or clans, of Manasseh
and Ephraim, see Nu. xxvi. 28—37; 1 Ch. v. 24, vii. 14—27 : cf. 1. 23.
21. Benjamin. Cf. Nn. xxvi. 38 — 40, where, however, Benjamin
has only five sous, Bela', Ashbel, Ahiram, Shephupham \ and Hupham,
Na'aman and Ard being sons of Bela'. In lxx. of this verse, Benjamin
has only three sons, Bela', Becher, and Ashbel, the rest being grand-
sons. In 1 Ch. vii. 6, also, he has only three sons, Bela', Becher, and
Jediael (= Ashbel); and Shuppim and Huppim (= Shephupham and
Hupham in Nu. xxvi.) appear (v. 12) as grandsons of Bela'. There
are further difierences in 1 Ch. viii. 1 — 5, — partly, at any rate, due
clearly to a corrupt text. See further Benjamin in EncB. ; and esp.
Marquart in Jew. Quart. Rev. 1902, p. 343 ff. (where the genealogies
are restored conjecturally in tabular form). Ehud (Jud. iii. 15), and
Shimei (2 S. xvi. 5) belonged to the clan of Gera, and Sheba (2 S. xx. 1)
to that of Becher.
23 — 25. The sons of Rachel's handmaid, Bilhah.
23. Dan. Nu. xxvi. 42.
24. Naphtali. Nu. xxvi. 48 f. ; 1 Ch. vii. 13.
26, 27. The number of those who thus migrated into Egypt.
26. RVm. is correct. The rend, 'with' is impossible.
1 From these two names (DDIDC'1 DITIN), 'Ehi, and Rosh, Muppim' (K'X*11 Tlt^
D"'D?3) can differ only by way ot textual corruption (cf. Gray, Heb. Pr. N^mes, 35).
The names must have been taken here from an ah*eady corrupt text.
368 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlvi. 26-28
wives, all the souls were [threescore and six ; 27 and the sons of i'
Joseph, which were born to him in Egypt, were two souls : all
the souls of the house of Jacob, which came into Egypt, were]
threescore and ten.
26 f. The bracketed words seem to be an addition to the original
text. Ex. i. 5 shews that P reckoned 70 souls vnthout Jacob as having
come down into Egypt: and with this computation v. 26* ('came out
of his loins '), and the figures in w). 15, 18, 22, 25 (33 + 16 + 14 + 7 = 70)
agree, Er and Onan (v. 12) being inconsistently included. '66' here
seems to be a correction made by one who considered that Er and Onan
(who died in Canaan) and Joseph and his two sons (who were aheady
in Egypt) should be excluded from the list of those who came with
Jacob into Egypt, and Dinah {v. 15) added; and who then adjusted
this figure to P's 70, by adding to it not only Joseph and his two sons
{v. 27), but also (though against v. 26* and Ex. i. 5) Jacob («. 8).
_ An interesting pictorial illustration of a party of thirty-seven Asiatics
{Amu) coming into Egypt with presents for Usertesen II., of the 12th
dynasty (c. 2600 B.C., Petrie), may be seen in Wilk. -Birch, i. 480
(coloured), Masp. i, 468 — 70, or (with four figures omitted) Ball, Light
from the East, p. 74.
In v. 27 Lxx. have ' 75' (so Acts vii. 14) for ' 70,' adding in v. 20 the
names of three grandsons of Joseph, and two great-grandsons (ch. 1. 23 ;
Nu. xxvi. 29, 35 f ), obviously with the intention of including here
the ancestors of all the families mentioned in Nu. xxvi., whereas P
includes those only whom he supposes to have been born at the time
of the migration into Egypt.
The chronology of P, which is here presupposed, is irreconcilable
with that of JE. Benjamin, who has been described just before as
a 'Httle lad' (xliv. 20), could not have been the father of ten sons, —
stiU less (lxx.) a grandfather. The supposition that some of Ben-
jamin's sons were born afterwards in Egypt is contrary to the express
terms of the chapter {yv. 8, 26); while the supposition that those not
yet born were regarded as having come down in lumbis patrum
exceeds the limits of credibility. [See fuitiier the Addenda.'\
XLVI. 28— XLVIL 12.
The arrival of Jacob and his sons in Egypt. Pharaoh assigns
tJiem the land of Goshen as a residence.
28 And he sent Judah before him unto Joseph, to shew the J
way before him unto Goshen ; and they came into the land of
28 — 30. Jacob and his sons arrive in Goshen, where they are met
by Josepli. The narrative (J) connects with xlvi. 1 — 5, and forms its
sequel. P has aheady narrated Jacob's arrival in Egypt (v. 6 f ).
XLVi. 28-34] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 369
Goshen. 29 And Joseph made ready his chariot, and went up J
to meet Israel his father, to Goshen ; and he presented himself
unto him, and fell on his neck, and wept on his neck a good
while. 30 And Israel said unto Joseph, Now let me die, since I
have seen thy face, that thou art yet alive. 31 And Joseph said
unto his brethren, and unto his father's house, I will go up, and
tell Pharaoh, and will say unto him. My bi ethren, and my father's
house, which were in the land of Canaan, are come unto me ;
32 and the men are shepherds, for they have been keepers of
cattle ; and they have brought their flocks, and their herds, and
all that they have. 33 And it shall come to pass, when Pharaoh
shall call you, and shall say, What is your occupation ? 34 that
ye shall say. Thy servants have been keepers of cattle from our
youth even until now, both we, and our fathers : that ye may
28, Goshen. Ancient hierogl)rphic lists of the 'nomes,' or ad-
ministrative districts, of Egypt mention Kesem as the 20th nome of
Lower Egypt, and state that its religious capital was Pa-soft, the
modem 8aft el-Henna, a village about 40 miles NE. of Cairo, the
ancient name of which, from inscriptions found on the spot, M. Naville
in 1885 ascertained to be Kes. These facts fix the situation of 'Go-
shen' : it must have been the district around Saft, 'within the triangle
lying between the villages of Saft, Belbeis, and Tel el-Kebir,' in a part
of the Delta which is still considered to have the best pasture-land
in Egypt (Rob. BR. 1. 54 i.)\
29. his cha/riot. Cf. xli. 43.
went up. From the Nile-land to the somewhat more elevated
Goshen, lxx., for to Goshen, here and v. 28*, have 'to Heroopolis'
(Kaff 'Hpco'tov ttoXlv), now known to have been the Greek name of Pithom
(Ex. i. 11), situated at the modern Tell el-Mashkuta (see DB, s.v.
Pithom), a little E. of Goshen.
30, Now. I.e. now at last (ii. 23). Jacob will die willingly, now
that the dearest wish of his life is fulfilled.
31 — 34, Joseph will go and inform Pharaoh; and by emphasizing
the fact that his father and brethren are shepherds, secure permission
for them to remain in Goshen, apart from the Egyptians generally (cf.
p. 332 w.).
31. go tip. The writer probably pictured the royal palace as situated
on what we should now call an acropolis, hke the palaces in Jerusalem
or Samaria. But the Book of Genesis furnishes no hint as to what the
city was in which the ' Pharaoh ' of Joseph was supposed to have dwelt.
1 The same locality is indicated by the rend, of lxx. in xlv. 10, xlvi. 34 Feo-e/i
'Apa^las; for 'Arabia' was in Graeco-Eoman times (see Ptol. iv, 5, 53) the name of
one of the nomes in the Delta, with a capital Phakoussa, which is just Kes with the
Egypt, art. Pa. See further Goshen in DB,
D. 24
370 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlvi. 34-XLVii. 6
dwell in the land of Goshen ; for every shepherd is an abomina- J
tion unto the Egyptians.
XL VII. 1 Then Joseph went in and told Pharaoh, and
said, My father and my brethren, and their flocks, and their
herds, and all that they have, are come out of the land of
Canaan ; and, behold, they are in the land of Goshen. 2 And
from among his brethren he took five men, and presented them
unto Pharaoh. 3 And Pharaoh said unto his brethren, What is
your occupation? And they said unto Pharaoh, Thy servants
are shepherds, both we, and our fathers. 4 And they said unto
Pharaoh, To sojourn in the land are we come ; for there is no
pasture for thy servants' flocks ; for the famine is sore in the
land of Canaan : now therefore, we pray thee, let thy servants
dwell in the land of Goshen. | 5 And Pharaoh spake unto P
Joseph, saying. Thy father and thy brethren are come unto
thee : 6 the land of Egypt is before thee ; in the best of the
land make thy father and thy brethren to dwell; | in the land of J
Goshen let them dwell : and if thou knowest any ^able men
* Or, men of activity
34. for every shepherd &c. There is independent evidence that
swine-herds (Hdt. 11. 47) and cow-herds were looked down upon by the
Egyptians, but not that shepherds were: the cow-herds, in particular,
from living with their herds in reed cottages on the marshes, were
called 'marshmen'; they are represented on the monuments as dirty,
unshaven, and poorly-clad, and were regarded as pariahs (Erman,
p. 439 f. ; cf. Ebers in Smith, DB."" n. 1802''— 1803'').
XL VII. 1 — 4, 6^. Joseph presents five of his brethren to Pharaoh,
who, upon learning that Jacob and his sons are all shepherds, grants
them permission to settle in Goshen.
3, 4. They reply as directed in xlvi. 34.
5, 6. Verse 5 is not at all a natural reply to the request in v. 4'';
and there can be no question that the arrangement of these verses in
the Lxx. is preferable to that of the present Heb. text. After v. 4 the
Lxx. continues : * 5* (J) And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, Let them dwell
in the land of Goshen : and if thou knowest any able men among them,
then make them rulers over my cattle, b^ (P) And Jacob and his sons ;
came into Egypt unto Joseph. And Pharaoh king of Egypt heard of it.
And Pharaoh spake unto Joseph, saying, Thy father and thy brethren
are come unto thee : 6 Behold, the land of Egypt is before thee : in
the best of the land make thy fatlier and thy brethren to dwell. 7 And
Joseph brought in' &c. (as in the Heb.). Here the words forming v. 5"
in the lxx. are a natural and suitable answer to v. 4.
6, able men. The same expression, implying both moral worth and
physical efficiency, as Ex. xviii. 21, 25; 1 K. i. 42, 52 (' a worthy man').
XLVii. 6-,2] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 371
among them, then make them rulers over my cattle. | 7 And J P
Joseph brought in Jacob his father, and set him before Pharaoh :
and Jacob blessed Pharaoh. 8 And Pharaoh said unto Jacob,
How many are the days of the years of thy life ? 9 And Jacob
said unto Pharaoh, The days of the years of my ^pilgrimage are
an hundred and thirty years : few and evil have been the days
of the years of my life, and they have not attained unto the
days of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their
^pilgrimage. 10 And Jacob blessed Pharaoh, and went out
from the presence of PharaoL 1 1 And Joseph placed his father
and his brethren, and gave them a possession in the land of
Egypt, in the best of the land, in the land of Rameses, as
Pharaoh had commanded. | 12 And Joseph nourished his father, J
and his brethren, and all his father's household, with bread,
^according to their families.
^ Or, sojournings * Or, according to the number of their little ones
rulers over my cattle. Much attention was paid to cattle-breeding
in Egypt; and there were many fine breeds, esp. of oxen (Erman, pp.
435 — 444). The Pharaoh possessed large herds; and the mer, or super-
intendent, of the royal cattle, is frequently mentioned in the inscriptions
(Erman, pp. 94, 95, 108, 143, 475).
7 — 11 (lxx. 5*^ — 111 Joseph presents his father to Pharaoh; and
afterwards, at Pharaohs command, assigns him an abode in the 'land
of Rameses.' P thus narrates only the presentation of Jacob, J only
that of Joseph's five brethren. The first words of v. 5^ (lxx.) may
seem tautologous after xlvi. 6 f. ; but the repetition is in P's manner :
cf. V. If; and on vi. 10.
7. blessed. I.e. saluted with wishes for his welfare: cf 1 S. xiii.
10; 2 K. iv. 29 ('salute').
9. sojoumings. Of Jacob's wandering life (the same word as in
xvii. 8, xxviii. 4, xxxvi. 7, xxxvii. l): not to be understood in the fig.
sense of a 'pilgrimage' through life.
have not attained &c. According to P, Abraham lived 175 years,
and Isaac 180 years.
10. blessed. I.e. saluted again at leaving, as 2 S. xix. 39, cf xiii. 25.
11. the land of Rameses. So lxx. in xlvi. 28 (seemingly for ' the
land of Goshen'). Probably a name for the E. part of the Delta, in
which Ramses II., of the 19th dyu., the Pharaoh of the oppression,
built many new cities (cf Masp. ii. 423 f ; Ex. i. 11), and which he
fi-equently made his residence. Ramses II., however, lived long after
the time of Joseph, so that the expression must be used proleptically.
12. Cf xlv. 11. — RVm. is correct. The expression (meaning
properly those who take quick, tripling steps) sometimes, however, in-
cludes women (see 1. 21; Ex. xii. 37** ['children']; Nu. xxxii. 16, 17).
24—2
372 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlvil 13-16
The inscriptions supply parallels for parties of foreigners receiving per-
mission to settle in Egypt. Under Hor-em-heb (18th dyn.) some Mentiu, or
nomads, expelled from their homes, receive permission to settle in a pre-
scribed locality {DB. ii. 774'') ; and under Merenptah (19th dyn.), — probably the
Pharaoh of the Exodus, — a body of Shasu (or Bedawin) are allowed to pass
the border fortress of Theku (perhaps the Succoth of Ex. xii. 37), 'in order
to obtain a living for themselves and their cattle in the great estate of
Pharaoh' (Hogarth, AiUhority and Archaeology^ p. 69X
XLVIL 13—27.
Progress of the years of famine. How the independent
land-owners of Egypt became tenants of the crown.
The Egyptians first spend all their money for com, v. 14, then they part
with their cattle, vv. 15 — 17, finally, they off'er Pharaoh their lands and them-
selves, vv. 18 — 22: the result was a permanent change in the Egyptian sys-
tem of land-tenure, the previously independent land-owners becoming now
tenants of the king, and paying him, as it were, an annual rent of one-fifth
of the produce, vv. 23 — 26. The section is remarkable, as dealing entirely,
except in v. 27, with a change in the economical constitution of Egypt The
clauses respecting the 'land of Canaan' in vv. 13 — 15 seem in such a narrative
to be out of place, and are not improbably later additions.
13 And there was no bread in all the land ; for the famine J
was very sore, so that the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan
fainted by reason of the famine. 14 And Joseph gathered up
all the money that was found in the land of Egypt, and in the
land of Canaan, for the corn which they bought : and Joseph
brought the money into Pharaoh's house. 15 And when the
money was all spent in the land of Egypt, and in the land of
Canaan, all the Egyptians came unto Joseph, and said, Give us
bread . for why should we die in thy presence ? for our money
faileth. 16 And Joseph said, Give your cattle ; and I vdll give
13. Cf. xli. 55—57, xlii. 5, xliii. 1.
14. into Pharaoh's home. According to Ebers (Smith, DB."^ n.
1803*), the treasury, called in the inscriptions the 'nouse of silver,'
The head treasurer was an important officer of state. There are many
representations of treasuries on the monuments, with clerks weighing
the rings, or ingots, of money (xliii. 21) in scales. Cf. Erman, pp. 85 f.,
89, 108—113.
15 — 17. The Egyptians part with their cattle.
15. in thy pi-esence. Whilst thou lookest on, and dost nothing to
prevent it. Cf. v. 19.
XLVii. 16-23] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 373
you for your cattle, if money fail. 17 And they brought their J
cattle unto Joseph : and Joseph gave them bread in exchange
for the horses, and for the ^flocks, and for tlie herds, and for the
asses : and he ^fed them with bread in exchange for all their
cattle for that year. 18 And when that year was ended, they
came unto him the second year, and said unto him, We will not
hide from my lord, how that our money is all spent ; and the
herds of cattle are my lord's ; there is nought left in the sight
of my lord, but our bodies, and our lands : 19 wherefore should
we die before thine eyes, both we and our land ? buy us aind our
land for bread, and we and our land will be servants unto
Pharaoh : and give us seed, that we may live, and not die, and
that the land be not desolate. 20 So Joseph bought all the
land of Egypt for Pharaoh ; for the Egyptians sold every man
his field, because the famine was sore upon them : and the land
became Pharaoh's. 21 And as for the people, ^he removed them
*to the cities from one end of the border of Egypt even to the
other end thereof. 22 Only the land of the priests bouglit he
not : for the priests had a portion from Pharaoh, and did eat
their portion which Pharaoh gave them ; wherefore they sold
not their land. 23 Then Joseph said unto the people. Behold, I
1 Heb. cattle of the flocks, and for the cattle of the herds. ^ jjgb. led them as
a shepherd. * According to Samar., Sept. and Vulg., he made bondmen of them,
from dx. * Or, according to their cities
17. fed. The verb, to judge from Arab., means properly to lead
to a watering-place (cf. Ps. xxiii. 2; Is. xlix. 10), then, more generally,
to lead gently, Is. xl. 11, Ex. xv. 13; here, fig., to refresh, suppm-t.
18. 19. They offer the Pharaoh their lands and persons.
19. servants. Or, bondmen (v. 21 marg.): they are ready to
forgo their independence, if only they can obtain corn to live on.
20 — 22. The result was that all the landed property in Egypt,
except that of the priests, passed into the hands of the king.
21. The text must mean, to the cities where the gTanaries were
(xli. 35, 48), to be supported there. But it is decidedly better to follow
the first margin, in which case, while v. 20 describes how the land
became Pharaoh's, v. 21 wiU describe how the land-owners became his
'bondmen,' or tenants, in exact accordance with v. 19.
22. The priests had a fixed income in kind from the Pharaoh ;
so there was no occasion for them to seU their lands. For 'portion'
in the sense of a fixed allowance of food, see Prov. xxx. 8, xxxi. 15 ;
Ez. xvi. 27 (RVm.); also Nu. xviii. 8, 11, 19 ('due').
23 — 26. The people become permanently Pharaoh's tenants, paying
374 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlvii. .3-^7
have bought you this day and your land for Pharaoh : lo, here is J
seed for you, and ye shall sow the land. 24 And it shall come
to pass at the ingatherings, that ye shall give a fifth unto
Pharaoh, and four parts shall be your own, for seed of the field,
and for your food, and for them of your households, and for food
for your little ones. 25 And they said, Thou hast saved our
lives : let us find grace in the sight of my lord, and we will be
Pharaoh's servants. 26 And Joseph made it a statute con-
cerning the land of Egypt unto this day, that Pharaoh should
have the fifth ; only the land of the priests alone became not
Pharaoh's. 27 And Israel dwelt in the land of Egypt, in the
land of Goshen ; | and they gat them possessions therein, and P
were fruitful, and multiplied exceedingly.
him annually one-fifth of the produce. 'In view of the fertility of
Egypt,' says Knobel, ' the proportion does not seem excessive. In the
time of the Maccabees the Jews, until Demetrius freed them, paid
the Syrian government one-third of the seed, and one-half of the fruit
(1 Mace. X. 30). Under Turkish rule the proportion is sometimes one-
half of the produce, and Arab exactions from the fellahin are similar.
In Syria cases occur where it is two-thirds; and about Ispahan, in
Persia, the peasants, who receive land and seed from the government,
pay even three-fourths of their harvest.'
25, They are content with the arrangement; and hope only to
find in Joseph a mild master.
27. The narrative here returns to Israel, v. 2T giving the sequel
to m 4, 6^ 12, and v. 21^ (P: of p. viii, No. 5, p. xi. No. 23) to v. 11.
The system of land-tenure, here described, must have prevailed in Egypt
in the writer's time, and have been popularly attributed to Joseph. The
inscriptions at present known make no mention of it. It is, however, so far
in accordance with the evidence of the monuments, that, whereas in the
'Old Empire' (Ist — 12th dynasties), as is related in the sepulchral inscriptions
of that period, the nobility and governors of the nomes possessed large landed
estates, in the 'New Empire' (the 18th and following dynasties) a change is
found to have taken place : ' the old aristocracy has made place for court-
oflScials, and the landed property has passed out of the hands of the old
families into the possession of the Crown and the great temples' (Erman,
p. 102 ; of. Ebers, in Smith, DB* IL 1S0.3 f.). Erman thinks that this change was
brought about by Aahmes (who freed Egypt from the llvksos, and founded
the 18th dynasty) confiscating the property of the old nobility. In a later
age, Diodorus Siculus says that tlie land in Egypt belonged to the king, the
priests, and the military caste (i. 73 f. ; cf. Hdt. ii. 168, where it is stated that
every priest and wairior in Egypt possessed twelve lipovpai — about nine acres
—of land tax-free). Whether in Joseph's time (the Hyksos period: p. 347)
XLvn. .8-xLViii. r] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 376
the priests really received fixed revenues from the Pharaohs (xlvii, 22) is
perhaps doubtful : the priests seem at all times to have administered, and
lived upon, the property of the temples, though the temples often received
gifts from the king, especially in the ' New Empire,' when the priests became
in consequence immensely wealthy (Erman, 104 f., 292 f., 298—304 [enormous
gifts made by Ramses III. to various temples] ; cf. Ebers, l.c.).
XLVII. 28— XLVIII.
Jacob's last instructions with regard to his burial. His
adoption, and blessing, of Manasseh and Ephraim.
28 And Jacob lived in the land of Egypt seventeen years : P
so the days of Jacob, the years of his life, were an hundi-ed forty
and seven years. | 29 And the time drew near that Israel must J
die : and he called his son Joseph, and said unto him. If now I
have found grace in thy sight, put, I pray thee, thy hand under
my thigh, and deal kindly and truly with me ; bury me not,
I pray thee, in Egypt : 30 but when I sleep with my fathers,
thou shalt carry me out of Egypt, and bury me in their burying-
place. And he said, I will do as thou hast said. 31 And he
said. Swear unto me : and he sware unto hioL And Israel
bowed himself upon the bed's head.
XLVIII. 1 And it came to pass after these things, that one E
28 (P) . Jacob's age at the time of his death.
29 — 31 (J). Jacob exacts a solemn promise from Joseph that he
will not bury him in Egypt. Cf. P's parallel, xlix. 29 — 32.
29. the time (Ut. the days) drew near &c. Exactly as Dt. xxxi. 14 ;
1 K. ii. 1.
put thy hand under my thigh. See on xxiv. 2.
30. in their bvryingplace. Viz. in Machpelah. Cf. (in P) xlix.
29, 1. 12 f.
31. Swear unto me. Cf. xxv. 33.
bowed himself &c. I.e., apparently, turned himself over on his
bed, and bent his head down towards its head, — in imitation, as far
as possible, of actual prostration. Gf., of David, 1 K. i. 47. lxx.,
foDowed in Heb. xi. 21, have, 'bowed himself (= worshipped) upon the
top of his staff' (vocalizing ntasn for ntasn : so also Pesh.), as though
he used it for the purpose of raising himself up in the bed. However,
this reading has no advantage over that of the Mass. text: there is
no apparent reason why the * stafif' should be specially mentioned; and
we should really in this case require -I'^f?^ (with the pron.), not ntSQn.
XLVIII. Jacob's adoption (P), and blessing (E), of Joseph's two
sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, The chapter has a historical significance:
it accounts viz. for the two facts : (1) that the two halves into which
376 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlviii. 1-7
said to Joseph, Behold, thy father is sick : and he took with him E
his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim. 2 And one told Jacob,
and said, Behold, thy son Joseph cometh unto thee : and Israel
strengthened himself, and sat upon the bed | 3 And Jacob said P
unto Joseph, ^God Almighty appeared unto me at Luz in the
land of Canaan, and blessed me, 4 and said unto me, Behold, I will
make thee fi-uitful, and multiply thee, and I will make of thee a
company of peoples ; and will give this land to thy seed after
thee for an everlasting possession. 5 And now thy two sons,
which were born unto thee in the land of Egypt before I came
unto thee into Egypt, are mine ; Ephraim and Manasseh, even
as Reuben and Simeon, shall be mine. 6 And thy issue, which
thou ^begettest after them, shall be thine ; they shall be called
after the name of their brethren in their inheritance. 7 And as
for me, when I came from Paddan, Rachel died ^by me in the
1 Heb. El Shaddai. * Or, hast begotten * Or, to my sorrow
the 'house of Joseph' (Jos. xvii. 14, xviii. 5, Jud. i. 22 f., al.) broke
up, took each the same rank in Israel as the other tribes ; and (2) that
Manasseh, though in some sense the older, and once the more im-
portant of these two tribes, was in process of time overshadowed by
the more powerful and brilliant tribe of Ephraim.
1, 2 (E). Introduction to v. 8 ff.
3 — 7 (P). The adoption by Jacob of Ephraim and Manasseh. By
this act Jacob raises them to the same level as his own sons; and
the position taken afterwards by the two corresponding tribes is thus
explained.
3, 4. The references are throughout to xxxv. 11, 12 (also P), not
to xxviii. 13 — 15 (JE). Observe P's phraseology : El Shaddai, as xvii.
1 &c. ; make fruitful and multiply, as xxviii. 3 ; company of peoples^
as xxviii. 3 (cf. xxxv. 11); and will give &c., as xvii. 8.
5. And now. I.e. in view of this future possession of Canaan.
Reuben &c. He takes as examples the two eldest of his sons.
6. they shall he called &c. I.e. they will be reckoned as belonging
to either Ephraim or Manasseh: they will not take an independent
position.
7. The verse is based upon parts of xxxv. 9, 16, 19. It has no
connexion with w. 3 — 6 : in its original context in P it must have
been followed by something to which the mention of Rachel's death
and burial would naturally lead up, — perhaps (Del., Di.) xlix. 29 ('But
I am to be gathered' &c.).
Paddan. Only here for Paddan-aram : see on xxv. 20.
by m£. To my sorrow (RVm.); Ut. upon me, i.e. as a trouble
to me. Cf. on xxxiii. 13 ; and ' to weep upon ' (vexing), Jud. xiv. 16, 17.
XLViii. 7-15] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 377
land of Canaan in the way, when there was still some way to P
come unto Ephrath : and I buried her there in the way to
Ephrath (the same is Beth-lehem). | 8 And Israel beheld Joseph's E
sons, and said, Who are these? 9 And Joseph said unto his
father, They are my sons, whom God hath given me here. And
he said. Bring them, I pray thee, unto me, and I will bless them.
10 Now the eyes of Israel were dim for age, so that he could
not see. And he brought them near unto him ; and he kissed
them, and embraced them. 11 And Israel said unto Joseph,
I had not thought to see thy face : and, lo, God hath let me see
thy seed also. 12 And Joseph brought them out from between
his knees ; and he bowed himself with his face to the earth.
13 And Joseph took them both, Ephraim in his right hand
toward Israel's left hand, and Manasseh in his left hand toward
Israel's right hand, and brought them near unto him. 14 And
Israel stretched out his right hand, and laid it upon Ephraim's
head, who was the younger, and his left hand upon Manasseh's
head, ^guiding his hands wittingly ; for Manasseh was the
firstborn. 15 And he blessed Joseph, and said, The God before
whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk, the God which
^ Or, crossing his hands
some way to come unto Ephrath. See on xxxv. 16, 19.
8 — 22 (E). The blessing of Ephraim and Manasseh. Ephraim and
Manasseh, particularly Ephraim, were the most powerful and inHuential
of the tribes, and possessed a large and fertile tract of country (cf.
xlix. 22 — 26; Dt xxxiii. 13 — 17); and during the time of the Judges,
and the earlier period of the divided monarchy, Ephraim was the real
centre of Israel. The commanding position of these two tribes, and
the pre-eminence of the younger, Ephraim, are here both explained,
in accordance with ancient belief (cf. on ix. 25 ; and ch. xxvii. p. 255),
as due to the efficacy of their ancestor's blessing.
8 — 12, Joseph introduces his two sons to Jacob.
12. from between his knees. I.e. Jacob's (see v. 10").
13, 14. Jacob, against Joseph's intention, places the younger above
the elder.
14. The rend, of the text (lit. prudentes fecit manus suas: so Ges.)
is best; that of the marg, is adopted by most moderns, but the
philol. justification from the Arabic is questionable. Lxx., Vulg., Pesh.,
' changing,' may be merely a paraphrase.
15, 16. Observe the threefold title: (1) the God 'before whom'
his ancestors had 'walked' (see on xvii. 1; and cf xxiv. 40); (2) the
God who had shepherded him (Ps. xxiii. 1), — in 'fed' the figure is
378 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlviii. 15-^1
hath fed me all my life long unto this day, 16 the angel which E
hath redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads ; and let my
name be named on them, and the name of my fathers Abraham
and Isaac ; and let them grow into a multitude in the midst of
the earth. 17 And when Joseph saw that his father laid his
right hand upon the head of Ephraim, it displeased him : and he
held up his father's hand, to remove it from Ephraim's head
unto Mauasseh's head. 18 And Joseph said unto his father,
Not so, my father : for this is the firstborn ; put thy right hand
upon his head. 19 And his father refused, and said, I know it,
my son, I know it : he also shall become a people, and he also
shall be great : howbeit his younger brother shall be greater
than he, and his seed shall become ^a multitude of nations.
20 And he blessed them that day, saying, ^In thee shall Israel
bless, saying, God make thee as Ephraim and as Manasseh : and
he set Ephraim before Manasseh. 21 And Israel said unto
Joseph, Behold, I die : but God shall be with you, and bring you
again unto the land of your fathers. 22 Moreover I have given
to thee one ^portion above thy brethren, which I took out of
the hand of the Amorite with my sword and with my bow.
1 Heb. fulness. ' Or, By ' Or, mountain slope Heb. shechem, shoulder.
entirely lost,— all his Ufa long; (3) the ' angel,'— interchanging with
•God,' as Ex. iii. 2, 4, al. (see p. 184), — who had delivered him from all
evil (cf. xxviii. 20, xxxi. 4, 7, 11, 24, 42, xxxv. 3).
16. be named in them. Let them perpetuate it (cf. xxi. 12").
17 — 19. Jacob refuses to alter what he has done; and aeclares
now explicitly that though Manasseh will be great, Ephraim will be
greater.
19. shall become the fulness of the nations. I.e. will become
populousness itseK : a hyiierbolical expression. Comp. Dt. xxxiii. 17^
20. By thee. I.e. using thy name as a type of happiness. The
custom may be illustrated from Ru. iv. 11, 12 (cf. on xxii. 18, xxvi. 4),
as also from the curse of Jer. xxix. 22.
21. 22. In anticipation of the time when his descendants would
return to the land of their fathers (xxxi. 3 ; cf. xlvi. 4), Jacob adds
a further blessing, addressed to Joseph personally.
21. again. Back. Cf. on xxiv. 5.
22. And I give thee one shoulder (or, perhaps, mountain-
slope*: Heb. shechem) above thy brethren &c. The allusion is to the
place Shechem, on the lower slopes of Gerizim, between this mountain
» The syn. Pjna 'shoulder' certainly has this derived sense (Jos. xv. 8, 10,
THE BOOK OF GENESIS 379
and Ebal, afterwards an important and central place in the territory
of Epliraim (of. on xii. 6). Jacob gives Shechem to Joseph, so that he
is, as it were, a 'shoulder' above his brethren, the other tribes. And
he gives it to him, because he had himself won it, by his sword and
his bow, from tlie Amorite (E's term for the pre-Isr, inhabitants of
the country: see on x. 16). This conquest of Shechem by Jacob
personally implies a version of Jacob's dealings at Shechem different
from any which we find elsewhere (cf. p. 307) : in the parts of ch. xxxiv.
which belong to P, — or originally perhaps to E (cf. xxxv. 5 E), —
Jacob's sons massacre the inhabitants of Shechem, but it is not said, or
even implied, that they retained the city in their own possession'.
Chapter XLIX.
JacoVs Blessing ; and final instructiotis respecting his burial.
The Blessing of Jacob (vv. 1 — 28). The title must be imderstood a potiori:
for in the case of several of Jacob's sons, the patriarch utters not a blessing,
but a censure {vv. 4, 14 f.), and in the case of two, even {v. 7) a curse. The
Blessing is in the form of a poem. Except in so far as the terms of w. 3 f.,
5 — 7, are suggested by incidents in the Uvea of Reuben, and Simeon, and Levi,
what the author has throughout in view is not Jacob's sons, as such, but the
tribes represented by them : as often elsewhere in Genesis (e.g. xvl 12,
XXV. 23, xxvii. 28 f.) the tribe is conceived as impersonated in its ancestor,
and the ancestor foreshadows the character of the tribe. The poet passes
the tribes in review; and singles out in each some striking feature of
moral character, political state, or geographical position, for poetical amplifica-
tion. The moral instability of Reuben, the disorganized social condition of
Simeon and Levi, the ideal sovereignty and vine-clad territory of Judah, the
maritime advantages enjoyed by Zebulun, the ignoble indifference which led
Issachar to prefer ease to independence, the quick and effective attack of
Dan, the warlike bearing of Gad, the richness of Asher's soil, the activity (1)
and eloquence (?) of Naphtali, the blessings of populousness, military eflBci-
ency, climate, and fertility, which, in spite of envious assailants, are secured
to Joseph, the martial skill and success of Benjamin — these, briefly, are the
features which the poet selects, and develops one after another, in varied
and effective imagery. The Blessing should be compared with the Song of
Deborah (Jud. v.), in which, similarly, judgements are passed upon several of
the tribes, and witli the ' Blessing of Moses' in Dt. xxxiii., in which the tribes
generally are passed under review : with each of these it exhibits sometimes
verbal parallels, shewing that one must contain reminiscences of the other.
As compared with Dt. xxxiii., it may be said to be pitched in a lower key :
xviii. 12, 13, 16, 18) ; and the same may have been the case with shechem as well,
though it does not occur with this meaning elsewhere.
1 The later Jews had a legend of an attack of seven Amorite kings upon Jacob
at Shechem. and of his conquest of them (Jubilees xxxiv. 1 — 9, with Charles'
notes).
380 THE BOOK OF GENESIS
there is less buoyancy, less enthusiasm, the outlook is less bright, the nation
as a whole (except indeed Judah, Dt. xxxiii. 7) seems less prosperous'; in
particular, the theocratic position or privileges, whether of Israel at large
or of individual tribes, which are celebrated with such warmth of feeling
in Dt xxxiii. {vv. 2—5, 8—10, 12, IQ*- *, 21'^ ♦, 26—7, 29), are in Gen. xlix. hardly
noticed at all : it is the secular relations of the tribes in which, all but ex-
clusively, the poet is interested.
It is not to be supposed that the Blessing was actually pronounced by
Jacob. Not only in v. 7 are the names 'Jacob' and 'Israel' used in the
national sense, which obviously they cannot have assumed till long after the
death of the patriarch ; but the historical and geographical conditions re-
flected in the poem are throughout those of the period of the Judges, Samuel,
and David : there are no allusions to the period between Jacob and the
Judges, or — except doubtfully (see on ». 23) — to the period after David. This
limitation of the allusions in the Blessing to the circumstances of a particular
period, form a cogent ground for the conclusion that it originated in that
period. The prophets, as the study of their writings sufficiently shews", start
in their predictions from the circumstances of their own time ; they look out
into the future from the standpoint of their own present ; even their more
ideal visions of the future are largely conditioned by the relations of their
own age ; in their temporal predictions it is events of the immediate or
proximate future which they foretell : to determine beforehand minute details,
geographical or political, about a distant future does not fall within tlie office
of prophecy. The present with which the Blessings contained in Gen. xlix.
are connected is not the age of Jacob, but the age of the Judges, or a little
later ; and this accordingly is the period in which they must be supposed to
have originated. It was in accordance with ancient belief (cf. on ix. 25) that
a father's curse or blessing should have a power in determining the destinies
of his children : no doubt there was besides an ancient tradition that Jacob
had actually blessed his twelve sons : and a poet, living in the age referred to,
cast this tradition into a poetical form, utilizing, it may be, in some cases
old sayings current about the tribes. There being twelve ancestors to be
included, and the occasion being one of great national significance, opportunity
was naturally taken to present the blessings with some variety of literary
form (contrast the shorter blessings, for instance, in xxvii. 27 — 29, 39 f .) • as
the previous blessings in Genesis, and many passages in the prophets (e.g. Is.
xiii. — xxiii.), shew, the Hebrews had a keen eye for differences of tribal or
national character; and so here the salient characteristics of the several
tribes are poetically delineated. Some had prospered, others had had reverses ;
some had done chivalrously, others had shewn slackness ; some had risen to
great power and eminence, others had barely maintained their independence :
upon each the word of praise or blame, according to its merits, is pronounced
by the poet, in the name of their common ancestor, Jacob.
^ Only Judah and Joseph can be said to be warmly eulogized in Gen. xlix.; and
Joseph, though powerful and prosperous, has been sorely beset by foes {v. 23).
Contrast also the blessings of Levi, Issachar, and Benjamin in Dt. xxxiii,
2 Cf. Kirkpatriok, Doctrine of the Prophets, p. 355 ; or the present writer's
Isaiah, his Life and Times, pp. 86, 126, 186.
xLix. 1-3] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 381
The Blessing seems to have formed part of the narrative of J. Not, of
course, that J was the author of it, for it dates from a time considerably
earlier than that at which J probably wrote : but he incorijorated it in his
narrative from some earlier source (cf. the poems in Ex. xv., Nu, xxi., Jud. v.,
&c.). Prom the terms in which Judah is eulogized, it may be inferred with
tolerable certainty that the author was a poet belonging to that tnbe^
XLIX. 1 And Jacob called unto his sons, [ and said : p j
Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you that which shall
befall you in the latter days.
2 Assemble yourselves, and hear, ye sons of Jacob ;
And hearken unto Israel your father.
3 Reuben, thou art my firstborn, my might, and the ^begin-
ning of my strength ;
^ Or, firstfruitt
XLIX. 1. Jacob summons to him his sons that he may declare
to them their future.
which shall befall you. Viz. in the persons of your descendants.
in the end of the days. The expression is one which occurs
fourteen times in the OT. ; and it always denotes the closing period
of the future, so far as it falls within the range of view of the writer
using it. The sense expressed by it is thus relative, not absolute,
varying with the context. Thus in Nu. xxiv. 14 it is used of the period
of Israel's future conquest of Moab and Edom (see w. 17, 18); in
Dt. xxxi. 29 and iv. 30, of the periods, respectively, of Israel's future
apostasy and return to God; in Dan. x. 14 of the age of Antiochus
Epiphanes. Elsewhere it denotes the ideal, or Messianic age, conceived
as following at the close of the existing order of things, as Hos. iii. 5 ;
Is. ii. 2 (= Mic. iv. 1); Jer. xlviii. 47. Here it is evidently used of
the period of Israel's occupation of Canaan, — in particular of the
period of the Judges and early years of the monarchy.
2. Introduction, inviting attention (cf iv. 23).
3, 4. Etuhen. Reuben first {v. 3) receives the tribute due to his
position, and then {v. 4) he is degraded from it.
Reuben, it seems, must once have been an important tribe ; but early
lost its pre-eminence. Its home was E. of the Dead Sea, N. of the
Arnon (Jos. xiii. 13—23); but it maintained its place with difficulty;
in Deborah's song (Jud. v. 15 f) it is reproached for its indifference in
a great national crisis; the Moabites also (from the S. of the Arnon)
encroached largely upon its territory, and many of the cities properly
belonging to it are mentioned afterwards, both on the Moabite Stone
(c. 850 B.C.), and in Is. xv., xvi., as being in their possession. The
national insignificance of Reuben, and its (probably) dwindling numbers,
^ The aTithor of the Blessing in Dt. xxxiii. appears, on the contrary, to have
been a poet of the Northern Kingdom.
382 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlix. 3, 4
The excellency of dignity, and the excellency of power.
4 ^Unstable as water, ^thou shalt not have the excellency ;
Because thou wentest up to thy father's bed :
Then defiledst thou it : he went up to my couch.
1 Or, Bubbling over ^ Or, have not thou
at the time when the Blessing of Moses was composed (after the division
of the kingdom), are sufficiently indicated by the terms of Dt. xxxiii. 6
(RV.). It is rarely mentioned in the history; and became politically
a nonentity. This early decadence of the tribe is attributed here to
its father's curse, which in its turn is said to have been provoked by
the act of immorality of which its ancestor had been guilty (xxxv. 22;
cf. 1 Ch. V. 1)'.
3. my might. I.e. the product of my strength (cf iv. 12).
the firstfruits of my strength. I.e. of my virile powers ; the first-
born being regarded as the fullest representative of the father's physical
nature. See the same expression in Dt, xxi. 17 ('for he is the firstfruits
of his strength'), Ps. Ixxviii. 51, cv. 36.
The pre-eminence of dignity and the pre-eminence of power.
Pre-eminent in rank (lit. lifting up : Ps. Lxii. 4) and power alike.
'Excellency' and 'excellent,' in Old English (from excello, to rise
up out of, to surpass), had the distinctive meaning, which they have
now lost, of pre-eminence, pre-eminent, surpassing : and they are always
to be so understood, wherever they occur in PBV. of the Psalms, in
AV., and even (except 1 P. ii. 9) in RV.* Their retention in RV.,
where to the great majority of readers they must inevitably suggest
a weak and unsuitable sense, is to be much regretted.
4. Unstable as water, have not thou the pre-eminence ! Reu-
ben, yielding weakly and recklessly to passion, is compared to water
which, when its confining dam is removed, dashes impetuously away*.
The moral weakness, — if not indeed, the moral laxity, — of the tribe
is assigned here as the cause of its losing its pre-eminence ^
he vent up &c. The change to the 3rd person is expressive of
aversion and disgust.
1 Comp. the rather curious parallel quoted by Knob, from II. rx. 447 — 457.
^ See the synopsis of passages in the writer's Daniel (in the Camb. Bible),
p. 33 f. ; and cf. bis Parallel Psalter, p. 470 f. As examples may be quoted Dan.
ii. 31, iv. 36, v. 12 (read in all 'surpassing'); 1 Cor. ii. 1 (for virepoxn) ', Phil. iii. 8
(for TO inrepixov) ; Ps. viii. 1, 9 (read 'glorious'); xlvii. 4 ('glory'); Ex. xv. 7,
Dt. xxxiii. 26, 29, Ps. Ixviii. 34 ('majesty'); Job siii. 11, xxxi. 23 ('loftiness').
s PkVm. on unstable, 'Or, Bubbling over,' has no philological justification. The
root means in Arab, to be boastful, and in Aram, to be lascivious: the fundamental
idea of the word is therefore probably to be uncontained. In the OT., except here,
the root occurs only thrice, in a moral sense, reckless, Jud. ix. 4, Zeph. iii. 4,
reckless boasting, Jer. xxiii. 32.
* It is possible (Stade, G. 1. 151 ; Dillm.) that the old nomadic custom, according
to which a man's concubines passed at his death, with the rest of his property, to
his heir, which was usual among the Arabs (Strab. xvi. 4. 25; Kor. iv. 26),
continued to prevail in Keuben, after it had been proscribed in Israel generally,
and that this custom is alluded to both in xxxv. 22, and in the present verse.
XLix. 5-7] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 383
5 Simeon aud Levi are brethren; «
Weapons of violence are their ^swords.
6 0 my soul, come not thou into their ^council ;
Unto their assembly, my glory, be not thou united ;
For in their anger they slew ^a man,
And in their selfwill they houghed *an ox.
7 Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce ;
^ Or, compacts ' Or, secret ' Or, men * Or, oxen
5 — 7. Simeon and Levi, Jacob's second and third sons by Leah.
They took part in a common deed ; they shared a common fate : and
so the poet groups them together in his verse.
5. are brethren. Viz. not only by physical descent, but, as the
sequel declares, in character and disposition as well.
Weapons of violence &c. Alluding to their deed of treachery and
violence against Hamor and Shechem in xxxiv. 26 (J) : there (u 30 J)
they received their father's censure, here they receive his curse.
their daggers (?). The word occurs only here ; and its real meaning
(even, if it be correctly read) is very uncertain. The rend, sword
(Rashi, al.) rests ultimately upon the resemblance to fidxaipa (according
to an old, — and of course fanciful, — Jewish saying that Jacob ' cursed
his sons' sword in Greek'); but that a Greek word should have found
its way into Heb. in the 11th cent. B.C. is in the last degree improbable,
though, as this rend, suits the context, some modems have sought
10 place it upon a defensible basis by deriving m'kherdk from kur, to
dig (as though properly a digging or piercing mstrument [but see the
Addenda^). Other explanations are (with different vowel-points),
machinations, plots (from the Arab, and Eth. makara); and marriage-
compacts (with allusion to xxxiv. 15 f), from the Sjt. m'kar, 'despon-
savit'; but neither of these meanings seems to suit the predicate
'weapons.' The versions render no help on the passage.
6. He disowns all partnership or complicity with them: their
council, in which treachery and violence are planned, he will not enter.
council. The word {sod) means in particular a council of intimate
and coufidential friends: cf. Job xix. 19 (RVm.); Jer. xxiii. 18, 22;
and the writer's note on Am. iii. 7 (in the Cambridge Bible).
my glory. A poet, expression for the spirit (as the 'glory,' or
noblest part of man): so Ps. xvi. 9 (|1 heart), xxx. 12, Ivii. 8 (=cviii. 1),
and probably vii. 5.
in their anger they slew a man. See xxxiv. 26.
houghed an ox. Apparently a figurative description of the same
act. To 'hough' is to cut the hamstrings or back sinews (AS. huh, the
heel) in the hind-leg of an animal, so as to disable it (cf Jos. xi. 6, 9 ;
2 S. viii. 4).
7. The curse. They (i.e. their descendants) are to have no
permanent territorial possession in Israel, but to be dispersed among
384 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlix. 7, 8
And their wrath, for it was cruel; .
I will divide them in Jacob,
And scatter them in Israel.
8 Judah, thee shall thy brethren praise:
the other tribes. Simeon was virtually absorbed in Judah: in Jud.
i. 3, 17 it is mentioned side by side with Judah; che cities in the
Negeb and the 'Shephdlah' (on xxxviii. 1) assigned to it in Jos.
xix. 1 — 9 (cf. 1 Ch. iv. 28 — 33) are reckoned as belonging to Judah in
Jos. XV. 26 — 32, 42; and in the Blessing of Moses (Dt. xxxiii.) it is
omitted altogether. Levi had no tribal territory: the privileges
connected with the custody of the ark were limited to particular
families; the majority of the tribe, during the earlier period of the
history, supported themselves at the different sanctuaries or 'high-
places' throughout the land; in the time of the Judges many — for
Jud. xvii. — xviii. is no doubt typical — travelled about the country
finding employment and support where they could; and even in Dt.
the members of the tribe (except those engaged at the principal
sanctuary, Dt. xviii. 1 — 8) are represented as in poor circumstances,
and are earnestly commended to the Israelite's benevolence (xii. 12, 18,
19, xiv. 27, 29, xvi. 11, 14, xxvi. 11, 12, 13). The blessing reflects the
condition of the tribe before the foundation of the Temple, when
worship was little centralized, and much disorganization and social
disorder prevailed.
It must be evident that we cannot have here more than either a
representation due to the poet's own imagination, or the poetical
expression of a popular behef It is undoubtedly true that children
often experience the evil consequences of their parents' actions : but to
suppose that the entire history of two tribes was determined in reality
by an act of their ancestors, which, though of course not defensible
upon a Christian standard, was nevertheless intended as a defence of
their sister's honour, and was of a kind sanctioned by the manners of
the age (cf p. 307), would be to extend this principle beyond all
reasonable limits \
8 — 12. Judah, Jacob's fourth son by Leah, and the first whom his
father can unreservedly praise. Though Judah seems to have early
gained a footing in Canaan, Jud. i. I'' — 7, 9, 17, 19 (see esp. on this ch.
G. F. Moore's Comm.), for some time afterwards little is heard of it;
and it owed the great historical importance which it acquired in later
times entirely to David. The present Blessing seems to reflect the en-
thusiasm and glow of pride kindled in the tribe by the achievements of
David. It may be noted that in J its ancestor takes the lead even in
the patriarchal period (xxxvii. 26 f , xliii. 3 ff., xliv. 14 ff., xlvi. 28).
^ No doubt there are instances, as the Greeks also, for example, strongly held
(Haigh, The Tragic Drama of the Greeks, pp. 91 — 94, 171 f.), of the guilt of an
ancestor mysteriously blighting, generation after generation, the happiness of a
family: but this is something considerably different from what would be implied in
the present verse, if understood in the sense referred to above.
XLix. 8-io] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 385
Thy hand shall be on the neck of thine enemies ;
Thy father's sons shall bow down before thee.
9 Judah is a lion's whelp ;
From the prey, my son, thou art gone up:
He stooped down, he couched as a lion,
And as a lioness ; who shall rouse him up ?
10 The sceptre shall not depart from Judah,
Nor Hhe ruler's staff from between his feet,
^ Until Shiloh come ;
^ Or, a lawgiver ^ Or, Till he come to Shiloh, having the obedievce of the
peoples Or, as read by the Sept., Until that which is his shall come (&c. Another
ancient rendering is, Till he come whose it is (&c.
8. The blessing starts from the name (' praise,' xxix. 35) : the
omen of its name is to be fulfilled. As its foes (Philistines, Edomites,
Ammonites, &c.) flee before it, its brethren, — i.e. the other tribes, —
bow down to it in homage, acknowledging its primacy. The reference
can only be to the position given to it by David (cf 2 S. viii).
on the neck. Pressing upon them in flight ; cf Ps. xviii. 40 (Heb.).
9. Its success in war. Judah is pictured as a lion, which coming
down from its lair in the mountains (Cant. iv. 8), seizes and consumes
its prey, and then goes up to its mountain-home again, where it reposes
in triumphant security, and none dare assail it.
a lions whelp. Young and vigorous. Cf Dt. xxxiii. 22 (of Dan).
thou art gone up. Viz. to its mountain territory, after its conflicts
in the plains are over, like a lion to its mountain-lair.
He stoopeth, he coucheth as a lion &c. Viz. on his mountains.
This and the next line agree almost verbatim with Nu. xxiv. 9*'^ in one
of Balaam's prophecies (' He stoopeth, he lieth down, as a hon ' &c.) ;
cf also xxiii. 24 (both of Israel as a whole).
10*'^ Judah pictured either as a sovereign, or as a military com-
mander, holding his wand of office, like a standard, between his feet.
The word rendered sceptre (lit. rod) usually denotes the sceptre of a
king; but it might also be used of the staff or wand of a military
leader (so Jud. v. 14 'the muster-master's [ht. the writer's] staff').
The commander's staff, as Nu. xxi. 18 [RV. sceptre], Ps. Ix. 7
(* Judah is my commander's staff,' fig. for, my leader in war). The rend.
a statute-maker (cf P\ Vm.) is possible, but not here probable.
10°. A very difficult and uncertain clause. If 'Shiloh' be a
personal name (AV., RV.), it must be significant; but it cannot
mean peaceful or peace-bringer (which have been sometimes suggested) ;
nor is there any allusion to 'Shiloh' as a title of the Messiah in any
other part of the Bible, nor is the word so taken here in any ancient
version. The name as a title of the Messiah is first found in a fanciful
passage of the Talmud {Sank. 98^^) where the pupils of different Rabbis
each compliment tlieir master by connecting his name with a (supposed)
D. 25
388 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlix. io, n
And unto him shall the obedience of the peoples be. .
11 Binding his foal unto the vine,
And his ass's colt unto the choice vine ;
He hath washed his garments in wine,
And his vesture in the blood of grapes :
title of the Messiah, and the pupils of a R. Shelah say that his iiarne is
'Shiloh,' quoting the present passage (see p. 413). The rend. Until
Shiloh come is found in no version earlier than those of the 16th cent.
(Seb. Miinster, 1534, and, following him, the 'Great Bible,' 1539—41,
and other Engl, versions). Nevertheless, the clause, viewed in relation
to its context, does seem to contain a Messianic thought : so probably,
on the whole, it is best to acquiesce in the reading rh^! for nV^ (i.e. in
the older orthography rhvf), which is that of the principal ancient
versions (lxx., Pesh., Targg., and also Saad. [10 cent. a.d.]), and to
render either Until he that is his shall come, or (though this rend, is
not free from gramm. objection) Until he come whose (it is). The verse,
in either case, will then promise that the sovereignty will not depart
from Judah, till it is merged in the higher, more perfect sovereignty to
be exercised by its ideal ruler, the Messiah. Such a reference to the
Messiah seems however to presuppose the teaching of Isaiah, and other
prophets ; and as it has been noticed also that v. 11 f connect better
with V. 9 than with v. 10, it must remain an open question whether
V. 10 is not a comparatively late addition to the original blessing,
added for the purpose of introducing into it the prophetic thought of
the future rule of the ideal king (so Wellh., DiUm.). See further the
Excursus, p. 410 fif.
And unto him &c. Cf xxii. 17 end, xxvii. 29*'''; Ps. xviii. 43"'°, 44;
Am. ix. 11 f ; Mic. iv. 13, v. 5, 6. The subjugation, or domination, of
foreign nations, whether by Israel or by its ideal king, is a not
unfrequent trait in prophetic pictures of the future. Cf. F. H. Woods,
The Hoin of Israel, p. 96 fif.
obedience. In the Heb. a rare word, found besides only Pr. xxx. 17.
11, 12. Judah's rich vine-land. The poet draws an idyllic picture.
Judah, the warrior and conqueror (-w. 8, 9), is now seen riding on his
ass, — in pre-Davidic times, the usual animal for riding, even for
persons of rank (Jud. v. 10, x. 4, xii. 14; cf 2 S. xvii. 23), and also
(Zech. ix. 9) the beast of peace : so abundant are the vines that, when
he dismounts, he fastens his animal to one of them ; so productive are
they of wine that he can use it even for washing his garments (for the
hyperbole, cf Job xxix. 6; also Am. ix. IS*", Joel iii. 18). Judah was
a great vine-growing district; and the hills were formerly terraced with
vineyards.
the choice vine. Properly, it seems, the red vine, so called (pre-
sumably) from the colour of the grapes. So Is. v. 2; Jer. ii. 21.
the bhod of grapes. So Dt. xxxii. 14; Ecclus. xxxix. 26, 1. 15;
y Mace. vi. 34; cf Is. Ixiii. 2.
XLix. 11-14] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 387
12 His eyes shall be red with wine, ,
And his teeth white with milk.
13 Zebuliin shall dwell at the ^haven of the sea:
And he shall be for an ^ haven of ships ;
And his border shall be ^upon Zidon.
14 Issachar is a strong ass,
1 Heb. beach. 2 Or, by
12. Two other traits, illustrating the fertility of the territory.
Judah's eyes are red {dark-red, dull), — in Prov. xxiii. 29 a mark of
excess, but not intended here as a reproach, — through the abundance
of wine; Ms teeth are white, dripping ftom the abundance of milk
produced upon its pasture-lands (cf 1 S. xxv. 2; 2 Ch. xxvi. 10).
13. Zebulun, Jacob's sixth son by Leah. Zebulun plays no pro-
minent part in the history; though in Jud. v. 18 (cf 14) it is warmly
commended for its valour in the great struggle against Sisera. The
theme of the blessing here is the favourable situation of its territory.
Zebulun shall dwell at the shore of the sea: And he (shall be) for
a shore of skips (a shore to which ships may come); And his flank
(shall be) upon (or unto, or hy) Zidon. The territory of Zebulun, as
described in Jos. xix. 10 — 16 (P), is entirely inland, being bounded on
the S. by Issachar, on the E. and N. by Naphtali, and on the W. by
Asher. But it is probable that the borders of the tribes in many cases
fluctuated; and that when the present Blessing was written Zebulun
had an approach to the sea (perhaps at or near Carmel)\ and also
extended N. -wards to Phoenician territory (which may be what is
meant by ' Zidon '). The same fact seems to follow also from Dt.
xxxiii. 19, where it is said of Zebulun ^and Issachar), 'They shall
suck the abundance of the seas. And the hidden treasures of the sand,'
with allusion to the gains made by them from their maritime com-
merce, and from the glass manufactured from the sand at or near
Accho,
shall dwell. Though the Heb. word is different {sliaken, not zabal),
the signification of 'Zebulun' (xxx. 20) is perhaps hinted at.
shore. As Dt. i. 7 ; Jos. ix. 1 ; and esp. (almost the same phrase
as here, applied to Asher) Jud. v. 17.
14. 15. Issachar, Jacob's fifth son by Leah. Issachar was an inland
tribe, being bounded on the N. by Naphtah and Zebulun, on the W.
and S. by Manasseh, and on the E. by Jordan. It included Gilboa,
and the fruitful plain of Esdraelon (Jos. xix. 1 7 — 23). Though Issachar
took part in the struggle for independence under Deborah (Jud. v. 15),
it is taunted here for the ignoble way in which it preferred ease to
fr-eedom.
14. Issachar is a bony, strong-built, ass, which, nevertheless,
instead of working, lay down, Couching^ between the sheepfolds (Jud.
V. 16t ; cf Ps. Ixviii. 13 [14lt), in the enjoyment of ease and comfort.
1 Where Jos. {Ant. v. 1. 22) says that the territory of Zebulun touched the sea.
25—2
388 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlix. 14-17
Couching down between the sheepfolds : 1
15 And he saw ^a resting place that it was good,
And the land that it was pleasant ;
And he bowed his shoulder to bear,
And became a servant under taskwork.
16 Dan shall judge his people,
As one of the tribes of Israel.
17 Dan shall be a serpent in the way,
* Or, rest
15. The excellency of its land beguiled it; and it took upon itself
too readily the yoke of the foreigner.
to bear. The word used suggests a heavy, or obligatory, burden :
of the cognate substs. in Ex. i. 11 ; 1 K. xi. 28 ; Ps. Ixxxi. 6 ; Is. x. 27.
And became a servant under taskwork. Or, more exactly, was for
the forced service of a labourer. The word {mas) is used specifically
of ih& forced labour to which Eastern rulers are in the habit of putting
their subjects, and also denotes the body of men doing forced labour :
it is rendered levy in 1 K. v. 13 [27], ix. 15, 21 (where it is used of the
body of men who did forced labour for Solomon upon his public
buildings: their overseer Adoniram, iv. 6, v. 14, was so unpopular
that he was stoned, xii. 18). In Jos. xvi. 10 (where the phrase is
exactly the same as here), xvii. 13 (= Jud. i. 28), Jud. i. 30, 33, 35 \ it
is used to denote the state to which certain Canaanites were reduced
by their Isr. conquerors; here, on the contrary, the case is reversed,
and it denotes the state to which Issachar was reduced by the Cana-
anites. Jud. i. 27—33 shews in how many parts of N. Israel the
Canaanites maintained a footing (cf Ewald, Hist. n. 331); and this
verse is evidence that in Issachar they even retained the supremacy.
16. 17. Dan, the first son of Rachel's handmaid, Bilhah. A small
tribe, whose territory was NW. of Jerusalem, with Joppa as a sea-port
rjos. xix. 40 — 48 ; Jud. v. 17): it was much pressed on by the Amorites
(Jnd. i. 34), so a part migrated N. -wards, and founded a colony at
Leshem or Laish (Jiid. xviii. 7, 27 flf. ; Jos. xix. 47, — the Northern Dan,
Gen. xiv. 14). Tne terms of the blessing are suggested by its name
(cf XXX. 6). Though small, and perhaps, when the poet wrote, hard
pressed by foes, Dan will judge his people, i.e. defend the members of
its own tribe, maintain its independence, as successfully as any one
of the other tribes of Israel (Wellh., Stade, Gunk., Holz.). Others
(Ew., Del., Di.) think his people to be Israel, in which case the meaning
will be, Dan will defend successfully the national cause : but a reference
to the tribe itself seems more probable.
17. May Dan be &c. The poet wishes Dan success in this con-
test. 'What he pourtrays is not, as in the case of Judah, an open
contest, decided by superior strength, bnt the insidious efforts of the
^ The rend, tributary depeuds upon a false etymology ; and is incorrect.
XLix. 17-^0] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 389
An ^ adder in the path, ,
That biteth the horse's heels,
So that his rider falleth backward.
18 I have waited for thy salvation, 0 Lord.
19 Gad, ^a troop ^ shall press upon him :
But he shall press upon their heel.
20 *Out of Asher his bread shall be fat,
^ Or, horned snake ^ Heb. gedud, a marauding band. ' Heb. gad, to
press. * According to some ancient versions, Asher, his bread (&c.
weaker against the stronger, which have, however, their results also.
Such were the surprise of Laish by the 600 Danites (Jud. xviii. 27l
and the stratagems by wliich Samson overcame the Philistines' (Di.).
Cf. Dt. xxxiii. 22.
A homed snake in the path. A small, but very venomous serpent,
called the Kfpda-TT]^, or * horned snake,' on account of its having two
peculiar horn-like appendages above the eyes : it is of a sandy colour ;
and its habit is to lie concealed in some small depression on the road-
side, whence it darts out upon any passing animal. Tristram {NHB.
274) states that once whilst he was riding in the Sahara his horse
suddenly started and reared, in the utmost terror: he could not
discover the cause, until he noticed a Cerastes coiled up two or three
paces in front, with its eyes intently fixed upon the horse, and ready
to spring as the animal passed by.
18. An ejaculation, uttered in the name of the tribes, and de-
claring how in their struggles with their foes they were conscious of
their dependence upon Jehovah's aid. Salvation naturally has here
its primary and material sense of deliverance, as in Ex. xiv. 13 ; Jud. xv.
18 (Heb.); 1 S. xiv. 45, xix. 5; 2 S. xxiii. 10 ; Ps. iii. 2, 8, al. : see the
writer's Parallel Psalter, Glossary i, s.v.
19. Gad, the first son of Leah's handmaid, Zilpah. Gad was
a brave and warlike tribe. In its home E. of Jordan (N. of Reuben),
it was exposed to the attacks of the desert-tribes and of the Ammonites
(Jud. xi.), but it always maintained its character for bravery (cf. 1 Ch.
xii. 8 — 15). The blessing, like that of Dan, is suggested by the name.
Gad, a troop shall troop upon him: But he shall troop upon their
heel. Marauding bands (see 2 K. v. 2, vi. 23) will press upon him ; but
he will disperse them, and pursue closely at their heels as they retreat.
20. Asher, Zilpah's second son. Asher (Jos. xix. 24 — 31; cf. Jud.
i. 31 f.) inhabited the strip of land along the sea (cf. Jud. v. 17) from
Carmel to Phoenicia, a fertile district, rich in wheat and wine and oil
(Dt. xxxiii. 24: see also DB. s.v.). 'Asher' is interpreted in xxx. 13
as = fortunate; and this meaning seems to be present to the poet in
what he says.
As for^ Asher, his bread (shall be) fat, And he shall yield royal
1 The o (rendered Oid of) belongs, there is no reasonable doubt, to the end of
the previous verse (read D2pi;, i.e. 'their heel'): it is at once superfluous here, and
desiderated there (RV. 'their' is not in the Heb., as it stands).
390 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlix. ao, ai
And he shall yield royal dainties. J
21 Naphtali is a hind let loose :
He giveth goodly words.
dainties. His soil will produce delicacies, which will even find their
way to kings' tables. The allusion is no doubt to articles of food,
exported to the neighbouring Phoenicians (cf. — as illustrating, at least
generally, tlie dependence of Phoenicia upon Israel for its supplies —
1 K. V. 9 end, 11; Ez. xxvii. 17; Acts xii. 20; Jos. Ant. xrv. 10. 6).
Oil is still exported largely from this region {DB. s.v.).
21. Naphtali, Bilhah's second son. 1 he territory of Naphtali con-
sisted of a long tract of country, stretching along the Lake of Gennesareth
as far as Lebanon ; it was fertile and well- watered ; the Plain of Genne-
sareth, in particular, is described by Josephus {BJ. ni. 10. 8) almost as
if it were a territorial paradise (cf. HG. 446 ; DB. n. 149 ; and the terms
of Dt. xxxiii. 23 ' 0 Naphtali, satisfied with favour, and full with the
blessing of Jehovah, possess thou the lake and the south'). In Jud. v. 18
Naphtah is praised for its heroism and self-devotion. The blessing here
is however obscure in its terms, and its meaning is not certain.
Naphtali is a kind let loose, He who giveth goodly words. The
hind is a figure of agility, nimbleness, and freedom (Ps. xviii. 33 ; Hab.
iii. 19; Is. xxxv. 6); and the comparison 'beautifully expresses the
feelings of exhilaration and life, which are bred by the health, the
spaciousness, the high freedom and glorious outlook of upper Galilee'
(substantially as HG. 420: so Del.). The second clause is supposed
to refer to the eloquence, the poetical or oratorical gifts of ttie tribe,
though we have no other evidence of these beyond the share in the So'ng
of Deborah, which Jud. v. 1 ascribes to Barak. But as tlms explained,
the two clauses do not connect weU together : and the interpretation
cannot be regarded as certain. Many moderns (Bochart, Lowth,
Herder, Ew. Hist. n. 291, DiUm., al.), vocalizing two words differently^
render, Naphtali is a slender (lit. stretched out') terebinth, he who
putteth forth goodly tops^; the allusion then being supposed to be
to the long, extended territory of Naphtali, and to the leaders or
national heroes sprung from the tribe (cf. Jud. iv. 6, v. 18, vii. 23).
22 — 26. Joseph, Rachel's firstborn, Jacob's favourite son, the
most populous and powerful of the tribes, over whom the poet waxes
warmer and more eloquent than even over Judah. The term 'Joseph,'
— as in the expressions, 'House of Joseph' (Jos. xvii. 17, xviii, 5; Jud.
i. 22, 23, 35; 2 S. xix. 20; 1 K. xi. 28), and 'Children of Joseph'
(Jos. xvi. 1, 4, xvii. 14, 16, al.), — naturally includes the two tribes of
Ephraim and Manasseh, though Ephraim, as the more important and
influential (see on xlviii. 8 — 22), is probably the one which the poet
has chiefly in mind. Dt. xxxiii. 13 — 17, which is in parts evidently
modelled upon the present blessing, should be specially compared.
1 n^'N for n^\S*, and nj?K for npx.
« Cf. the cognate verb in Ez. xvii. 6, 7 ('shot forth'), Ps. Ixxx. 11 ('sent out').
» Is. xvii. 6 ('uppermost bough').
XLix.«-,4] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 391
22 Joseph is ^a fruitful bough, ,
A fruitful bough by a fountain ;
His ^branches run over the wall.
23 The archers have sorely grieved him,
And shot at him, and persecuted him :
24 But his bow abode in strength,
And the arms of his hands were made 'strong,
^ Heb. the ton of a fruitful tree. ' Heb. daughters. ' Or, active
The poet starts with the thought of the numbers and prosperity of the
tribe (the 'ten thousands of Ephraim,' and the 'thousands of Manasseh,'
Dt. xxxiii. 17), comparing it to a fruitful, spreading vine, planted in a
well -watered spot, and extending its tendrils luxuriantly over the
confining walls of the vineyard.
22. Joseph is a young fruit tree (twice). Heb. son of a fruitful
(tree), i.e. a young and vigorously growing tree, which the sequel shews
must be a vine. There is a play on the name of Ephraim (xh, 52;
cf. Hos. xiii. 15), the principal branch of the tribe.
by a fountain. And consequently well supplied with moisture for
its growth. In a country like Palestine the proximity of water was an
important condition, if a tree was to flourish, and is often emphasized :
Ps. i. 3; Jer. xvii. 8; Ez. xvii. 5, 8.
Its branches. Heb. The daughters, fig. for shoots, tendrils.
23. But Joseph's prosperity provoked foes, envious rivals, who
bitterly assailed him. For the abrupt dropping of the figure, cf.
Is. xviii. 6 (after 5). The reference may be to attacks made upon
Ephraim and Manasseh (on both sides of the Jordan) by nomad tribes,
hke the Midianites, and 'children of the East' (Jud. vi. 3 fi".), or even
by Canaanites (Jos. xvii. 16): our information does not enable us to
fix the allusion more definitely. Wellh. (Compos, des Hex. 1889,
p. 320 f ), and Stade {Gesch. i. 165), dating the Blessing (or at least
this part of it) later, suppose that the reference is to the prolonged
attacks of the Syrians under Ahab and his successors. An allusion to
ch. xxxvii. 24, 28, xxxix. 20 (cited in reference Bibles) is not probable;
the reference is manifestly to the tribe.
have sorely grieved him. Rather, either embittered (i.e. provoked)
him, or dealt bitterly with (G.-K. § 117^) him (i.e. shewed bitter enmity
against him). Grieved is an archaism, = harassed : see DB. s.v.
persecuted him. ddC' is rendered hate in xxvii. 41, 1. 15 : it implies
an active, persecuting hatred; cf Job xvi. 9, xxx. 21.
24. But through the strength of his God, he repelled and over-
came them.
But his bow abode firm. And the arms of his hands (the arms which
regulate and control the movements of the hands) were agile, From
(of the source, =By) the hands of the Mighty One of Jacob. The rend.
agile (cf RVm.) is supported by Arab, and Syr. : cf 2 S. vi. 16 ('leaping').
392 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlix. 24, ^s
By the hands of the Mighty One of Jacob, ,
(^From thence is the shepherd, the stone of Israel,)
25 Even by the God of thy father, who shall help thee,
And by the Almighty, who shall bless thee,
With blessings of heaven above.
Blessings of the deep that coucheth beneath,
1 Or, From thence, from the shepherd Or, as otherwise read, By the name of the
shepherd
firm. Properly ever-flowing, of a stream (Am. v. 24) ; then fig. of
what is imperishable, enduring, unmoved, as Jer. v. 15 (of a nation),
Nu. xxiv. 21 and Jer. xlix. 19 (of a dwelling-place).
the Mighty One of Jacob. A poetical title of God, recurring Is. i. 24
('of Israel'), xlix. 26, Ix. 16; Ps. cxxxii. 2, 5. See further p. 409.
(From thnce &c.) This clause, however construed, yields such a
strained and halting sense, that it is clear there is some corruption in
it. RV. (=AV.) is understood to mean, From thence (i.e. from God)
comes Joseph, who had been, as it were, the shepherd and support
(stone = rock) of his family. But the parenthesis, and the sense thus
obtained, are both extremely improbable. RVm. (so Del.) makes the
line parallel to clause c : * From the hands of the Mighty One of
Jacob, From thence [i.e. from heaven], (from) the shepherd (i.e. God,
xlviii. 15), the Stone of IsraeV (also treated as a title of God, like the
'Rock of Israel,' Is. xxx. 29). But 'from thence' is very intrusive and
superfluous; and although a 'rock' is a natural figure for strength or
defence, it is doubtful whether a 'stone' would be; and certainly the
term is not elsewhere appHed to God'. The 2nd marg. (with D^p for
Dt^p, as Pesh.) jdelds substantially the same sense: for the use of
name, cf. Ps. xx. 1. The line undoubtedly expressed some thought
parallel to that of clause c ; but what exactly the thought was, it seems
impossible now to discover (see further the Addenda).
25. This verse carries on the description of the source of Joseph's
strength, in order (clauses b — e) to attach to it the blessing: (Even)
from the God of thy father— T(i2^y^ he help thee! And God Almighty
— may he bless thee ! With blessings &c.
the God of thy father. The same God who has defended thy father
so many years. Cf xxxi. 5, 42, xlviii. 15; Ex. xv. 2, xviii. 4.
And God Almighty (El Shaddai: see on xvii. 1). The Heb. text
has And with Shaddai; but ^Ki ('And God') must certainly be read,
with Lxx. (o ^€os 6 e/Ao's : see p. 404), Sam., Pesh., for nx).
of heaven above. I.e. dew, rain, and sunshine: so xxvii. 39; also
Dt. xxxiii. 13 [read ^yo for h^d].
of the deep that coucheth beneath (so Dt. xxxiii. 13). I.e. springs
and fountains, brooks and rivers, issuing forth from the subterranean
'deep' (see on i. 9), — a characteristic feature of Palestine (Dt. viii. 7).
1 Is. xxviii. 16, Eph. ii. 20, 1 P. ii. 4, cited in the E.V. with marginal references,
are alien to the passage altogether.
XLix. 25, 27] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 393
Blessings of the breasts, and of the womb. .
26 The blessings of thy father
Have prevailed above Hhe blessings of my progenitors
Unto the utmost bound of the everlasting hills :
They shall be on the head of Joseph,
And on the crown of the head of him ^that was separate
from his brethren.
27 Benjamin is a wolf that ravineth :
^ According to some ancient authorities, the blessings of the ancient mountains,
the desire (or, desirable things) of the everlasting hills. ^ Or, that is prince among
of the breasts, and of the womb. Fertility among both men and
animals (cf. the contrary in Hos. ix. 14).
26. The margin must be followed : the textual change involved is
only mn for nin.
The blessings of thi/ father (the blessings received by Jacob from his
ancestors) are mighty beyond (i.e. surpass) the blessings of the
perpetual mountains, The desirable things (i.e. the choice pro-
ducts) of the everlasting hills. The meaning is that the blessings
received by Jacob from his ancestors relate to things higher than the
merely material products, however choice, of the fertile hills of
Ephraim: they include national and political greatness, as also the
high religious privileges implied in the 'promises' (cf. xii. 2, 3, xiii. 16,
xviii. 18 i.y xxvii. 29, xxviii, 13 — 15).
my progenitors. Heb. my cmiceivers {masc, not fem.), an incredible
expression for 'ancestors.' With the emended text (perpetual moun-
tains \\ everlasting hills), comp. Hab. iii. 6, Dt. xxxiii. 15.
May they be upon &c. Hence (with the one change of come for
be) Dt. xxxiii. 16. By passing these blessings on to Joseph, Jacob
makes him in a special sense the heir both of himself and of his father
(cf xlviii. 16).
of him that is the prince among his brethren (so Dt. xxxiii. 16).
The word (ndzh) means properly one separated (religiously) : it com-
monly means Nazirite, but also sometimes denotes a prince (cf Lam.
iv. 7 RV. ' her nobles '), as one separated from the rest of the people by
religious sanctions: the cogn. subst. nezer means correspondingly a
crown, whether of a king (2 S. i. 10; 2 K. xi. 12), or of the high priest
(Ex. xxix, 6), as a symbol or badge of sepa/ration. It is not certain
that the passage presupposes the royalty of the tribe of Ephraim : it
may merely mean that in prestige and position, the double Joseph-
tribe was as a princely tribe amongst the others.
27. Benjamin, Rachel's younger son. A small, but martial tribe,
famed for its bowmen and slingers (Jud. xx. 16; 1 Ch. viii. 40, xii. 2).
Ehud (Jud. iii. 15 f , 27 — 29), Saul, and Jonathan, were all warriors of
Benjamin. It is compared to a wolf, a predatory animal, particularly
dangerous to sheep : its habit is to secrete itself till dark among the
rocks, and then, without arousing the vigilance of the sheep-dogs, to
394 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [xlix. 27-33
In the morning he shall devour the prey, J
And at even he shall divide the spoil.
28 All these are the twelve tribes of Israel : and this is it
that their father spake unto them | and blessed them ; every p
one according to his blessing he blessed them. 29 And he
charged them, and said unto them, I am to be gathered unto
my people : bury me with my fathers in the cave that is in the
field of Ephron the Hittite, 30 in the cave that is in the field of
Machpelah, which is before Mamre, in the land of Canaan,
which Abraham bought with the field from Ephron the Hittite
for a possession of a buryingplace : 31 there they buried
Abraham and Sarah his wife ; there they buried Isaac and
Rebekah his wife ; and there I buried Leah : 32 the field
and the cave that is therein, which was purchased from the
children of Heth. 33 And when Jacob made an end of
charging his sons, he gathered up his feet into the bed, and
yielded up the ghost, and was gathered unto his people.
leap suddenly into the fold, and seize its victim by stealth (Tristram,
NHB. 153).
that ravineth. That teareth, as the same word is rendered,
xxxvii. 33, xliv. 28, Mic. v. 7, al. To ravin (from Lat. rapina, Old
Fr. ravine) means to plunder or prey on rapaciously (Cymb. I. 6. 49) ;
but it is now virtually obsolete. Cf. Ez. xxii. 25, 27; Mt. vii. 15.
In the morning .. .at even. I.e. he is at all times equally ready for
fighting, and equally successful in the wars which he undertakes.
at even. Cf. the expression 'evening wolves,' Hab. i. 8, Zeph. iii. 3.
28, Clause a (as far as unto them) is the subscription to the
Blessing : clause b will have been originally the sequel in P to xlix. 1*.
29 — 3S (P). Jacob's last instructions to his sons to bury him in
the family burial-place, in the cave of Maclipelah; and his death.
Verses 29 — 32 are P's parallel to xlvii. 29 — 31 in J.
29. to be gathered &c. See on xxv. 8, though here the expression,
as pointed, is sing., and is therefore correctly rendered 'people'.'
29, 30, in the cave &c. See xxiii. 8 f , 16 — 18.
31. See xxiii, 19, xxv. 9 f , xxxv. 29 (cf. 27). The burials of
Rebekah and Leah are not elsewhere recorded in Gen. On the burial-
place of Rachel, see xxxv. 19 f , xlviii. 7.
33. yielded up the ghost. See on xxv. 8.
and was gathered unto his father's kin. The word is here plural
(as in xxv. 8, and usually).
^ In fact, however, we should probably point *©y, and render 'my father's kin.'
L. i-4j THE BOOK OF GENESIS 396
Chapter L.
The burial of Jacob; and the death of Joseph.
L. 1 And Joseph fell upon his father's face, and wept upon J
hun, and kissed him. 2 And Joseph commanded his servants
the physicians to embalm his father : and the physicians em-
balmed Israel. 3 And forty days were fulfilled for him ; for so
are fulfilled the days of embalming : and the Egyptians wept
for him threescore and ten days.
4 And when the days of weeping for him were past, Joseph
spake unto the house of Pharaoh, saying, If now I have found
L. 1 — 3. Jacob's body embalmed.
2. Egypt abounded in physicians (Hdt. ii. 84, in. 1, 129; cf. Od.
rv. 229 f. ; Jer. xlvi. 11; and see further Wilkinson-Bircli, The Anc.
Egyptians, ii. 354 — 358); they formed part of the priesthood, and
Egyptian treatises on medicine (containing some remarkable prescrip-
tions) have come down to us (Erman, pp. 357 — 364).
Embalming, as is well known, was a standing Egyptian custom:
it was beHeved that the soul would in time return to its body after
death, and pains were therefore taken to preserve the body from dis-
solution in the grave. Numerous mummies have been found during
recent years in Egyptian tombs, in a state of preservation which testifies
to the skill of the ancient embalmers. On the methods employed, see
Hdt. n. 86—88; Budge, The Mummy (1893), pp. 160 fi"., 177 tf. '; Wilk.-
Birch, III. 470 fi".^ The embalmers {Tapixf-vTaX) formed, however, a
distinct profession: so that the term physicians does not seem to be
used quite exactly. Still, it would not be altogether unsuitable : for
some knowledge of anatomy, and of the drugs necessary for the preser-
vation of bodies, would be required by the embalmers.
3. forty days. Diod. Sic. (i. 91) says that the process lasted more
than thirty days; Hdt. (ii. 86) speaks of seventy days: in point of
fact (Budge, p. 179) the period varied.
threescore and ten days. The Eg}^tians are said to have mourned
for a king for seventy-two days (Diod. i. 72), That they mourned for
Jacob so long, will have been out of respect for Joseph.
4 — 13. Jacob conveyed by his sons to Canaan, and buried in the
cave of Machpelah, in Hebron.
4 — 6. Joseph asks leave of absence of the Pharaoh to bury his
father in Canaan.
4. the house of Pharaoh. The request, as it related to himself,
was prefeiTed indirectly through members of the royal house, who, it
may be presumed, gave it their support.
^ iiitumen was largely used : and hence the name ' mummy,' properly an
Arabic word, meaning ' bitumenized thing' (Budge, p. 173 f.).
396 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [l. 4-"
grace in your eyes, speak, I pray you, in the ears of Pharaoh, J
saying, 5 My father made me swear, saying, Lo, I die : in my
grave which I ^have digged for me in the land of Canaan, there
shalt thou bury me. Now therefore let me go up, I pray thee,
and bury my father, and I will come again. 6 And Pharaoh
said, Go up, and bury thy father, according as he made thee
swear. 7 And Joseph went up to bury his father : and with
him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, the elders of his house,
and aU the elders of the land of Egypt, 8 and all the house of
Joseph, and his brethren, and his father's house : only their
little ones, and their flocks, and their herds, they left in the land
of Goshen. 9 And there went up with him both chariots and
horsemen : and it was a very great company. 10 And they
came to the threshing-floor of Atad, which is beyond Jordan,
and there they lamented with a very great and sore lamentation :
and he made a mourning for his father seven days. 11 And
1 Or, bought
5. made me swear. See xlvii. 30.
have digged. RVm. bought. Tlie Heb. word is ambi^ous, and may
have either meaning (xxvi. 25 ; Dt. ii. 6), though 'digged' is on the
whole the more probable (cf. 2 Ch. xvi. 14, where the same verb is badly
rendered 'had hewn out'): so Lxx., Vulg., Del., Dillm., &c.
go up. See on xii. 10. So ' went up,' vv. 7, 9.
come again. Come back (on xxiv. 5).
7 — 9. A considerable funeral procession, such as the Egyptians
loved, is described : the terms of v. 1^ imply that it was as splendid
as if Joseph had been of royal birth. These processions, — only (Ebers
in Smith, DB.^u. 1804) without 'horsemen,' — are often represented on
the Egyptian tombs: see Plates lxvi., lxvii., lxviii. in Wilk.- Birch
(m. 444, 446, 449); Erman, p. 320 £; or Ball, Light from tJie East, p. 119.
8, the land of Goshen. See on xlv. 10.
10, 11. Arrival of the procession at Atad.
10. the threshing-floor of Atad (or, of the buckthorn). The name, —
either this, or that in v. 11, — has not been preserved; and the situation
is unknown.
and they wailed there with a very great and sore wailing. With
loud demonstrations of grief : see on xxiii. 2.
seven days. The usual period of mourning among the Hebrews
(1 S. xxxi. 13; Judith xvi. 24; Ecclus. xxii. 12).
11. There must have been a place on the E. of Jordan called the
'Meadow {^abeiy of Egypt,' — so named, presumably, from some incident
1 Also found in other pr. names, as Abel-meholah ('of dancing'), Abel-ha-shittim
('of tJae acacias'), Abel-cheramim ('of vineyards ').
L. 11-15] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 397
when the inhabitants of the land, ths Canaanites, saw the J"
mourning in the floor of Atad, they said, This is a grievous
^mourning to the Egyptians : wherefore the name of it was
called Abel-mizraim, which is beyond Jordan. | 12 And his sons P
did unto him according as he commanded them : 13 for his sons
carried him into the land of Canaan, and buried him in the cave
of the field of Machpelah, which Abraham bought with the
field, for a possession of a buryingplace, of Ephron the Hittite,
before Mamre.
14 And Joseph returned into Egypt, he, and his brethren, J
and all that went up with him to bury his father, after he had
buried his father. | 15 And when Joseph's brethren saw that E
their father was dead, they said. It may be that Joseph will hate
1 Heb. ebel.
either in one of the early Egyptian invasions of W. Asia, or in the Egyp-
tian occupation of Palestine, which v/e now know from the Tel el-Amarna
letters existed for some time previously to B.C. 1400', — which was
explained popularly by the Hebrews, as though it meant the ' Mourn-
ing {ebet) of Egypt,' and derived its name from the occurrence here
narrated. In accordance with this explanation of the name, it was
naturally supposed that the funeral procession made a detour round
the Dead Sea and the E. of Jordan, instead of following the direct
and obvious route from Egypt to Hebron by Beer-sheba.
the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites. I.e. the natives on
the opposite (W.) side of the Jordan.
12, 13. The account of the actual burial of Jacob is told in an
excerpt from P. The verses form evidently the direct sequel to xlix.
29 — 33^: notice (1) Jacob's 'sons' in both, whereas in 1. 4 — 11 Joseph
is the prominent figure; and (2) that v. 12 'his sons did unto him' &c.
is obviously written without reference to vv. 7 — 11.
13. Repeated largely verbatim, in P's manner, from xlix. 30.
14 (J). The narrative of vv. 7 — 1 1 is here resumed and concluded,
Joseph appearing again as the leading figure.
15 — 21. Their father being dead the brethren fear that Joseph
will no longer feel any restraint in exacting retribution for their past
treatment of him, and send accordingly to crave his forgiveness. He
replies generously that he has no intention of exacting vengeance for
actions which, however intended, have been overruled by God's pro-
vidence for good, and that he will continue to make provision for their
nourishment and welfare.
1 The basaltic monolith, called 'Job's Stone,' at Sheikh Sa'ad, about 22 m. E.
of the Lake of Gennesareth, has on it an indcription shewing that it was erected in
honour of Ramses II., the Pharaoh of the oppression (DB. i. 166''). See also
Hogarth's Auth. and Arch. pp. 68 — 70, 71.
a « Command ' here is in the Heb. the same as ' charge ' there (H-IV),
398 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [l. 15-^3
us, and will fully requite us all the evil which we did unto him. E
16 And they sent a message unto Joseph, saying, Thy father did
command before he died, saying, 17 So shall ye say unto Joseph,
Forgive, I pray thee now, the transgression of thy brethren, and
their sin, for that they did unto thee evil : and now, we pray
thee, forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of thy
father. And Joseph wept when they spake unto him. 18 And
his brethren also went and fell down before his face ; and they
said. Behold, we be thy servants. 19 And Joseph said unto
them. Fear not : for am I in the place of God ? 20 And as for
you, ye meant evil against me ; but God meant it for good, to
bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive.
21 Now therefore fear ye not : I will nourish you, and your
little ones. And he comforted them, and spake ^kindly unto
them.
22 And Joseph dwelt in Egypt, he, and his father's house :
and Joseph lived an hundred and ten years. 23 And Joseph
^ Heb. to their heart,
15. fully. Rather, surely.
16 f. As motives for him to grant a favourable hearing, they
mention that their present request is made in obedience to their father's
express command, and remind him incidentally that he and they are
all worshippers of the same God.
18. The brethren next appear before Joseph personally ; and offer
themselves to him as his slaves (cf. xliv. 16, where the same word is
rendered bondmen).
19 — 21. Joseph's magnanimous reply.
19. am I in the place of God .? Viz. to inflict retribution upon you.
The same expression as in xxx. 2, but differently applied.
20. The verse brings out the didactic import of the narrative:
God often accomplishes his ends through human means, without the
knowledge, and even against the wishes, of the agents who actually
give them effect. Cf. xlv. 5, 7, 8 (also E).
as it is this day, to save &c. The words seem to imply that the
writer pictured the famine as still continuing (cf. also 'nourish' in u 21
with xlv. 11, xlvii. 12). It is true, according to P, the famine must
have long ceased, at the time of Jacob's death (see xlvii. 28); but we
have had several instances in which the chronology of J and E has not
been in agreement with that of P.
21. spake kindly unto them. Cf on xxxiv. 3.
22 — 26. Joseph's old age and death.
22. an hundred and ten years. It is a remarkable coincidence
that 110 years appear to have been regarded in Egypt as the ideal
L. 23, 14] THE BOOK OF GENESIS 399
saw Ephraim's children of the third generation : the children E
also of Machir the son of Manasseh were born upon Joseph's
knees. 24 And Joseph said unto his brethren, T die : but God
will surely visit you, and bring you up out of this land unto the
lifetime for a man, and the most perfect age to be desired. Thus
in the most ancient MS. which we possess, the Papjn-us Prisse, con-
taining the celebrated 'precepts of Ptah-hotep',' a life of 110 years
is declared to be the best ; and on a granite statue at Vienna there is
a prayer to Isis to grant health and happiness for 110 years: according
to Ebers (Smith, BB.^ n. 1804 f ), also, there are many other passages
which speak similarly.
23. Joseph survived to see his own great-great-grandchilclren.
children of the third generation. I.e. Ephraim's great-grandchildren :
on the Heb. expression used, see Dillm.
the children also of Machir. What 'children' are meant, is not
stated: the 'child' (or 'son') of Machir, most frequently mentioned
elsewhere is Gilead (the country : see the next note) : others are Peresh
and Sheresh (1 Ch. vii. 16), and an unnamed daughter (1 Ch. ii. 21);
but the connexion in which these are mentioned makes it probable
that they are the names of clans, rather than of individuals. Refer-
ence Bibles (including RV.) compare Nu. xxxii. 39 : but the ' children
of Machir,' who are there said to have gone and conquered Gilead,
cannot, upon any view of the chronology, be the same as the infants
who are here described as laid upon Joseph's Imees.
Machir. Mentioned specially on account of his being the epony-
mous ancestor of the leading and most warlike (Jos. xvii. 1) of the clans
of Manasseh, which was spread over both the W. (Jud. v. 14) and E.
(Nu. xxxii. 39) of Jordan. In Nu. xxxii. 40, Dt. iii. 15, the settlement
of Machir in Gilead is expressed by its being said that Moses 'gave
Gilead to Machir'; in Nu. xxvi. 29, xxvii. 1, Jos. xvii. 1^ 3, and else-
where, it is expressed in terms of a genealogy, it being said that ]\Iachir
'begat' Gilead (or, was the 'father' of Gilead: cf p. 112 f), or that
Gilead was the 'son' of Machir*.
were born upon Joseph's knees. I.e. he recognized them as his de-
scendants; implying indirectly that he survived their birth. An
expression used properly and originally, it seems, of the father: see
on XXX. 3; and cf. Od. xix. 401 — 4; //. ix. 455 f
24, 25. Joseph, before he dies, makes his kinsmen solemnly promise
that, when they leave Egypt for Canaan (cf xlvi. 4, xlviii. 21), they will
bring up his bones with them. Cf Heb. xi. 22.
24. brethren. I.e. kinsmen (as xxxi. 23, 46); cf 'children of
Israel' in v. 25.
visit you &c. See Ex. iii. 16, 17, iv. 31.
1 See Maspero, i. 400 f.
^ See further on Machir, and on the remarkable variations in the different
genealogies in which he figures, the art. Manasseh in DB. iii,, esp. p. 231 f.
400 THE BOOK OF GENESIS [l. h->6
land which he sware to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. E
25 And Joseph took an oath of the children of Israel, saying,
God will surely visit you, and ye shall carry up my bones from
hence. 26 So. Joseph died, being an hundred and ten years
old : and they embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in
Egypt.
which he sware &c. As Ex. xiii. 5, Nu. xiv. 16 (JE), and often in
Dt. Cf. Gen. xxii. 16, xxvi. 3 f
25. took an oath &c. Cf Ex. xiii. 19; and see also Jos. xxiv. 32.
26. in a coffin. I.e. the usual decorated mummy-case, such as are
to be seen now in most of the museums of Europe.
' The character of Joseph is one that is singularly amiable and free from
faults. He is the true son, the true brother, the true servant. Loyal and
faithful, disinterested and sincere, modest and considerate, he wins the
confidence and esteem of all right-minded persons with whom he has to do.
He is obedient to duty in whatever position he finds himself — whether feeding
his father's sheep, or attending to his master's house, or acting for the keeper
of the prison, or invested by Pharaoh with authority over Egypt. " Jehovah
was with him" is the significant phrase by which the narrator indicates the
Divine approval of his conduct (xxxix, 2, 3, 21, 23). In misfortune he is
resigned, and does not complain. He resists temptation. In his elevation he
neither presumes upon his position nor forgets his humbler relations: in spite
of their cruel treatment of him, he bears his brethren no grudge ; even after
his father's death he is as generous and magnanimous as before (I. 17 — 21),
He has deep and true aff"ection ; his younger brother and his father are ever
foremost in his thoughts^. His attitude towards his other brethren, and the
humiliation which he imposes on them, are, of course, dictated by the desire
to prove them, and bring them to acknowledge their sin ; as soon as they have
done this (cf. xiii. 21, 22, xliv. 16), and he is satisfied that they are treating his
father and Benjamin with genuine affection, he discloses himself, excuses them
for what they had done (xlv. 5 — 8), and, to assure them of his forgiveness and
goodwill, makes provision for their residence near himself in Egypt. He has
a lively sense of dependence upon God (xl. 8, xli. 16, 25, 28, 32, 51, 52, xlv, 9,
xlviii. 9, 11, 15, 21, 1. 19, 24, 25) and of his duty towards Him (xxxix. 9, xiii. 18).
He is conscious that he is in God's hands, who overrules evil that good may
come, and efi"ects His purposes even though it may be without the knowledge
and against the wishes of the actual agents (1. 20, cf. xlv. 5, 7, 8), As a
righteous man, persecuted and sold by his brethren, wrongfully accused and
humiliated, but afterwards exalted, and using his position for the good of
^ Gen. xli. 51 end is naturally not to be taken au pied de la lettre. It is an old
difficulty, which can be solved only conjecturaliy, that Joseph did not, immediately
after his elevation, take steps to inform his father of his welfare, and relieve him
of the anxiety which he must have known he would be feeling.
THE BOOK OF GENESIS 401
others, submissive, forgiving, and tender-hearted, it is not surprising that he
should often have been regarded as a type of Christ. Only the measures
adopted by Joseph for the relief of the famine might be thought to strike a
discordant note in his character. To appropriate the surplus produce of the
seven years of plenty, and then to compel the Egyptians to buy hack, even to
their own impoverishment, what they had themselves previously given up,
does not seem consistent with our ideas of justice and equity. It must,
however, be remembered, that, in this respect, Joseph was not, and could not
be expected to be, in advance of the public morality of his age. The economic
conditions of Egypt are, and always have been, peculiar. The fertility of the
soil is dependent upon a system of irrigation, which can only be kept in proper
order by the central government ; and the cultivator falls into a state of
dependency and indebtedness to it at the same time. Moreover, the Egyptian
fellah lacks inherently the spirit of independence, and, even to the present
day, is content to enrich others by his labour rather than himself. Of course
such considerations as these do not justify in the abstract the oppressions to
which Egypt has habitually been exposed at the hands of Oriental viceroys
and pashas ; but they tend to shet^r that Joseph did not do more than was
consistent with the condition of the country, with the age in which he lived,
and with the position in which he found himself placed at the time^'
1 From the writer's art. Joseph in DJB. ii. 770.
D. 26
EXCURSUS L
The Names of God in Genesis.
1. 'EldJiim. This is the ordinary Heb. word for *God* (Gen. i.
1, 2, 3, &c.): it is plural in form, though construed, with very few
exceptions, with a sing, verb or adj., the most probable explanation
of the plural being that it is a 'plural of majesty,' or honorific plural,
being used to express dignity and greatness^ just as the Heb. words
for 'lord' and 'master,' are not unfrequently plural in form, even
though the reference be to a single person*. The sing. *Moah is rare,
being found only in poetry (50 times, 41 being in Job) and late prose
(7 times, — once of the true God, Neh. ix. 17, 6 times of heathen gods,
2 Ch. xxxii. 15, Dan. xi. 37, 38 his, 39, and the KHih of 2 K. xvii^ 31).
The same word, with only vocalic differences, is the ordinary word for
'God' in Aramaic (^eldh) and Arabic {'ildky : it is found also in Sabaean
(see on x. 28) and the allied dialects of S. Arabia. The idea originally
expressed by the word is unknown. In Arabic 'ali/ia, according
to Arabic lexicographers, is an old Bedawi word meaning to wander
about, go hither and thither in perplexity and fear, and followed by
'to,' to betake oneself to a person by reason of fright and fear, seeking
protection*: hence, if really derived from this root, 'ildh might denote
God as one to whom one resorted for protection, a refuge^. Whether,
however, 'ildh is really derived from 'aliha is far from certain : so that
this meaning of \lah, 'Eloah cannot be regarded as more than con-
jectural"._
2. 'El. This is the ordinary word for ' God' in Ass5n'ian and Phoe-
nician (both as an appellative and in proper names) : it is found also in
the S. Arabian dialects, though (except in proper names, in which it is
1 See G.-K. § 124s, and Kautzscb, art. Names in EncB. § 114; and cf. above,
p. 14.
2 See, for instance, the Heb. of Gen. xlii. 30, Is. xix. 4j Ex. xxi. 9, Is. i. 3
(G.-K. § 124'). In Ethiopic, Amldk, meauiug properly 'lords,' is the general word
for ' God ' (Dillm. Lex. Aeth. p. 151). Elohim is used also often, as a real plural,
of heathen deities.
» 'Allah' is 'ildh with the art., contracted from al-'ildh.
■* Lane, Arab. Lex. p. 82.
" It would hardly, in view of the meaning of the root, denote Him, as has been
Bugge.'ited, as an object of dread.
' Ci. Kautzsch, EncB. art. Names, § 116.
THE NAMES OF GOD IN GENESIS 403
very common^) not as frequently as ^ildh: in Aram,, Arab., and Etli.,
it occurs only in proper uames, — often in Aram., rarely in Arab.^ and
Eth. In Heb. ^El appears to have formed no part of the ordinary
spoken language, being found only in the following connexions: (1) in
poetry, very frequently, e.g. 73 times in the Psalms, 55 times in Job,
21 times in Isaiah (including both parts), and occasionally in the other
prophets ; (2) in proper names (in which in Heb. 'Eloah is never used),
very frequently, as Ishmael, Israel, Bethel, Jezreel, Eikanah, Elijah,
Elisha'; (3) in prose, rarely, and chiefly when some epithet is attached
to it, as in 'a jealous God' (s:p '?x), Ex. xx. 5, a/., 'the great God,' or
'the faithful God' (7\i),r\ ^xn, |nN:n Ssn), Dt. vii. 9, x. 17.
The occurrences of 'El in Genesis (excluding proper names) are —
jVt'y bx ' God most High,' xiv. 18, 19, 20, 22.
'iJ^n '« ' God of seeing,' xvi. 13.
nc' '?« 'God Almighty (?),' xvii. 1, xxviii. 3, xxxv. 11, xliii. 14,
xlviii. 3, and to be read also m xlix, 25 : see further below, p. 404 ff.
□"piy ^^ ' God everlasting,' xxi. 33.
^xn»3 '?X(n) 'The God of Bethel,' xxxi. 13, xxxv. 7 (here the name
of a place).
ba-i^" M^N ^x ' God, the God of Israel,' xxxiii. 20 (name of an
altar).
yha nxi3n ban ' The God who appeared unto thee,' xxxv. 1.
*nx n:yn bxn 'The God who answered me,' xxxv. 3.
-|nx M^x "pxn >33X • I am God, the God of thy father,' xlvi. 3.
T3X ha ' The God of thy father,' xlix. 25 (in Jacob's Blessing).
In the other historical books ^El occurs only — {a) with epithets attached,
mostly in passat^es belonging to the more elevated prose style, Ex. vi. 3
{'ElShaddai); xx. 5 ('a jealous God'; so xxxiv. U"", Dt iv. 24, v. 9, vi 15, Jos.
xxiv. 19), xxxiv. 6 (*a gracious and merciful God': hence Neh. ix. 31; cf.
Dt. iv. 31), Dt. vii. 9 ('the faithful God'), 21 ('a great and terrible God'), x. 17
('the great, the mighty, and the terrible God'; hence Jer. xxxii. 18, Neh. i. 5,
ix. 32, Dan. ix. 4), Jos. iii. 10 ('the living God'), Jud. ix. 46 {'El-b'rith, 'the
God of the covenant,' cf. ' Baal of the covenant,' v. 4) ; (6) in poetical passages,
Ex. XV. 2, 11 (plur.), Nu. xxiii. 8, 19, 22, 23, xxiv. 4, 8, 16, 23, Dt. xxxii. 4, 12,
18, 21, xxxiii. 26, 1 S. ii. 3, 2 S. xxii. 31, 32, 33, 48, xxiii. 5; (c) otherwise,
Ex. xxxiv. 14», Nu. xii. 13 (text doubtful), xvi. 22 ('0 God'), Dt. iii. 24, Jos.
xxii. 22 bis (' God of gods ').
1 Comp. Almodad (perhaps, with other vowels, meaninj^ 'God loves') and
Abima'el ('God is a father ' = the Heb. Abi'el) in Gen. x. 26, 28: see DB. or
EncB. svv.
2 Chiefly in the half-Aramaic, half- Arabic, Nabataean inscriptions of 1 cent. b.o.
— 3 cent. A.D. In the time of Mohammed 'El was an unknown word to the Arabs.
Comp. the Bibhcal names from places E. or SE. of Palestine, the Aramaean
Kemu'el, Bethu'el (Gen. xxii. 21, 22), Elyada' (1 K. xi. 23), and Hazael; Ishmael
and Adbe'el (Gen. xxv. 13); the Midianite Elda'ah (xxv. 4) and Ee'uel (Ex. ii. 18);
and the Edomite Eliphaz, Re'u'el, Mehetab'el, and Magdi'el (Gen, xxxvi. 4,
39, 43).
26—2
404 EXCURSUS I
The etymological meaning of ^El is however as obscure as that
of ^Eldah. At first sight, especially to one unacquainted with the
Semitic languages, it seems as if two names, each denoting ' God,' and
each containing the common element 'el,' must he connected with
each other: but for Semitic roots of the types biN and ^'^ to be
connected in meaning is against general analogy'. If ^El stood by
itself, the most plausible explanation of it would be to regard it as
formed (like '^V. witness, from ^•1y) from Six, whether with the meaning
to be strong, for which there is some support', and which was formerly
the generally accepted etymology ^ or with the meaning to he in front
(in Arab, to precede, be foremost, preside, rule), which would give for
'El the meaning leader, lord*, a suitable term for a primitive tribal
deity ; but the originally short e in 'El (which appears not only in Heb.
names such as ^'^\t^j^ and ^<•1'"'vX^ but also especially in the Ass. ilu) is a
serious objection to this explanation. Other explanations that have
been suggested are not less questionable. We must rest content
with the knowledge that there were two Semitic words, 'ildh and il{ii),
both of uncertain etymology, but both undoubtedly denoting ' God,'
and both probably existing already side by side before the dift'erent
Semitic peoples had begun to separate from their common home: in
after times, some of the Semitic peoples preferred one of the two
synonyms, while others preferred the other; in one or two cases
both remained in use, though they were not in practice used quite
indiscriminately'.
3, 'El Shaddai (''!'t^ '?^?), rendered conventionally by ' God Al-
mighty''; but the real meaning of Shaddai is extremely uncertain,
neither tradition nor philology throwing any certain light upon it.
(a) The lxx. in Gen. and Ex. use strangely my {thy, their) God for
1 Still, as even Noldeke suggests, w2^ might conceivably be a very ancient ex-
pansion of a biliteral root S{<. .
^ Esp. in the expression H* ?iO CJ'* 'it is according to the power of my hand'
Gen. xixi. 29 al. {Lex. 43»); the etym. meaning of 7Ni in Ez. xxxi. 11, and of
Wha, D'''?^X, in Ex. xv. 15, Ez. xvii. 13, xxxi. 14, xxxii. 21, 2 K. xxiv. 15, Job xli.
25 (Heb. 17), is uncertain; it might be either mighty (so RV.) or leader, chief (from
the other sense of SlK, mentioned above), cf. Lex. 18», 42». El is also rendered
laxvphi 19 times by lxx. (e.g. Ps. vii. 11); this is likewise the regular rend, of
Aquila, and the usual rend, of Symm. and Theod., esp. of Theod. : see e.g. Dt.
iii. 24, vi. 15, Ps. xvi. 1, L 1 in Field's Hexapla.
s See e.g. Ges. Thes. pp. 42, 47, 48.
♦ So Noldeke, though not confidently.
' See further on these two words the Excursus at the end of Spurrell's Notes
on the Heb. Text of Genesis, with the references; Bathgen's Beitr/ige zur Sem.
Rel.-Gesch, 1888, p. 270 S., 297 ff. ; Kautzsch's art. on Divine Names in the EncB.
ni. 3323 — 6; and Kittel's art. Elohim in the Prot. Reaiencyklopadie, ed. 3, vol. v.
p. 316.
« On the occurrences, see p. 185, with n. 1 ; and add the pr. names (all in P)
Zurishaddai, ' Shaddai is my rock,' Nu. i. 6, 'Ammishaddai, ' Shaddai is my father's
kinsman,' v. 12, and Shaddai'ur, ' Shaddai is a flame,' if Shede'ur in v. 5 should be
Bo vocaUzed : cf. Gray, Heb. Pr. Names, p. 196 f.
THE NAMES OF GOD IN GENESIS 405
'El Shaddai: elsewhere they represent Shaddai by ^eo's (Nu. xxiv. 16,
Is. xiii. 6), Ku'pios (9 times in Job), TravTOKparcop (14 times in Job),
Kvpios iravTOKpanap (twice in Job), o TO. TravTtt Tronqaaq (Job viii. 3),
o eTTovpavios (Ps. Lxviii. 15), o ^€0? tot) ovpavov (Ps. xci. l) : Pesh. has
12 times in Job N:^Dn the strong one (elsewhere it either transliterates,
or represents by 'God' or 'the Highest'): the Targums transliterate:
Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion^ render by i/<avds^ which,
however, very probably, merely gives expression to an improbable
Rabbinical etymology H't* 'he that is sufficient' (so Rashi on Gen.
xvii. 1), which may also underlie the Massoretic vocalization Shaddai
(already in Ez. x. 5 lxx. SaSSai) : Vulg. has mostly onmipotens.
(b) The Heb. verb shddad means to overpower, treat with violence,
devastate (Jud. v. 27 RVm., of Sisera, Is. xv. 1, xxiii. 1, 14 ; in EW.
often spoil, as Is. xxxiii. 1, Ps. xvii. 9); and the subst. shod means
devastation, destruction, Is. li. 19 (AV., RV., desolation), lix. 7
and Ix. 18 (AV. wasting, RV. desolation): if, however, Shaddai were
derived from this, it would, as Prof. Davidson rightly remarks {BB.
n. 199''), mean 'not the Almighty, but "the destroyer," signifying
presumably the storm-god, or possibly the scorching sun-god,' or, it
might be, ' the Waster,' with reference (see e.g. Job xii. 14 — 25) to the
desti-uctive aspects of God's providence. It is no doubt conceivable
that the term might originally have expressed some such material
idea : but if so, it must by long usage have been forgotten : for as
used actually in the OT., Shaddai certainly does not suggest the idea
of Waster or Destroyer (see e.g. Gen. xvii. 1, Ps. xci. l)^ Others
explain Shaddai as signifying the Over-poiverer, i.e. either the God who
manifests Himself in might, and coerces nature to His will*, or, in
a more historical sense, the God who in the patriarchal age was
conceived principally as ruhng by might ('der naturgewaltige'), but
whose ethical and spiritual nature was only more distinctly revealed
afterwards^ This meaning of Shaddai is however quite conjectural:
for in actual usage the verb shddad always involves the idea of
violence : though again it is conceivable that in the age when Shaddai
was formed from it, it had not yet acquired this nuance, and meant
simply to overpower.
1 See Field, Hexapla, on Ez. x. 5. Dillm. says by an oversight that Theod.
now and then renders by laxvpos'- but in Gen. xliii. 14, xlviii. 3, Ex. vi. 3, where
El Shaddai is represented by laxvpos iKavos, not only is the rend, not referred to
Theod. (it belongs rather to Aq.: see Field, ii. Auctarium,]^. 3, on Gen. xvii. 1),
but Iffx^pbs corresponds to El (see p. 404, n. 2), and lKav6s to Shaddai.
2 So LXX. in Ru. i. 20, 21, Job xxi. 15, xxxi. 2, xxxix. 32 (xl. 2), Ez. i. 24 A [the
clause is omitted in B]; but, as Field, Hexapla, ad locc, shews, these passages,
except at least Eu. i. 20, 21, are really insertions in the i-xx. from the text
of Theodotion.
» Kouig, accepting the same etymology, explains (Lehrgeb. u. 118) by violenta
potentia praeditus ; but neither in actual usage is the idea of violence associated
with Shaddai. It is true, we have in Is. xiii. 6 = JolI i. 15 the assonance ' as shod
from Shaddai shall it come'; but whether this can be taken as evidence of the real
meaning of Shaddai, is very uncertain.
* Delitzsch; Oehler, TIteol. of tlie OT. § 37; Dillmanu, AT. Theol. p. 214 f.
' Bathgen, Beitrdge zur Sem. Rel.-Gesch. p. 295 f., of. 192-7.
406 EXCURSUS I
(c) In Assyrian shadu is the common word for 'mountain'; and
Sargon and Asshurbanipal both speak of Bel and Asshur as shadu
rahu, 'the great mountain' {KB. n. 79, 83, 217); there occur also
such proper names as Bel-shadiia, Marduk-shadila, * Bel or Marduk is
my mountain,' Sin-shadiini, ' Sin (the moon-god) is our mountain' :
it has hence been conjectured (Friedrich Delitzsch; Hommel, AHT.
p. 110 f.^) that this is the origin of the Heb. Shaddai, and that it
means properly ' my mountain' (cf. 'my rock,' Ps. xviii. 2 al.), or even, —
for the Ass, shadu occurs sometimes with this meaning, — 'lord.' There
is no apparent reason why the termination -u or -ua should be changed
to -ai; but perhaps the word was originally Hebraized as Shaddl, 'my
mountain' (or 'my lord'). Even, however, if this etymology be
correct, usage shews that all consciousness of such having been the
original meaning of the name had been lost by the Hebrews ^
It must be evident from what has been said that as regards the
real meaning of Shaddai, we are entirely in the dark : neither Hebrew
nor any of the cognate Semitic langiiages offers any convincing
explanation of it. Whatever, however, be the etymology of the name,
it is true that the choice of it does seem sometimes to be determined by
the thought of the power of God, whether in the way of protection
and blessing (Gen. xvii. 1, &c. ; Job xxix. 5 ; Ps. xci. 1), or in the way
of authority, punishment, or trial (Job v. 17, vi. 4, viii. 3, xxi. 20,
xxvii. 2; Ps. Ixviii. 14; Is. xiii. 6). We may therefore acquiesce, at
least provisionally, in the now familiar rendering ' Almighty,' re-
membering however that it is far from certain that this is the real
meaning of the word, that the 'All' involved in 'Almighty' is not
to be pressed, and that certainly no dogmatic inferences can be
legitimately drawn from the term.
Pearson (On the Creed, fol. 45) insists strongly upon the idea of omni-
potence, in what he terms its * operative ' aspect, involved in Shaddai : but his
argument (fol. 46 n.) is altogether invalid. It of course may be granted that a
Being able to destroy utterly, i.e. in the strict, metaphysical sense of the word,
to annihilate, must be endued with omnipotent power; but there is no proof
whatever that shddad does mean 'to destroy utterly': it is simply a general
term signifying to treat with violence, to spoil or waxte, and it is used often
(e.g. Ps. xvii. 9, Ez. xxxii. 12: R.V. spoil) with a human subject; so that the
same argument would prove man, — and even an animal (Jer. v. 9), — to be
omnipotent likewise! ^ It is true that in Lxx. iravTOKparmp represents '<-]\i>
14 times ; but it ought to be remembered that Kvpios iravroKpaTcop is used in
many parts of the lxx. to represent Jehovah of Hosts ; and that it is this
expression, rather than Shaddai, which in course of time came to suggest to
the Hebrews the ideas which we express by the term Omnipotent (see the
writer's art. Lokd of Hosts in DB.).
1 Cf. Zimmem, KAT.^ 355, 356, 358 (thinks a connexion with thadu possible),
" Ball (Light from the East, p. 151) would derive '£i Shaddai from an original
AsHyrian II shadde, ' God of the mountains.'
3 Pearson's alternative explanation, the {All-)sitfficient, depends upon the im-
probable Sabbiaical etymology noticed above (p. 405 top).
THE NAI^IES OF GOD IN GENESIS 407
4. Yaliweh} {p'\^1; apocopated in poetry [49 times, 23 times being
in 'Hallelujah'] to Yah, and in compound proper names, at the
beginning to Y^ho-, Yd-^ and at the end to -ydku, -ydhy . This is the
personal name of the God of Israel. It is greatly more common than
Ehhim in the OT. generally, though it is avoided by particular
writers'. In form it is, to all appearance, the third person imperfect
of njn^ to he, used as a subst., of exactly the same type as Isaac,
Jacob, Jephthah (more exactly Yizhdk, Ya'cikob, Yiphtdh); and in
Ex. iii. 14 (E) it. is explained, the third person being changed into the
first, by '"ivH? "'?'^ 'T'l?, ' I am that I am,' or rather, more exactly*,
' I am wont to be that which I am wont to be,' or ' I wiU be that which
I wiU be' (A. B. Davidson, W. R. Smith). This explanation (1) implies
that Yahweh's nature can be defined only by itself ; and (2) declares
that, while He is, as opposed to non-existent heathen deities, He
exists, not simply in an abstract sense (lxx. iya el/xi 6 wv), but
actively, it is His nature ever to express Himself anew, ever to
manifest Himself under a fresh aspect to the world (Oehler*, Delitzsch).
or (if the future rend, be adopted) that He will be (to His people)
what lie will be, i.e. will shew Himself to Israel under the manifold
^ The form 'Jehovah' is a philologically impossible one: it is a hybrid word,
formed by combining the consonants of Yahweh with the vowels of Adonai
('Lord'), which is the word that the Massorites intended to be read by their
vocalization niH^. It has no support from antiquity, being first used, so far as is
known, by Petrus Galatinus in 1518. The pronunciation Yahweh is supported both by
philology (it is a uatiiral form of the impf. of niH ; and is also presupposed by the
apocopated form -ydhu), and by ancient tradition (Clem. Al. Strom, v. 6. 34 gives
the form 'laoue or 'laoval; and Theodoret, Quaest. 15 in Exod. says that the
Samaritans pronounced the sacred name 'la^i).
* Mentioned also on the Moabite Stone, 1. 18, where Mesha' boasts of having
dragged the ' vessels of Yahweh ' before Chemosh.
* P does not use it till Ex. vi. 2, 3 (p. vii); E uses Elohim in Genesis almost
exclusively; but after Ex. iii. 14 f. only occasionally, as Ex. xiii. 17 — 19, xviii., xx.
1, 19 — 21. Certain later writers also avoided Yahweh. Thus it does not occur
in Ecclesiastes, or in Daniel (except in ch. ix.); the Chronicler, when writing in-
dependently (i.e. in passages not excerpted from Sam. or Kings) is apt to shew
a preference for Elohim (though he also uses Yahweh), and sometimes changes
Yahweh of his source into Elohim (comp. e.g. 2 Ch. xxii. 12, xxiii. 9, xxv. 24,
xxxiii. 7 with 2 K. xi. 3, 10, xiv. 14, xxi. 7) ; and the exceptional preponderance of
Elohim over Yahweh in Book II of the Psalms (Ps. xlii. — Ixxii.), and in Ps. Ixxiii. —
Ixxxiii., as compared with the rest of the Psalter, shews that here the editor, or
collector, must have substituted it for an original Yahweh (cf. also Ps. liii. 2, 4, 5", 6
with xiv. 2, 4, 6, 7).
* The imperfect tense in Hebrew does not denote continued action (which is
expressed by the participle), but either reiterated (habitual) or future action. The
reiteration expressed by it may belong to either the past (as Gen. ii. 6 ' used to go
up ') or the present (as Gen. x. 9 ' it is wont to be said,' Ex. xviii. 15 ' are wont to
come'). In the latter case, it is commonly rendered in EVV. by the present tense
(as Ps. i. 2 'doth he meditate,' 3 ' bringeth forth,' ' doth not wither,' 'doeth,'
4 ' driveth away,' Ac); the Heb., however, in all such cases denotes reiteration,
and expresses, more distinctly than is done by the English ' present ' tense, what is
habitual or customary (see numerous examples in Davidson's Heb. Syntax, § 44, or
the writer's Hebrew Tenses, §§ 30 — 36).
s OT. Theology, § 39.
408 EXCURSUS I
attributes of goodness, mercy, love, &c/, — in either case, the implica-
tion being that what He is wont to be, or will be, cannot be adequately
expressed in words. Even with the rend. ' I am that I am,' tlie verb is
to be understood as implying not simply existence as such, or even
self-existence, but active, self-manifesting existence ^ Whatever uncer-
tainty, in view of the ambiguity of the Heb. tense employed, may thus rest
on the exact shade of meaning expressed by n\"iN' "iL*\s iTTix, it can hardly
be doubted that the general idea which the writer connected with the
name Yahweh was that of a Being who both is, and manifests His being.
This is certainly the sense that must have been attached to the
name Yahweh by the Israelites from the time when Ex. iii. 14 was
written. The possibility cannot however be excluded that the intention
of Ex. iii. 14 is to attach to the name a special theological sense, and
that originally it may have had some other meaning. Grammatically
Yahweh might be also the impf. of the Hiphil or causative conjugation :
this would give the meaning He who makes to he, i.e. either the creator,
or the life-giver (Kuenen, Schrader, Schultz, OT. Theol. n. 134, though
not confidently), or He who brings to pass (cf. i^I? in 1 K. xiii. 32),
i.e. the performer of His promises (Le Clerc [1696], Lagarde,
Nestle). The more primary meaning of 'IJO, as Arabic shews (Kor.
liii. 1), was to fall (cf. Job xxxvii. 6) ; and so it has been conjectured
that the name may have meant originally He who causes to fall
(sc. rain), or He who ovei'throws (with lightning), and denoted the god
who manifested himself in the storm (as Yahweh, Ps. xviii. 9 fif., and
frequently). These explanations are, however, quite hypothetical: it
is an objection to the first that the Hiphil of •"'Jv', '"IJI?, to be, is very
rare in the Semitic languages, being found only in Syriac, and there
in late writers. It cannot be denied that the name Yahweh may have
originally had some physical meaning; but if so, it is quite uncertain
what it was. To the Hebrews, it must have meant what it is ex-
plained to mean in Ex. iii. 14; and this is the only meaning with
which, in dealing with the Old Testament, we have to do. That the
name was a very ancient one in Israel is apparent from its form : for
hdwdh, the verb from which it is derived, though retained in
Aramaic, and (with the meaning to fall, &c.) in Arabic, went out
of use in classical Hebrew, and is everywhere (except 6 times ^), even
^ Comp. A. B. Davidson {DB. ii. igO*"), 'What He will be is left unexpressed —
He will be with them, helper, strengthener, deliverer.' Rashi (on Ex. iii. 14) long
ago gave an explanation on the same track, * I will be with them in their affliction
what I will be with them in the subjection of their future captivities.' Ewald,
in his last work (Die Lekre der Bibel von Gott, 1873, ii. 337 f.) explained the passage
as signifying 'I will be it,' viz. what I have promised to be {v. 12), I will be the
performer of My promises.
2 The verb hdydh ' does not mean " to be " essentially or ontologically, but
phenomenally' (A. B. Davidson, I.e.). Comp. Kittel, p. 534 of the art. cited p. 409 n.
3 Gen. xxvii. 29, Is. xvi. 4, Job xxxvii. 6, Neh. vi. 6, Eccl. ii. 22, xi. 3. In the
last three passages its use is no doubt due to Aramaic influence ; in Job xxxvii. 6
it may be an Arabism; its use in Is. xvi. 4 might be explained by the supposition
that it was the form used in Moab : why it is used in Gen. xxvii. 29 must remain
uncertain. It reappears in the post-Biblical Hebrew of the Mishna, &o., doubtless
THE NAMES OF GOD IN GENESIS 409
in the earliest documents that have been j/reserved to us, superseded
by hdydh. _
In regard to both Yahweh, and also 'Elohim, 'El, considered above,
it must be remembered that what is really of importance is not the
ultimate etymology of the words, but what they came actually to
denote: the name Yahweh, for instance, may have originally expressed
some physical action, it might even, as Hommel has conjectured^ be the
Hebrew transformation of a Babylonian A'i or Ea: these are matters
of purely speculative interest; all that is of real theological interest
or importance is to know what the words came to mean to the
Hebrews, and what are the character and attributes of the Being
whom they are used in the Old Testament to denote. The case is
exactly parallel to that of ^€09, Deus, and 'God': nothing can be
learnt respecting the Divine nature from either the etymology or the
early history of these words: our knowledge of the Divine nature
can be learnt only from the study of the ideas which, whether derived
from natural or revealed religion, we associate with the Being whom
they are used to denote. With Shaddai the case is no doubt different :
this, it is tolerably clear, must denote some particular attribute of
the Divine nature, which must have been expressed by the word
Shaddai : unfortunately, however, we cannot say with confidence what
this attribute is : for philology fails us, and the verdict of usage is not
sufficiently distinct*.
5. The Mighty One of Jacob (Spi?: 725?). A poetical title, only
in Gen. xlix. 24, and, borrowed thence, in Is. xlix. 26, Ix. 16, and in
a late Psalm, Ps. cxxxii. 2, 5 ; also, with Israel for Jacob, in Is. i. 24.
^Ablr does not occur except in these passages; but 'abbir is a word
occurring 16 times in poetry, and once (1 S. xxi. 7) in prose, meaning
strong, mighty, used sometimes of mighty men (as Job xxiv. 22, xxxiv.
20), once fig. of angels (Ps. Ixxviii. 25), but most commonly as a
poet, term either for bulls, Ps. 1. 13, Jer. xivi. 15 BVm. (of Apis), and
(fig. of strong or fierce men) Is. x. 13, xxxiv. 7; Ps. xxii. 12, Lxviii. 30;
or for war-horses, Jud. v. 22, .Jer. viii. 16, xlvi. 15 (BV. text), xlvii. 3,
1. 11. In the expression 'Mighty One of Jacob,' the punctuation
■**3^ (constr. of "'''?^) is probably chosen for the purpose of differenti-
ating the word from "'''3'<.
6. The Fear of Isaac {\>^'^'' 7ns): only Gen. xxxi. 42, 53
7. The stone of Israel (''??l'^*'- R-?)- An uncertain Divine title,
found in Gen. xlix. 24, according to the rendering adopted in RVm. :
see the note ad he. ; and cf. also the Addenda.
through the influence of Aramaic. Hiiwdh, to live, preserved in Heb., if the
etymology given in Gen. ii. 20 is correct, only in 'Eve' (Heb. Hawwdli), but used
regularly in Phoenician, has been similarly superseded in both Heb. and Aramaic
by hdydh.
' But upon very insufficient grounds (AHT. pp. 113 — 116, 144 f., 226 ; Expos.
Times, Dec. 1898, p. 144 ; and elsewhere).
2 See further, on the name Yahweh, a paper by the present writer in the Studia
Bihlica, i. (1885), esp. p. 12 ff., with the references; Kautzsch, art. Names (%§ 109
— 113) in the EncB.; Kittel, art. Jahve in the Realencyklopadie, ed. 3, vol. vni.
(1900) ; and G. F. Moore, in the A nierican Journal of Theology, 1908, p. o4 ff.
EXCURSUS TI.
On Gen. xlk. 10 ('Until Shiloh come').
Of this difficult and uncertain passage, it seems, unfortunately,
impossible to obtain a perfectly satisfactory interpretation.
I. The following are the chief objections to the rend, of RV.
(= AV.l (1) If the word be a personal name, and a title of the
Messian, it must be significant : but from ' Shiloh ' no meaning
suitable for such a purpose can be extracted; it cannot, for instance,
mean peaceful or peace-bringer : for the form of the word is not that
which a derivative of shdlcih, to he at ease, would have^; moreover
shdldh itself has not the associations of shdldm 'peace' (Is. ix. 6\
but often denotes careless, worldly ease (e.g. Job xii. 6, Ez, xvi. 49).
(2) No ancient version understood the passage in this sense: ' Shiloh'
is everywhere else in the OT. the name of the place (1 S. i. 3, &c.); it
appears first as a title of the Messiah in a fanciful passage of the
Talmud (see p. 413); and the rend, 'until Shiloh come' is found in
no known version of the OT. till that of Seb. Miinster in 1534. Nor
is there any allusion to ' Shiloh' as a title of the Messiah in any other
part of either the OT. or the NT., or in any patristic writing. (3) To
those who take a historical view of the growth of Messianic prophecy,
it must be evident that the figure whom we call the 'Messiah' was
— as the very name indicates^ — originally the ide(d king of Israel, and
presupposes for its formation the existence of the monarchy", — in fact,
though a second David is once, for a moment, looked forward to by
Hosea (iii. 5), the character of such a king was for the first time
portrayed with any distinctness by Isaiah (ix. 6 f, xi. 1 — 10): it is
thus very much out of harmony with the general analogy of prophecy
to find a personal ideal ruler anticipated — and anticipated, moreover,
^ ' Shiloh' can only be derived from a root 71C or ^^K'. Shilyon (if this were
the form), from shdlah, might mean one at ease or in prosperity (but not peace-
giver) ; cf. ^elyon, ' high,' from 'dldh, ' to go up.'
2 ' The anointed one,' — in post-Biblical Jewish writings the full title is
Nn'K'D N37D ' the anointed king,' — a title based upon the expression ' Jehovah's
anointed,' often applied in the OT. to the Israelitish king (1 S. xxiv. 6 &c.), (The
term is not used in the OT. in its technical sense: on Dan. ix. 25, 26 see the
note in the writer's Commentary on Daniel in the Camhridqe Bible)
3 Cf. BB. III. 121 f.; Riehm, Messianic Prophecy"^ {IS'dl), pp. 102 ff., 121;
F. H. Woods, The Hope of Israel, p. 117 ft.
ON GENESIS XLIX. 10 411
in such vague and doubtful language — hefwe the great prophets had
even conceived the figure of the ideal king.
The reading of the passage presupposed generally by the ancient ver-
sions is 'iW {shelloW) for nV^ {shiloh), ^ being an alternative, and (mostly)
poetical form of the relative pronoun for l^'t?, found in certain parts of the
OT. This reading may be construed : (1) until there come that v;hkk
(or he who) is his; (2) until he come to whom (or whose) is..., the sentence
in the latter case being without a subject, and requiring either ' it,'
or some word expressive of dominion, to be supplied. Of these render-
ings, (1) is represented by the lxx. Until the things reserved for him
come (€ws 6av (.XOr) TO, aTroKii/xeva avrw), which is a legitimate, though
paraphrastic rendering of the text mentioned above, and is the first
alternative reading of RVm. (2) is represented in the variant found
often in mss. of the lxx., and in patristic citations*, witil he come
for whom it is reseroed (Itos cav tkOr^ oi a7ro/<€iTat), which however is
open to question as a rendering of the Heb., as it interpolates the
absent subject {until he come whose [it is]) : this is the second alter-
native reading given in RVm,, where it is introduced, it may be
observed, in terms simply recording the fact of its being an ancient
rendering, and implying no judgement on the question whether it is
a legitimate translation of the (presumable) Hebrew npC' N2» '•3 nj?.
The same rend, is found in the Pesh. ; and it is implied in the para-
phrases of the Targums, the word traditionally supplied being 'the
kingdom.' Ez. xxi. 27 (Heb. 32), 'until he come whose right it is,'
has been supposed to contain an allusion to the passage as thus read
and understood.
The following are the actual renderings :
Pesh. : ' The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a declarer [of the
law] from between his feet, until he shall come whose it is.' The word for * it '
is fern., and in the existing text there is nothing to which to refer it. The
Pesh. is, however, especially in the Pent., dependent upon traditional Jewish
exegesis; and no doubt the pron. refers to 'kingdom' understood (see below);
the Syriao Father, Aphraates {c. 330 — 350 A.D.), in his Homilies (p. 320, ed.
Wright), actually quotes the verse with the addition of * the kingdom.'
Onk. : 'A ruler {lit. one exercising authority) shall not depart from those
of the house of Judah, nor a scribe from his sons' sons for ever, until Messiah
comes, whose is the kingdom.'
' From between his feet ' is paraphrased by * from his sons' sous,' as in lxx.
by e'lc Totv nT]pSv avTov, on account of Dt XXviii. 57 (lxx. 8ia rap firjpav avTtjs).
Targ. Jerus. : * Kings cease not from those of the house of Judah, nor the
1 With n^ for Sh, as Jer. xvii. 24 n'l for n : cf. p. 412 n. 1.
• In the Massoretic text HP^ti'; but as the ancient versions abundantly shew
see the writer's Notes on Samuel, p. xxxiii f.), the plena scriptio is of late intro-
ductiou ; and many Heb. mss. have T\7^.
* E.g. Justin, Apol. i. 32, 54; Iren. iv. 24; Euseb. H. E. i. 6. The rend. ?wy
^di' fKOji TO. dwoKei/jLeva airifi is found (e.g.) in Justin, Tryph. 52; Orig. c. Cela. § 53 ;
Bus. Eel. Proph.i. 8; Athan, de Inc. Verbi § 40.
412 EXCURSUS II
learned, teachers of the law, from his sons' sons, until the time when the Bang
Messiah comes, to whom the kingdom belongeth.'
Targ. Ps.-Jon. : 'Kings and rulers cease not from those of the house of
Judah, nor scribes, teachers of the law, from his seed, until the time when the
King Messiah, the youngest of his sons, shall come.'
n?K' is here explained curiously as his youngest child\ being connected
fancifully with nnj^i:' Dt. xxviii. 57, which is rendered by Oiik. [wrongly] ' the
youngest of her sous.' The same interpretation is adopted by several of the
mediaeval Jews, notably by David Kimchi (d. 1235), who expressly explains
\hv} as meaning 'his son'; and it is very probably embodied in the Massoretic
punctuation rb^.
The Vulgate has the isolated rend, donee veniat qui mittendus est {rh^
read as D^
We thus see that antiquity, both Jewish and Christian, interpreted
the passage in a Messianic sense: but this sense was not bound up
with a personal name ' Shiloh,' but partly Avith an entirely different
vocalization and interpretation of the Heb. word in question, and
partly with the general promise of ideal sovereignty to Judah, ex-
pressed in the verse.
The rend, until that which is his shall come is grammatically quite
legitimate. The rend, until he shall come, whose [it is] is doubtful,
though isolated cases do occur in Heb. of sentences in which the
subject is not expressed, but has to be understood from the context';
and the case might be similar here. There is, however, another
difficulty, which attaches to both these renderings, viz. the form of
the relative ^. It is true, this occurs frequently in the OT., but
it occurs in it peculiarly, and only in books, or passages, which were
either, it seems, written in North Palestine, or are late^. Thus it
occurs exclusively in the Song of Songs, 68 times in Ecclesiastes,
thrice in Jonah, four times in Lam., 19 times in Ps. cxxii. — cxlvi.,
once in Ezr., twice in Ch., but in all the historical books from Gen. to
2 K., only Gen. vi. 3 (very doubtfully), Jud. v. 7 (Deborah's Song),
vi. 17, vii. 12, viii. 26, 2 K. vi. 11 (if the text is correct), and in none
of the other prophets or poetical books, except (doubtfully) in Job
xix. 29. Hence it is a form which we do not naturally expect to find
in an early and, presumably. Judaic text. Still, we are hardly in
a position to say that it could not so occur, or to rule out of court,
upon this ground alone, a rendering which implies it.
II. Here is the passage of the Talmud {Sa?ih. 98''), in which n^^t5»
occurs as a title of the Messiah, The passage, in order to be properly
understood, must be cited at length : —
1 The suffix of the 3rd sing. masc. being written with n, as happens occa-
sionally: e.g. in n'yv, nh-ID, in Gen. xlix. 11 (G.-K. § 91»).
2 E.g. Ps. xvi. 8 'because [he is] on my right hand.'
3 It is the usual form of the relative in the Mishna; and is very common in
other post-Biblical Hebrew.
ON GENESIS XLIX. 10 413
' Rab said, The world was created only for the sake of David : Samuel said,
It was for the sake of Moses : R. Yohanan said, It was only for the sake of the
Messiah. What is his name 1 Those of the school of R. Shela^ say, Shiloh is
his name, as it is said. Until his son (Heb. shiloh) come. Those of the school
of R. Yannai say, Yinnon is his name, as it is said (Ps. Ixxii. 17), Let his name
be for ever, before the sun let his name be propagated (Heb. yinnon). Those
of the school of R. Haninah say, ^aninah is his name, as it is said ( Jer. xvi. 13),
For 1 will give you no favour (Heb. J^nlndh). And some say, Menahem is his
name, as it is said (Lam. 1. 16), For comforter (Heb. menahem), and restorer
of my soul, is far from me.'
This is a genuine specimen of Rabbinical exegesis; but its value
in determining the real meaning of a passage in the OT. is evidently
nil: the authority of the pupils of R. rihela is of no greater weight
in determining the true sense of Gen. xlix. 10, than that of the
pupils of R. Yannai in determining the true sense of Ps. Lsxii. 17.
It is, however, in this doubtful company that 'Shiloh' is first cited
as a name of the Messiah, though we do not learn what the word was
understood to signify ^
III. Other interpretations. The first marg. of RV. 'Till he come
to Shiloh' is grammatically unexceptionable (see 1 S. iv. 12) ; it was
proposed first in modern times by W. G. Teller in 1766, was adopted
by Herder* and Ewald*, and also by Delitzsch, Dillmanu", and Strack,
in their Commentaries. In favour of this view Del. urges the great
philological difficulty alluded to above, as attaching to the popular
explanation of the name ' Shiloh,' and observes that elsewhere in the
OT. the word denotes regularly the place of that name in the tribe
of Epliraim (1 S. i. — iv., &c.) : then, looking at the history, he supposes
the reference to be to the assembling of Israel at Shiloh, described in
Jos. xviii. 1 [P], 8 — 10 [J], when, the period of wandering and conflict
being now over, Judah, it may be supposed, lost the pre-eminence, or
tribe-leadership held by it before (Nu. x. 14 [P]; cf Jud. i. 2, xx. 18):
the obedience of the peoples was realized primarily in the victories of
David (2 S. viii. ; Ps. xviii. 43), while at the same time it would
include that ideal relation of Israel to the heathen, of which the
prophets speak more distinctly. Upon this view, as no royalty
attached to Judah at this early time, '^nK' in v. 10* will, of course,
^ A teacher of the 3rd century a.d. (Bacher, Die Agada der Bab. Amoraer
p. 35).
' It is rendered above * his son,' as this was the explanation current formerly
(p. 412) among the Jews, except by those who read the word n?K' ' whose.' By
another Eabbinical artifice the word was divided into two (1/ ^K'), » Until ^t/(s shall
come to him ' ! See further on the history of the exegesis of the passage, esp. in
the hands of the mediaeval Jews, the writer's study in the Journal of Philology, vol.
XIV. (1885), pp. 4—22.
* Vom Geist der Ebr. Poesie, ii. 6.
* Hist. II. 288 f.
* Provisionally ; for Dillm. thinks that a really satisfactory explanation is not
to be found.
414 EXCURSUS II
denote not a sceptre, but a staff, the symbol of military power, and
must be rendered accordingly (see p, 385).
This view is set forth in a specially attractive form by Herder.
We see Judah, the honoured of his brethren, victorious after battle,
marching in triumphal progress to the national sanctuary (1 S. i. — iv.),
and there laying down the emblem of authority in order to enjoy the
fruits of peace, while the nations round bow submissive to his sway.
It is, however, very doubtful whether it can be sustained: and in
spite of the names that can be quoted for it, it has not been viewed
with favour by recent scholars. Thus it is historically doubtful
whether Judah really enjoyed that early pre-eminence in a united
Israel, which this interpretation postulates for it^ : Judah had no
particular connexion with Shiloh (which was in the tribe of Ephraim) ;
and it seems natural to think of ^7^' in v. 10 as suggesting sovereignty,
rather than merely tribal or military pre-eminence*.
On the whole, in view of the difficulties and uncertainty attaching
to every proposed reading and interpretation of the clause it must
be owned that, — as in the case of other passages which occur from
time to time in the poetical and prophetical books of the OT., — it
is impossible to say with confidence what its real meaning is. The
present writer considered formerly that, — apart from the rend. Till he
come to Shiloh, — the only rendering consistent with strict grammar
was, — with naturally n?^ for i?'?', — Until that which is his shall come.
This, however, yields a somewhat poor sense; and it is perhaps over-
strict to rule out of court the other ancient rendering. Until he shall
come whose (it is)^ The element of uncertainty occasioned by the
use of ^! (see above) of course stiU remains. If, however, this be
the true rendering of the passage, as it will then presuppose an
allusion to an ideal figure, having a right to the 'sceptre' of Judah,
which is extremely unlikely to have been formed before such an
emblem of royalty was known in Judah, it will be later in date than
the time of David's accession, if not later than the age of Isaiah.
As was pointed out on p. 386, v. \\ connects very naturally with
w. 8 — 9, so that v. 10 might quite possibly be a later addition to the
original Blessing, added at a time when the Messianic hope in Israel
had become more distinct.
The verse is undoubtedly 'Messianic' in the broader sense of the
word, i.e. it anticipates an ideal future for Judah, as the prophets
often do for either Israel or Judah, without reference to a personal
Messiah (see e.g. Hos. xiv.. Is. ii. 2 — 4, iv. 2—6, Ix.): whether it is
'Messianic' in the narrower sense of the word, depends upon the
question whether or not a personal ideal rider is referred to in clause c.
The principal early promises of ideal future blessings to the patriarchs
1 Comp. p. 385 ; Ottley, Hist, of the Hebreicx, p. 137.
2 See further Schultz, OT. Theol. ii. 338 — 40. For other suggestions and con-
jectures respecting the clause, see DB. 8. v. Shiloh.
3 So Soliultz, {. c. p. 341 ; and Gunkel.
ON GENESIS XLIX. 10 415
or Israel, fall into a consistent series, with a gradually narrowing
scope : given in Gen. xii. 2 f. to Abraham, they are limited in xxvi.
2 — 5, 24 to Isaac, in xxv. 23, xxvii. 27 — 29 to Jacob; in 2 S. vii.
(Nathan's prophecy), xxiii. 5 (David's 'Last Words'), Am. ix. 11 — 15',
they are attached to the Davidic djoiasty in general; in Hos. iii. 5,
and esp. in Is. ix. 6 f., xi. 1 — 10, xvi. 5, they centre round a particular
ideal ruler of David's line. Gen. xlix. 10, if it contain no reference
to a personal ideal ruler, will fall between Gen. xxvii. 27 — 29 and
2 S. vii. ; for Judah is a narrower unity than ' Jacob,' but a broader
one than the d)masty founded by David: if, on the contrary, it does
contain such a reference, it will fall certainly after 2 S. vii., if not after
Hos. iii. 5 and Is. ix. 6 f., xi. 1 — 10, xvi. 5, as well.
* Notice here {v. 12), as also in Ps. xviii. 43, 44. the same anticipation of rnle
over (surrounding) nations, wiiich is found also in Gen. xxvii. 29, and in the last
clause of Gen. xlix. 10.
INDEX.
Abel-mizraim 396 f.
Abimael 130, 403 n.
Abraham and Abram (the names) xlix,
185; date of Abraham xxix
Accad 121; 'Accadian' 133
Admah and Zeboiim 127
'all flesh' 87
'Almighty' (Shaddai) 185, 404—6
altars in pre-Mosaio times xviii, xix f.,
xxiv, 89, 147
'Amalek 161, 315
Amorites 125 f. ; in Babylonia xlviii,
142 n. ; * Amorite ' in E 125 f.
Amurri, land of 173
angel of Jehovah 184
anachronisms xv, 207, 250, 304, 338, 380
anthropomorphisms in Genesis xx f.
(cf. xxv), 35 f.
' appease,' to 293
Arab, Arabia 244 n.
'Arabah 168
Aram ( = Syria) 129, 223
Ararat 93
Archaeology and the narratives of
Genesis xlviii— liii, 167 f., 172 f., 229,
230, 374 f., XX, XXXI— XXXVIII
Archaisms explained —
again ( = back) 232
bakemeats 338
brass 70
comfort 192
commune 197
cunning 247
dreadful 265
duke 315
entreat 150
excellent, excellency 382
favour^ well favoured, ill favoured
grieve 391 [271
gristed 281
intreated, to be 245
journey 151
lien 251
lightly 251
meat 16
meet 41 n.
ravin 394
replenish 16
strakes, ringstraked 278
strange, stranger 187, 282, 308
stricken 194
tell 175
tempt 217 n.
Arioch 156. \XXI
Arpachshad 128
Asher lii, 275, 389 t
Ashkenaz 116
Asshur 121, 128, 243
Asshur, city of 40
Atra-hasis 105 n.
Babel 120, 136; tower of 132 £f.
Babylon, antediluvian kings of 80 ;
first dynasty of XXIX, 120, 156 ?i. 1
Babylonia, antiquity of civilization in
xxxi — xxxiii
Babylonian elements in Genesis 27 &.,
52 f., 106, cf. 80 f.
Babylonian story of Creation 27 ff. ;
of the Flood 103 ff., cf. XXV
bdeihum 39
Bedawin 182
Beer-lahai-roi 183
Beer-sheba 212, 215, 216, 254
♦before' (or 'in front of) = East of
154, 182, 227, 300, of. 164
Benjamin 18, 348 ff., 367, 393 f.
Berossus 27 with n. 2, 28 n., 29 n.,
80 n., 80, 103
Bethel 147 f., 264 ff.
Bethlehem 311
betrothal 237
bitumen 87, 135, 162 f., 202 f., 395 n.
* bless oneself,' to 220 f.
Bronze age, the xli, 68
•broad place' 198
• brother ' = relation 152, 163, 237, 270,
283, 287, 399
'butter' (i.e. leben) 193
Buz 223
Cain 62, 63 ff., 71, 72; lessons of the
story of 68
Cainites 62, 68—71, 72 f., 80
Calah 121 f.
Canaan, Canaanites 108—112, 118, 127,
147 ; ' Canaanite ' in J 126, 147
Caphtor 124
Cassites (Kasshu, Kasshites) 59, 120
cattle in Egypt 371
Chaldees (Heb. Kasdim) 141
Chedorla'omer XXXIH, 157, 171—3
cherubim 60 f.
Chesed 223
chronology, Babylonian XXVII — XXXI,
Egyptian XVII— XIX
chronology of Genesis xxvff., xxx t., 75,
79 f., 138, 149, 212, 262, 365 w., 368
INDEX
417
circumcision 189 ff.
civilization, beginnings of 62 ff., 68 ft.;
Phoenician legends of 73 f,
'coat of many colours' 322
' consume,' to 196
' corn and wine (tirosh) ' 258
cosmogony of Genesis 19 ff., XXI — IV;
source of 26 ff . ; teaching of 5, 32 ff.,
54 ff. ; Babylonian cosmogony 27 ff. ;
Phoenician cosmogony 5, 30 n.
covenant 176, 178
creation 3; two accounts of in Genesis
2 ff., 35 ff.
creation-tablets, Babylonian 27 ff.
'creature' (Heb. soul) 12, 13
'creeping thing' 13
Cush 58, 69, 120
customs, institutions, &c., origin of,
explained xvii f., xx, Iviii, 1, 36, 43,
49, 50, 62, 108
Dan 274, 388 f.; the place 163
Dana, Prof. 24, XXIII
'days' of Gen. i., xxviiin. 20, 21 f., 26
Dead Sea, the 159 ; geology of 168 ff.
Dedan 119, 240
'deep,' the 4, 392; the 'great deep' 90
dew in Palestine 258
Dillmann's view of the patriarchs XX
Dinah 276, 302 ff., 807, 366
Dothan 323
'dowry' 304
dreams xxi, 206; in Egypt 342
Dumah 242
duplicate narratives iii, iv, 85 ff., 191,
254 f., 309, 310
•E,' term explained xi, xii; contents
and literary character of xii — xv ;
probable date of xvi; other charac-
teristics of xix— xxi, 206, 321, 332 f.
• east, children of the ' 268
'east wind' (sirocco), the 340
' eat,' to, in sacrificial sense 289
'Eber 127, 138 f.
'Eden 38
'Eder, tower of 311
Edom, name of 246, 248, country 260,
people 261, 312 ff., kings 317 f.
Egypt, antiquity of civilization in
xxxiii f. ; length of Israel's sojourn
in xxviii — xxx, 177
Egyptian words in Genesis li n.
'El 402 f.
'El 'Ely on (' God Most High ') 165
'El Shaddai viii, xxiii, 185, 404 ff.
'Elam 128
EUshah 116
'Elohim xxiii, 14, 402: see God
Elohist iv
embalming in Egvpt 395
'En-gedi 161 f., 171, 172
•En-Mishpat 161
Enoch 77, 78 f.
book of 76 n., 78 f. , 82
•Ephah (tribe) 240
Ephraim and Manasseh, birth of 346;
adopted by Jacob 375 f. ; blessing of
317 f., 390 f.
Ephrath 311
Erech xxxii, 52, 103, 120 f.
Eriaku 156, XXXI
Eridu 52
'Esau 246, 249; wives of 313
etymologies of OT. 63, 71, 77, 272 n.
Euj^hrates 179
'evil inclination or propensity' (Jewish
theological term) 95
evolution 55
Exodus, probable date of xxix
' face,' to ' see the face of ' 298
faith, Abraham's 176
Fall of man 44 ff., 56, 57; no Bab.
version of, at present known 53 n. 1
(add King, Tablets of Creation, p. 221)
famines in Egypt 346 f.
' father ' = originator 69 ; = founder or
eponymous ancestor 300 ; = chief
minister 362
•father's kin,' to be cut off from one's
X, 187, 188 ; to be gathered to x, 241
firmament 6 f., 29
Flood, historical character of the 99 ff.
folklore, Hebrew 62, 70, 73, 82 f., 108,
134, 203, cf. 246, 331
'folly' 303 f.
'form,' to 37
furnace (-|12n) 178; (15^33) 202
' furniture,' camel's 285
Gad 274 f. (name of a Semitic deity), 389
garden of Eden 38—40, 51
gate (in an Eastern city) 197
genealogies in Genesis v — vi, 69, 75,
112—114, 137 f., 222 f., 243 f., 312 ff.,
326 f., 399
'generations' (D'n'Pin) ii, viii, 19;
(nnn) ix, 87, 186
Genesis, contents of iff.; composite
structure of iii ff., xvi f.; probable
date of XV f. ; historical value of
xxxiff., xlii (chs. i. — xi.), xliiiff. (chs.
xii. — 1.); religious value of Ix ff.,
Ixx ff,, cf. 1, 11, 31 ff., 54 ff., 107,
and passim; Genesis and modem
science xxxvii ff., xlii, Ixi — iii, 6, 8,
11, 17, 19 ff., 991., 103n.,XXII— IV
Gerar 206, 251
QMr, the 168
27
418
INDEX
Gilead 283, 287, 290, 399
Gilgamesh 102, 123
glacial period xxxviii f.
' glory' = spirit (|1 ' soul ') 383
God, names of in Genesis 402 ff. ; doc-
trine of xxi f., xxiv f., Ixx f., 5, 11,
31 — 33 &c. ; the word used of divine
beings 45, 50, 82 n. ; Elohim con-
strued with a plur. pronoun 14, or
verb 208, 289, 402 ; use of word in
Genesis iv, vii, xi f., 2 &c. ; expres-
sions such as ' prince of God,' ' terror
of God' 225, 274, 309
Goiim 158
Gomer 114
good and evil, knowledge of 41, 46
Goshen 332 n., 369
granaries in Egypt 343
' guard, captain of the ' 326
Hadad (Syrian God) 318
Hagar 180
Ham 108—111, 113, 117
Hamath 126
Hammurabi XXXVI, 39, 156, 330 n.
Haian 141 f., 233, 269
Hasisadra (Hasis-atra) 105 n., 107 n.
Havilah 39, '119, 131, 243
Hazazou-tamar 161, 162
lieaven and earth, Heb. idea of 8, 9, 11
'Hebrew,' name 127, 138 f., 335
Hebron 155 ; Hittites in 228-30
'helpmeet' (incorrect expression) 41 n.
Heroopolis 369
Heth 124, 225, 263; «^c Hittites
Hittites 124 f., 179, 225, 228—30, 313
Hivites 126
Horites 160, 312, 313, 316 f.
horned snake 389
human sacrifices 221
hydromancy 358
EykBos 347
ideal representations in Genesis xxiii,
xxiv, liii fE., Ixvii— Ixx, 17, 143, 307
•image of God' 14 f., 32 f., 76, 97
individual, rights of the 207, 222
inspiration Ixiv ff., 31, 59 n.
Isaac, name played on or explained
118, 194, 210; sacrifice of 221 f.
Ishmael, name played on or explained
182, 188, 212; character of 182; Jew-
ish Haggadahs respecting 210 n.
Ishmaelites 182 n. 1, 213, 243 f. ; Ish-
maelite tribes 241 — 3
•isles' 117
Israel 295, 310, 311, 353; meaning of
name 295; preferred for 'Jacob' by
J 311, 353
Issachar 275 f., 387 f.
liaraeans 242
•J,' term explained xi, xii; contents
and literary character of xii — xv;
probable date of xvi; other charac-
teristics of xvii — xxii
Jabbok 283, 294
Jacob, name explained or played on
246, 259; character 246 f., 249, 255,
296 f. ; migration into Egypt 364 f .,
368 ff. ; list of descendants 365 ff. ;
blessing 379 ff. ; burial 396 f. ; early
occurrence of name in Palestine li f.
Japheth 108, 110 f., 113, 114
Javan (Yavan), i.e. the Greeks, 115
Jebel Usdum (range of salt-cliffs in
SW. corner of Dead Sea) 159, 169,
201
Jehovah (Yahweh), meaning of name
407 ff. ; use of name in Genesis vii,
xiii; question of early history of
name xviii n. 4, xlix, XIX f.
'Jehovah God,' use of expression 37
Jehovah-jireh 219 f.
Jerahmeel (clan in Judah) 327
Jordan-valley, the 153, 168 f.
Joseph 276, 319—21, 321 ff., 332 ff.;
probable date of xxx, 347; character
of 320 f., 400 f.; historical character
of xlvi f., cf. lix f. ; early possible oc-
currence of name in Pal. lii, XX
Jubilees, Book of 76 n., 82, 211, 379 n.
Judah 273, 321, 326 ff., 332, 353, 359,
384—7; clans of 326 f., 331 f.
justice, ancient ideas of 207, 307;
Divine justice 196
Kadesh 161
Kedar 242
Kenites 72, 179
Kenizzites 179, 315
Keturah, tribes descended from 239 f.
Kikkdr of Jordan, the 152 f.
'kind' (P») viii, 9
Kiriath-arba' x, 224
' knees, to bear upon the ' 274, 399
' know,' to ( = to take knowledge of) 195
Laban 235, 269 ff., 290
land-tenure in Egypt 374 f.
languages, origin of different xxxiv f,,
133 f. ; origin of, according to the
Hebrews 132, 134 ff.
' latter days, ' the 381
lentils 248
Levi 273, 302—8; tribe of 383 f.
levirate-marriage 328
• life,' two Heb. words for 97
light, Heb. idea of 6
•Uvtng' water 252
INDEX
419\
longevity of patriarchs xxvi, xxx, 75,
138
'Lord Jehovah,' use of expresBion 175
Lot, character of 205; Lot's wife 201
•lowland,' the 327
Ludkn 123
Luz 266
Machir (Manassite clan) 399
Machpelah xi, 226, 228
magicians of Egypt 340
Magog 115
Mahanaim 291, 301 f.
Mamre 154
Man, pre-eminence of in Gen. 15, 38,
42; beginnings of 54; before the
Fall 56 f.; antiquity of xxxi — xlii,
63, 68, 134
Manasseh 346, 375 ff., 390 f.; clans of
399
mandrakes 275
marriage 43
•measures' 193
Melchizedek 164, 167 f.
Merenptah, mention of Israel by xlviii
Mesopotamia 232
Messianic outlooks 48, 144, 145, 386,
410 f., 414 f.
Midian 240
Mizpah 288, 301 f.
Mizraim (Egypt) 117
Moab and Ammon 203 — 5
mohar (price of wife) 271, 304
Moriah, land of 217
'Most High' 165
mourning-customs in East 224 f., 396
Nahoridae 222 f.
• name of JehovaJi,' to call with (upon)
xiii, 71
names explained or played on xviii n.,
xxiu n. ; 110, 251, 259, 378 f., 384,
388, 389, 391
Naphtali 274, 390
nature in OT. 19
Nebaioth 242
Negeb, the 148
neolithic man xl f.
Nephilim, the 84
NUe (Heb. Y^Or) 339
Nimrod 120, 122 f.
Nineveh 121
Nod, the land of 67
nose-ring 236
oak (as sacred tree) 147
' offering,' ' present ' {minhdh) 64, 293
On 345
Ophir XXVI, 131
literary character of iv — vii; parts
of the Hexateuoh belonging to iv, v;
words and phrases used by vii — xi ;
probable date of xvi; other charac-
teristics of xxii — XXV, 2, 86, 186 &c.
Paddan-aram xi, 244 f.
palaeolithic man xxxix f.
Paradise 38, 51 (in NT.), 61; theories
of the site of 57 ff.
Pathros 124
patriarchs, antediluvian 68 ff., 73, 74 ff.,
80 f., 137—40
patriarchs, post-diluvian, historical cha-
racter of xUii ff., 143
patriarchal genealogies 68 ff., 74 ff.,
138 ff.
patriarchal period in J 147
Peleg 130
Peniel, Penuel 296, 301 f.
•people,' in the phrases •to be cut off
from,' and ' be gathered to,' one's
people 188: see father's kin
Perez 327, 331 f.
Perizzites, 152
Pharaoh, meaning of name 150
Philistines 124, 250
pillar (mazzehah) 266, 267 f., 310
pits 323 f.
•plague' 151
•plain' (Kikkdr) of Jordan 152 f . ; the
cities of the Kikkdr, site of 170 f. ;
destruction of 202 f.
Potiphar, name explained 326
Poti-phera" b^C, ^*5
pre-Mosaic age in o s.7m. 89; in E
xix; in P xxiv, 89
priestly element in Genesis iv
promises in Genesis 144, 147, 186, 386,
414 f.
prophetical teaching of Genesis xvii,
xxi f., 64, 111
Protevangelium, the 48, 57
proverb, or proverbial saying, origin
of, explained 120, 219
Eaces of mankind, remote origin of
XXXV, xxxvi — xxxvii, 114; origin of,
according to the Hebrews 112 ff.
Eachel's grave 311
rainbow, the 98, 99, 106 n.
Barneses, the land of 371
Ramses II, xxix, 347, 397 n.
Eehoboth 253 ; Eehoboth-'Ir 121
Eephaim 160
rest, to (of God) 18
Eeuben 273, 321, 332, 352, 381 f.
rings as amulets 309
'River,' the 283
' river of Egypt,' the 178
P, term explained iv; contents and Sabaeans 119, 130 f.
420
INDEX
sabbath 18 f., 34 f., cf. XXV
sacred scribes (in Egypt) 340
sacred sites in Pal. xix f. , 147, 155, 216,
253, 264, 266, 800
sacrifice, first mention of 64
' saith Jehovah ' 220
Salem 164
Salt Sea, the 159
'salvation' 389
Sargon of Accad xxxii, 173 n.
science of the Bible 33, XXni— IV
'sea' = the West 148
sea-monsters 12
Seba 119
'see God,' to 296; cf. 183 n.
'seeds' (Gal. iii. 16) 154
Se'ir 246, 312, 314, 316
serpent, the 44 f., 47, 48
Serug 139
' set feasts' 10
Sethites 71, 74 ft., 80
Shalem (near Shecbem) 300
Sheba 119, 130 f., 240
Shechem (place) 146, 300, 302, 307 ff.,
378 f.; (person) 300, 302 f., 306—8
shekel, value of 227
Shem 108, 110 f., 113, 127
Sheol 326
Shephelah, the 327
shepherds in Egypt 370
'Shiloh' (Gen. xlix. 10) 385 f., 410 ff.
Shin'ar 121
Shur 181 f., 243
Siddim, vale of 159. ^^ j, 170 f.
Simeon 273, 302—8, 354 n., 383 f.
S«dom and Gomorrah 127, 170 f.,
194 ff., 202 f.
'sojourner' 177, 186, 199, 225; cf. 149
' sojournings,' land of one's 186; cf. 371
' son ' = grandson or descendant 269, 284
' Song of the Sword,' the 70 f.
'sons of God' 82 f.
'soul' in Heb., use of and ideas asso-
ciated with 12 (in animals), 38, 42,
96 (in the blood), 149 (as seat of
feeling and emotion), 360 ; = ' person '
ix (No. 19), X (No. 24 a), 146
'South,' the 148
spirit of God, the 4, 83 f., 343
springs, sacred 161
Stone-age, the xxxix ff., 68
stone-worship 267
' stranger ' r= sojourner or temporary re-
sident pJl) 177, 225 ; = foreigner
(13r|3 or n33) 187, 282, 308
Succoth 299, 30i"f.
' Samerian ' xxxiv, 133
'swarm,' to viii, 11 f., 12 n., 94, 97;
'swarming thing' viii, 12
• sweet savour ' 95
'Syria' 129
Tarshish 116
•taskwork' (DO) 388
Tel el-Amarna letters xxix, 31, 125,
164, 167 f., 397
T^ma 242
Teman 315
temptation, operation and power of
44 ff., 64—8
teraphim 283
terebinth 146, 147
'that be far from thee' 196
Tiamat 2, 28
Tid'al 158
Timnah 329
tirosh 258
tithe 166, 267
trees, sacred or oracular 146 t
tribes or nations represented as indi-
viduals liv ff,, 110—112, 112 ff.,
138—140, 223—4, 239 f., 241—3,
316 (Se'ir), 399; cf. 72, 307 f., 331 f.
'trouble,' to (IDJ?) 306
Tubal 115
Tubal-cain 70
Two Brothers, Tale of the 336
unleavened cakes 198
Ur 140, 141, 142
Uru-salim (Jerusalem) 164, 167
Ussher, chronology of xxvii, xxyiii n.,
142 n., 262
'Uz 129, 223, 317
wddy 252
' walk,' to, with God 77; before God 185
waters above the firmament, the 7
under the earth, the 8, 52 n.
'wax old,' to 194
weighing money 227, 355
'without form' (-inh) 3 f.
Xisuthros 77, 103, 105 n.
Yahweh 407: see Jehovah
Zaphenath-pa'neah 344
Zebulun 276, 387"
Zerah 331 f.
Zidon 124
'zikkurat 137
Zion 311, with n.
Zo'ar 153, 170, 200, 201
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